It’s Always Sunny in Paddy’s Pub: The Worst Bar in Philadelphia”

Before we get deep into the goings on of the Philly gang from Thursday’s ep, I recently interviewed writing partners (and former NBC pages!) Sonny Lee and Patrick Walsh on the Fox lot in Century City, CA and got some fantastic teasers and anecdotes about the current season, all of which will be transcribed and ready to go for your enjoyment soon! On another note, as we were making our way down to the makeshift patio, Glenn Howerton (Dennis) walked right past – only in Hollywood. Glenn also made an appearance on “Talk Show with Spike Feresten” recently. Check it out here.

Don’t forget to check out the first viral video of Sweet Dee and Artemis (wasn’t her detective work in last week’s poop episode genius?!) reenacting the funeral scene of the tearjerker “Steel Magnolias.” Priceless.

In this episode, the gang (minus Frank) finds an extremely negative Zagat’s Guide-like review on the pub in the local newspaper, the Philadelphia Inquirer, calling Paddy’s Pub “the worst bar in Philly.” And because they have nothing better to do than to “yell at each other,” as the review reveals, they decide to confront the reviewer who penned the nasty phrase. In an act of rage (sort of) and frankly, extreme stupidity (what else is new?), Charlie kidnaps the reviewer, a glasses-wearing, young professor-looking Lyle Corman (forgive me if his name is incorrect) in the trunk of his car. The gang decides that they’re just “borrowing him” and Charlie duct tapes the poor man in the only swively chair they have in the office.

Dennis and Dee make the intelligent point – one of the only light bulb moments that actually makes some sort of logical sense – to clean up Charlie’s trace (aka mess) in Corman’s apartment, but accidentally enters the apartment across the hall. In an effort to resolve this massive mistake, they kidnap the neighbor to cover up the first kidnapping. Oh, and while this is happening, Corman’s bladder is about to explode so Mac and Charlie both help him pee by (you guessed it) touching his hoo-ha. In the end though, Corman is released and prints another review in the paper, only this time, he wants to condemn the four by having them survive each other’s insanity, stupidity and self-absorbedness. Whew, did you get all that yet?

While I missed last week’s poop episode, I was able to watch an interesting production video that discussed how the different types of poop were made. (If you haven’t checked that out yet, please do it now! I swear you’ll never look at poop the same again.) Well, this episode certainly was a departure from the crew’s usual antics, such as last week’s. It was funny but the whole time I was watching, there was something missing and found myself wondering where Frank had gone and what he was doing when he wasn’t at Paddy’s Pub or with the three dudes and dudette. Don’t you think that’d be a fantastic twist to have a 22-minute ep sort of centered on Frank’s non-Paddy’s life? Questions like, who does he hang out with and what strip joints he frequents on days off are legitimate inquiries. What are your thoughts on that?

I also worry about Charlie’s upbringing. What did his mom do to/teach him when he was 8 years old, 14 years old, 20 years old? Usually I have a strong stomach for “It’s Always Sunny” humor because the gang is just absolutely and ridiculously dumb but the one gross-out moment I had was when Charlie ate something out of the urinal to prove that the bathroom (which has to be the dirtiest, most disgusting bathroom I’ve ever seen short of porta-potties) was “pristine” – his words, not mine.

Memorable Lines…

* Dennis: “Now a diabetic cat is in play? We can’t catch a break.”
* Charlie: “Did he get kind of hard on us?”
* Dennis (referring to the new bar review): “It’s uh … heavy on the kidnapping aspect.”

What did you think of the Frank-less episode? Did you miss DeVito as much as I did? Are you as worried about Charlie as I am? What are your thoughts on the gang’s reaction to the bad reviews in the Philly newspaper? What about the diabetic cat? Do you think that guys ordering chardonnay should rightfully be called gay? What about the random song they sang at the very end?
— posted by Philiana

GMMR is excited to have Philiana on board to cover “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” for us this season. She’s always sunny and she lives in Philadelphia so it’s a perfect match. (Some of these statements may not be true, but I’ll let you decide which.)