Malcolm in the Middle
Malcolm in the Middle was an American
situation comedy created by
Linwood Boomer for the
Fox Network.
The show starred
Frankie Muniz as Malcolm, the third-oldest of four, (later five) children in the family (hence the title of the show). The situation centered on Malcolm and his dysfunctional family's life.
The series was different from many others, in that Malcolm broke the
fourth wall, and talked directly to the viewer, it was shot using a
single camera and used neither a
laugh track nor a live studio audience. Like most dramas, it was shot on film. As a
midseason replacement, the show quickly gained a large viewerbase, starting off with ratings of 23 million for the debut episode and 26 million for the second episode.
The series
first aired on January 9, 2000, and ended its six-and-a-half-year run on May 14, 2006. There have been recent rumors that a reunion is in effect, but they have not received full confirmation yet. The show has entered
syndication, with
YTV set to begin broadcasts of it in the fall.
FOX shuffled the show's air time repeatedly to make room for other shows.
*January 9, 2000 - July 2002 - Sundays, 8:30 p.m.
*August, 2002 - October 2004 - Sundays, 9:00 p.m.
*November, 2004 - September 11, 2005 - Sundays, 7:30 p.m.
*September 30, 2005 - January 13, 2006 - Fridays, 8:30 p.m.
*January 29, 2006 - April 23, 2006 - Sundays, 7:00 p.m.
*May 14, 2006 - Sunday, 8:30 p.m. (series finale).
It is aired in Canada on the
Global Television Network and also will start airing in the fall of 2006 on
YTV, but can also be viewed on the FOX network. It is also shown in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland on
Sky One and then, a few months later, on
BBC2 (UK) and
TV3 (ROI). In France it is aired by
M6 and
Paris Première, in Australia it is aired by
Nine network and in New Zealand it is aired by
TV3. In Mexico it is aired in Spanish on Channel Five (XHGC) of
Televisa. In Israel it is aired on
Bip Channel. In Germany it is aired on
Pro 7, in Austria on
ORF 1. In Italy on
Italia 1. In Denmark on
TV2 Zulu and
TV3+, in Norway on
TV2 and in Sweden on
TV4. The series is also aired on one of
Malaysia's free TV stations,
NTV7. In the Middle East, the series is aired on MBC 2 and Showtime Arabia's Paramount Comedy Channel. In Spain it is aired on Antena 3, in Portugal on SIC-Radical, a cable network owned by
SIC and on
M-Net in South Africa. In the Netherlands it is aired on
Veronica. In Belgium it is aired on
Kanaal 2. In Hong Kong it is aired on
TVB Pearl and it can be watched on
Star World around Asia.
FX Networks plans to carry the show on cable in 2007.
After successfully selling the show into syndication, FOX essentially gave the show a free pass during its seventh and final season. After moving to Fridays at 8:30 p.m. next to
The Bernie Mac Show,
Malcolm in the Middle averaged fewer than 3.5 million viewers a week, making it FOX's lowest-rated show. On Friday, January 13, 2006, FOX announced that the show would be moving to 7:00 on Sundays effective January 29, 2006. On Tuesday, January 17, 2006, FOX announced the end of the series, with the 151st and
final episode airing at 8:30 p.m. ET/PT (the show's original timeslot) on May 14, 2006. The final episode aired in the United Kingdom on July 2, 2006.
|
Malcolm in the Middle family. From left to right: Francis, Lois, Jamie, Malcolm, Dewey, Hal, and Reese. |
 |
The youngest member of the family, Jamie. |
 |
From the sixth season episode "Stilts", with Malcolm Wilkerson taking on the role of Uncle Sam at the Lucky Aide, and Reese taking part in multiple drug development programs. |
Originally there were only four children (although Malcolm's oldest brother attended a
military school away from home, so he was still the middle child left at home). The fifth child, a new baby, was introduced in the show's fourth season to coincide with Jane Kaczmarek's pregnancy. The boys are, from eldest to youngest: Francis, Reese, Malcolm, Dewey, and Jamie. On the last episode Lois discovered she was, once again, pregnant with a sixth child.
Bryan Cranston (Hal),
Justin Berfield (Reese) and
Erik Per Sullivan (Dewey) are the only actors to appear in every episode.
Francis
The oldest of the brothers and the biggest trouble-maker, Francis is a regular character on the show, though he has lived outside of the house since before season 1 began. Lois was in labour with Francis in the middle of her and Hal's wedding, Lois apparently resented Francis for being born a footling
breech and exiled him to a
military academy. After the second season, at only 16 years old, he legally (for those who ignore the fact that he had forged his parents' signatures)
emancipates himself with the help of an unscrupulous Alabama lawyer, leaves the academy and heads to Alaska to find work as a logger.
