The Middle: One Kid at a Time

Finally, a good episode of The Middle.
Here, after a crazy evening with all three kids in the car, fighting over what to do and which restaurant to eat dinner at, Frankie and Mike decide to focus on each kid at a time. And that's exactly what they do.
Axl, being the oldest, is up first. Though he is reluctant at spending time with his parents, he decides to see how far he can push this. He decides to go play paint ball, which is going pretty well until he disappears. Mike finds him making out with his girlfriend in her car. Naturally Mike is furious that he ditched his parents for some random girl (I love when the audience knows more than the characters), so Axl finally tells them that Cassidy is his girlfriend and he wants to spend all of his time with her.
The next day is spent with Sue and she takes full advantage of it, even making shirts with a picture of all of them on it, which was incredibly funny. After spending the whole day, even waking up before dawn so they could watch the sun rise, Sue wants to see Frankie's old prom dresses which are at Aunt Edie's house. Frankie reluctantly agrees. Instead of being shocked at how dated the dresses are, Sue loves them and even tries one of them on (it fits her much too well) and then she finds Frankie's old high school yearbooks. Here Sue learns that Frankie was a cheerleader (she tries to explain that it was only for her senior year) and on prom court. This, at first, devastates Sue, but then she realizes that this means that there is cheer-leading DNA in her blood, which means that she will never give up. Great, just great.
For Brick's day, both Mike and Frankie are exhausted but they still try to give Brick his special day, but ultimately fail because they don't want to drive to the special convention in Indianapolis and then shoe shopping doesn't go well either. Brick explains to his mother that he wishes that they would treat him just like Sue and Axl, but they ran out of energy by the time they came around to him. However, when they get home and Brick simply throws his stuff on the floor, they yell at him which they've seldom done before. As Brick walks to his room, he smiles, happy with how everything turned out.
This episode was wonderful especially after last week's upsettingly poor one and it didn't rely on guest stars, with only one short appearance from Axl's girlfriend (thanks for bringing her back). This was only one of the really funny shows, especially Sue's segment. The family members learned stuff about each other and they grew because of it. Keep episodes like these coming as it is one of the best of the season. Grade: A