By David Valdes

Welcome back to Wisteria Lane, the most dysfunctional street to ever be lined with picket fences.  Last we saw the ladies of DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES, life was looking pretty sweet for Susan, whose trailer-side wedding to Mike was the culmination of three years of will-they-or-won’t-they viewer frustration.  Bree was sporting a strap-on pregnancy bump to con her neighbors into believing the baby her teenage daughter will eventually have – while away at a convent – belongs to her.  Gabrielle was kissing Carlos moments after marrying a manipulative politician whose motives are still unclear.  Lynette was reeling from news that she has cancer and Edie, oh Edie, was hanging herself with a silk scarf.

The fourth season premiere wastes no time revealing that Edie did not, in fact, kill herself.  As it turns out, her suicide attempt was just another well-timed ploy for Carlos’s attention.  This puts a wrench in Carlos and Gaby’s plan to run away together on, yes, her wedding night.  Carlos is forced to stay in the hospital looking after Edie while Gaby is forced to grin and consummate.

Susan still has the worst luck in the world, this time finding herself in stirrups being examined by a gynecologist who also happens to be her new neighbor.  I know the writers love to put Susan through the wringer, but as far as uncomfortable situations go, this one takes the cake.  That Teri Hatcher is such a trooper.  Oh, we find out she’s pregnant too.  Here’s hoping we don’t later find out the baby belongs to her Season 3 love interest, Ian.  Who am I kidding?  You know that storyline is already on its way down the pike.


Bree finds herself in a few uncomfortable situations of her own, all thanks to her fake pregnancy belly.  The first run-in occurs in a Macy’s department store where an elderly acquaintance of Bree’s is persistent about stroking her pregnant belly.  After a few polite refusals from Bree and Orson, Bree finally grabs the little old woman by the wrist and orders her to back off.  Her second “pregnancy scare,” if you will, occurs when a barbeque skewer accidentally gets lodged in Bree’s big foam belly.  Forced to improvise in the face of all of their dismayed neighbors, Orson and Bree say it is a gag barbeque skewer.  The neighbors are even more horrified as Orson demonstrates by stabbing Bree in the foam belly.  “Ooh, my baby!” she feigns.  Leave it to Marcia Cross to inject these scenes with such pure comedy.  Forty-two minutes into the season premiere and I already think she deserves the Emmy.

As is often the case, Lynette’s storyline is the most grounded and poignant of the bunch.  Marc Cherry is onto something with a portrayal of cancer that is refreshingly real but not without humor.  Lynette’s husband Tom is not fawning over Lynette or crying at her bedside; rather, he’s sleeping in and refusing to help her look for the wig she wears to cover her bald head.  And when Lynette gets sick because of the chemo at her son’s school play, she does so into a rival mom’s purse.  It seems like cancer’s effect on the Scavo family will not be dramatized or romanticized, and I think that might be smartest decision the writers on DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES have ever made.


But I am forgetting Katherine Mayfair, the overly sunny but stern new neighbor who is actually an old neighbor.  Played by Dana Delany, she disappeared years ago and has just returned with her daughter and a new husband.  Speaking of her daughter, that girl either has the worst memory EVER or Katherine flat-out replaced the girl with a new one.  I am not even going to entertain the thought that the daughter has amnesia.  Remember Mike’s Season 3 bout of amnesia?  DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES wouldn’t dare fall back on that tired plot device again.  And they did the whole stolen baby thing before as well in Season 1.  However Katherine’s mystery unfolds, it is exciting to see someone on Wisteria Lane who can go toe-to-toe with Bree in the passive aggressive bitch department.

What did you all think of the Season 4 premiere?  My favorite line of the night was Bree responding to Andew’s refusal to help her strap on her pregnancy suit with, “I’ll remember this next time you want money for leather pants!”  Has DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES still got your attention or are you done with these ladies’ suburban scandals?