While in Alaska, he marries a local woman, Piama, whom he had dated for three weeks. By season 4 he and Piama have left Alaska and Francis has begun working as a farmhand at a Texas ranch/hotel owned by a German couple. (They are Danish in the German-dubbed version of the series.) Francis has become a responsible adult; he has even begun to discipline his younger brothers, who used to regard him as a rule-breaking role model. Unfortunately, a little over two years after he begins working at the ranch, he is fired because the ATM he used to deposit funds isn't actually an ATM. For the remainder of seasons six and seven, Francis makes only occasional appearances, yet he is still credited in each episode. Later, we find that for some time he has been living in a cheap apartment and has failed at getting a job. He briefly took a job as the agent for his friend's band and recently started his own business.
In the final episode, it is revealed that he has actually had a job with a large corporation titled Amerisys for two months, which he is enjoying immensely (although he equally enjoys telling his mother that he's unemployed.) Piama also seems to be pregnant in their final scene, illustrating Francis and his father as having extremely similar personalities and fates. (Both married young to ethnic women whom their mothers hate and both seem to be intensely in love with their wives despite constant fighting.)
Reese
Reese, the second oldest, is also the least intelligent and most destructive. While in labor with Reese, he was kicking her so hard, that Lois forcefully gave 'pre-mature' birth to Reese. He is unintelligent because at an early age he learned how to get rid of his troubles by turning his brain off, or singing the "Minty Mint Song" in his head (Season 4, Episode "Stupid Girl," Original air date 11/24/2002). He is an excellent chef and loves to cook, and banning him from the kitchen has become Hal and Lois's only effective punishment against him. As a baby he called Hal "Phone". He finds success in meat packing, but is fired after setting all the cows free to impress a girl. He once got married to a girl that Ida had introduced him to. She dominated the marriage and constantly shouted at him. Later in the same episode, Reese and Lois enter the garage and find her cheating on Reese with a man she had told Reese was her brother. Reese blindly believes that he is her brother when he and Lois find her. After graduating high school, Reese moves in with Craig and finally finds success as a janitor in his former high school.
Malcolm
At the beginning of the series, Malcolm's teacher recognizes him as a
gifted student, and places him in a gifted class. Much to his dismay, the move brands him as a "Krelboyne" (the name "Krelboyne" comes from the surname of one of the characters in the movie
The Little Shop of Horrors, Seymour Krelboyne). Many episodes revolve around Malcolm's attempts to reconcile his genius-level
IQ with his desire to lead a "normal" social life. In the final episode it is revealed that his parents did not plan for him to be happy in life. They found that every time they set a goal for Malcolm, he would exceed their expectations due to his personality and abilities. Instead of letting him take an easy six figure job out of high school, they force him to go to
Harvard. They explained that since he grew up poor, he would have to work for everything. With his resentment for not being liked, and his skills, he would be a natural politician. He would start off as a District Attorney but graduate to mayor, then governor of a midsize state before becoming
President of the United States. Lois and Hal envision that he would then become one of the greatest Presidents ever.
Dewey
Dewey is portrayed as quieter and more inclined to the arts than his brothers. He hides his intellect from Malcolm and Reese, in many cases cleverly taking advantage of them. In one episode he fools Reese into believing he is forwarding instructions from their mother when in fact he is making them up while talking to a
telemarketer, Francis, a time and temperature lady, or even no one on the phone ("Hal's Friend"). In the fourth season, Dewey begins to exhibit a high degree of intelligence, seen mainly in his talent of playing the piano (which he taught himself after secretly building a piano out of household objects and hiding it in the garage in "Humilithon.") Dewey is about to follow his brother into the gifted class, only to have Malcolm help him stay in normal classes. Malcolm has Reese complete Dewey's test, which accidentally gets Dewey thrown into the "Special" class, full of kids considered lost causes (the class is known as the "Buseys", an apparent reference to actor
Gary Busey). Dewey has since organized the class to want to be all they can be, and is teaching them standard lessons. He has been trying to show that they are just as capable as others, and has organized them to do things such as performing an
opera he wrote based on his family. Unlike Malcolm, his parents intend for Dewey to be rich and happy later in life. He spends much effort making sure his brother Jamie doesn't feel neglected like he did.
