Once again the
writers went the nostalgic route with this episode where they paid homage to the
classic episode from season one “Charlie Has Cancer” much like they did with
episode 8x02 “The Gang Recycles Their Trash” which was a reference to season
four episode “The Gang Solves The Gas Crisis” and to a certain extent the
season three episode “The Gang Sells Out”. While I feel like that was an
excellent episode that did a great job of making a lot of references to
previous episodes without seeming like the writers were using the idea from a
previous episode out of laziness, this episode’s attempt at nostalgia didn’t
work out nearly as well.
The episode began
with Charlie and Mac visiting Charlie’s mother, Bonnie, who’s still living with
Mac’s mother because they wanted her to do their laundry for them as well as
Dee, Dennis and Frank’s laundry. Bonnie was repeatedly telling Charlie that she
needed to tell him something, but he initially ignored her because he only
cared about the laundry. Bonnie finally blurted out that she had lung cancer,
which confused Charlie since his mom doesn’t smoke. However, the cold open
ended with showing Mac’s mother smoking in the background saying that the whole
thing was strange.
Don’t get me
wrong, I didn’t hate this episode, but as I was watching this episode for the
first time I kept feeling like the whole episode had a major “been there, done
that” feel to it, and given the way the episode “Charlie Has Cancer” turned out
I spent the whole time waiting for Bonnie to tell everyone that she didn’t have
cancer after all. Bonnie told him that she wanted to go see a man named Dr.
Jinx who was played by Sean “Diddy” Combs because she believed that he could
cure her cancer. However, she needed the money to see him. Charlie was
skeptical about Dr. Jinx, so he, Dennis and Mac went to see him, and I have to
say that Sean “Diddy” Combs did a great job playing the role, in my opinion.
Charlie, Dennis and Mac ended up leaving because they thought that Dr. Jinx was
a strange man, especially since his doctor’s office was in a warehouse; I
agree, he was downright weird. Although, while Charlie, Dennis and Mac were
visiting him Dr. Jinx treated a rash that Mac had on his arm, which later went
away, leading him to think that Dr. Jinx might be able to help Bonnie after
all.
One of the
things that I liked the most about this episode is the fact that the writers
once again revisited Mac’s religious beliefs. After Charlie, Dennis and Mac
visited Dr. Jinx, Mac suggested that they turn to God and go to church. The
scene where Mac, Charlie and Dennis were at church was definitely one of my
favorite scenes from the episode. My parents raised me in the Lutheran church,
although, my mom was raised in the Catholic Church and converted to the
Lutheran church when she married my dad. Pretty much all of my mom’s siblings have
remained a part of the catholic church, and whenever I go to church with them I
always get confused about when to kneel, when to stand and when I’m supposed to
sit. I could definitely relate to Charlie and Dennis’ confusion in that scene,
and I simply thought that it was a rather funny scene as a whole. Charlie’s
reaction to the priest asking them for money to fix the church’s statue was
also beyond hilarious, and I have to admit that I didn’t think that them
mentioning the statue in that scene would come into play later on in the episode
the first time I watched this episode.
After going to
church and seeing how willing people are to give money to the church, Charlie,
Mac and Dennis decided that they should have a beef and beer fundraiser at the
bar to raise money for Bonnie’s cancer treatments like they had apparently done
in the past. Only this time they decided to call it a “Beef, Beer and Jesus”
fundraiser, and this being It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia they couldn’t just
have the fundraiser. Charlie, Mac and Dennis all decided that the best way to
convince people to donate money was if they had Bonnie wear a bald cap, and have
Artemis use makeup to make her look like she had lesions on her face. Charlie
and Mac also wrote a speech for Bonnie to give at the fundraiser, which was
beyond hilarious due to Charlie being practically illiterate.
In the end, Bonnie
broke down and admitted that she didn’t have cancer after all as she was giving
the speech that Charlie and Mac wrote. It also turns out that Dr. Jinx was
indeed not a doctor, he was only a gardener. Like I said earlier, I totally saw
the whole thing with Bonnie not having cancer coming given the way the episode
“Charlie Has Cancer” ended, and I think that’s a big part of why I didn’t enjoy
this episode nearly as much as I usually enjoy most episodes of It’s Always
Sunny In Philadelphia.
It turns out
that what Bonnie really wanted the money for was to pay for the church statue
to be fixed because she and Mac’s mother were the people who had crashed into
the church’s statue. At first Charlie didn’t understand why she hadn’t just
asked him for the money and told him what the money was really for, but she
explained that she did it because everything that she’s learned, she learned
from him. Even though it bothered me that I found the ending of the episode
extremely predictable, I love that Charlie and the others quickly realized
where she had gotten the idea to tell people that she had cancer when she
actually didn’t. It was great to see them acknowledging their behavior in the past
in this episode just like they did to a more prominent extent in episode 8x02
“The Gang Recycles Their Trash”.
