In my review for the previous episode I talked about the writers having a great idea for the plot of an
episode, but the execution of it was handled rather poorly. With this episode,
the writers took an idea for an episode, which would be The Gang all going out
to dinner, and made it better by having them all go out to eat separately at
the same Italian restaurant. In my opinion, Mac and Dennis having their monthly
dinner that they apparently have together at the same restaurant where Frank
and Charlie are having dinner together, while Dee is having dinner by herself
is a much better idea on the writers’ part than if they had all gone out to
dinner together, in my personal opinion, and that’s honestly what I thought the
episode was going to be about before it aired.
Just when I thought the
writers couldn’t do another episode to show just how bizarre Mac and Dennis’
friendship is in the season five episode “Mac and Dennis Break Up”, which is
one of my favorite episodes of the show, they followed it up with this episode.
In this episode, they established that Mac and Dennis have dinner together once
a month so they can spend some time together without the others. Mac was
apparently so excited for their dinner together that he ended up wearing two
different colognes. Mac wanted to talk to Dennis about getting a karaoke
machine, but Dennis was in a bad mood because their table was right by the
kitchen and he was constantly getting bumped into whenever someone went into
the kitchen or came out of the kitchen. To make matters worse for Dennis, his
chair was wobbly and he was extremely fixated on his chair, which offended Mac.
Frank and Charlie were
having dinner together to celebrate the anniversary of them living together,
which served as a perfect example of how bizarre their relationship is.
However, both Frank and Charlie’s dinner and Mac and Dennis’ dinner were ruined
by the fact that Frank was expecting Mac and Dennis to come over to their table
and pay tribute to them, while Dennis was expecting Frank and Charlie to come
over to his and Mac’s table and pay tribute to them. Mac and Charlie were both
trying to play peacemaker, but they both refused to do that, especially Frank
who told Charlie that he was expecting them to come over and say hi to them
first since he’s the oldest member of The Gang.
Given the fact that the
writers have often portrayed Dee as being rather pathetic, the fact that she
was having dinner by herself felt rather fitting to me. Dee was at the
restaurant to use a Groupon for the restaurant, which was going to expire that
day. Dee was expecting the others to come over and pay tribute to her, but she
quickly believed that they weren’t coming over to her table because they were
making fun of her for being at the restaurant by herself. At one point in the
episode Dee asked the waiter to sit down with her, and she ended up mocking him
when he refused to. Later on in the episode she asked a random guy at the
restaurant to join her, and I have to say that I loved the exchange between Dee
and the guy who was also having dinner at the restaurant, especially when the
guy told the waiter what Dee had told him. Also, I don’t know what the deal was
with the whole thing about everybody wanting the other members of The Gang to
pay tribute to them. I thought it was hilarious though since it was what fueled
most of the humor in episode for me personally as Dennis and Frank were
continually trying to one-up each other throughout the episode.
I actually had dinner by
myself at Applebee’s the night this episode airs, so I can definitely relate to
Dee’s scenes in this episode. Personally, I’ve always felt like whenever you go
out to eat by yourself waiters and waitresses tend to treat you differently and
kind of push you to decide what you want to order very quickly like the waiter
did with Dee and in general aren’t as nice to you as they would be if you were eating
other people, which is something that has always bugged me. However, sometimes
the only chance I have to go to restaurants that I like is if I go by myself,
so I always just try to put up with it, but I digress.
One thing that I especially
liked about the episode was how the waiter took the empty chair from Dee’s
table when Dennis asked for a new chair and dragged it on the floor through the
restaurant, drawing attention to Dee after she had insulted him for being a
waiter. This happened before Dennis, Mac, Charlie and Frank realized that Dee
was also at the restaurant, and I have to say that I’m surprised that they
didn’t realize that Dee was also there once the waiter was dragging the chair
across the restaurant. Also, it was pretty hypocritical of Dee to mock the
waiter about the fact that he’s a waiter given the fact that she’s also a
waitress, but then again, that’s classic Dee to do something like that.
