Malcolm in the Middle
Your perspective of the family changes as you progress through the seasons. What at first I thought was acceptable in the early seasons felt kind of childish as the brothers grew up. Now knowing their current state of affairs in the end makes it harder to review individual episodes in the past. The core of the first two seasons makes up most of the chaos. The parents are just as disorganized as the children. They have no shame in smoking, being completely nude in front of their whole family, and creating shortcuts to simple tasks. There were also a lot of episodes with a bunch of fan service and some form of vulgarity (when those things were still cool). I found the episodes structured very well between the kids going to school, Francis at military school, Lois at the market, and Hal at his job. I would say Lois vs Evil is a nice episode that sums up all of the points I listed above.
Although they toned down some, starting from the third season, you can tell they were still trying to salvage the show. Half of the show made me want to tear my eyes out as Francis Wilkerson went from a military school to working in Alaska. In Hal's Birthday he suddenly shows up with a wife. They had a running joke with a hamster inside a ball that would occasionally appear in the background of certain episodes. They do a couple of episodes with their grandma, which I ultimately can't stand, without a valid explanation what happened to their grandfather. In fact, I noticed a lot of characters just pop in-and-out whenever they feel like it. I think I counted 4 episodes where Cynthia Sanders actually makes an appearance (the last being in 2nd episode in season 4). Meanwhile Malcolm's teacher Caroline Miller gets replaced with Mr. Herkabe. His aggressive nature tore apart any enjoyment I had in watching Malcolm evolve in the gifted class.
Seasons 4 to 7 were probably the hardest to watch. I'm not saying that there weren't good episodes. It's just that they had some cringe-worthy revelations. Francis working at the ranch was a nice change of pace in seasons 4 & 5 but he barely gets any sort of mention in seasons 6 & 7. Without his story told, the episodes become full-fledged family affairs. In the 9th episode of season 4, Lois finds out that she is pregnant. Though this allows the writers to include baby jokes, the dynamic gets stretched a little too thin between all the characters. Things only get worse when they try to create shocking reveals in the 5th season like Abe and Kitty divorcing (e3), Malcolm gets drunk (e4), Lois has been smoking this whole time (e6), Malcolm gets his tongue pierced (e11), Dewey gets put in a slow class (e18). Season 7 has a couple bad episodes too like Malcolm has sex (e1), and Dewey smokes (e3). The last episode felt more like an epilogue where everybody gets a proper farewell as the "chaotic family" dynamic is forever changed.
Malcolm in the Middle was a show you were not supposed to binge watch. The conclusion of every episode generally left me bewildered as there was no proper resolution or follow-up in the next episode. Most of the time they toyed with people's expectations (I never did figure out what Hal's painting looked like in Hal Quits). Sometimes the mini 20-second introduction was better than the whole episode. Just watch Clip Show #1/Clip Show #2 if you want the highlights. A decent show with 4th wall narration and no laugh track. Yet I find it hard to define the experience worthwhile just for those few moments of intrigue and laughter.
Now for the Memorable Mentions:
Season 1: Red Dress (Interrogation of Burnt Dress), Lois vs Evil (Lois faces the boss)
Season 2: Tutoring Reese (Cheating Dilemma), Traffic Ticket (Lois is right), Reese Cooks (hobby)
Season 3: Lois Makeover (Lois uses makeup), Reese Drives (Driving Lessons)
Season 4: Humilithon (Dewey's hobby), Boys at Ranch (Komodo 3000)
Season 5: Malcolm Films Reese (Malcolm's apology), Reese's Apartment (Reese's Methods), Experiment (Retracing Reese Steps)
2-18-2019