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« It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Episode Recap: "AM vs. FM"/"The Gang Solves the N. Korean Situation"
I thought this was the gang’s strongest pairing of episodes thus far. Lots of good moments. Lots of good Charlie moments, in particular.
"The Aluminum Monster vs. Fatty McGoo"
So this week’s spiteful plan for revenge centered on Dee needing to prove that she was not the biggest loser from high school. That title belonged to her "best" friend, Ingrid. At least in Dee’s head it did, though it sounds like it may have been a tie between the two of them. In those days, Ingrid was overweight (Fatty McGoo), while Dee was in the midst of her back-brace period (The Aluminum Monster).
But when Dee unexpectedly runs into Ingrid, she discovers something extremely depressing: Ingrid is now Skinny McGoo, and she’s way more successful than Dee. The best part of the scene is seeing Dee return to Charlie, who has decided he’s going to shoplift multiple shirts, a hoodie, two hats and a belt by wearing all of them at once.
It was also good to see Judy Greer pop up as Ingrid. I am currently doing my best to plow through my Arrested Development DVDs, so it’s good to see Kitty pop up here.
Dee runs into a slight obstacle in her plan to be a better designer than Ingrid: She’s a terrible artist. As Charlie asks, "Have your hands been smashed with hammers?" But it’s her desire to be a designer that causes Dennis to conduct an experiment in human nature. Dennis believes winners and losers are born that way. To prove this, Dennis (born winner) will design a dress and sell it to Ingrid (born loser), and she’ll be unable to turn him down. Unfortunately for Dennis, Ingrid doesn’t cooperate, but he refuses to accept it. She hates the dress, but he blames the model. Eventually he realizes he is the only person beautiful enough to model his dress. This leads to the most frightening scene involving a man in front of a mirror since Silence of the Lambs when Buffalo Bill does his tuck dance.
Mac and Frank start their own experiment when they start up a sweatshop to make the dresses. Frank has promised to teach Mac how to manipulate people. I’m still not sure if Frank’s instruction that a partition should be built between a boss and his workers was a slight reference to Danny DeVito's role on Taxi as Louie De Palma. I’m going to pretend it was.
Meanwhile Charlie, after shoplifting, is just kind of hanging out in this episode doing the usual stuff: sewing in the sweatshop and getting disturbingly attached to the girl in Dennis’ drawings.
In addition to the funny storyline, they also had a nice final scene where it all came together, which this show often has. As expected, Dennis makes a frightening woman, and he appeared to be smuggling two regulation NBA basketballs in his dress. On top of that, Rick Astley is probably the perfect music to play for a scene involving a man in drag.
"The Gang Solves the North Korea Situation"
I thought this episode had a really nice Romeo and Juliet/West Side Story feel to it: Despite the fighting between the gang and the North Koreans, Charlie and Sun-Li were able to ignore their differences and find love. Throw away Frank wanting to serve moonshine and antifreeze to the customers, Dee having sex with a toothless old man for the rival bar’s microbrew recipe, and a 12-year-old girl nearly involved in a wet T-shirt contest and these stories are exactly the same.
It makes sense that the perfect girl for Charlie would be a 12-year-old. However, she would probably know the difference between the words "pirate" and "private," which Charlie did not. The two best Charlie moments were him thinking his apartment keys might work on the locked door ("How many lock combinations can there be?"), and when Dennis was using him as a battering ram to try to break open the door.
Dee may have had the best line in this episode. She walks in on an argument between Mac and Frank about which color should be considered more dangerous as a threat level and says, "Wow. Color fight."
Does anyone know what song that woman was singing when she auditioned for the talent show? I looked online and came up empty.
Frank’s best line of the night came near the end when he’s trying to shut the Korean bar down so they aren’t competition for the pub crawl. Mr. Kim tells him his daughter is missing, and Frank replies, "Korean broad?"
I loved the fact that when Charlie announced he was engaged to Sun-Li, a girl he had just met, the gang’s only reaction is that she would be a good candidate for the wet T-shirt contest.
Dennis is two-for-two in the "shirtless in an episode" department tonight. This is a disturbing trend.
Once again, I thought they wrapped the episode up nicely. It featured the most uncomfortable moment of the episode: when you realize they are about to have a wet T-shirt contest with a girl who is 12 years old. It also featured the second-most uncomfortable moment of the show: when Frank ends up the wet T-shirt participant after he dives to block the water.
I was a little worried after last week’s second episode, but after this week, I feel a little more confident that this season will be a solid one.
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Sep 28, 2007 1:59 AM
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yeah, way too much shirtless Dennis this season. way too much.
its pretty weird - i usually end up watching the episodes the first time after i come home from a bit of drinking on thursday night and i'm usually disappointed. then i re-watch the episodes sober and i love them.
so, i actually thought the episodes were boring, but i haven't watched them while not under the influence yet - so i officially reserve judgement. otherwise, great season so far. could use more of the waitress, she's always the best at putting charlie down.
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Sep 28, 2007 11:26 AM
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You know that your cast is off the hook funny when you have to cast Judy Greer as the straight man in the episode.
Kaitlin Olsen is the funniest actress in a sitcom on television. Period.
This is the "It's Always Sunny" I know and love. (I'm with you on the glass partition being a "Taxi" shout out.)
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Sep 28, 2007 12:00 PM
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MJK - I am completely surprised that the alcohol has that effect on your appreciation of the show. I would have thought the opposite. Seems like the perfect show for it. Perhaps I should do an experiment with this for the next blog?
Don't get your hopes up, though: even sober, Dennis is still shirtless in these episodes.
BHM - good point on Judy. She was pretty straight in the episode. And yes, I am a big fan of Kaitlin. She holds her own despite the overwhelming amount of testosterone in the cast.
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Sep 28, 2007 6:07 PM
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