Current Events > Malcolm in the Middle holds up. Wow

(+) Yeah! (+)

So damned good. Going through it at a leisure pace, maybe an episode or two a day. Half way through season one, it is so fucking good.
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Lois is one of my favorite TV moms
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In what way is Malcolm In the Middle relateable?

FvP posted...

Lois is one of my favorite TV moms

Lois is a god awful parent.

Great show though.
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I watched through it earlier this year, having never seen it growing up

Really funny show. Unexpectedly good and pretty consistent quality.
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there is literally no boring episode, its comedy perfection.
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WafflehouseJK posted...

FvP posted...

Lois is one of my favorite TV moms

Lois is a god awful parent.

Great show though.

Better than Hal. Hal and Craig are the only people I cannot stand in the show.
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FvP posted...

WafflehouseJK posted...

FvP posted...

Lois is one of my favorite TV moms

Lois is a god awful parent.

Great show though.

Better than Hal. Hal and Craig are the only people I cannot stand in the show.

Craig is a legitimately terrible person.

But WTF? Hal's a pretty solid character, and while he has his flaws as a father, no way is he a worse parent than Lois. Most of his mistakes as a parent are reactionary to Lois anyways.
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Lois has her moments. And so does the family in her defense. Her birthday and the family reunion at Hal's in particular.

I do like the billboard graffiti episode, but spoilers and all.
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WafflehouseJK posted...

FvP posted...

WafflehouseJK posted...

FvP posted...

Lois is one of my favorite TV moms

Lois is a god awful parent.

Great show though.

Better than Hal. Hal and Craig are the only people I cannot stand in the show.

Craig is a legitimately terrible person.

But WTF? Hal's a pretty solid character, and while he has his flaws as a father, no way is he a worse parent than Lois. Most of his mistakes as a parent are reactionary to Lois anyways.

His weird parenting moments though. Revealing himself to a girl at the sports store. Helping Dewey get a gf. Lots of his advice.
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gunplagirl posted...

WafflehouseJK posted...

FvP posted...

WafflehouseJK posted...

FvP posted...

Lois is one of my favorite TV moms

Lois is a god awful parent.

Great show though.

Better than Hal. Hal and Craig are the only people I cannot stand in the show.

Craig is a legitimately terrible person.

But WTF? Hal's a pretty solid character, and while he has his flaws as a father, no way is he a worse parent than Lois. Most of his mistakes as a parent are reactionary to Lois anyways.

His weird parenting moments though. Revealing himself to a girl at the sports store. Helping Dewey get a gf. Lots of his advice.

Most of Hal's problems are from dumb mistakes and accidents, but he pretty much always has good intentions. He had a couple really bad moments, but the majority of the time, he was just a good intentioned, goofy dad whose antics could be ignored if necessary.

Unlike Lois, who actively sabotaged her children the majority of the time and treated them like shit even when they didn't do anything remotely deserving of it, and even when they did, often went outside the bounds of discipline. Hell, most of the time her abusive, controlling nature is what drove them to act out, at least for Malcolm and Dewey.

The finale still pisses me the fuck off.
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What's wrong with Lois declining Malcolm's scholarship so that he would be a president that understands what it's like to be poor?

Because it means he doesn't get to choose his own future, it's always been picked for him since what, 5th grade?
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Malcolm will be the best president.
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Watch your spoilers, fellas.

But that is one of my biggest problems with Lois. She's an absolute control freak, and the shit in the finale shows it off to an extreme.She doesn't allow her children any independence or self-control, it has to be exactly how she has their lives planned, or she will actively sabotage their plans and dreams. She does it throughout the entire series, but it's incredibly blatant in the finale.

Fuck Lois.
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Foppe posted...

Malcolm will be the best president.

I liked the ending. Lois is always right. Mother knows best.
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is this on netflix or amazon prime video?
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBvysuewIOs
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FvP posted...

Foppe posted...

Malcolm will be the best president.

I liked the ending. Lois is always right. Mother knows best.

I loved the episode where she was wrong for once where she backed her car into somebody else and got a ticket. Then the rest of the family burned the tape when they found out it actually wasn't her fault after all

Anisoptera posted...

In what way is Malcolm In the Middle relateable?

I found many ways to relate it to my life growing up. Four kids in our family, two working parents struggling to make ends meet, yet still finding a way to do stuff for us by sacrificing on their own stuff.
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WafflehouseJK posted...

Watch your spoilers, fellas.

But that is one of my biggest problems with Lois. She's an absolute control freak, and the shit in the finale shows it off to an extreme.She doesn't allow her children any independence or self-control, it has to be exactly how she has their lives planned, or she will actively sabotage their plans and dreams. She does it throughout the entire series, but it's incredibly blatant in the finale.

Fuck Lois.

What's better

A mother who disciplines her children
A mother who coddles them to their every needs (see parts when she first had Francis)

She doesn't punish them for no reason. Her kids act out and they get punished. When they don't act out they don't get punished. I swear every time there's a MITM topic on here Lois gets bashed left and right. But when I watched this show with my brothers we all hated Hal and liked Lois.
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FvP posted...

WafflehouseJK posted...

