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Reese's Party is the 18th episode of season 4 and 81st episode overall on Malcolm in the Middle. It was directed by Levi Isaacks and written by Andy Bobrow.

Plot[]

Reese decides to throw a party while Lois and Hal take a weekend break, on the same night Malcolm has arranged a date with Kathy. All is fine until Donnie's gang of hoodlums turns the party into a crystal meth operation that even Francis can't handle and they take Craig hostage.

However, Dewey ends up solving the situation by telling on the gang to their mothers who quickly show up to pick up their children and give them a piece of their minds. Meanwhile, Hal and Lois are having a miserable time at their honeymoon. When they come home, Hal and Lois finds everything normal.

Summary[]

Hal and a very pregnant Lois decide they need to get away for a long weekend. Refusing to hire a babysitter, they decide that the three boys need to be separated in order to avoid having to field another of the neighbors' complaints about them. As they're leaving, Lois mentions that Craig will take care of Dewey for the weekend, Reese is to visit Ida in Whitehorse, and Malcolm is to stay with Stevie's house for the weekend.

When the two older brothers complain, she silences them by reminding them of their previous misbehavior from their former babysitters and the neighbors' complaints that results in the police being involved. Hal mentions that he and Lois doesn't want to field any complaints about the boys while they're gone. Thus, they're being separated for the weekend to avoid having their vacation ruined and having to come back home to deal with them again.

Reese is seen on the bus, bidding Malcolm an Dewey a taunting farewell as he's going to be spending time with Ida in Whitehorse. Malcolm remind him to think about it for a minute. He mentions that Hal and Lois gave Reese two sets of clean clothes in his bag, another bag full of food and that neither parent has called Ida to inform her that he's coming over. He is horrified and gets the idea that he's going to spend the weekend riding on the bus. As the bus pulls away, Malcolm and Dewey bids Reese farewell in the same taunting.

Hal and Lois' weekend gets off to a bad start when they're so late arriving at the hotel due to her needing to stop to use the bathroom constantly that the hotel gives their room away. They're moved to a smaller room than they paid for and she begins to complain about it.

Hal asks Lois to give it a rest and try to enjoy herself. He convinces her that they have two good thing going for them: they don't have to deal with their boys since they've been separated and fielding complaints from the neighbors regarding their misbehavior. Lois tells Hal that he's right and it would be nice for them to have a perfect weekend alone away from them. However, the weekend sours more when Hal accidentally reveals he never got a vasectomy. This causes a separation between them during their vacation.

Lois shouts at Hal for having lied to her all those years and the unwanted children they have. She wanted to stop having children after the stress she was dealing with the troublesome Francis and Reese. Hal mentioned he didn't want a vasectomy and wants to try other contraception options. Lois reminds him that every single other method of contraception resulted in a baby that neither wanted to have and evicts him out of the room. She spends the rest of her night staying in the room and eating dinner alone. Hal spends his night complaining to the rest of the (uninterested) guests about Lois.

At Craig's apartment, things are initially awkward between Dewey and Craig but then Dewey invites Craig to play some games with him and the two end up bonding and having a lot of fun. For the first time, Craig is happy to relive a childhood that he never had in his life.

Reese makes his escape through the bus window while it's moving and returns home to throw a party. Malcolm is supposed to stay with Stevie at his house, but also returns home for a dinner date with popular (and promiscuous) Kathy McCulsky. The two boys see each other and yell at one another. Malcolm tells Reese to cancel his party because he has a dinner date set up. He refuses to cancel the party and runs into a bunch of dangerous looking guys led by Donnie and makes the mistake of mentioning that the house will be adult free for two days.

Donnie turns up with his entire gang who set up a meth lab in the family's garage and quickly makes it clear to Malcolm and Reese that he's taking over the house for the next couple of days. The two brothers find themselves forced to served their unwanted guests. When Kathy turns up for her date with Malcolm, she much prefers Dave and ends up making out with him and joining the gang, much to Malcolm's dismay.

At the house, Malcolm and Reese enlists the help of Francis from the ranch to deal with Donnie. It turns out Francis and Donnie go way back, but Francis is unable to reason with or blackmail Donnie into leaving. Craig brings Dewey to the house to collect some stuff, only for the gang to begin torturing him and forcibly inducts him into the gang. The brothers think they're out of options to deal with them and are ready to just wait in Craig's apartment for Lois and Hal to return. However, Dewey refuses to abandon Craig to the gang and comes to the rescue.

When Francis tries to warn against standing up to Donnie, Dewey points out that he, Reese and Malcolm has underestimated him in the past. He has one weapon that can bring the gang down to their knees. Dewey decides that Donnie and his buddies need a big, heavy dose of parental control. He sneaks out of the house, finds a telephone and secretly calls their mothers right away.

