Wednesday, November 12, 2014

The Middle: The Sinkhole

Well, the Hecks might be back on TV, but things aren't looking good for them.
Frankie (Patricia Heaton) tosses a fork into the sink and it falls to the ground. Brick (Atticus Shaffer) accidentally broke the family lawnmower and Sue (Eden Sher) lacks a physical education credit and might not be able to graduate and thus go to college.
Yes, things certainly suck in the Heck household, but then again, when don't they?
Axl (Charlie McDermott) opts to actually help Brick get out of trouble, and tells him to steal Mike's (Neil Flynn's) wallet. Which he does and no one notices because he's the kid no one notices. But that idea comes back to bite him. He actually loses Mike's wallet and then adds to his plan and steals Mike's car keys which leads Mike to think he's losing his mind.
Then Mike decides to mow the lawn and discovers a bookmark. But then Brick looks like the hero, presently Mike with both his wallet, found near the mailbox and his car keys. Then, the family starts going though his wallet, which he's had since he was a boy. He has a picture of his high school girlfriend, Genie, and no pictures of Sue, but he does have some of Brick and Limestone, the old cat at the quarry. And the location of the death napkin is revealed. It's in Mike's wallet. Frankie tries not to let them read it, but Sue and Axl are too curious, and, just as I predicted, the napkin ends up in a bowl of milk, ruined. Frankie, then, at the request of her children, starts writing another one and urges them to look around the house to see if there is anything, but there is nothing they really want. Because everything sucks. Of course, Axl can't stand Brick taking all the glory for finding the wallet so he spills the beans but Mike doesn't get mad at all. That shouldn't have happened.
Sue does get into a gym class, however, instead of a normal sport, they are doing this ridiculous dance with wood sticks. Sue is horrible so Frankie suggests that she become a stick person, clanking them together in time, but this goes even worse, she trips someone but worse, someone  gets taken away to the hospital on a stretcher. That quick scene was absolutely hilarious.
Sue tries to get her parents to help her practice but that doesn't  go to well, either. However, a miracle happens. Somehow, someway, at the end, she performs a brilliant performance to Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off". Her friends are pleased.
This was a great episode, with many call backs to previous episodes, including the old quarry cat and the often referred to death napkin. Plus, Brick's tick of saying he's lying is gone, replaced with something else. Sue's thermometer, measuring her amount of money set aside for college is also there. But there are some holes, including Sue's miraculous recovery in gym class to why in the world is Axl at home instead of being at college?
That being said, it was still one of the better episodes of the season so far. Grade: A-
Side Notes:
-Sue doesn't earn much money at Spudsy Malones.
-We get a few glimpses of her friends, Becky (Jessica Marie Garcia) and Ruth (Grace Bannon) whom we haven't seen much of lately. They are great characters, always good for a laugh.
-She argues that Wrestlerettes should count as a sport, even though she just made it up, but wasn't everything made up at one point?
-Axl is so sweet, he actually thinks he's responsible now. He's not.
-Because of the broken sink, Frankie is forced to wash dishes with the neighbor's hose and urges her family to drink out of the container and serves breakfast in a community bowl, another funny gag.
-At the end, the family works together to wash the dishes in the bathroom, Brick dumping the scraps of food into the toilet, Axl scrubs them in the shower, Sue drinks them with the hair dryer and Mike stacks in them in the laundry basket. Teamwork, people, teamwork.
-No, seriously, why isn't Axl at college? I can't think of any logical reason for his presence.

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