Malcolm In The Middle: The 10 Worst Episodes, Ranked According To IMDb

When it comes to Malcolm in the Middle, there isn’t much room for error, as the kids’ pranks that were recipes for disaster were also recipes for ingenious comedy. What makes up the best episodes of Malcolm in the Middle are ones where the children of the family are continuously at the mercy of Lois and ones where Hal acts just as bad.

But the show’s worst episodes come when the side characters are given too much attention and when Lois is unnecessarily mean, as there’s usually a method to her madness. However, it’s hard for the show to go wrong, and while fans wait for a revival season, even the worst of Malcolm can be enjoyed by audiences, as it rarely ever hits a truly low point.

10 Hal Coaches – 7.5

Before he starred in as the sometimes disturbing Walter White, Bryan Cranston was still playing psycho-maniacs, only in much subtler ways. As the title suggests, the episode sees Hal take over coaching Dewey’s soccer team, and after he sees the team get their butts kicked he teaches them to play dirty.

Every member of the team follows suit, and they completely ignore the soccer aspect, opting to just rub their opponents’ faces in the dirt instead. It’s a funny episode, but it sees every character of the show at their worst, and there isn’t any moral compass, as Reese and his brothers end up blackmailing their neighbor, and Piama kidnaps Lavernia’s Parakeet.

9 Jury Duty – 7.5

In “Jury Duty,” Lois is forced into being part of a jury deciding whether or not a man is guilty of stealing a motorbike. Lois votes not guilty just to spite the rest of the jury and make them stay after hours, even though she believes the man is guilty.

Meanwhile, Hal spends his time at home, jealous of Lois because he thinks she’s part of a jury that is determining whether or not a man is a serial killer, and gets consumed by the whole case himself. He even has a cork board covered in newspaper cutouts. It hilariously leads to Abe and Hal arguing about it like it’s a soap opera, but the episode just doesn’t reach the heights of Malcolm’s best.

8 Polly In The Middle – 7.5

Polly is one of the most underrated characters in the series, and the IMDb score of this episode proves exactly that. Being Jamie’s hippie babysitter, Hal tries to set her up with Abe, the complete opposite of her in every way.

It’s hilariously typical of Hal to be so shortsighted that he can’t see that it’s a terrible match. What’s even funnier is her choice between Abe and Craig, the two biggest deadbeats of a show, of which there are many.

7 Stilts – 7.5

Having worked at the Lucky Aide for a while at this point, Malcolm had already been subjected to enough embarrassment, but “Stilts” might be the very worst of the lot.

Lois is one of the strongest TV moms of the era, but she goes too far when she makes Malcolm wear an Uncle Sam outfit and sing in a megaphone to promote the store. The episode’s high point is again during Reese’s scenes, as he’s getting paid $2,500 to do drug testing, and when Hal accidentally spends $800 on phone sex.

6 Softball – 7.4

Being yet another installment in which Malcolm is tormented by Lois while working at the Lucky Aide, it seems as if fans of the show just simply don’t like these episodes as much as others. Malcolm joins the Lucky Aide softball team in order to get a break from Lois’ strict working conditions, only for her to be the head of the entire team.

But the best part of the episode is when Reese tries to break Francis’ record in collecting the most toilet seats from a junkyard while being chased by dogs.

5 Living Will – 7.4

“Living Will” is easily the most morbid episode of Malcolm In The Middle in all of its seven seasons, as Hal is forced to decide whether to keep a person on life support or pull the plug. The humor is in Hal absolutely tearing himself apart, but it comes off more depressing than anything, especially as relatives of the person in the coma are whispering about how much pain the man is in.

However, there is a funny sequence at the beginning of the episode that reveals the origins of what made Hal so indecisive in the first place.

4 Cattle Court – 7.4

There are many times when Hal and Lois were couple goals, and “Cattle Court” just goes to prove exactly that, as Lois is uncontrollably mean when she tells Craig that there’s no chance they’ll ever end up together. But it makes Lois yet again look like the villain, which has always rubbed fans the wrong way.

And being in the final season when there are a lot of changes going on, there are quite a few things about the episode that don’t make sense. Though Lois won a new truck two episodes earlier, she is still driving the old one, and though Reese has a job as a telemarketer in the previous episode, he’s working as a meat packer in “Cattle Court.”

3 Kitty’s Back – 7.2

As Kitty left her family behind to carry out some crazy life experiences, it was hilarious because it was so out of character, as Kitty was always so by-the-book. But she was never the most exciting character, and a full episode based on her return comes off a little tiring.

However, the episode is saved thanks to Reese’s arc, as he gets a full-body sunburn and tries to peel it all off in one go. It’s just as hilarious as it is grotesque.

2 Clip Show #2 – 6.7

Everybody knows that clip shows are the considered worst episodes of a TV series, and the only reason they ever existed was to pad out a season when networks ordered 20+ episodes at a time, and that’s why there isn’t one, but two Malcolm in the Middle clip show episodes. The second clip show comes close to the end of the fourth season, but it at least comes with an interesting narrative that ties all of the clips together.

Hal and Lois are putting together their will, and while trying to figure out which of their children gets what, they think back to all of the times the four kids have borderline ruined their lives. However, as it comes just one season after the first clip show, the episode is ultimately pretty pointless.

1 Clip Show – 6.5

It’s no surprise that the worst show of the entire series is a clip show. There isn’t any interesting plot surrounding the clips, as the boys are simply thrown into a psychiatrist’s office and they recite back a bunch of random stories back to the psychiatrist.

The parts of the show that are generally the most fun, such as Francis or Hal, are barely in it, and Lois is completely absent from the episode except for the flashback scenes. And though the flashbacks are funny, it’s stuff that fans have seen a million times before.