It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia is a fantastic show. Although nothing will ever measure up to it’s first two seasons, it’s gotten very close. Of four episodes this season, two have been funny and two have been amazingly crying-from-laughing funny. Go online and watch Frank’s Intervention (maybe here also). Classic TV.

The best thing about the show is that it has no redeeming values whatsoever. None. Everything on the show is just awful. Even South Park usually has a lesson. Just reading the descriptions on Wikipedia made me laugh out loud.

The series follows The Gang, a group of five white, semi-alcoholic, unethical underachievers who run Paddy’s Pub, a run-down bar in Philadelphia.

Dennis, Dee (Deandra), Mac, Charlie, and Frank are dishonest, selfish, egotistical, and/or antagonistic, and are often embroiled in controversial issues. Episodes usually find them hatching elaborate schemes, conspiring against one another or others for personal gain or the pleasure of watching their downfall. Their tactics often rely on inflicting emotional and sometimes physical pain on individuals both deserving and undeserving. They regularly use sex to blackmail and manipulate one another and others outside of the group. Their unity is never solid; any of them would quickly dump the others for quick profit or personal gain regardless of the consequences.

Dennis has a strong superiority complex. He is almost wholly unable to empathize and routinely destroys others’ property, betrays his friends, and harshly criticizes the appearance of people in his presence. He even insults and demeans his friends, particularly Deandra and Charlie, on a regular basis and never hesitates to draw attention to their flaws, shortcomings, and past failures. Both his friends and enemies consistently refer to him as “a piece of sh*t” throughout the series.

Charlie is an angry underachiever prone to Al Pacino-styled outbursts. He has poor personal hygiene, lives in squalor, and frequently abuses inhalants such as glue and spray paint. Charlie, like the rest of The Gang, drinks copious amounts of alcohol. In addition, Charlie has abused anabolic steroids, LSD, and amyl nitrate poppers, and has been addicted to powdered cocaine. Throughout the show, Charlie exhibits difficulty reading and writing; The Gang frequently accuses him of being illiterate and calls him “retarded.”Sweet Dee was unpopular in high school due to her severe scoliosis, for which she wore a corrective back brace that earned her the nickname “The Aluminum Monster.” Despite identifying herself as a compassionate liberal, she is characterized as being selfish, greedy, and prejudiced. She is consistently criticized and belittled by The Gang for her appearance (in one episode Dennis refers to her as “The Female Larry Bird”), for her lack of talent, and for being a woman. Dee is usually ignored or ridiculed whenever she presents an idea to The Gang; however, if someone repeats her exact suggestion, it is immediately accepted. In her mother’s will, Dee is told that she has been a disappointment and a mistake (even though she is Dennis’ twin).

Like the rest of The Gang, Charlie has a poor grasp of history and current events, sometimes avoiding a conversation altogether to maintain his dignity.

Although he seeks his friends’ acceptance, Mac takes special pleasure in undermining, physically harming, contradicting, and publicly belittling Sweet Dee at every possible opportunity. Though Mac seems to care more about issues such as abortion, community activism, and parenting than the rest of The Gang, his views on such subjects are invaraiably twisted, ignorant, or prejudiced, and his actions regarding them are always hypocritical and selfish.

Frank claims to have his children’s best interests at heart but he frequently exploits and insults them. Over the course of the series he has pimped out his son Dennis for “no-rules” sexual favors and trained his daughter Sweet Dee to be a boxer so she could fight the daughter of his longtime nemesis. He is especially cruel to Dee, constantly remarking negatively on her age and looks. Frank personally waterboards Dee in Paddy’s men’s room to gain a confession in “The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis.”

He says he went to Vietnam, leading people to believe he fought in the Vietnam War, but Dennis and Dee both remind him that he went to Vietnam in 1993 to open a sweatshop.

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