Hal Sleepwalks is the seventh episode of Season 6 and the 114th episode overall of Malcolm in the Middle. It aired on January 16, 2005.
Synopsis[]
It's Hal and Lois' 20th anniversary and Hal has no idea what to get her. He becomes so paralyzed with stress, that he begins sleepwalking and Reese takes advantage of it. A bully nominates two Buseys for student body president. Meanwhile, Malcolm takes up the guitar.
Plot[]
In the cold opening, Hal and Lois are in the living room playing Scrabble when Hal gets up to get another cup of tea he whispers the letters he has to Malcolm studying in the kitchen. Malcolm tells him about the “jivku” a small featherless bird from southern Africa, Hal thanks Malcolm and tells him he can feel free to blow off curfew that weekend. Hal returns to the game and tells Lois that he was just reading about the jivku. Malcolm states that “jivku” isn’t a real word, but “nazqweb” is a viking toothpaste and Lois got 162 points for it. Lois gets up, likely intending to ask Malcolm for help too.
One morning, Lois tells Malcolm she is leaving for work and asks him to make sure his father gets out of bed since for some reason he hasn’t slept for the past four nights. She claims he can yell “Fire” if he has to, and if that doesn’t work, set one.
In their bedroom, Hal gets dressed so frantically he puts his pants on backwards and wonders why Lois buy him pants without a zipper. When Malcolm informs him they’re on backwards Hal informs him that their twentieth anniversary is coming up and he has no idea what to get her as a present. Malcolm thinks he’s trying too hard and suggests doing something simple like getting a bottle of champagne, watch a sunset and reciting a poem to her. Hal isn’t impressed and states that Malcolm must only use the genius thing on himself. Hal informs him that their twentieth anniversary has to make up for nineteen crappy ones where he put Lois through hell including: making a marching band crowd their room giving her a rude awakening, knocking her unconscious with their closet door trying to surprise her with champagne and arranging for two planes to make a heart in the sky only to crash into each other. Hal claims that the last one wasn't even the low point of the day.
At the schoolyard, Dewey asks Chad if he is trying to make Coach Cleary burst into flames again. He is then approached by Hanson and Zoe who excitedly tell him that they befriended a normal boy named Kyle Rogers who signed them both up for the upcoming Student body president election. Zoe is excited since it is like a dream except without the presence of a crying armless scarecrow. She and Hanson both agree that they won't let competition come between them. As the other Buseys congratulate them, Dewey sees through Kyle's façade and decides to even the score.
As Kyle comes out of the school, he sees Dewey speaking to Mr. Myers, he approaches him and asks if he ratted him out. Dewey says that since Kyle is so into politics he nominated him to run for student body president as well. He admits it was clever making Hanson and Zoe run since they’ll wind up being humiliated. The only thing more humiliating would be losing to them. As Dewey leaves Kyle realizes he has to get serious about the election.
In the kitchen, Lois attempts to clean out a zit behind Malcolm’s ear while he protests in pain and about how no one would even notice it back there.
In the middle of the night Hal grabs Reese and drags him into the kitchen, Reese assuming he is in trouble attempts to argue against any accusations and the only reason he missed so many days of school is because his watch stopped and he thought it was Saturday all week. Hal tells him how he needs to find the perfect gift for his and Lois' upcoming anniversary and is so stressed out he cannot think straight. Reese is unsure if his father is stable or not so he tests it out by telling him his shoe is untied and he ties it except he isn't wearing shoes, Reese realizes that he is sleepwalking and decides to take advantage of it by getting Hal to get him $20 from a secret hiding place (one of the bronze fish ornaments hanging in the kitchen) before asking him to relax and make him a BLT sandwich with avocado and open a bag of chips and a soda and purr like a cat while he eats, when Hal goes to do it with no hesitation Reese sees the amount of power he now holds.
Back at the school, Kyle tells another student that someone has been spreading lies about his campaign and how he doesn’t want to have school on Saturdays and he doesn’t wear pull-ups. Mr. Myers approaches Kyle and is glad he is getting so dedicated to the election especially since most kids think they’re too hip for student government. But he thinks he’ll realize how exciting it can be when he organizes his first recycling drive. As Hanson and Zoe make campaign posters, Hanson admits hoping that Zoe wins. She thanks him and says the same thing for him, although unfortunately she can’t say the same for “Bad Zoe”. Dewey points out a group of kids to Chad who are friends of Kyle’s and believes it would be best if they didn’t vote on election day. Chad agrees to take care of them and warns Dewey to go inside since he probably doesn’t want to see what he’s going to do to them.
