Malcolm in the Middle - The Complete First Season - Region 1 DVD

This three-disc set contains all 16 episodes from the irreverently funny first season. The series instantly toned things down a tad from the pilot episode that saw Lois body-shaving a naked hirsute Hal in the kitchen. But it brilliantly sustains its subversive tone, from episode two, in which the brothers stand united against Lois's increasingly desperate methods to uncover who burned her red dress, to the season finale, in which Malcolm dares to push her down a water slide. Not that there aren't sublimely sweet moments, as in that season finale when Dewey bonds with his elderly babysitter (Bea Arthur!) over Abba's "Fernando." Before you get out your handkerchiefs, said sitter collapses and is carted away in an ambulance. --Donald Liebenson