Season 3 - Episode 14
ABC (US)
Frankie has Superbowl fever. She's going to be a volunteer at the game and have the eyes of the world watching her. Of course, that's what she thinks anyway. And if they had gone with that as the storyline, this might have been a better episode.
Unfortunately, what we get is the family at their absolute selfish worst. With their friends and neighbours the (pretty perfect) Donovons on a trip to the big game itself, Frankie is left to put their brand new car in their garage. From there, the whole Heck clan abuses the car for their own selfish reasons. While Mike was only napping, Brick was using it to get some peace from Axl and Sue was using it to practice her driving (without actually driving the car - save for when she accidentally slips the handbreak off and is forced to drive it round the block; probably the funniest scene of the episode), Axl and Frankie both take the car on drives. The end of the episode sees them basically having ruined the car and covered it in crap. I just don't believe that these people are shitty enough to do this. Sure, it's nice when they clean it up together, and the resolution is predictably saccharine, but I just don't think they would have acted like that in the first place.
The best thing about the episode is Sue. She plucks up the courage to tell new boyfriend Matt (introduced last week) that she loves him, and is crushed when he doesn't return the feelings. He eventually does, just having been caught off guard by Sue's gung-ho attitude, but her moping is a huge plus point of the episode - as well as her aforementioned accidental drive round the block. Eden Sher is excelling in the character, who is fast becoming one of my favourites on television just now.
"Hecking It Up" is the Hecks at their worst, but not the show at its worst. It's not the best episode ever, but The Middle is always worth watching.
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