Come Sunday, Hal and Lois are miserable and decide to leave early while still not talking to each other. Hal finally apologize for his earlier behavior fearing that if he actually had gotten a vasectomy, he would've been infertile. Lois finally forgives him for the whole thing and even admits, she does tends to be more demanding while pregnant.

With just a few minutes left, Lois asks Hal to do one nice thing for her that weekend and rub her feet. Doing so, Hal and Lois are overcome with animal lust and end up having wild sex on the bed, eventually running over their checkout time by two hours. The concierge orders them out of the room, only to get a bedpan thrown at the other side of the door by Lois, as if telling him that they'll leave when they're ready.

Sure enough, Dewey opens the makeshift meth lab by pulling on the garage door for his confrontation with Donnie and his gang of hoodlums. He immediately demands that they release Craig and leave their house right away.

The gang adamantly refuses thinking it's a trick, but he remains undaunted because he reveals that he called their parents and told on them. Donnie thinks Dewey's joking, but he's in the shock of his life when he hears his mother, Wanda's shrill voice yelling out his name. He wasn't joking as she shows up to confront Donnie and gives him a piece of her mind.

When he tries to ask Wanda to leave because she's embarrassing him and reminds her that he's an adult, she continues railing on him. She points out that he skipped out of work from the Suit Outlet and wasted the years that she and his father sacrificed to give him what he wanted, only to be embarrassed by his life choices in squatting in a garage, creating a meth lab and dealing drugs.

Dave and the gang members start laughing at Donnie knowing he's getting in a lot of trouble; however, Dave quickly hears his mother, Amanda, yelling at him to stop laughing at once because he's not getting out of his punishment either. She mentions that not only that his father will hear about him and his buddies, but also his many stepfathers.

Soon the other gang members' mothers shows up at the house to pick them up and give the group a piece of their minds. Francis, Reese and Malcolm are smug seeing the gang getting their comeuppance from their mothers. Wanda, Amanda and the gang's mothers ends it by telling Donnie and his friends to get inside the car ASAP so they can go home.

The group are permanently expelled from the Wilkerson's garage and Craig is freed. Francis, Reese and Malcolm all express their gratitude towards Dewey, since his telling on Donnie and his gang of hoodlums to their mothers actually saved them from risking punishment with their own parents, Hal and Lois, if they should find out what happened.

Everything in the house is back in order, Francis is back at the Grotto Ranch and the boys have cleaned up the house. Hal and Lois returns hours later, but doesn't question Malcolm's story when he mentions how well behaved he, Reese and Dewey were while they were gone in separation.

Once the boys and Craig are out of earshot, Hal and Lois immediately discerns that something obviously happened in their absence though decide they can't be bothered to find out.

Cast[]

  • Jane Kaczmerek as Lois
  • Bryan Cranston as Hal
  • Christopher Kennedy Masterson as Francis
  • Justin Berfield as Reese
  • Erik Per Sullivan as Dewey
  • Frankie Muniz as Malcolm

Guest stars[]

Recurring[]

  • David Anthony Higgins as Craig

Cameos[]

  • Danielle Panabaker as Kathy McCulsky
  • Nick Weschler as Donnie
  • Dominic Colon as Dave
  • Candace T. Cain as Big Wanda (Donnie's mom, uncredited)
  • Jim Jackman as Bus Driver
  • Michael Schoolcraft as Hotel Clerk
  • Christie Lynn Smith as Angela
  • Gail Borges as Amanda
  • Billy Brown as Andy (credited as Bill Lee Brown)
  • Chris Freeman as Squatter 1
  • Randolph Jones as Squatter 2
  • Kevin Thomas as Squatter 3 (credited as Kevin "Repo" Thomas)
  • Alexander Cardinal as Squatter 4 (uncredited)
  • Lawrence Calvin as Suicidal (uncredited)

Trivia[]

  • When Reese talks about potentially having to turn back the odometer, it's a possible reference to popular teen party movies such as Risky Business and Ferris Bueller's Day Off.
  • Originally, Todd Giebenhain and Parker Mills were supposed to return as Francis' former lowlife pals, Richie and Circus. They were intended to give him some trouble when he confronted the two and their gang for turning the family garage into a meth lab. They were supposed to have their mothers show up in front of them and give them a piece of their minds. They were replaced by Donnie and Dave.
  • When Francis's friends take over the garage, it is apparent that they are importing a meth lab. Bryan Cranston would later star in Breaking Bad where he would spend most of his time in a meth lab as drug lord, Walter White.
  • The street number given on Reese's party invitation (12334 Maple Rd) is the actual street number of the house that served as the shooting location at 12334 Cantura Street.
  • This episode marks the first time Lois learned that Hal lied to her about getting a vasectomy, which resulted in the unwanted sons that she never wanted to have. She didn't want to have any more children after dealing with Francis and Reese.
  • Dominic Colon, who plays Dave in this episode, will later have a main role of Manny Spamboni on the PBS Kids GO show The Electric Company.
  • Malcolm should've reminded Reese of the last time Francis babysat them in Home Alone 4, when he invited his lowlife pals to hang out. The trio threw a huge party, trashed the house and the police were called to arrest them.
  • This is the 2nd time that Hal and Lois knew the boys did something wrong, but chose the denial route. The first time was in Christmas.
  • This episode revealed that each of the kid's births were part of Lois' and Hal's methods of not having more kids:
    • Francis was the result of rhythm method.
    • Reese was the result of diaphragm method.
    • Malcolm was the result of a condom method.
    • Dewey and Jamie were the result of a abstinence method.
  • Donnie mentioned Alaska when he first saw Francis.

