"Meet the Applegates" is yet another attempt to find humor behind the facade of middle-class suburbia, by revealing that a normal family is secretly bizarre. For some reasons these movies almost always center around eating habits. In "Parents" the parents ate human flesh, in "Mermaids" Mom prepared marshmallow kebabs, and in "Edward Scissorhands" the hero had lots of trouble picking up his food. Now we have a family of insects in human form. "Clean up your sugar," Mom tells the kids, "and for dessert you can have some rancid trash I found in a dumpster behind the 7-Eleven." The Applegates, we learn, are insects from deep in the Amazon rain forest - a rare species that can mimic the forms and customs of their hosts, while dining off of their garbage. They are such consummate masters of disguise, indeed, that even their pet is special; it's an insect that can assume the shape of a dog.
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