The one hundred thirty-eighth TV show: #594 Malcolm in the Middle
There's something realistically wholesome about Malcolm in the Middle. It has the heart of a family that loves each other, but also the rough way a household of four boys would interact. The parents aren't great - Hal has partially detached, while Lois is the type-A loud mother who seems out of her depth a lot of the time. There's shades of what the Middle later did, but with younger kids, and the cast is a powerhouse- we know what Bryan Cranston can do, and here he goes into everything with wild abandon, Jane Kaczamarek is amazing in the show and the kids are amazingly well cast. The whole series becomes a delight that delivers. The main struggle, at least in these early seasons, is that Francis, the oldest son, is stuck in the military academy - while he gets his own story lines, it feels like an unnecessary separation that makes everything more complicated and doesn't always add much. It's a great show, still, and I'm glad we still have several stations left.