My Name is Earl

2005 - 2009

Earl Hickey wins the lottery, then gets hit by a car, and while he's in the hospital recovering, his wife leaves him for her lover. When Earl sees Carson Daly on TV talking about karma, he decides to change his life. He makes a list of all the bad things he's done and vows to make things right so karma will stop kicking his ass.

Stars: Jason Lee, Ethan Suplee, Jaime Pressley, Nadine Velazquez, Eddie Steeples
Created by: Greg Garcia
Tags: quirky

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Episode Tropes

Season 1

Beauty Pageant: Episode 6, "Broke Joy's Fancy Figurine" (2005). Earl wants to make up for blowing up Joy's figurine, but Joy tells him he can't because you can only get one of those figurines by winning the Prettiest Pretty Princess mother and daughter beauty pageant, so Earl decides to help the former champ and her daughter win, but Joy wants to win the figurine back herself so she can get Earl to buy her a hot tub instead, so she pretends to have a dead mother in an urn full of cigarette ashes and enters as a daughter.
Election: Episode 9, "Cost Dad the Election" (2005). When Earl's dad, Carl, ran for mayor to prevent airplanes from being re-routed directly over his house, his opponent used dash cam footage of Earl assaulting a police officer in a smear campaign that ruined his chances, so Earl tries to make it up to his dad by entering him in the next mayoral election, but somehow he manages to blow it again, and Carl loses again, but Earl is encouraged by the fact that Carl bailed him out of jail for the first time in six years.
Mail Order Bride: Episode 12, "O Karma, Where Art Thou?" (2006). Earl is making up for robbing Jasper's pawn shop, and Jasper proudly tells him that he's "online" now and introduces Earl to his "Russian bride," Tatiana, whom he ordered over the internet.
The Magician: Episode 13, "Stole P's HD Cart" (2006). At Earl Jr.'s birthday party, Crabman puts ona magic show to entertain the kids. After he guesses the card Randy picked five or six times, Randy admits he thought Crabman asked him to pick a color.
Trapped: Episode 13, "Stole P's HD Cart" (2006). To make up for Ralph burning down Pops's hot dog cart, Earl gets the old gang back together to steal $10,000 worth of stuff from Winky Dinky Dogs, the company that paid Ralph to do it. Ralph decides they should steal a giant copy machine so he can sell it to a guy who prints counterfeit money, but when the gang tries to get it out of the copy room, it gets wedged in the door, trapping them all inside.
Witness Protection: Episode 19, "Y2K" (2006). In a flashback to New Year's 2000, Harry Monroe enters the witness protection program and becomes Darnell Turner, who still loves cheese, but nobody can know.

Season 2

Not Since the Incident: Episode 2, "Jump for Joy" (2006). Earl wants to borrow money from Chubby to bail Joy out of jail, but Chubby will only give Earl the money if he gets Catalina to dance at his club again, and Catalina refuses because the last time she danced, a man had a heart attack and died.
Act of God: Episode 6, "Made a Lady Think I Was God" (2006). When Earl and randy are trying out their new walkie talkies, their mean, nasty neighbor, Millie, hears Earl in her hearing aid and thinks he's God. So Earl takes advantage of it and tells her to do things like wax his car and bring all her silverware to him and Joy.
Witness Protection: Episode 7, "Mailbox" (2006). Joy finds out Darnell is in the witness protection program, and his real name is Harry Monroe, and she throws him out because he'd been lying to her.
Lie Detector: Episode 8, "Robbed a Stoner Blind" (2006). Joy practices trying to fool a lie detector for her criminal case, and while she's wired to it, she accidentally reveals that she's lying to Earl.
Misspent Money: Episode 9, "Born a Gamblin Man" (2006). When Earl's gambling addiction makes her late for her shift at Club Chubby, Earl promises to wire her money to her family back home, but instead, he gambles with it, and Catalina gets pulled over for speeding to get to work on time, and because she doesn't have a license (because she's undocumented), she gets arrested.
Anger Management: Episode 9, "Born a Gamblin Man" (2006). Joy's lawyer sends her to an anger management group to help her learn to control her temper for her upcoming trial, and her only takeaway is that her anger isn't her fault.
Fear of Flying: Episode 10, "South of the Border: Part Uno" (2006). When Catalina gets deported, Earl and Randy decide to travel to her country and take her home. They get passports and board a plane, but when the flight attendant gives the safety presentation, Earl is too scared to fly and runs off the plane. They get their old pediatrician to give Earl some drugs to help him relax, but the plane is delayed for hours, and the drugs wear off just as the plane is taking off, and Earl tries to run for it and has to be physically restrained by the crew.
Green Card: Episode 11, "South of the Border: Part Dos" (2006). When Earl and Randy get separated while looking for Catalina in her country, Earl runs into her uncle, who for some reason tells Catalina that Earl is going to marry her so she can go back to America. When Randy finds out he's devastated, so Earl purposely fails three challenges he has to pass to marry Catalina so that Randy can marry her instead.
Murphy Bed: Episode 14, "Kept a Guy Locked in a Truck" (2007). Earl decides to do something to make up for helping Joy keep a guy named Josh locked in a truck, so he brings a masseuse to his apartment, but when he gets there, he finds that Josh was crushed to death when his Murphy bed retracted while he was sleeping in it.

Season 3

Amish Paradise: Episodes 21-22, "Camdenites" (2008). Earl wants to make things up to all the women he's wronged, so he decides to help the Camdenites, an Amish-like community, for showing their young women such a good time that they didn't come back home after their sojourns into the real world. He and Randy take a Camdenite woman named Greta under their wing, and while Earl tries to show her the horrors of the world, Randy falls for her and shows her everything he thinks is cool. Ultimately, Greta decides to stay, but Earl still makes it up to the Camdenites by sending them Billie.

Season 4

Make-a-wish: Episode 1, "The Magic Hour" (2008). Joy makes "Make-a-wish" T-shirts for her boys to wear to the grand re-opening of Mystery Fun Land and teaches them to say "I'm dying" in an attempt to avoid standing in line.
Big Brothers Big Sisters: Episode 8, "Little Bad Voodoo Brother" (2008). Randy blames Earl for his never getting a baby brother, so to make it up to him, Earl tries to sign Randy up for "Big Bros Little Bros," but he's rejected, so instead, he becomes a big brother to Catalina's nephew, Oscar, who recently arrived from their country. Unfortunately, Oscar turns out to be a creepy little voodoo kid.
Replacement Pet: Episode 14, "Got the Babysitter Pregnant" (2009). Joy accidentally drives off with Mr. Turtle ont he roof of her car, so she buys another turtle to replace him, but when Joy finds Darnell holding a funeral for the replacement turtle, thinking it was his beloved Mr. Turtle, she feels badly and confesses what she did.
Witness Protection: Episodes 15-16, "Darnell Outed" (2009). Earl ruined Joy's opportunity to be on Fear Factor, so he tries to help her achieve her dream of being famous by getting her on "Estrada or Nada," but she gets eliminated and throws a fit. When Darnell runs out on stage to stop join from attacking the judges, he accidentally ruins his Witness Protection cover, so the whole family has to get new identities.

Character Tropes

Mild Mannered Man-child: Randy Hickey - Played by Ethan Suplee.
Frenemy: Ralph Mariano - Played by Giovanni Ribisi.
The Gaucho: Pierre - Played by Ernie Grunwald in season 2, episode 15, "Foreign Exchange Student" (2007).