Once again
Dennis was one of the main highlights of the episode for me, especially when it
comes to how he was frequently talking about how he was trying to make himself
feel emotions again. While Dennis hasn’t been written as if he’s a full-on
sociopath so far this season like the writers did last season, I thought that
Dennis repeatedly saying throughout the episode that he was trying to make
himself feel emotions again was a great and funny way to once again showcase
Dennis’ sociopathic tendencies. Dennis’ reaction to Dr. Jinx’s playing that
weird song for him was beyond priceless, but my favorite Dennis moment in the
episode was definitely Dennis’ speech at the “Beef, Beer and Jesus” fundraiser
where he was telling everybody there that he was finally feeling emotions again
only to tell Charlie, Dee, Mac and Frank that he didn’t mean anything he that
he had said after he gave his speech. Glenn Howerton definitely deserves an
Emmy for his acting on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, but sadly I don’t
think that will ever happen.
Frank was acting
rather senile in this episode, and Dee took advantage of that in order to get
money to go see a psychic who had apparently been telling that she was
apparently going to come into a lot of money soon when he had apparently been
refusing to give her the money at first. After Frank and Dee visited the
psychic they were led to believe that Barbara Reynolds (Frank’s wife, Dee’s
mother) was still alive and that she had hid a large amount of her before she
had apparently died. They ended up finding one of Frank’s toupees buried in a
box in the first the place they looked. I have to say that I liked this storyline
for several reasons. First off, I’ve always loved the dynamic between Frank and
Dee, and I’ve always thought that Danny DeVito and Kaitlin Olson play off each
other very well. Plus, I thought it was great that this storyline featured a
brief appearance from the character Mr. Juarez. (He’s the husband/father of the
family whose house The Gang tried to remodel in the season four episode “The
Gang Gets Extreme: Home Makeover Edition”, but in the end Dee was forced to
give Barbara’s mansion to the Juarez family.) This brings me to the next thing
about this episode that I really liked.
Throughout the
episode The Gang was talking about various things that they think are a scam.
For example, Frank thought that psychics are a scam, after Charlie, Dennis and
Mac went to see Dr. Jinx they thought that he was scamming them, and Dee also told
Frank that she thinks property taxes are a scam after Mr. Juarez told them that
the property taxes on the mansion were really high. Those are just a few
examples of things they said were a scam, but I feel like that element of the
episode really showed that It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia is more than just
a really funny show. The writers have always done a great job of tackling
various social and political issues in an extremely funny way, which I think
adds a certain level of intelligence to the writing for the show.
Toward the very
end of the episode The Gang decided to dig up Barbara’s grave to see if her
body was actually in there and if she had indeed buried any money with her,
which Charlie said they could use to pay to have the church’s statue fixed. In
the end, they didn’t find any money in Barbara’s coffin; they only found her
rotting corpse. It turns out that Frank had paid off the psychic to make Dee
think that Barbara was still alive and buried the money in the dog grave all as
a part of a plan to get back at The Gang for saying that he was going senile.
Dee, Dennis, Mac and Charlie’s reaction to seeing Barbara’s corpse was beyond
priceless, but the fact that Frank immediately realized that he had lost
another pair of shoes after he had finished telling them that the whole thing
had been a trick made the ending of the episode even better, if you ask me.
Although, I have to wonder how did Frank manage to constantly lose the shoes
that he had been wearing? That’s just weird if you ask me, but it’s also what
made the whole thing with Frank constantly losing his shoes and having to buy
at least four new pairs of shoes in the span of just one month so funny to me.
All in all, this
definitely wasn’t the best episode of It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, but it
wasn’t a bad episode either. It definitely had its fair share of funny moments.
Dennis was without a doubt one of the main highlights for the episode for me
personally. I can always count on Glenn Howerton to deliver a fantastic
performance on the show. The scenes between Dee and Frank were also thoroughly
enjoyable to watch.
The main problem
that I have with this episode is that this was one time when the writers’ attempt
to go for the nostalgia factor with an episode didn’t work out very well in the
end. Unlike episode 8x02 “The Gang Recycles Their Trash” where they
acknowledged that they were “recycling” ideas from previous episodes and made
it part of the humor in the episode, the writers’ attempt to go for the
nostalgia factor in this episode simply came across as laziness on their part.
There was very little originality when it comes to this episode in my opinion,
which just left me thinking that this episode had a major “Been there, done
that” feel to it. As a result of that, it prevented this episode from living up
to its full potential that it could have had if the writers had added just a
little bit more of a fresh spin on the premise of the episode “Charlie Has
Cancer”.
That being said,
I give this episode a rating of a B.
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