Stuck on Installing update 40 out of 167

I'm afraid I'm breaking the bending the rules a bit, but frustration pushed me.
I am trying to do a clean install of Windows 7 on a brand new machine.
The first time updates locked up on me after trying to download ALL language packs (by mistake).
Since I had nothing to lose I just did a wipe and reinstalled again on the formatted HDD. This time I ran into the problem of Windows Updates alternating between never detecting the updates or installing them. I tried to power down whenever things got stuck because the resource usage kept increasing, filling up the 8gb of ram entirely. Trying to fix things I attempted to delete the updates folder, following instructions elsewhere on the internet. This did not help and lead to even more problems. Finally I attempted a system restore, but even that failed.
So another wipe had to happen. I'm on my third install. I don't want to mess up anymore. I tried to let Windows do everything on its own, enabling automatic updates. I got to install SP1 with no issues. But then this new update batch has 160+ entries. They all seemed to have been downloaded just fine.
But I have been stuck in update 40 (Security Update for Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5, 4.5.1 and 4.5.2) for hours and I don't know what to do. I don't want to force a shutdown or to stop installation because that's what got me all the problems before, and I'd wish to avoid a fourh installation.

What would be the recommended course of action in this case? Should I just let it run even longer? If not, how should I stop it and what do I do then?

As I said before I'm aware my request doesn't conform to the guidelines, but that's because I don't have an error message yet and I don't believe running SURT while Updates is installing would do me any good.

EDIT:
7 hours later, it has now gotten to 61/167... and it's now stuck there.
Reviewing the Update History also shows that two updates failed to install: KB2898864 and KB2943357.
I'm still unsure about how should I proceed.