The Middle

The Middle is a single-camera comedy about raising a family and lowering your expectations. Middle-aged, middle class and living in the middle of the country in Orson, Indiana, Frankie Heck is a married wife and mother of three who uses her wry wit and sense of humor to get her family through each day intact. Frankie works as a dental assistant, and her unflappable husband, Mike, is manager at the local quarry and her sardonic partner in the daily grind that is raising their average – yes, most definitely average – family.

Between juggling shifts and picking up fast food dinners eaten in front of the TV, Frankie and Mike raise their kids with love, humor and solid Midwestern practicality. Axl, the oldest, is a jock slacker who is beginning his second year of college via a sports scholarship; moving this year from the dorm to a house with his friend and teammate Hutch. Now responsible for his own meals, it's a given that he will continue to come home often and eat his family out of house and home. Then there's the ever-optimistic Sue, their extraordinarily ordinary daughter, who fails at just about everything she tries with great gusto. Now in her senior year of high school, this just might be the "year of Sue" as things may finally start going her way. And finally there's Brick, their quirky son, now navigating his way through his second year in the treacherous times of middle school. He reads constantly, whispers and "whoops" to himself and has always unapologetically marched to the beat of his own drummer. But now that he's getting older, he wonders if he might be missing something, leading him into a misguided effort to be more social. (ABC)