Poker is the eighth episode of the third season of Malcolm in the Middle. It broadcasted on January 6, 2002 .
Plot[]
Cold Open:
Hal and Lois snuggle up on the couch next to the fireplace until they realize that neither one of them started the fire. They quickly douse the fire with an extinguisher and its revealed that the boys started the fire to destroy their bad report cards and letters from their teachers. Hal and Lois sift through the destroyed documents to make out what they can.
Malcolm is frustrated that Herkabe is allowing Stevie to do a video project for their class while Malcolm has to write a paper because his family can’t afford to buy him a camera. Stevie is taping Malcolm for his project which Malcolm wants him to stop doing. Hal finally gets an invitation to Abe's poker game tonight which he’s ecstatic for until Lois reminds him that it’s the night they were going to start taking dance lessons as part of his birthday present to her. After some uncomfortable silence, Lois begrudgingly allows Hal to go play Poker. Looking for a partner, Dewey claims Reese didn’t finish his homework with Reese claiming he did and Lois makes Reese her dance partner to Reese’s horror and tries to backtrack but Lois still makes him go with her to Dewey’s delight.
Meanwhile, Francis and his Alaskan friends are trapped in an Alaskan blizzard fending off cabin fever for a whole week. Lavernia gives them an assortment of supplies (which consist of meat paste and caribou jerky) that they are supposed to ration.
Abe brings Hal down to his basement to play poker with his friends who are all African American men named Brian, Trey, Steve, and Malik. Hal begins feeling uncomfortable after they tell him it’s a $50 buy in and misses a cue to opt-out of putting another dollar in the pot.
At the dance class, Lois and Reese are mostly dancing with senior citizens. When they’re told to partner up, the instructor goes with Lois while Reese is forced to dance with an old lady. The instructor compliments Lois asking if this is her first class and that she had the ankles for dancing. Another old lady wants to dance with Reese and she offers to pay him $5 and Reese immediately accepts.
Malcolm can’t think of an idea for his paper while Stevie narrates his movie. Malcolm decides to write his paper about Stevie making a movie about him. Reese comes in after finishing the dance class and loves the fact that old people saved up their money their whole lives only to outlive everyone they would have spent it on as he takes out a wad of cash earned from having seniors pay to dance with him.
At the poker game, Hal is down to one chip as he and Trey are dueling with their hands. Trey raises and Hal is forced to go into his wallet to pay up. After Trey calls, Hal reveals he had a full house while Trey had a Straight Flush, beating Hal. Hal doesn’t understand how the others knew Trey had a good hand and they explain Trey never holds on unless he has something good. The other guys laugh and call it a night and tell Hal they’ll definitely invite him to the next poker night and leave as Hal sits alone.
At night, Lois talks effusively about the dance class with the teacher using her as his partner to demonstrate moves while Hal is more taciturn about the poker match. Lois wants to have sex while Hal isn’t in the mood which confuses her since he’s always in the mood and Hal reluctantly agrees to.
Throughout the blizzard in Alaska, the guys do many activities to pass the time: reenacting whole episodes of "Gilligan's Island", memorizing the ingredients labeled on the rations, and Pete making puppet shows with his socks. They eventually become desperate to find a new thing to do, then they see Eric playing with a string.
Lois is about to go to the dance class while Hal angrily tries to open a pickle jar. Lois notices that Hal has been snapping at people all week and wants to know what’s wrong. Hal tries to describe the issue but can’t seem to directly say what it is that has him so worked up. Outside, Reese told Dewey he saw a kid at the mall that looked like him and decided to buy Dewey a toy model of a fighter jet which Dewey loves. But before giving it to Dewey, Reese drops the toy on the ground and jumps on it to destroy it as what he really wanted was to see Dewey’s reaction to losing the toy. Dewey calls him the worst brother ever which Reese agrees. Hal keeps trying to talk about his issue but Lois is impatient and heads to the dance class with Reese. Hal tries to call Abe repeatedly but hangs up before someone can answer. He gets the answering machine and while trying to talk about the issue, he hears the answering machine beep to start talking which frustrates him and he hangs up. Malcolm comes out with Stevie and Malcolm complains about Stevie filming him. Before Stevie can say a rebuttal, Hal raises his voice and tells Stevie that he’s a guest in the house and should behave himself which surprises Malcolm and Stevie.
