| | Desperate Housewives Season 1The Suicide of Mary Alice Young The show opens with the suicide of Mary Alice Young (Brenda Strong), who narrates the episodes from beyond the grave. Mary Alice's suicide leaves behind a mystery involving her husband Paul Young (Mark Moses), her son Zach (Cody Kasch), and a mysterious toy chest, which Paul digs out from under the family's pool. Ultimately, it is revealed to contain the skeletal remains of a dead woman. The story unravels through Mary Alice's four friends and neighbours. Each has her own storyline that ties into the theme of being a desperate housewife: accident-prone single mother Susan Mayer (Teri Hatcher) trying to find love; perfect housewife Bree Van de Kamp (Marcia Cross), mother of two problematic teenagers, who struggles to save her marriage; married Lynette Scavo (Felicity Huffman) tries to be super-mom to four children while longing to return to her life as a corporate executive; and materialistic, adulterous ex-runway model Gabrielle Solis (Eva Longoria) who tries to stop her husband finding out about her affair, and then discovers she's pregnant. In its first season, the show reveals the mystery of why Mary Alice took her own life and the quest by a mysterious "plumber" named Mike Delfino (James Denton) to find out the fate of his former lover, drug addict Deirdre. By the end of the season, the show resolves the mystery with the revelation that 15 years ago, Mary Alice's name was Angela Forrest, she and her husband bought Deirdre's baby son Dana, and they then fled to Fairview (the town Housewives is set in) to raise the child (now named Zach) as their own. When Deirdre finds them, Mary Alice refuses to let her take him back. Upon being accused of being back on drugs, Deirdre hits Paul (Mary Alice's husband) and goes to get her son. Mary Alice, determined to stop her, stabs her. She dies shortly afterward and Mary Alice checks her arm for signs of drug use (she was clean), and persuades Paul to dismember the body, put it in Zach's toy-chest, and bury it under the pool in their backyard. All this happens while a 4-year-old Zach is watching from the staircase. What Mary Alice does not count on is that one of her neighbours, Martha Huber, learns Mary Alice's secret from her sister, Felicia Tilman (Harriet Sansom Harris), (with whom Mary Alice worked before coming to Fairview). After learning the secret, Martha tries to blackmail Mary Alice. Rather than face this, Mary Alice kills herself. Later, when Paul discovers this, he kills Martha after she tells him she does not regret the results of her blackmail. Paul tells Mike (Deirdre's former lover) this when he takes Paul to the desert, planning to murder him, but leaves him there when he realizes Zach is his son. As a surprising twist, Bree's husband Rex (Steven Culp) dies of poisoning shortly after George Williams, a pharmacist in love with Bree, tampered with his heart medication and Bree intentionally prolonged his attempt to reach medical help. Bree's behaviour is caused by her anger at her husband because she was told by George (who lied), saying that Rex had bragged to his co-workers about their sex life, or more specifically Bree's attempts at being a dominatrix to satisfy Rex's BDSM needs. First Aired: October 3, 2004
Last Aired: May 22, 2005 Notes: - There are 23 episodes in this season.
- There is 1 special episode in this season.
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