Lois
Lois is Malcolm's ever tempestuous, tough mother. She works as a clerk at Lucky Aide, a local drugstore (Lucky Aide's slogan:
"The "L" Stands for Value"). She has unconventional ways of disciplining her children, such as having them stand on their heads next to a wall or making them spin in circles with their foreheads on baseball bats. She also has an unhealthy obsession of winning every conceiveable argument that may or may not arise. Her mother is still alive, much to the family's dismay. Lois also has a sister called Susan (played in an episode by
Laurie Metcalf) with whom she is on uneven ground (Hal was her sister's boyfriend, but he and Lois had sex on top of a car, on her prom night). The sister is now a middle-aged single lady with counseling, who had
kidney failure and was going to leave Malcom and Reese her car in her will, though Lois donated one of hers and had it transplanted in her sister's. Her co-worker, the domineering but socially inept Craig Feldspar, has romantic feelings for her, which he makes known in several episodes. Lois is of undetermined Eastern European descent, an aspect explored in a single episode in the fifth season. Lois and Hal continue to be sexually attracted to one another; according to Hal in the season three episode
Poker II he and Lois have sex twice a day.
Hal
Hal, Malcolm's father, is more relaxed in his parenting than Lois, mainly because he is afraid to make the wrong choice. Several episodes refer to him as a former rebel and troublemaker, much like his sons. His indecisiveness supposedly stems from a childhood incident in which he caused a clown to get attacked by a snake (both of which he is now afraid of). He knows better than to cross Lois. When Lois is away, he quickly loses self-control and indulges in his baser enjoyments, such as smoking, loud music, and building "killer robots" (as explored in one episode). He has fits of rage over petty annoyances, frequently engaging in self-destructive vendettas against those who cross him, such as a co-worker he believes stole an idea from him, or a mini-golf manager who wouldn't give Dewey a free game, or a bothersome bee, or even his own sons. He keeps encyclopedias with certain letters filled in with pencil, a sort of secret self-therapy, which has occupied many years and many books. This is possibly a harbinger of
obsessive-compulsive disorder. He is arguably the biggest dreamer of the family, usually fantasizing about enjoyable situations. He is quite passionate about a range of activities, such as roller-skating,
pirate radio and
race walking. He comes from a large and rich family, all members of which have some (repressed) problem or another. They rarely visit because of the friction between Hal's relatives and Lois. Their family believes that Hal deserved a high class woman, instead of Lois, who has a lower-class background. His Father is never listening to Hal, and so he always makes jokes or tickles Hal before they both can speak about Lois. Hal works as a low level cubicle bound white collar worker in large but scandal ridden corporation. He stated in one episode that he works in systems-management.
Victor and Ida
Lois's parents, Victor (
Robert Loggia) and Ida (
Cloris Leachman), are the most dysfunctional. They were introduced in the episode "The Grandparents." Victor got off to a bad start by giving Reese a hand grenade, which he accidentally set off. Malcolm prevented the house from blowing up by shoving the grenade in the new steel-reinforced refrigerator. Victor and Ida's exact origins are unknown, but it has been referred to as "The Old Country," which has been hinted to be either in Eastern Europe or inside
Russia. Both characters speak with noticeably Slavic accents. Their country of origin may be
Ukraine, as some episodes mentioned the grandparents had lived in
Manitoba, which has a large Ukrainian-Canadian community. Ida said she had been through a "camp", and would have been old enough to have lived through the displaced person experience after
World War II, in which many Ukrainian people sought refuge in Canada. One episode centers on a fictitious "St. Grotus Day" celebration, which featured embroidered costumes similar to traditional Ukrainian dress. St. Grotus was said to burn down "enemy churches", and Ukraine has a history of several competing Catholic and Orthodox churches. However, in the same episode Lois says "Narog" (Romanian for "cheers") to her mother, before they both down their drinks. However, in another episode, Lois becomes extremely excited over the prospect of meeting a famous Polish-American baseball player, possibly giving some hints as to her family's ethnic origins, though it might just as well be a reference to actress Jane Kaczmarek's own ethnicity. Victor later runs off and marries a Canadian woman.
Not much is known about Victor, except that he left his home at a young age and that he was in the war. Victor had another family, but kept it a secret from Ida.
