Pleasant Little Kingdom

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"Pleasant Little Kingdom" is the 143rd episode of the ABC television series, Desperate Housewives. It is the ninth episode of the show's seventh season and was broadcast on December 5, 2010.

Plot[]

Gabrielle is struggling to live with Carmen, but enjoys living with Grace. Carmen and Gabby clash about their daughters and Carmen accuses Gabby of spoiling Juanita and calls her a bad mother. In revenge, Gabby seeks out Bob's legal advice about turning in undocumented immigrants. After discovering that she can legally have Carmen deported but leave Grace with her, as Grace is an American citizen, she calls immigration and tells them of Carmen's whereabouts. However, when the immigration services arrive to arrest Carmen, Gabrielle feels guilty when she sees how much Grace loves Carmen. To make up for her mistake, she poses as Carmen in order to allow Carmen enough time to escape. However, now that Carlos and Gabrielle's home is no longer a safe haven for Carmen and Grace, as Gaby had lied to a government service and used her home to harbor immigrants, Carmen and Grace must leave for Texas immediately. Gaby, Carlos, Grace and Carmen have an emotional farewell and Carmen and Gaby reconcile.

Bree, meanwhile, is oblivious to Keith's plans to propose to her and invites his dad along with the pair of them on numerous dates in order to help him overcome his depression ever since being separated from Keith's mother. However, whilst on a date Bree encounters an old friend who she sets Keith's dad up with. However, she turns out to be less than stable and the date ends badly, when the engagement ring Keith arranged to be placed in the starter course is unveiled amidst all the chaos. Keith is upset with everyone, including Bree, for ruining his engagement plans. Bree goes to Keith's apartment but finds his father, Richard, there, who implies that Bree should be with him instead.

Lynette and Tom are caught in the opening sequence having sex in the nursery by Susan. Susan comments about how large Tom's manhood is, which Tom overhears. However, Tom feels that when discussing Tom with her friends, Lynette does not place enough emphasis on his good, masculine qualities and that she only focuses on the negatives. This disagreement culminates in the homeowners' association meeting with Lynette going into a tirade about just how masculine Tom really is in an exaggerated and patronizing way. It is later revealed that Lynette only ever mentions Tom's negative attributes because she is always being told by the other women how great a guy Tom really is and that she only focuses on his negative qualities as an attempt to forget that she isn't really worthy of him.

Paul Young unveils his plan to build a halfway house for released convicts on Wisteria Lane, realizing that it will de-value his neighbors' property. Throughout the season he has been acquiring numerous properties on the lane. This enables him to bring the homeowners association vote on the rehabilitation center to a deadlock as there are only 15 votes and Paul has 7. In an attempt to pit his neighbors against one another he offers numerous neighbors financial incentives to sell their homes to him in order to secure a majority. This causes those proposed to think about his offer, while those who were not to condemn those who were thinking about it. Lynette tells him he will not be able to destroy the community, to which Paul responds: "I don't have to. You're going to do it yourselves.".

Reception[]

On its original broadcast on ABC, the episode scored 11.359 million of viewers and achieved a 3.6 rating in the adults 18–49 demographic.^[1] With the DVR Rating, this episode is up 1.8 in million of viewers (rising to a total of 13.2 million of viewers) and it was up 0.9 in the adults 18–49 demographic (rising to a total of a 4.5 rating).^[2]

Notes[]

• The episode title comes from a song that was cut from the Stephen Sondheim musical Follies.^[3]
• Although credited, James Denton (Mike Delfino) does not appear in this episode.
• Charlie Carver (Porter Scavo), Joshua Logan Moore (Parker Scavo), Darcy Rose Byrnes (Penny Scavo), and Mason Vale Cotton (M.J. Delfino) do not appear and are not credited.

International titles[]

• Arabic: لطيفة المملكة ليتل (Pleasant Little Kingdom)
• Finnish: Naapuruston uhka (A Neighborhood's Threat)
• German: Schöne heile Welt (A Perfect World)
• Italian: Il buon vicinato (The Good Neighborhood)
• French : Les questions que nous nous posons (Questions which we wonders)

References[]