There is but one rule: hunt or be hunted.

Welcome back.

Back in 2013 house of cards came on the scene as Netflix's first ever self

commissioned original series. Since then the series created by Beau Willimon has

not only grown as a mature, textured piece of television, but also offered a

sturdy foundation for the towering house that Netflix built.

Inspired by the 90s BBC series starring Ian Richardson, and the 1989 book by

Michael Dobbs, House of Cards's appeal is based on its darkly distinctive mood

and world, it's Shakespearean magnitude, its

heightened mirrors of our own world and historical past, and the guilty pleasure

of rooting for its deliciously wicked central couple -- Frank and Claire

Underwood, played by Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright. Let's walk through each of

these elements which make this series so enduringly binge worthy. Beware there

will be a few spoilers coming.

[And the butchery begins.]

House of Cards draws on

the spirit of Shakespearean history and tragedy to imbue its drama with hyper

real grandeur and intrigue. We feel we might be watching a heightened version

of today's politics presented as exaggerated history for a future

audience. The show captures perhaps better than any modern example the

spirit of what Shakespearean audiences must have felt going to see productions

of Richard III. In the historical play the villainous Richard, who Spacey

played at the London Old Vic in 2011, speaks openly to the audience,

using his asides, not to confess but to gloat about his wicked designs.

House of Cards, like it's

BBC predecessor, utilizes the same confessional fourth wall break

[Please slit my wrists with this butter knife.]

The theatrical device could easily

fall flat on camera. But it works thanks to Spacey's

enjoyably devious performance, the over-the-top nature of this extra dirty

world, and the disconnect between Frank says to us, and how he appears to

everyone else.

[I will not run for President. Look they're thinking it's

too good to be true and it is.]

Getting this window into his mind fascinates us

and knowing his secrets gets us on his side until we subtly root for his success

at all costs. We feel in the know, superior to the foolishly honest victims

All of this psychologically works on us the same way Shakespeare played his

audiences. In Othello, Iago is motivated by resentment when a fellow

promotes another over him -- just as Frank's plot against the President is

set off by him feeling robbed of his promised cabinet position. Claire takes a

cue from Iago's tactics of suggestion, as well, when she plants the idea of an

affair in the First Lady's head.

[I just have a thing about women who sleep with

their bosses.]

But the Shakespeare play that most deeply shapes House of Cards

thematically is Macbeth.

The Underwood's channel the

Macbeths disconnect between inner and outer to hide their true selves. As Lady

Macbeth says:

[Look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under it.]

When Frank speaks to Peter

Russo's ghost in church, this recalls how Macbeth is haunted

by the ghost of Banquo the friend he murdered. Most strikingly though is Lady

Macbeth as a model for Claire. At times, like Lady Macbeth, Claire seems the

superior mastermind, the even more ambitious one really pulling the strings.

Claire's convincing lack of need for romance, fidelity, or motherhood reminds

us of Lady Macbeth's famous words

[I'm willing to let your child wither and

die inside you if that's what's required.]

Lady Macbeth

references having given suck, or breastfed, a child but we're told that

the Macbeth's are childless. Their implicit lost child is

echoed in Claire's past abortions. And neither woman expresses regret for a

childless destiny. Yet in both stories the couple's lack of children starts to

haunt them, at least politically. The Macbeth's and their barren crown, and

the Underwoods in their inability to present the shining picture-perfect

family of Frank's Republican opponent, Conway.

[You guessed it, I still hate children.]

The Macbeth's ascent to power leads to a mixed-up

world in which fair is foul, and foul is fair. Yet in the vast majority of

Shakespeare's plays divine order or great chain of being must inevitably be

restored. it remains to be seen if the House of Cards universe believes

in poetic justice, but if Macbeth is any indication the

story doesn't end well. The Macbeth's breakdown from within, as Lady Macbeth

obsessively tries to wash invisible blood from her hands, and Macbeth

reflects that "life is a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury signifying nothing."

The dangerous nihilism of the Macbeth's can only drive human beings insane where

we cannot continue to engage with the world of nothing that means nothing.

Like a mix of Shakespearean history and tragedy, House of Cards also draws

loosely and colorfully from our own historical past and present. In season

4, Underwood and Conway introduce a meta-commentary comparing themselves to

Richard Nixon and John F Kennedy in the 1960 presidential election.

[If you were a Democrat you'd be unstoppable you'd be the new JFK.]

[And if you were a

Republican would you be? Nixon?]

Underwood's comparison to the notorious

Nixon, whom Spacey also played in the 2016 film Elvis and Nixon, is a plausible

parallel. Brought down by his own paranoid plots, crimes, and scandals

Nixon was experienced and ruthless. Kennedy was young, relatable

and charismatic, just as the social media friendly Conway speaks directly to

Americans and gives people hope. In the show, the candidates represent opposite

parties to their historical parallels. Underwood is a Southern Democrat,

long after the age when Democrats held the South. And Conway is a

Republican from New York.

[Oh you're a New York Republican that's an attractive

fiction isn't it?]

[And you're a Democrat from South Carolina that's even bigger fiction.]

[Well there you go.]

This recalls an earlier presidential

race between Harry S. Truman and Thomas Dewey in 1948 -- a pragmatic Democrat

versus a young New York Republican with a lead in the polls. Famously the belief

that Dewey would win was so strong that the Chicago Tribune printed the false

headline: Dewey Defeats Truman, only to be disproven by the final vote. Like Gerald

Ford, Nixon's successor, Underwood becomes president without ever winning an

election, having taken on the offices of both President and Vice President after

a series of cabinet changes and resignations.