The family's last name
The last name of the family has been revealed only once in the show, in the pilot episode, where Francis wears the name tag "Wilkerson" on his school uniform (it can be seen best in the scene where he is talking with his family on the phone). Also, though unaired, it appears in a joke from the original pilot script. In that script, Malcolm was walking to school when a neighborhood kid came running up shouting, "Malcolm, Malcolm, Malcolm. I was talking to my parents last night - I was listening to them talk, and what's your last name?" "Wilkerson, why?" Malcolm replied. "Oh. Who are the
Pariahs?" said the other kid. The joke was eventually cut. One theory of why their last name has been played down is that the producers did not want them to be typecast as any particular ethnicity, and they likely hoped rerun viewers would miss Francis' name tag. A special feature on the series 1 DVD stated also that their surname were Wilkersons. A trailer on the UK channel
Sky One in Early 2006 advised you to spend time with "
The Simpsons" and "The Wilkersons", advertising Sunday night new episodes of both series. However, on
Bryan Cranston's official website, Mr. Cranston says the crew regularly joked amongst themselves that their last name is actually Nolastname. During the series finale, when Malcolm is being introduced for his graduation speech, his last name is not heard due to a squeak of the microphone. Just before Malcolm gives his graduation speech, Francis drops his employee ID on the ground and it clearly shows his name as "Francis Nolastname", this may be a joke or Francis is too embarrassed of his family.
Jamie's Gender
The show kept viewers in suspense regarding Jamie's gender for several episodes after his birth in season 4. In the episode "Baby part 2", after Jamie was born, Hal's friends asked Abe what gender it was. Abe's response was "It's a beautiful-," his speech getting cut off by the sound of ambulance sirens. In the following episode, the season finale, "Day Care," whenever Jamie's gender was mentioned, it was either interrupted, the subject changed, or the question, which viewers thought would lead to inquiry about gender, ended in a different and often humorous way. This led to some speculation that Jamie's gender would be kept a secret. During the
cold open for the next episode (season five's opener, "Vegas"), this idea is toyed with when Hal and Lois change Jamie's diaper. (They called Jamie a "he" lots of times, though.) After numerous opportunities at revealing Jamie's gender were left unfulfilled, the sequence finally ends with Jamie urinating straight up at Hal who responds, "Nice try, mister." Also in the episode "Ida's Boyfriend" Lois says to her mother Ida, "Mom, Jamie's got your cigarettes," to which Ida replies, "Who the hell is Jamie?" which finally garners Lois's response of, "It's your grandson." Also, in the episode where Chad comes over for a sleepover, Lois was putting fruit in the broken blender for Jamie because he had been a good boy.
Other mysteries
*In season 1 episode "
Funeral", Francis keeps asking how his Aunt Helen died. Dewey says twice that, "Cats ate her face." Francis then asks Hal who responds that it was cats eating her face as her cause of death, going on to say that Dewey knew more about it. The true cause is never revealed unless Dewey was telling the truth. Also in the episode was a character named "Egg" that was Dewey's friend. Egg was only shown once. What happened to this character remains a mystery.
*In season 5 episode "Reese's Apartment", Lois keeps repeating an outlandish thing that Reese did, but at the moment the outlandish occurrence is to be revealed, the scene changes to the reaction of what he did, leaving the revelation unfulfilled. The only mentions the audience gets regarding what Reese did were Malcolm's response of "Did they have to evacuate?", a therapist's response of "What were the cats for?" and Reese's defense, "I can name third world countries where stuff like that happens all the time."
*In season 6 episode "Living Will", the episode when Hal's fears of making decisions was shown, he had to choose between
euthanasia or prolonged
life support on someone in a coma who put the entire neighborhood in his will. After a brief bout with
paralysis from the waist up, Hal made a "third choice." The audience will never know since at the end of the episode he said he would never mention it again, though there were some clues as to what he did. These were mentioned as Hal and Lois were talking in bed. He said that the moment he learned the person was a bird lover, it all "became clear." In response, Lois asked if everything was at
Radio Shack. Hal responded "Everything except the hat." This leads many people to believe that he gave the man up for a scarecrow, which he lets electronically move or pump life support in to.
*In the final episode Francis finds evidence of the time that Reese, Malcolm, and Dewey tricked Lois into beliveing she had cancer. When Dewey explains Francis remarks about the fact he can use this for blackmail and Dewey replies "mom's friend Jenny". Francis quickly returns the evidence to Dewey leaving what he actually did unanswered.
Much like the on
The Simpsons, the setting of the show has never been revealed, though their street address - 12334 Maple Blvd. - was identified in episode 418 ("
Reese's Party"). The locale doesn't appear to have noticeable seasons, and also appears not to be in a desert environment, so one could conjecture the setting is somewhere in suburban
California (the show is filmed in this state and the outdoor setting closely resembles the physical landscape of the state). Also, the schools the teens attend have the look and layout of a common California public school, with classes in many single story buildings, separated by open-air common areas, instead of a single multi-story building. The actual house is privately owned, and is situated in
Studio City, at 12334 Cantura Street. The
CBS Studio Center in (
Studio City) is where the set is.