Quotes[]

Wanda: DONNIE!
[Donnie is taken by surprise when his mother, Wanda, appears before him next to Dewey]
Donnie: Mom, what... what are you doing here?
Wanda: Trying to hide how ashamed I am at your behaviour and wondering where I went wrong.
Donnie: Mom, come on.
Wanda: Your father and I tried to give you the best life possible and this is how we're paid back.
Donnie: Mom, you don't own me. I make my own decisions.
Wanda: These are the decisions you make. This is the life you choose. Who's covering your shift at the Suit Outlet?
Dave:[smug] Dude, you are so busted!!!!
[Dave starts laughing shortly until his mother, Amanda, arrives. Francis, Reese and Malcolm are smug watching the whole thing]
Amanda: Don't you be so smug, David Alan Ferguson. Believe me, every one of your step-fathers will hear about this.
Wanda: You say good-bye to your friends and you get in the car, RIGHT NOW!!!
[Donnie and Dave leaves with their mothers. The gang is so embarrassed and bail out of the garage fearing their own mothers will appear.]
Dewey: I forgot it feels good to tell.
[Francis, Reese and Malcolm are grateful to Dewey for his actions in telling on Donnie and his gang to their mothers.]

Errors[]

  • In the cold opening as Hal is chasing his sandwich, he is show to be on his back as if he were repairing the car. In the next shot, he is still under the car on his stomach.
Malcolm in the Middle episodes
Season 1 PilotRed DressHome Alone 4ShameMalcolm BabysitsSleepoverFrancis EscapesKrelboyne PicnicLois VS EvilStock Car RacesFuneralCheerleaderRollerskatesThe Bots and the BeesSmundayWater Park
Season 2 Traffic JamHalloween ApproximatelyLois' BirthdayDinner OutCasinoConventionRobberyTherapyHigh School PlayBullyOld Mrs. OldKrelboyne GirlNew NeighborsHal QuitsThe GrandparentsTraffic TicketSurgeryReese CooksTutoring ReeseBowlingMalcolm vs. ReeseMini-BikeCarnivalEvacuationFlashback
Season 3 HouseboatEmancipationBook ClubMalcolm's GirlfriendCharityHealth ScareChristmasPokerReese's JobLois' MakeoverCompany Picnic (1)Company Picnic (2)Reese DrivesCynthia's BackHal's BirthdayHal CoachesDewey's DogPoker 2Clip ShowJury DutyCliquesMonkey
Season 4 ZooHumilithonFamily ReunionStupid GirlForwards BackwardsForbidden GirlfriendMalcolm Holds His TongueBoys At RanchGrandma SuesIf Boys Were GirlsLong DriveKicked OutStereo StoreHal's FriendGarage SaleAcademic OctathalonClip Show #2Reese's PartyFuture MalcolmBaby Part 1Baby Part 2Day Care
Season 5 VegasWatching The BabyGoodbye KittyThanksgivingMalcolm Films ReeseMalcolm's JobChristmas TreesBlock PartyDirty MagazineHot TubIda's BoyfriendSoftballLois' SisterMalcolm Dates a FamilyReese's ApartmentMalcolm Visits CollegePolly in the MiddleDewey's Special ClassExperimentVictor's Other FamilyReese Joins the Army: Part 1Reese Joins the Army: Part 2
Season 6 Reese Comes HomeBuseys Run AwayStandeePearl HarborKitty's BackHal's Christmas GiftHal SleepwalksLois Battles JamieMalcolm's CarBillboardDewey's OperaLiving WillTiki LoungeIda Loses a LegChad's SleepoverNo MotorcyclesButterfliesIda's DanceMotivational SpeakerStiltsBuseys Take A HostageMrs. Tri-County
Season 7 Burning ManHealth InsuranceReese vs. StevieHalloweenJessica Stays OverSecret BoyfriendBlackoutArmy BuddyMalcolm Defends ReeseMalcolm's MoneyBride of IdaCollege RecruitersMonoHal GrievesA.ALois Strikes BackHal's DentistBomb ShelterStevie in the HospitalCattle CourtMorpGraduation
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