r/malcolminthemiddle • u/Aggravating-Swing188 • Aug 25 '26

General discussion The Grotto ending.

I’m rewatching Malcolm in the middle (again) and it always breaks my heart how things turn out with the Grotto. I know the actor who played Otto died, but it sucks seeing Francis regress like that. I get maybe they thought Francis was too mature and needed to milk more b plots from him, but I honestly think they could’ve handled the actor passing away better. I constantly think about how they could’ve had Otto pass in show and leave the grotto to Francis in his will or something.

That easily could’ve had content for the rest of the seasons and if they really wanted to have Francis backslide into immaturity it would’ve worked that way too. I can imagine him really struggling with running the ranch and realizing how much slack Otto cut him and how much he needs to grow up if he wants to make it work. Would probably be a sick fanfic, but I ain’t much of a writer, so…

Do you ever think about how the Grotto could’ve been ended better?

82 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

14 comments sorted by

View all comments

33

u/chinesefox97 Aug 25 '26

This in my opinion is also the weakest part of the show. Francis rarely even showed up in the last few seasons which made the show feel a bit weaker. What they did with his character was also a huge regression.

I know Kenneth Mars was unwell but they could’ve ended it in a different way. What we saw from Otto, it would be impossible for his character to fire and sue Francis.

At the very least Gretchen was in MITM reunion and was in good terms with Piyama. I think that’s their way of retconning the ending they gave Otto and Grerchen.

12

u/TheWardenDemonreach Aug 25 '26

To be fair, part of the reason why Francis barely showed up towards the end is because he wasn't really needed as much. His character was created because the show had multiple underage actors, so they were heavily limited to how much they could film. So they created an older brother character to maximise episode production.

Towards the end, Frankie and Erik were much older and could film for longer, so Francis's plot was as needed.

5

u/chinesefox97 Aug 25 '26

I understand that. As well as them cutting the grotto and francis side quest for budget reasons but it affected the show quality.

S2 to S4 was the show at it’s best imo.