There is also a good chance that the family lives in Arizona, as in the episode "
Future Malcolm" when Dewey is being reprimanded for painting on the wall, a water bottle with the symbol for the
NFL team the
Arizona Cardinals is clearly visible.
Oklahoma is a possibility. In later seasons, license plates display "Cherokee State" which is another name for Oklahoma. Despite that, the look of the plates intentionally made like California's, such as the font of the words "Cherokee State", and digits are in the format of "1 XXX 111", where 1 is a digit, and X is a letter. In episode 415, Otto was singing the title song from "
Oklahoma!." In episode 313, Oklahoma Highway Police can be seen on the police car doors. However, in one episode, Hal comes to visit Francis at military school and upon seeing his father, Francis exclaims, "you drove eight hours just to see me!" The school is known to be located in Alabama, so Malcolm's family must live within an eight-hour drive of the state, perhaps in Florida. On the other hand there is also in episode 418 where Reese is sent to
Whitehorse on a bus for at least 52 hours. Malcolm: "Reese, think about it. It takes 26 hours to get to Canada, and 26 hours to get back. Your bag is filled with food and nobody called Grandma!" Only Alaska is within a 26 hour drive of Whitehorse, Canada. However, in episode 43, Alaska is stated to be "5000 miles away and in the episode "Krelborne Picnic", Francis says "So I'm still a member of the family even after you sent me away to military school 1,000 miles away". In the series finale, Malcolm reveals that
Harvard is 2,000 miles away. Triangulation using these distances puts the family's location somewhere in West Texas.
In episode 112, on a desk in the brothers' room, is what appears to be an
In-N-Out Burger coffee mug. If this is true, its likely the show is in states such as California, Nevada, or Arizona as the In-N-Out food chain is only present in these three states. Although, because the show is filmed in California, it is possible that it was added there from a cast member or crew member. Another explanation to this is that they simply traveled through one of those states and acquired a mug.
Also, in episode 110, "
Stock Car Races", when Hal and the boys are entering the track the billboard behind the entrance displays the place as
Irwindale Speedway (a real race track in Southern California).
It is likely that there is no real-world location that is consistent with all the facts about Malcolm's location given in the show. It is known, however, that the area in which the family live is called
Tri-County. This has been references several times; for example, in the "
Carnival" episode, the sign to the fairgrounds reads "Tri-County"; and in the "
Mrs. Tri-County" episode, Lois enters a local beauty pagent called
Miss Tri-County. In an episode, Malcolm also visits Stevie, who was in the Tri-County hospital.
In the episode in which Hal reveals to Dewey the origins of his fear of kites, we see a flashback to Hal's childhood. In the park, he crashes into a sign that shows a municipal code with the abbreviation RAPD. The PD almost certainly refer to "Park District," but the RA is not explained.
Yet, in the episode, "
Vegas", Reese wears a shirt that says El Paso Longhorns.
In the episode, "
Water Park", the waterpark they go to is actually at
Wild Rivers, located in
Irvine, California, but within the show it was given a different name.
An avid viewer of the show has claimed all indications reflect that the family actually live in the suburbs of Washington DC, even believing there to be a clear verbal confirmation of this by Hal in one episode (TBC).
Clues leading to the setting of Malcolm In The Middle are delibrately misleading & confusing.
