As most of you I love the show because I think it´s just hilarious. A great example is of course the clown fight. And though I´m one of the people who don´t like it when Hal goes too crazy, that just cracked me up (btw I didn´t even think he was so crazy in this scene, he´s more crazy when his voice becomes so high and he´s yelling and things like that).
Another thing I love about the show is that (in my opinion) it isn´t clichee at all. Ok, as usually there are 3 kids (I´m excluding Francis and Jamie now) of which the oldest isn´t very bright, the middle child is pretty smart and the youngest is kind of an outcast. BUT ususally the oldest is pretty popular and good at sports. I don´t know if Reese is good at sports, but he definitely isn´t popular. It´s the same thing with Malcolm and Dewey is (or used to be) a little weirdo. Ususally the mother is very caring, lovely and does everything right. Maybe Lois is caring in her special way and she usually does everything right, but people think of her more as a bitch than as a perfect and lovely mother. And even if it sounds weird, that´s one of the things I love so much about the show.
I´m so tired of watching perfect families, where every episode ends in a group hug (like Full house, I hate that show).
It´s so crazy but still realistic. When have you ever seen a sitcom where people dare each other to eat spoiled food from the refridgerator? That´s so funny and I think there are kids who do things like that (when I was younger I also used to do things like that, so I can relate to it).
But still (and this is one more thing I like) they´re not a rotten family. They like each other and even if they fight a lot, they don´t let other people insult one of their family members (like in Lois´birthday, family reunion...). But whenever you can see they actually like each other it´s shown in a very funny way. None of the kids ever said "I love you" (and if they did the other person´s reaction usually was "stop saying that!"), but you can see it by the things they do for each other.
And once again I have to mention the clown fight at the end of "Lois´ birthday". That´s just the greatest example for all the things mentioned above. It´s crazy, funny and you can see how they usually express their love for each other.
Another thing I like (I think I could go on forever
) is that you really never have the impression they´re trying to be funny. This is not only because of the missing laugh track (which was a great idea), but also because there is a lot of subtle humour in this show. And as someone said the attention to details is great, too. It gives you the feeling that you´re watching a real family. And that´s also the reason why I think that people who always watch the show like it better than people who only watch it once in a while. You really have to know the characters to understand everything.