"Santa Claws" <santa.claws@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:btacmv8v8pcd2lrsng0vo0hcrci526di5h@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> I didn't figure Reese too out of character; I kind of figured Reese
> was 'helping' Stevie purely so he could spy on him making out with
> Chandra. Nothing altruistic or nice, just feeding his own voyeuristic
> tendancies. After all, he had spied on Malcolm making out before. And
> he wasn't really in the bath, that was just his cover for hiding in
> the bathroom so he could look through the keyhole into the bedroom.
I have to say I didn't quite consider that scenario at all - I simply
thought Reese was in it for his own indulgence - but now that you say it
that way it makes sense. Stevie probably doesn't get his fair share of
female companion****p in school being in the Krelboynes and all, so Reese
may
have thought he would get his jollies by watching to see what Stevie would
(know what to) do in a romantic setting. And since it was Stevie who got
busted and not Reese, that probably made it even funnier for him.
> It was clear the girls weren't going to make out with him, this was
> his way of at least getting something out of the evening. Although I
> guess that could be considered out of character is as far as Reese
> having the intellect to plan a scheme like that.
Remember though that kids like Reese are "dumb, but not so dumb". Sure
they
can't reason where it make sense to, yet that void affords them to develop
their own logic of deviance that they almost perfect to an art.
> I felt much of the meanness to Dewey in this episode wasn't personal
> or vindictive. Dewey wasn't a target, he was just in the way. Reese
> didn't force him outside out of malice, Reese was only interested in
> watching Chandra making out with Stevie, he couldn't do that with
> Dewey around.
Or is _all_ meanness to Dewey (from Reese, anyway) personal and
vindictive?
> >> For me, the _worst_ MITM episode to date was "Health Scare", season
3.
>
> To me it is a toss up between that and 'Contamination'. And pretty
> much for the same reason I think you are saying. Like Poker #2, the
> one thing these episodes lacked was balance.
I think you are thinking of "Evacuation".
> While individual plot lines and isolated moments of these episodes
> work fine, the overall payback doesn't match up by the end of the
> show. In 'Health Scare' and 'Contamination' the problem was Lois.
She seems to be the problem in a lot of it (I believe more often than not
that is just who her character is) but yes, these were definitely
standouts
of her insensitiveness and selfish empowerment.
> Sure, she is a monster, but she does have a heart underneath that. In
> these episodes she is ****trayed as just vindictive. I guess 'Health
> Scare' more so as it implies she cares about Hal to the total
> detriment of the kids. No balance, no caring under the surface even if
> it is in her own twisted over-protective kind of way.
I wouldn't be that sure about the heart underneath. While these show her
at
her worst, you have to consider the character in general. She answers the
door half ****d, for crying out loud. She doesn't really seem to be
scrupled enough to not put someone else (except maybe Hal, who she also
has
whipped into fear of her a lot) above herself.
> They kind of ****tray her that way in the bowling segments of
> 'Bowling'. But in that they ****tray her slightly more human side in
> the segments of her with Dewey, and even in the bowling story, Malcolm
> gets humiliated, but the balance there is that he gets the girl, which
> he doesn't in the Hal version.
I will give you that one. I remember thinking what a nice comedic change
of
pace it was to have Lois be the advocate for Malcolm's happiness. When
she
told him to "turn in his shoes" she had to have known he would get with
the
girl (if she really does know anything like she is supposed to).
Though as you bring up the Dewey substory there, I might say that one of
the
plays of the show is that, as many families probably do, the parents like
the youngest best. Lois never really seems to take to Malcolm or Reese
the
way she has Dewey, even though Dewey is now the same age that M&R
supposedly
are/were when the show started. Maybe the baby will change that dynamic
and
Dewey's in for a wakeup call...
> In 'Health Scare' the kids get nothing,
> except grounded unreasonably as Lois gets more and more paranoid. She
> finds out Hal is okay, there was nothing to worry about, but there is
> no payback for her unreasonable behavior. She even gets last licks,
> winding the kids up over custody.
To me that wasn't merely "parental overprotection" or whatever but just
plain awful and selfish. Saying she was sorry for her actions due to the
cir***stances with Hal would have been just basic human consideration.
But
even after she knew, she kept up the shtick. You really have to be not
only
a bad parent, but a bad person to do that.
I guess we're left to assume, though, that since they weren't "grounded
for
the rest of their lives", that behind the scenes everything went OK and
Lois
fessed. We're just not supposed to hear her say she is wrong (save the
time
it practically killed her to utter it in "Traffic Ticket").
> And in 'Evacuation' the way she publicly humiliates Malcolm, that
> went just too far for me to find funny, unless there had been some
> kind of major punchline. Sure she gets 'grounded' by the military at
> the end along with all the family except Malcolm, a taste of her own
> medicine, but that just didn't cut it as balance for me. Maybe if
> Malcolm had actually done anything wrong to deserve the wrath she
> poured on him throughout the story I would have dealt better, but all
> this came from him getting back late from the library after doing
> schoolwork.
Any punchline there may have been quickly came and went in the opening,
for
me anyway. He gets grounded for - of all things - doing extra credit
homework. How many parents out there reading this would just *love* to
have
their kids doing extra credit homework??? But, to Lois, that wasn't as
valid as being home to help move a couch *never mind they managed to get
it
there anyway).
So all through the episode, you have Malcolm getting not only grounded but
put in the virtual gallows while not only he but many of the viewers
simply
do not understand why. So if *that* was the running joke, I would
actually
*hope* it would be lost on many.
Since it was schoolwork, I believe that may hold the key to Lois's dislike
of Malcolm. She has a beef with all of her children (save Dewey) based
solely on consequences of their place in the family;. You have Francis
where - well, we hit that one already. You have not-so-smart Reese that
gets into trouble on the count of not being smart, always being blamed,
and
being next to the oldest. Her beef with Malcolm,. I think, comes from the
idea that she may feel threatened by his super intelligence. For whatever
reason, Lois has an incredible ego and she is afraid of a sense of
inferiority to Malcolm. Ergo, she keeps just as tight of a leash on him
(or
maybe tighter) then the troublemakers.
> I have issues with those two stories. Those are the only two shows I
> would hesitate before re-watching. 'Poker #2' I can see is heading
> toward the same precipice, but somehow for me stops short of falling
> over.
"Evacuation" would have been near my bottom 3 had it not been for the
ending.
> 'Reese Drives', 'Traffic Ticket' and 'Cynthia's back' I would not place
> in the bottom twelve. Unfortunately there are only three or four
> episodes I WOULD place in the bottom twelve, so I guess I have a math
> problem there.
"Reese Drives" is in my personal Top 5.
> 'Day Care' in the top 5. It wasn't bad, but in no way did I think it
> better than 80+ other episodes. Okay, the Dewey story in that was
> great. The scene where he is arguing philosophy with the Sunday
> school teacher was inspired (any bets Dewey shows up to have a higher
> IQ than Malcolm in the final ever episode??). But for an out of
> character Reese, this had to be the worst.
So was his singing right at the end. Uffff. :(
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