[One heartbeat away from the presidency and not a single vote cast in my name. Democracy is so overrated]

Meanwhile, Underwood's wheeling and dealing with Congress is

inspired by JFK successor Lyndon B Johnson, also a southern Democrat and

former Majority Whip. Frank Underwood proudly displays a famous picture of

Lyndon B. Johnson staring down a frightened congressman; both also

introduce ambitious social programs -- LBJ's Great Society and Underwood's

America Works. The outcomes of the programs are opposite: building the

welfare system versus demolishing it. But both Underwood's

and LBJ's hopes to define their legacies are derailed when global conflicts

overshadow their legislative agenda. And of course there's today. Claire's and

Frank's power couple status invites comparisons to the Clintons.

While the Nixonian undertones have been eerily close to new stories about

Trump's claims of tapes and calls for impeachment.

[You know it's at times like

these I wish I was Nixon -- had every nook and cranny bugged.]

Yet again like Shakespeare's histories, the show is willfully rearranging loose historical

or present inspirations to create something larger than life.

[All three of us took bullets. Well I know why we're smiling: we survived.]

House of Cards

captures a tone of outright, over-the-top wickedness, letting us live our juicy

imaginings of how bad Washington might be, while scaring us with the thought, at

times, that it's not purely exaggerated. One of the biggest differences between

Netflix's series and its BBC ancestor lies in the look, feel, and mood. Her Card's

Parliament is brightly lit, visually reflecting a stuffy, staid political

landscape at its civilised surface, hiding all intrigue. But from its first

episode -- directed by David Fincher -- the updated House of Cards is dark. From the

pounding music, to the literal darkness of an overwhelming number of frames,

we're told the Underwood's world is an underworld. This is a window into the shadows.

[Miss Barnes].

[How very Deepthroat of you.]

Adding to the dark is a calculated

distance between the characters and the camera. Rarely do we get a true close-up.

The space around the characters retains their outer personas which they rarely

let draw. No one is allowed inside. Camera movements are flawless tracking shots,

always smooth. Composition is precise. Never do we see a human shake or

messiness to the camera or framing. The production design heightens this feel of

sterility. Frank and Claire -- almost unbelievably free of clutter -- seem to

possess almost no personal items. Their perfectly empty homes visually

underline that they lack a personal life; that they are their work and outer

personas. Meanwhile the pristine surface belies the dirty plotting underneath. The

darkness also leads to a muted color palette and understated desaturation.

Both contribute to our feeling that the environment is clean and attractive

yet not vibrant, human, or alive. We emotionally perceive the light is cold

and it often is, but viewers have noted that many frames involve an interplay of

cold and warm, or blue and yellow, often with blue in the foreground and yellow

in the background. The blue and yellow create a spiritual contrast -- not between

black and white, which in noir might represent good and evil, but between warm

and cold, making us think of the pull between human warmth and icy ambition.

The frame is neatly streamlined, not crowded by diverging colors. Both lights

also stem from realistic light sources -- daylight or interior lights -- so there is

a functional foundation which is then moderately stylized thanks to the

darkness and precision of lighting setups that strategically avoid multiple

shadows. All of these visual cues together with music add up to a

consistent mood and world. The atmosphere seems at once severely removed from our

factual DC, and a close to home actual mirror of the disillusionment we feel about our

actual political landscape. What keeps us engaged most of all is the central

relationship between Frank and Claire. Their ups and downs, evolution and growth,

together and away from one another. Like the Macbeth's the Underwood's are truly

close. Setting aside their duplicity, they almost seem like a relationship other

couples should study to learn how to communicate, work together, and read each

other's minds.

[Are you unsatisfied?]

They're soul mates.

[I love that woman. I love her more than sharks love blood.]

Yet their connection

isn't traditionally romantic or primarily sexual -- they rarely have sex

and they each accept and expect the others' sexual affairs. Yet both place much

higher importance on achieving their shared plans.

[Your wife -- what does that even mean to you?]

[Do not mistake any history you have shared for the slightest

understanding of what our marriage is, or how insignificant you are in comparison.]

in later seasons though we start to doubt the love and respect between the

couple as their marriage falters, and looks, in bleaker moments,

like a purely political arrangement.

[I'm starting to question all of it Francis.

What any of it is worth; what are we doing this for?]

In the White House the

couple now sleeps in separate rooms -- the hall between them signaling their

growing, gaping distance. The virtue Frank demands from others is loyalty.

[Don't surprise me.]

But to Frank it's about others being loyal to him. Apart from those he

deceives, he treats everyone as a servant, even a dog who must obey before all else.

[After a dog's bitten you, you either put it to sleep or you put a muzzle on it.]

This derives from Frank Urquhart's worldview

[Well, everybody can be valuable, that's my philosophy.]

Viewing all other people as pawns and servants leads to

a tyrannical, dictator-like state, and ironically pushes people to consider

turning on him, most notably Claire. Whereas Claire believes -- and we initially

perceive -- if a couple are equal partners it becomes clear that he views her as

another loyal subject merely the most privileged and important one.

[And you will be the First Lady!]

Though it's not clear whether this is result of the

isolating role of the presidency, or has been his feeling all along, Claire's

leaving at the end of Season 3, and her attempt to take political power in her

own name in Season 4, finally proved to Frank that he needs her as much or

more than she needs him.

[I said you were nothing in the Oval without me. It's the other way around.]

Season 4 ends with a very significant

moment, when for the first time they break the fourth wall together.

[That's right. We don't submit to terror. We make the terror.]

This cements the fact that they are now partners in crime

Claire has finally convinced Frank that she is his equal, not his servant.