Reese vs. Stevie is the third episode of season seven of Malcolm in the Middle.
Plot
Reese tells Stevie that he is going to beat him up, which puts Stevie on the edge. After Hal catches Dewey smoking, he makes a deal with him that he will stop drinking coffee if Dewey quits smoking. Dewey and Hal engage in a battle, with Dewey drinking a lot of coffee and Hal smoking cigarettes simply because the other is not allowed to indulge in their preferred vice. Meanwhile Lois tries to get Jamie to talk by telling him everything about herself, and eventually has an epiphany about her mother influencing her insecurity all these years. Fed up, and after Lois leaves the room, he speaks his first word that was similar to Francis: "Shut Up."
Quotes
- Malcolm: Reese, you're insane!
- Reese: Am I? They thought Einstein was crazy. Until he started kicking ass! (falls and Malcolm looks confused)
- Hal: Kids go at their own pace. Heck, 6th grade I had a full beard and I still couldn't tie my shoes properly.
- Dewey: This is so degrading. On the way home from school, I almost pulled a cigarette butt out of the gutter.
- Hal: I french-kissed your mother this morning just to lick the coffee off her teeth.
- Lois: You know what Jamie. You talk when your ready to talk. (leaves the room)
- Jamie (annoyed): Shut up.
- [Lois walks in to see Hal and Dewey antagonizing each other.]
- Dewey:[Drinking Coffee] Mmmm. Rich roasted goodness. Suddenly I'm in a French café.
- Hal:[smoking a cigarette] Well I'm with two girls in a speedboat sucking down a smooth blend of fine tobaccos. Mmm.
- Lois:[Catches Hal smoking] HAL!
- Hal:[takes out his cigarette] Dewey's drinking coffee.
- [Lois ignores Dewey since his drinking coffee doesn't equal to what Hal did in breaking his promise not to smoke.]
- Malcolm:[last lines] The Norvet Institute kicked Stevie out for unauthorized use of their equipment and Reese will be ok, but he's not allowed out of bed until he stops seeing four of everything.
- [Hal comes into the kitchen, carrying a trash bin to one of the air conditioner vents where he hides his cigarettes. Opening the vent, the cigarettes all cascade down into the bin. Hal then closes it and leaves.]
- Malcolm: Mom's making dad find the last of his old cigarettes and she's gonna make eat any she finds in the morning so he's pretty motivated. The amazing thing is I got off scott free.
- Lois: Malcolm go change Reese's bedpan.
- Malcolm: Hey, he's my brother.
Trivia
- Hal reveals that he has set up a rule for his sons. Each of his sons get a "One free pass", where if they do something extremely horrible, he'll let it slide without a punishment. Each of his boys was given a free pass before. Francis' one free pass was going to a strip club when he was a young child and handcuffing a stripper's leg to a pole. Reese's one free pass was breaking both of his legs, while roller skating, to the point where they are upright and put behind his head, Malcolm's one free pass was burning his father's hair off, and in this episode, Dewey's one free pass was getting addicted to smoking.
- Reese is shown to be societally obligated against hitting Stevie. However, he was shown to be perfectly fine with punching him multiple times in the episode Dinner Out.
- This episode reveals that Dewey is addicted to smoking in this episode, making him the third member of the Wilkerson family to be addicted to smoking, with the first two being Hal and Francis.
- This episode also reveals that Hal has an addiction to coffee.
- It is revealed that one of Stevie's problems is motor neuropathy. Motor neuropathy is a nerve disability in which the nerves either cease to fire or fire incorrectly, which results in either no mobility or poor movement control.
- A lot of Lois' backstory is revealed in this episode, as she explains that throughout her childhood, she's always been unhappy with who she was and has always been trying to be better, because her mother has always been forcing her to be someone she's not.
- Jamie says his first word in this episode, which is "Shut up".
- The exoskeleton that Stevie wears is based on actual medical studies that are ongoing. Many different universities and doctors are working on assisted movement exoskeletons with a wide range of medical applications. The US military branches actually have some in test phases, being used on soldiers who were crippled in the line of duty.
- Francis' only appearance in this episode, is a flashback to when he was a little kid. He was portrayed by a different actor and only made a non-speaking cameo.
- Lois told the boys that they were forbidden to use pillowcases for a month. However, in the very next scene, they are using pillowcases. To be fair, Lois was only saying this as a cover up for her crying, so she most likely didn't follow through with it.