What made this episode so funny
to me is the fact that it not only once again showed how bizarre Mac and
Dennis’ friendship is, it showed how bizarre all of the friendships on the show
are with all of them expecting the others to come over to their tables and pay
tribute to them. I got a lot of amusement out of watching Dennis and Frank try
to one up each other throughout the episode, and I feel like this episode is
worthy of being considered a classic. It also seems like the kind of episode
that would be good to show to someone who has never watched the show before,
because I think this episode does a really good job of showcasing a lot of the
common elements of the show, such as the bizarre friendship between Dennis and
Mac, Frank and Charlie’s bizarre relationship, as well as what Dennis, Charlie,
Mac and Frank think of Dee and how they treat her.
Dennis once again was a
constant source of laughter throughout the episode for me, especially when it
came to him constantly mentioning how he had gone down on a girl at a party at
some point in the past. I thought it was funny that he first mentioned it after
Mac insisted that Dennis pay him a compliment. At one point in the episode,
Dennis sang the Bette Midler song “Wind Beneath My Wings” in front of everyone
in the restaurant as his way of paying Mac a compliment like he wanted him to.
Unfortunately, Mac didn’t realize that Dennis was referring to him when he was
singing until Dennis told him that he had been referring to him. If you ask me,
Glenn Howerton is a great singer.
Another thing that I really
liked about the episode was how Frank tried to bribe the hostess into giving
him and Charlie a good table by giving her some money and shoved it right into
her breasts when he tried to give it to her. It was even funnier when Mac tried
to do the same thing with a waiter later on in the episode when he tried to
shove a one-dollar bill in the guy’s pocket. I thought Mac doing that was funny
for several reasons. First off, I think it’s hilarious that a person would try
to bribe a person with a one dollar bill, but I also thought it was a funny to
way for the writers to once again reference Mac’s questionable sexual
orientation with the way Mac handled the whole situation. I know I’ve said this
before, but I really do think the writers are going to have Mac come out of the
closet at some point in the future.
One thing I’ve always
wondered about is what’s with Frank constantly wearing a toupee? I don’t know
if he does it because he thinks he looks better with a toupee on, but if you
ask me it only makes Frank look weird. None of his toupees have ever been one
bit flattering on him. If you ask me, Frank is better off not wearing a toupee,
but on the other hand from the standpoint of a viewer, it’s always funny to see
Danny DeVito wearing a toupee.
I don’t know why, but the
writers for the show seem to really like having episodes end rather quickly.
That’s never bothered me though, because I’ve come to realize that’s simply a
part of the writers’ writing style for the show. Plus, the writers have always
done a good job of having episodes end rather abruptly, but at the same time
they’ve pretty much always ended episodes in a very effective manner, and that’s
definitely the case with this episode.
The episode came to an end
when Dennis and Mac as well Frank and Charlie ultimately decided to confront
each other about them not paying tribute to each other by dumping food on them.
However, before any of them managed to dump food on each other, the waiter who
had been waiting on them as well as Dee throughout the episode got in the way
and ended up tripping and falling to the ground, spilling spaghetti on himself
in the process due to his shoelaces being tied together. It was at this point
in the episode when Dennis, Mac, Frank and Charlie finally discovered that Dee
was also at the restaurant.
They all laughed at the
waiter falling and spilling spaghetti on himself due to his shoelaces being
tied together and wanted to know who was responsible for tying his shoelaces
together. Dee revealed to them that she had been at the restaurant the whole
time and was the one who had tied the waiter’s shoelaces together. All of the
hostility between them immediately went away as they all laughed at the
situation and decided to all eat together as the waiter continued to lay on the
floor covered in spaghetti, saying that he thought he had hurt himself when he
fell. I have to say that I love the way the writers set up everything that
happened to the waiter earlier in the episode by having Mac tell Dennis that he
hoped one of the waiters would spill spaghetti on themselves, and Dee had also
tried to convince the waiter to tie Dennis’ shoelaces together at another point
in the episode. It was ultimately the waiter’s refusal to do that that prompted
Dee to mock him for being a waiter.
All things considered, this
was a really great episode that took a rather simple idea, which would be The
Gang all going out to dinner, but put a very clever spin on the idea by having
them all go to the same restaurant for separate reasons. As I mentioned
earlier, the episode really did a great job of showcasing Dennis and Mac’s
bizarre friendship, the strange dynamic between Charlie and Frank, as well as
Dee constantly being portrayed as being considered pathetic by both herself and
the rest of The Gang. This episode was full of laughs, and I definitely think
it’s worthy of being considered a classic episode of It’s Always Sunny in
Philadelphia.
That being said, I give this
episode a rating of an A+.
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