who was locked in the basement on desperate housewives
Betty Applewhite Even several seasons after Betty's departure, her mystery was a target of negative reviews and comparisons. In his review of the fourth season premiere, Matt Roush of TV Guide complimented the addition of Katherine Mayfair (Dana Delany), writing "while she's obviously harboring a dark secret, at least there's no one trapped in the basement."[11] While reviewing the third episode of the fifth season, Tanner Stransky of Entertainment Weekly hoped that, after finding the truth behind the mystery of Dave Williams (Neal McDonough), the audience would not feel "Applewhited", commenting that "After episodes of buildup and rattling chains coming from her basement, the story line was such a disappointment."[12] Four episodes into the sixth season, Ken Tucker of Entertainment Weekly declared that the mystery storyline of Angie Bolen (Drea de Matteo) was suffering from the lack of interaction between the character and the other leading women, similar to Betty's storyline in season two.[13] When Vanessa Williams was cast as Renee Perry, who became the second African-American housewife to be a major character on the series, she admitted to having been a fan of the series during its first year, but stopped watching because of the racially insensitive Applewhite mystery storyline. Williams explained to Entertainment Weekly, "[Betty] had her son in chains in the basement. It was like, 'Really? Do we have to go there with our first Black character?' I honestly fell off the show after that. I think it was just so implausible and just an image that Black folks don't want to see: their child chained and shackled in the basement."[14]