Desperate Housewives Timeline

I just finished watching the latest installment of "Ask Desperate Housewives" on youtube, which you can view here if you're interested. But I'll quickly transcribe the portion that is of interest to me:

Question: I assume the show has always taken place in current day. With the five year jump last season, do we assume it is now 2013-2014?

Marc Cherry: The writers had a long talk about this and I tried desperately not to do topical references. It's whatever time you want it to be. Is it 2012? Is it current? What time is it? I always said the show takes place in a place that doesn't quite exist, in a time that never was. It's based on values of traditional America. It should look modern enough for us to relate to it, but I never try to pinpoint it. Whether we're in the future or whether it's right now, I kind of like it just left up to the audience's imagination.


Upon hearing this, my initial reaction was relief in knowing that the show wouldn't belittle or discredit my own belief that the current season takes place in 2016-2017. However, the more I thought about it, the more the entire thing really annoyed me. First of all, Marc Cherry may not use a lot of topical references, but he has on occasion pinpointed specific times on the show. For instance, there was a very exact reference to the date in the season one episode "Pretty Little Picture" that set that episode in October 2004. Tombstones of departed characters have given exact years of death. In the season five episode "Mirror Mirror," Tom's hospital bracelet read 2012. So pretending that the show isn't set somewhere in the early 21st century is an impossibility.

Second of all, I feel like Marc Cherry is using this idea that the show is set whenever the audience wants it to be as an excuse to be lazy with the timeline. Don't get me wrong; I absolutely love this show and I give the writing staff a huge amount of credit for their continuity in a lot of other areas that are really more important to the cohesion of the show. However, as obsessive as I am about the show, a thing like a bad perception of time annoys the hell out of me.

Here are a couple of examples:

1) The Scavo kids

• In the season one episode "Come In, Stranger," Porter's application for admission lists his date of birth as February 27, 1998. Since "Pretty Little Picture" previously set the show in October 2004, we can assume that "Come in, Stranger" takes place in October or November of the same year. This makes the twins 6.
• In the season three premiere episode "Listen to the Rain on the Roof," the Scavos celebrate Parker's birthday. The fact that Wisteria Lane has a Christmas celebration in episode ten, "The Miracle Song," it's logical to assume that "Listen to the Rain on the Roof" takes place sometime in the late summer or early fall.
• In the season one episode "Love is in the Air," the boys tell Mrs. McCluskey that they're 6 (the twins) and 5 (Parker). The episode takes place on Valentine's Day (in what would be 2005), so this would logically take place a couple of weeks before the twins' 7th birthday. If Parker is 5 and we deduce that his birthday is in the fall, he will be turning 6 in 2005. This means he was born in 1999, about a year in a half after the twins.
• As far as figuring out Penny's birthday, the season one episode "Ah, But Underneath" lists her at 10 months according to Mike's master list of Wisteria Lane residents. If she is 10 months old in early October 2004, then her birthdate is most likely January 2004.

Now, knowing all of this, let's look at the Scavo kids after the five year jump.

• In the season five premiere, there are references to the twins being 16. Assuming that the season begins in the fall (as it usually does) then this means it is 2014. This would coincide with the twins being 16, it would make Parker 15 (or nearly 15) and Penny 10 going on 11. However, since the show makes multiple references to the fact that it jumped five years, that means that the end of season 4 must have taken place in 2009, placing it a year ahead of the current time stamp (at that time).
• In "The Best Thing that Ever Could Have Happened," (aka: the episode that drives me to distraction with its sloppy writing), a flashback has Lynette say that Penny will be born in the fall that Parker starts kindergarten. This is impossible since Parker started kindergarten at the beginning season two when Penny was over a year old. If you went by that time stamp, Parker would be 5 years older than Penny and that simply doesn't work since we know that Parker was 5 in season one.
  
• The next reference given to age in season five is in "In a World Where the Kings are Employers" in which Penny is said to be 9. Even if we ignore any knowledge of what time of year should be Penny's birthday, it is still completely impossible for her to be 7 years younger than the twins as we know that she was already born when they were 6.
  
• At the end of the season, the twins are graduating from high school and heading off to college. "Everybody Says Don't" specifically focuses on the idea of Preston wanting to go to Europe the following year instead of to college. This would mean that the twins are now presumably 18. Logically, this means that season five spanned 2 years time (this is further backed up by the aging of Juanita, but I will argue that elsewhere). If the twins are now 18, then Parker should be close to 17 and Penny 12. Following this concept of ages, that means that season five ended in 2016 and that season six should span 2016-2017.

My primary concern in this instance is how much younger the show seems to be playing Parker and Penny compared to Porter and Preston. While this won't really affect the current season, I fear that next year Parker won't graduate from high school and that will grate on my last nerve. And really, I'd be more interested to see Penny entering her teenage years like she should be rather than remaining in this limbo of preteen anonymity.

2) MJ and Juanita

• Following the logic that season five starts in 2014 thus ending season four in 2009, then that makes MJ's birthday in spring 2009. I would get really specific and say that it was in May, coinciding with Mother's Day, but quite honestly that time stamp made no sense either. It would have meant Susan was pregnant for 12 months. Regardless of this, a spring 2009 birthday puts MJ at 5-years-old at the start of season five.
• In the season six episode "Everybody Ought to Have a Maid," Juanita celebrates her 7th birthday. If season six starts in 2016, this means that Juanita was also born in 2009. This, of course, means that Gaby must have discovered she was pregnant mere minutes after the end of season four. Logically then, Juanita is only maybe six months younger than MJ and they seem to be in the same year of school.
• However, in the season five premiere episode "You're Gonna Love Tomorrow," Carlos says that Juanita is 4. So, the only way that it is remotely possible that Juanita went from 4 to 7 in just 2 seasons is if she turned 5 very soon after the premiere and then season five spanned 2 years as previously stated. That would set her to turn 7 as she did at the beginning of season six.
• On the other hand, MJ was still 5 at the end of season five (according to Susan in the season finale), joining Penny and Parker as the set of kids that didn't age where the others did. Luckily they seemed to have dropped that pretense in favor of making him and Juanita classmates in season six.
  

While all of this is logical when thought out in context, I can only hope that the show has decided to put an end to Juanita's rapid aging. Any more discrepancies will drive me up a wall.

3) The Angie Plotline

Unfortunately I don't have the easy access to the season six episodes that I do to the other seasons, so I have to rely on my memory sans specific references.

• In season six, Angie makes several references to going on the run in 1991. She also makes quite a few references to Danny being born just before or just after she went on the run. But if Danny is 18 (as was stated at the start of the season), this would put him at the same age as the Scavo twins and make his birth year around 1998.

In this instance, I feel like the show just got really, really lazy and completely forgot to account for the five year jump. If Danny was 18 in the present day, after all, then his birthday would be sometime in 1991 (going by the 2009 start of the season). This, more than anything, is what grates on my nerves.


I could give a hundred more examples of timeline inconsistencies that bother or worry me, but I think I've gotten my point across. Mainly, I just wanted to show that while Marc Cherry might claim that the time setting is free-flowing, there is a lot more to giving an indication of the time than topical references. If I had my way, they would hire someone just to track the timeline of the show.

But really, I guess should just be satisfied that I can now date my fanfiction and not feel guilty about betraying the vision of the show.