Watching the Baby is the second episode of season five of Malcolm in the Middle.
Plot[]
In the cold opening, Lois tells Jamie she will finally have some pictures of him to show to all her friends at work. However she soon realizes that none of the photos are good when she looks through them. They are all either out of focus, show Jamie crying or one where Reese got in the way. She then sees a photo of a baby on the flier for the photo lab and puts that picture in her wallet instead.
One Friday afternoon Malcolm, Reese, Dewey and Stevie are playing basketball in the driveway as Hal bids farewell to Polly who mistakes the day it is knowing she has to go to court and file a restraining order against her sister. Who thinks because she has been Polly's boyfriends first and third wife she has a claim on him. Stevie asks if Polly used to be the cat lady, Malcolm responds that she was also the naked jogger but now is a cheap babysitter. Hal states the boys are making dinner since Lois hasn't had any sleep for the past 4 days, inside Lois had fallen asleep breastfeeding Jamie who is on the table while Lois is fast asleep with a loaf of bread in her shirt.
Hal states Lois needs to get some sleep and that he and the boys are going to take care of Jamie for the rest of the night so she can sleep, Lois tiredly defends it but immediately falls asleep on the bed. As Hal leaves the room,
In the living room, Hal tells the boys to try and get Jamie to eat and if the nipple on the bottle gets clogged there’s an extra one in the fridge. He decides to make a run to the Lucky Aide for more diapers, stating to the boys he'll be back in 10 minutes and doesn’t want anything going wrong in that window of time since he is trusting that the boys are mature enough to handle being responsible. After he leaves, Reese finds it hilarious that he said “nipple”.
Hal arrives at the Lucky Aide and gets Craig to check him out, however Craig proceeds to bother him with a unrelated elaborate conversation. Hal claims he's in a hurry and doesn't have time. Hal then realizes he left his wallet at home and apologizes to Craig and asks him for a loan, Craig claims he could help him but refuses since Hal has a tendency to yell at people who try to help him. Hal then takes the diapers and claims Lois will pay for them tomorrow, Craig says he is shoplifting, Hal admits this and asks what he gonna do, Craig calls for Vernon the head of security who stops him from leaving.
Back at the house, Lois still asleep rolls off the bed and onto the floor where breathing in and out causes a ball of dust under the bed to form.
In the kitchen the boys change Jamie with a newspaper diaper and an oven mitt. Dewey goes outside to throw the old diaper in the trash with Malcolm telling him to triple bag it and hold his breath because if he passes out they will not come and get him. Stevie claims it to be a fun Saturday night, with Malcolm misunderstanding that he wasn't being sarcastic. Just then, three girls from their school show up wearing fancy dresses and ask them out. Stevie claims all his praying has finally paid off. Malcolm questions them further for the first girl named Joanne to go right then in a limousine outside, Reese bets it has a toilet but Malcolm is apprehensive and reminds Reese they are supposed to be taking care of Jamie, and they can't just go riding around in a limo with three hot girls, Malcolm then realizes what he just said. Dewey comes back inside only to hear tires squeal away and finds that the others have left him all alone to look after Jamie.
At the Lucky Aide, Craig takes a mugshot of Hal and sticks it on a shoplifters' wall of shame. He tells Hal he's not under arrest, so therefore isn't entitled to a phone call, Craig sentences Hal to work off his debt for two hours at minimum wage.
Back at the house, Lois is still fast asleep on the bedroom floor as the dust ball has now doubled in size. Dewey is watching Jamie and decides to tell him a story about himself and Jamie being the favorites of the household and how Jamie worshiped Dewey, when Malcolm and Reese enter and start throwing Jamie around, Dewey begs them to stop before Lois catches them red-handed they admit they are stupid and Lois shoves both Reese and Malcolm down the garbage disposal. Lois then warns Dewey not to go in her closet.
In the limo, Joanne explains that their boyfriends ditched them at the fall formal dance to go to a party and claiming that they want revenge by cheating on them with Reese, Malcolm and Stevie. The second girl named Kathy is crying since she arranged her schedule so she and her boyfriend Kevin could have all the same classes together. Malcolm asks if they want to make them jealous, but Joanne states they want to make them barf because of their disgusting behavior and they'd never be able to live it down afterwards. Malcolm remains off put claiming they only want them because they are the most repulsive guys they could find. The limo driver then says another boy with a hunchback and gills they had asked turned them down claiming he had too much pride. Stevie is awestruck by the situation and Malcolm isn't eager about being paraded around like monkeys on a chain. Kathy then tells them how they've already been rejected once that night and asks them to not be so selfish.
Back in Dewey's story, Dewey and Jamie need the key to open the closet. Dewey distracts Lois with a song and ribbon dance while Jamie receives the key from under her pillow.