Watch your spoilers, fellas.

But that is one of my biggest problems with Lois. She's an absolute control freak, and the shit in the finale shows it off to an extreme.She doesn't allow her children any independence or self-control, it has to be exactly how she has their lives planned, or she will actively sabotage their plans and dreams. She does it throughout the entire series, but it's incredibly blatant in the finale.

Fuck Lois.

What's better

A mother who disciplines her children
A mother who coddles them to their every needs (see parts when she first had Francis)

She doesn't punish them for no reason. Her kids act out and they get punished. When they don't act out they don't get punished. I swear every time there's a MITM topic on here Lois gets bashed left and right. But when I watched this show with my brothers we all hated Hal and liked Lois.

There's a line between discipline and actively sabotaging your children at every turn.

There were several times throughout the show that she would do awful shit to her kids when they hadn't done anything wrong. Francis and Reese did a lot of shit, but all too often Malcolm and Dewy would get a lot of unwarranted shit just because Lois felt like it. The times that Malcolm was legit scummy and got punished is one thing, but Lois was a straight up abusive mother. The majority of the time she drove Malcolm and Dewey into acting out when they wouldn't have in the first place, like that one episode where there was a chemical leak or whatever in the town.

I frankly cant understand hating Hal. A little irresponsible on occasion, but otherwise a decent human being. Same cant be said for Lois.
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The series has an ending? maybe i should finish it some time...
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Parappa09 posted...

is this on netflix or amazon prime video?

It's on Netflix but knowing Netflix it was too popular and they've removed it by now.
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lois is a terrible parent
but like peggy bundy she is hilarious at being a terrible parent
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Every character in that show had mental issues. There was no hero. They were all assholes someway or another.

Lois, no matter how you spill it, was the queen of assholes.
You shouldn't get credit for cleaning up your family's messes when you cause a bunch of them...
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Fishy posted...

Parappa09 posted...

is this on netflix or amazon prime video?

It's on Netflix but knowing Netflix it was too popular and they've removed it by now.

It was on Netflix, they just removed it in October.
The funny thing is that they managed to get their hands on a 16:9 version that was not intended to be shown, which resulted in a couple of screwups, like visible recording equipments


Or in this case, showing that they didnt have enough people to fill the benches at school


Or not using the right actors all the time, because this is clearly not Dewey

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Oh wow I watched most of the reasons over the summer and I didn't notice any of those lol.

But looks like I'm right, why am I even still subbed to Netflix...
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Foppe posted...

Fishy posted...

Parappa09 posted...

is this on netflix or amazon prime video?

It's on Netflix but knowing Netflix it was too popular and they've removed it by now.

It was on Netflix, they just removed it in October.
The funny thing is that they managed to get their hands on a 16:9 version that was not intended to be shown, which resulted in a couple of screwups, like visible recording equipments


Or in this case, showing that they didnt have enough people to fill the benches at school


Or not using the right actors all the time, because this is clearly not Dewey

lmao, that's fantastic.
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WafflehouseJK posted...

gunplagirl posted...

WafflehouseJK posted...

FvP posted...

WafflehouseJK posted...

FvP posted...

Lois is one of my favorite TV moms

Lois is a god awful parent.

Great show though.

Better than Hal. Hal and Craig are the only people I cannot stand in the show.

Craig is a legitimately terrible person.

But WTF? Hal's a pretty solid character, and while he has his flaws as a father, no way is he a worse parent than Lois. Most of his mistakes as a parent are reactionary to Lois anyways.

His weird parenting moments though. Revealing himself to a girl at the sports store. Helping Dewey get a gf. Lots of his advice.

Most of Hal's problems are from dumb mistakes and accidents, but he pretty much always has good intentions. He had a couple really bad moments, but the majority of the time, he was just a good intentioned, goofy dad whose antics could be ignored if necessary.

Unlike Lois, who actively sabotaged her children the majority of the time and treated them like shit even when they didn't do anything remotely deserving of it, and even when they did, often went outside the bounds of discipline. Hell, most of the time her abusive, controlling nature is what drove them to act out, at least for Malcolm and Dewey.

The finale still pisses me the fuck off.

Same. Malcolm could have been set for life and she fucks him over for the most selfish reason.

"Durrr, you're gonna slave away and then become president so poor people like us will have a better chance".
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You know, thinking about it, Lois and Varys from GoT have a lot in common <_<
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I thought you were going to post a story about Frankie Muniz robbing a bank.
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Yup, just as I told you during my own rewatch a few weeks ago. It's really good. Although after rewatching the episodes to death, I will say that I prefer the earlier seasons much more than the last 3. And it's not because of the new brother.

Also I was surprised to find out that Malcolm's teacher who adores him was only in season 1 for the most part. From season 3 onwards they replaced her with the recurring antagonist of the series, Herkabee. Who they liked so much they seemed to have gotten him to follow Malcolm from middle school to high school as well, weirdly enough. And then he becomes principal of said high school? Dude starts off as a fun antagonist you love to hate but then he just does weird shit in the later seasons like joining the school's gym class to get a grade and maintain his old gpa. It's like... what?