In the kitchen, Malcolm approaches his mother and tells her he found the perfect way to protect his opportunity, he bought a guitar and figures if Dewey has musical talent with the piano he must as well. Lois asks him if he really bought it, Malcolm reveals he only rented it for fifteen days but claims he isn’t going to return it. Lois claims that fifteen days will be enough time for him to realize he can't do it. She apologizes and tells Malcolm his brain doesn't work the same way Dewey's does. She states Dewey is a flyer who will simply float and drift through life and things will work in his favour, but herself and Malcolm are burrowers who are at their best when their heads are down and are grinding through a mountain of drudgery. Malcolm doesn't believe she knows what he'd be good at before he does it and asks how he'd be at a few activities. She tells him he'd be bad at scuba diving, good at mountain climbing and a disaster at flamenco dancing. She informs him that she’s not trying to hurt his feelings, she’s just giving him the facts. Malcolm states it's a good thing she wasn't John Lennon's mother, Lois claims if she were John Lennon's mother, he'd still be alive.
Malcolm is practicing his guitar in the garage when Reese wanders in, he tells Malcolm he'd be willing to forget what he saw if he tells him all that he knows about sleepwalking. Malcolm states that people who sleepwalk usually suffer from an overwhelming amount of stress, Reese leaves satisfied.
Reese enters the kitchen and when he sees Jamie playing with a toy hammer and workbench he gets an idea.
Cast[]
- Jane Kaczmarek as Lois
- Bryan Cranston as Hal
- Christopher Masterson as Francis
- Justin Berfield as Reese
- Erik Per Sullivan as Dewey
- Frankie Muniz as Malcolm
Guest Stars[]
Recurring[]
- Cameron Monaghan as Chad
- Danny McCarthy, Jr. as Hanson
- Amy Bruckner as Zoe
Cameos[]
- Soren Fulton as Kyle
- Terence Bernie Hines as Mr. Myers
- Derek Cox-Berg as Classmate #1
- Tashana Haye as Classmate #2
Trivia[]
- Francis does not appear in this episode.
- This episode reveals that Hanson's first name is "David".
- Second episode to use censored bleeps (Dirty Magazine).
- Lois and Hal finally admit that Dewey is musically talented.
- In Red Dress, Dewey says that he can understand what dogs are saying. In this episode, Zoe says “dogs don’t lie to me”, implying that she can also understand dogs.
- Bryan Cranston's character Walter White also caused a midair plane collision in the Breaking Bad season 2 episode "ABQ". Also, Hal's father is named Walter Wilkerson.
- The first episode to air in 2005, which would be the final year of production of the final season.
Errors[]
- In the scene where Hanson and Zoe are fighting, there are some shots in which Hanson, who is mostly offscreen, has his hands in the position of his motorcycle. However, his hands are on his sides in other shots.
- Malcolm walks in an the family is watching TV. The camera cuts to Malcolm reaching for the remote. In this shot, the TV is turned off, yet there is still sound from the TV playing and Malcolm still turns the TV off.
- There are a lot of events that happen in this episode, which cause plot holes in the series that contradict with events from previous and future episodes.
- Francis was born on the day Hal and Lois got married (Flashback). Since this was their 20th anniversary, That means that this episode must have taken place on his birthday and Francis is 20 years old, turning 21 in this episode. Additionally, Francis' birthday is never mentioned in this episode. This is the second episode to take place on their anniversary and make no mention of Francis' birthday. (Red Dress)
- However it is entirely plausible Hal and Lois postponed their engagement until after Francis' birth since he doesn't turn 21 until No Motorcycles.
- In the episode Hal Quits, Malcolm takes a test which tells him that he could be good at anything he does. However, this episode proves he's bad at music.
- In this episode, it's established that Lois is always right when telling her boys that they won't be good at something. She briefly tells Malcolm that "Flamenco dancing would have been a disaster" if he tried it. Later in the series, however, Malcolm takes up dancing and proves to be extremely talented at all forms of it, including flamenco dancing. (Bomb Shelter)
- In Dewey’s Special Class, they say that the Buseys don’t have recess with the rest of the school because they make them too sad, but in this episode, they are having recess with the rest of the school. It is entirely possible that the decision was overturned after Mr. Sheridan quit.