Hal is sentenced to mop all the aisles where he learns the other night-shift employees are mistreated by Craig as well. One employee named Sanjay says that Hal is another innocent victim caught up in the evil net of Craig Feldspar. Another employee named Theresa says that Craig is a monster who treats them like dirt and Sanjay says that the power of the assistant night manager position has corrupted him and they’re nothing better than slaves. Hal tells them since they are the employees they are the ones actually running the store. Theresa says he doesn’t care and he insists on using store brand coffee in the coffee maker (which they claim is so bitter it tastes like death). An employee named Dolores who rides on a mobility scooter stalls out on her way out of the store after her shift due to Craig refusing to change the incline on the ramp and cannot leave until someone gives her a push. Sanjay says he has an iron grip on the store radio, not respecting that they unanimously voted to listen to adult contemporary music (namely Phil Collins) instead of show tunes on the PA system. Hal says Craig is a bastard for treating them like slaves and they can’t allow him to treat them as such, since without them he’s nothing and suggests overthrowing Craig's power. They all cease talking as Vernon walks by and Dolores second guesses herself remembering Craig gave her the employee of the month award for cleaning his aquarium. Hal states that the award is an opiate of the masses and they can’t let fear run their lives. Just then Craig announces he needs one of his employees to heat up a hot pocket for him. The employees comply and Hal rallies them together so they can rebel against Craig and take back the night-shift for themselves.
With the older boys in the limo, the girls discuss a plethora of parties that their boyfriends could be at. Malcolm questions them again but Stevie tells him to stop rocking the boat. Malcolm suggests going home and taking a horrible punishment from their father. Reese tells his brother to stop complaining about being losers because they are having a free limousine ride with attractive girls. Malcolm reminds Reese that a large intimidating football player named Aaron Stepanovich is Joanne's boyfriend and Reese is okay with it because he is tired of being a nobody, telling a tale about how he tried asking his lab partner Cheryl out but she didn't even know who he was. Reese claims after he is beaten by Aaron people will notice him for making out with Joanne. The limo driver is touched asking if Reese wants to wear his hat. The girls discuss who will kiss whom, with the third girl Val compares the situation to eating roaches. Joanne chooses Reese but claims she needs liquor to do it, and they know where an idiot will sell it to them. The idiot turns out to be Craig who buys that the girls are Cambodian and begins to bother them with another elaborate off-topic discussion about him needing special orthotics that are difficult to find in the tropics since he suffers from pronation.
Back at the house, Lois is still fast asleep on the bedroom floor and the dust ball has now grown quadruple its original size as Dewey continues telling Jamie his story. Once the coast is clear the younger boys go into the closet to find out under the original house was a secret better more luxurious house the boy's parents had been hiding from them. Also discovering Hal and Lois are actually rich and have taken a trip to Paris and own their own robot the Brother-bot 9000 (modeled after Francis). Dewey and Jamie eventually find a secret room where a perfect pair of pants is kept, that weren't hand-me-downs, never been worn with no holes, stains, funny smells or dead things in the pockets but when he tries to take them, he sets off an alarm. Back in the real world Dewey screams upsetting his little brother, Dewey apologizes and calms him down.
Then Hal leads the Lucky Aid employees marching down the aisles to Phil Collins "Sussudio". Craig calls for Vernon much to Joanne, Val and Kathy's anger. Vernon is disabled by baby powder in his face and having his arm jammed in a blood-pressure machine before being unplugged by some employees. They then form a shopping cart train to ram his office door, eventually breaking through and attacking him as Dolores drags off Craig's standee. Hal leaves the store and bids the employees goodbye and a job well done. Telling them once Craig has signed a confession form to give him back his clothes, he then runs past the limo without noticing that the boys are inside.
Just then the boyfriends of the girls arrive, Joanne then gets Aaron's attention and grabs Reese claiming that she will kiss anyone. While Reese is preparing to receive a kiss, he realizes Jaime's pacifier (they call Jamie's Nu-Nu) was in his pocket and that he cannot sleep without it. Without hesitation, Malcolm, Reese, and Stevie hijack the limo and leave the girls behind in the parking lot, much to their frustration. Stevie obliviously asks if they'll meet up with them later. The limo driver is proud and tells Reese that for a dumb-ass he has heart.
Back in Dewey's story, Dewey realizes there is only one solution. Once his parents arrive in the room they find Jamie wearing the pants and proceed to punish him so hard, Dewey was hidden out of sight behind the door. Back in the real world Dewey explains the moral of the story is that he will personally screw Jamie over just as his brothers do to him and that that's how it works, by then Jamie has fallen asleep.
Just then the older boys arrive back home right when Dewey had just gotten Jamie to sleep, luckily Reese puts the pacifier in his mouth calming him down. However, Hal arrives seconds later with the diapers waking Jamie up a second time, everyone gets into an argument and at the same time the dust ball has finished growing to the size of a baseball causing it to wake Lois up by inhaling it. When she enters the kitchen she notices Jamie's newspaper diaper and lightly reprimands the boys about the way they looked after Jamie. Malcolm suggests they go for a drive, believing that it could calm Jamie down, much to Lois' dismay, she is skeptical. In the final scene, the whole family is in the limousine, Lois is amazed by how big it is claiming she's never been in a limo that big, Dewey tells Jamie "Yeah right."
Trivia[]
- This episode does not contain a Francis plotline (with Francis only appearing as the robot in Dewey's story).
- This episode casts Caitlin Crosby as Joanne who later plays Kelly in Morp in Season 7.
- In the scene where Dewey is distracting Lois with his dance and a ribbon, he is singing "Quando Quando Quando". However, the audio is muted and the song was replaced in the Hulu version most likely due to copyright reasons. However, you can still see Dewey mouthing the words.
- This is the first appearance of Polly
- This episode was aired out of order. The original episode was supposed to be Malcolm's Job in which Craig is promoted as district manager.
- An original ending was supposed to have Lois appear at Lucky Aide the next day and screaming at Craig once she found out what he done.
Errors[]
- Stevie claims it to be a fun Saturday night but Hal earlier stated it was Friday.