Abe comes over and is angry that Hal yelled at Stevie since Stevie was a guest and Hal said he apologized two minutes later which Stevie accepted. Abe is still angry that Hal yelled at his child which Hal retorts that at least he can apologize when he knows he was a jerk. Abe wants to know what Hal is talking about and Hal brings up the Poker game the previous night and how he stood out like a sore thumb in front of Abe’s friends and thought the little things didn’t matter. Abe gets angry at what he thinks Hal might be implying and dares Hal to come out and say what he thinks. Hal reveals that his issue is he thinks all of Abe’s friends ganged up on him because Abe’s friends are professionals who make way more money while Hal is a working stiff with little money, which perplexes Abe. Abe tells Hal they didn’t gang up on Hal, he’s just terrible at poker. Hal claims he’d win in a straight game and Abe retorts they did play a straight game and Hal went home crying to his momma. Hal then challenges Abe to another poker game and says he will “own him”, not realizing the context of what he just said to Abe and tries to apologize before Abe tells him to shut up and get the cards.
Hal and Abe play poker against each other with their sons supporting their dads. Malcolm tells Hal that Abe has a tell which is that he licks his lips when he’s bluffing. Hal uses that info and raises his hand which makes Abe fold. Hal begins winning hand after hand until a new hand where Abe bets $10 and licks his lips. Hal sees it and shows off his hand which was a straight, but Abe’s hand was a flush which surprises Hal and Malcolm with Stevie smiling which indicates that Abe and Stevie lured Hal into a trap using Abe’s tell against him.
During the blizzard, they all take turns playing with the string until it is lost. Pete, Artie, and Francis all blame Eric for hoarding the string for himself believing he was the last one that had it and hold a kangaroo court where they pronounce him guilty.
After more poker hands, the boys get more intense with the games than their dads as they’re likely using it as proxy battle for their own conflict. Hal decides the next hand is winner take all which Abe agrees to. Abe shows Three Fives and Hal shows Three Fives with a Jack. Hal and Malcolm think they’ve won until everyone realizes that there were Six Fives in that hand which is impossible for a standard deck of cards which only has four of any number. Abe complains about where Hal got his cards and Hal said it was from the boys’ room. Abe says Hal can’t call himself a poker player without a decent deck while Hal sarcastically says that he doesn’t have gold plated cards like Abe has. Both men are sick of each other’s acts until Hal admits the main reason he came to play poker was because he wanted to play with his best friend Abe which surprises him. Both men admit they wanted to play poker together and were looking forward to it. They hug it out and reconcile and tell their sons they’re going to get ice cream. Hal calls for Dewey but he can’t find him.
For revenge, Dewey took Stevie’s camera and films Reese at the dance class. Reese tells the old ladies to pay up if they want to dance with some of them trading lockets because Reese says they might not even be around next week. Lois dances an amazing waltz which ends with the class applauding. Lois wants to sign up for more classes but the instructor tells her they have to stop because she’s outgrown the class as he teaches beginning dances to people who can barely walk. The instructor gives Lois the card of another dance instructor for her to go see. Lois is saddened since she loved the class, but the instructor tells her that she needs to spread her wings and fly.
Eric is seen being held down with his buttocks exposed and Francis about to brand him like a cow. When all seems to be an inevitable ordeal for Eric, Lavernia barges in and announces that the blizzard has ended and that the whole camp has been cleared of the snow. She sees all the men getting ready to brand Eric with Francis explaining he took the string and she comments "every damn storm".
At the house, Reese teases Dewey about the toy he broke before Dewey shows him footage of Reese happily dancing with all the old ladies with one even grabbing his butt. Reese is humiliated at this and tries to destroy the tape before Dewey tells him he already made a bunch of copies and to look forward to his school assembly tomorrow.
Hal tells Lois that Abe invited him to a ball game over the weekend. Lois spots the footage Dewey recorded which was now playing Lois’ dance. It’s revealed that Lois was actually a clumsy and ungraceful dancer who kept knocking into people and the beautiful dance shown earlier was just in her imagination. Lois realizes that the instructor was just trying to get rid of her by saying she had outgrown the class when he was actually too timid to tell the truth. Lois wants Hal to turn the TV off but Hal is swept up in love thinking that Lois is dancing beautifully. Hal offers Lois a dance as they dance around the kitchen when in actuality, their dance is breaking all of the dishes in the kitchen due to Lois’ clumsiness.
Trivia[]
- Bernard, the hamster in the orange ball that Dewey set free in the episode Health Scare, is briefly seen again in this episode, as it rolls past Dewey in the background while he is filming Reese.
- This was the first episode to premiere in 2002.
- The poker variation they are playing, while not specifically named, appears to be 7-card stud.
Errors[]
- Towards the end of this episode, Lois is shown to be a very sloppy and uncoordinated dancer however in Ida's Dance, Lois is shown to be a rather good and coordinated dancer.
Quotes[]
- Artie: You're the only one who seems to have a motive against the string.
- Eric: No, I love the string, it's just-...
- Artie: Maybe you loved it a little too much, and I quote: "If I can't have the string, no one will."
- Eric: I didn't say that!
- Artie: Well someone said it!
- Eric: You! Just now!