*Family
**
Frankie Muniz as Malcolm
**
Jane Kaczmarek as Lois
**
Bryan Cranston as Hal
**
Christopher Masterson as Francis
**
Justin Berfield as Reese
**
Erik Per Sullivan as Dewey
**
Emy Coligado as Piama Tananahaakna
**
Cloris Leachman as Grandma Ida
**
James and Lukas Rodriguez as Jamie
*Other major characters
**
Craig Lamar Traylor as Steven "Stevie" Kenarban
**
Gary Anthony Williams as Abraham "Abe" Kenarban
**
Merrin Dungey as "Kitty" Kenarban
**
David Anthony Higgins as Craig Feldspar
**
Kenneth Mars as Otto Mannkusser (2002-2004)
**
Meagen Fay as Gretchen Mannkusser (2002-2004)
**
Jonathan Craig Williams as Steve
**
Edward James Gage as Brian
**
Alex Morris as Trey
**
Dan Martin as Malik
**
Eric Nenninger as Eric Hansen (2000-2002)
**
Daniel von Bargen as Commandant Edwin Spangler (2000-2002)
**
Catherine Lloyd Burns as Caroline Miller (2000)
**
Chris Eigeman as Lionel Herkabe
*Krelboynes
**
Kyle Sullivan as Dabney Hooper
**
Tania Raymonde as Cynthia
**
Evan Matthew Cohen as Lloyd
**
Will Jennings as Eraserhead
**
Victor Isaac as Kevin
Guest stars have included
Andy Richter,
Christopher Lloyd,
Patrick Warburton,
Stephen Root,
Jason Alexander,
Laurie Metcalf,
Amy Bruckner,
Hallee Hirsh,
Lauren Storm,
Dakota Fanning,
Ashlee Simpson,
Tom Green,
Christina Ricci,
Danielle Panabaker,
Susan Sarandon,
Bradley Whitford, (Jane Kaczmarek's real life husband).
The opening titles feature short clips from cult icons or movies, edited together with clips from the early seasons of the TV series. These include, in order of appearance:
* Three women fighting a giant turtle: From
One Million Years BC (1966)
* Grinning anime boy in rain: Shiogami from anime
Nazca* The monster rising out of the ocean is the
Kraken: From
Clash of the Titans (1981)
* Woman being held above a nest of hungry pterodactyl: From
One Million Years BC (1966)
* Anime guy skateboarding: From the
anime Nazca [
1]
* Mud-monster grabbing a woman as she kisses a man: From
The Creature From The Haunted Sea (1961)
* Man ski-jumping while ignited in flames: unknown origin
* Wrestling match:
Bret Hart wrestling
Chris Benoit (locking him in his finishing move, The Sharpshooter), during the WCW World Heavyweight Championship Match at
WCW Mayhem PPV in
Toronto,
Ontario.
* Prosthetic face being assembled: unknown origin
* Man attacking giant brain with an axe: From
The Brain From Planet Arous (1957)
* Boxer knocking out referee:
Pedro Cardenas fighting
Willie deWit but accidentally KOd referee
Bert Lowes instead, during the 1982
North American Championships in Las Vegas.
The show's theme song, "
Boss of Me", was written and recorded by the alternative rock group
They Might Be Giants, who also performed nearly all of the incidental music for the show in its first two seasons. Mood setting music is sprinkled throughout the series, in replacement of the laugh track, in a way that resembles feature film more than other TV sitcoms. Some examples of this highly varied music include
ABBA,
Sum 41,
Kenny Rogers,
Lords Of Acid,
En Vogue,
Phil Collins,
Quiet Riot and
Queen.
*
Jane Kaczmarek has been nominated for an
Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series in every year
Malcolm in the Middle has been broadcast. She has yet to win.
*
Frankie Muniz and
Bryan Cranston have received Emmy nominations for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series and Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series, respectively.
Malcolm in the Middle was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series in 2001.
Malcolm In The Middle won "Best International Comedy" at the 2003
British Comedy Awards, beating out favourites such as
Friends,
The Simpsons and
South Park.
Season Releases| DVD Name | Release Date | Ep # | Additional Information | | Season 1 | October 29 2002 | 16 | Extended pilot episode, A Stroke of Genius Featurette, Commentary on select episodes, Gag reel, Deleted scenes, Alternate show openings, bloopers, Dewey's Day Job featurette. |
*Only the first Season of Malcolm in the Middle has been released on DVD.
*Season 2 was going to be released Fall 2003 but was cancelled due to high costs on music clearances [
2].
*One episode featured a remarkable domino sequence set up by Hal, who missed the dominos falling since he closed the door a little bit too hard. The sequence was set up by multiple cameras with no digital editing.
*The Mannkussers are
Danes in the German version.
*Mannkusser is derived from the German word Mannküsser, which means man-kisser.
*Justin Berfield is younger than Frankie Muniz, yet Justin's character, Reese, is older than Malcolm.
*
Official Website of the HFPA and Golden Globe Awards*
Official Website of Emmy Awards*
Music from Malcolm in the Middle*
List of Malcolm in the Middle episodes*
Malcolm in the Middle launches on YTV Fall 2006*
Official FOX Malcolm in the Middle website*
*
Malcolm in the Middle on TKTV*
Malcolm in the Middle Voting Community*
Malcolm in the Middle Voting Community Forums*
Malcolm in the Middle'' French Website*
A site with a list of music used in the series
