Picture it. Suburban Maryland, 1980-something. A doofy seventh-grader on the fringes of popularity has the worst day of her life and gets stuck with a total dingus as a partner for a huge English project. She comes to realize that her partner is actually pretty cool, but is grossly neglected and facing abuse at home. After promising not to tell, she tells her mom, and the partner/her sister are thrown into an orphanage. Happy ending?
Sophia Petrillo couldn’t make this shit up.
Jessica, a sort-of nerd who’s bffs with a popular girl, gets stuck with Daphne for a creative writing project. Jess = the best writer in the class; Daphne = best artist in the class. Apparently Daphne is Ally Sheedy’s character in The Breakfast Club minus the dandruff. They work on their story by playing with mice and Daphne’s sister, Hope, but Jessica is concerned that they are being abused and/or neglected at home by Psycho Grandma.
Yes, Psycho Grandma truly believes that Dead Father is coming home from Vietnam. It’s pretty freaking sad.
Anyway, Daphne flips her nonsense on Jessica because she has no spine and just sits there when her “friends” rip on Daphne. After a while, D decides to drop out of school at the tender age of 12? 13? because Psycho Grandma says she’s “too smart!” to go, according to Hope. Unfortunately, this information is revealed in a Mickey D’s bathroom where the Plastics are playing with makeup. I can only imagine a soundtrack involving Good Charlotte and Jimmie’s Chicken Shack at this point, with some SR-71 thrown in for good measure.
Daphne is actually dropping out to take care of Hope, because Grandma has lost her ever loving mind. Things get very tense/stressful, and Grandma flips her shit at the local food mart (Giant?) over some pickles and/or peanut butter – Daphne has only collected enough bottles to pay for one. No, I am not making this up; yes, this is heartbreaking.
Daphne makes Jessica promise not to tell anyone about what’s going on, but she talks to her brother and he pretty much tells her if she cares about Daphne at all to do something. So, Jessica tells her mom and shit hits the fan. Grandma goes into the hospital, Daphne and Hope are placed in a maximum security orphanarium, Adlai gives them surgery to make them adequate.. wait, Futurama tangent, sorry. Actually, their orphanage is quite pleasant. Jessica and Daphne win first place in the writing contest. Grandma dies. Hope & Daphne go live with relatives.
This is why I love MDH. Is it really a happy ending, or is it a Gordy happy ending?
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