And I could write a whole post on what they did to the Francis character in the later seasons, but another reddit topic lays it out pretty damn well.

Otherwise the show is great and I'm actually contemplating buying the UK dvds just to have the show because lord knows they're not gonna release it on bluray.
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saspa posted...

but another reddit topic lays it out pretty damn well.

link to it?

WafflehouseJK posted...

Foppe posted...

Fishy posted...

Parappa09 posted...

is this on netflix or amazon prime video?

It's on Netflix but knowing Netflix it was too popular and they've removed it by now.

It was on Netflix, they just removed it in October.
The funny thing is that they managed to get their hands on a 16:9 version that was not intended to be shown, which resulted in a couple of screwups, like visible recording equipments


Or in this case, showing that they didnt have enough people to fill the benches at school


Or not using the right actors all the time, because this is clearly not Dewey

lmao, that's fantastic.

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Foppe posted...

Fishy posted...

Parappa09 posted...

is this on netflix or amazon prime video?

It's on Netflix but knowing Netflix it was too popular and they've removed it by now.

It was on Netflix, they just removed it in October.
The funny thing is that they managed to get their hands on a 16:9 version that was not intended to be shown, which resulted in a couple of screwups, like visible recording equipments


Or in this case, showing that they didnt have enough people to fill the benches at school


Or not using the right actors all the time, because this is clearly not Dewey

oh my god that is glorious. I'm now sad that we'll literally never get to see this version ever again. It's unedited xmen origins sans cgi all over again. Just so unfair.
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coolpal23 posted...

link to it?

https://www.reddit.com/r/television/comments/6rt8kv/rewatching_malcolm_in_the_middle_and_the_one/
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saspa posted...

coolpal23 posted...

link to it?

https://www.reddit.com/r/television/comments/6rt8kv/rewatching_malcolm_in_the_middle_and_the_one/

Ah, thank you!
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Also one of my favorite episodes is Lois' Birthday. Not just because it's a hilarious episode in and of itself with an excellent ending (the clown fight) but because it features this absolutely stunning black actress who I've never seen in anything else. Like my god




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saspa posted...

And I could write a whole post on what they did to the Francis character in the later seasons, but another reddit topic lays it out pretty damn well.

He actually took a backseat in the show to either write or produce it, I can't remember.
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saspa posted...

Also one of my favorite episodes is Lois' Birthday. Not just because it's a hilarious episode in and of itself with an excellent ending (the clown fight) but because it features this absolutely stunning black actress who I've never seen in anything else. Like my god

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1078285/?ref_=tt_cl_t8
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Foppe posted...

Fishy posted...

Parappa09 posted...

is this on netflix or amazon prime video?

It's on Netflix but knowing Netflix it was too popular and they've removed it by now.

It was on Netflix, they just removed it in October.
The funny thing is that they managed to get their hands on a 16:9 version that was not intended to be shown, which resulted in a couple of screwups, like visible recording equipments


Or in this case, showing that they didnt have enough people to fill the benches at school


Or not using the right actors all the time, because this is clearly not Dewey

Yeah, there are a ton of mistakes with that version as well, some with audio as well. I don't know why they opted to use that one.

But still, it's a shame that Netflix removed it.
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Crazy some of those interesting shots from the widescreen version
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_Goggalor_ posted...

Same. Malcolm could have been set for life and she fucks him over for the most selfish reason.

"Durrr, you're gonna slave away and then become president so poor people like us will have a better chance".

I would argue that it is the opposite of selfish. I'm sure Malcolm getting a great salary would benefit the rest of the family too. But they were willing to sacrifice comfort in order to benefit all the families in their position.
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except for the finale, I think Lois did the best she could with her demon children
like they were all horrible, and outside of the finale I feel like you can rationalize Lois' actions
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She actively ruined the kids chances at more than a few things and on some occasions grounded them for things they might have done. She was the main reason they did that "us vs mom" thing. Because she really did go off way more than necessary a lot of the time.
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gunplagirl posted...

She actively ruined the kids chances at more than a few things and on some occasions grounded them for things they might have done. She was the main reason they did that "us vs mom" thing. Because she really did go off way more than necessary a lot of the time.

Oh yeah, she says in season one that her whole parenting scheme is to stay one step ahead of them and crush their POTENTIAL bad behavior before it happens.

I would say that Lois isn't always a good parent, but she always was trying to make her kids be good PEOPLE, regardless of the fact she would often do things that were kinda shitty.
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Remember when Malcolm worked on the supermarket and Lois asked him to have her back while backstabbing him at every oportunity she could?
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LordFarquad1312 posted...

Remember when Malcolm worked on the supermarket and Lois asked him to have her back while backstabbing him at every oportunity she could?

Or the fact she knows how awful Craig is yet took Craig's side when she forced Francis to spend spring break working at the lucky mart. "Oh, everyone has an incompetent boss and they're awful and you know better than them."

Meanwhile she had been in so many crappy situations even the preceding season due to Craig and the other (often changing) bosses there.
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WafflehouseJK posted...

The finale still pisses me the fuck off.

What it was excellent.

Malcolm doing the same job as Reese was irony at its best.
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