The Gang Has a Two-Episode Season Premiere
Nobody asked me to review the 16th season of Sunny so I'm taking initiative
Now that Succession has ended, we can finally get back to real television. For a person who has near-zero interest in keeping up with new series, June 2023 is awash in premium Brianna Content — The Idol (or, as I like to call Sam Levinson’s TV ventures, the Slop) and the sixth season of The Eric Andre Show premiered last Sunday, The Righteous Gemstones (praise Jesus!) returns on the 18th, and my long-beloved It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia came back in a two-episode season premiere on Wednesday. As per the subhead of this piece, nobody asked me to review the new season of Sunny — though, I should clarify, I didn’t ask anyone either. Probably because I knew reviewing a weekly TV show that I love would be an easy cop-out way for me to produce consistent content for this newsletter for a little bit.
(Disclaimer: I have never actually reviewed narrative TV before [only season 2 of I Think You Should Leave] so bear with me possibly on this journey?)
It’s been about a year and a half since Sunny wrapped up season 15 — a season I have very wrongly dismissed in private as “more late period drudgery,” for a show “far past its heyday.” I’m probably over a decade-long Sunny fan at this point, could probably call myself a superfan though not quite on the level of fandom or standom. (Interested in an essay on that topic, actually? You’re in luck: I literally JUST wrote one for The Daily Beast!!!) I started watching Sunny sometime in high school and have kept up with it and done more rewatches than I can count in the years since, now regularly listening to their podcast, The Always Sunny Podcast, as well.
With this in mind, and with a recent rewatch in my rearview, I firmly believe the show’s best seasons are 7 through 10, with the series — now having been on the air for nearly two decades — peaking with their magnum opus “Mac & Dennis Move to the Suburbs” in season 11, then trending steadily downhill ever since. Now, I still believe this arc is accurate; the Sunny writers, which include stars and creators Glenn Howerton, Charlie Day, and Rob McElhenney, have lost a little bit of the spark that made their earlier seasons really sing. My feeling is this is just a natural part of them getting older and their show having been on for so long, but I don’t think that the late period Sunny seasons are anywhere near as subpar as I used to.
On a rewatch of the series from beginning to end, in which I revisited seasons 13 through 15 for the first time, I found more nuggets of gold than I had done on the first go. And starting with season 12, episodes like “Old Lady House: A Situation Comedy,” “The Gang Does a Clip Show,” “The Gang Buys a Roller Rink,” and “The Gang Goes to Ireland” (Dennis holding in a COVID cough is easily some of the funniest acting he’s ever done) still showcase some of their best work and plenty of incredible, hysterical moments that prove they very much still have the juice all these years later (there’s just, like, uhh, some pulp in it now too).
Always Sunny debuted season 16 on FXX with a two-episode premiere: “The Gang Inflates (INSANE title) and “Frank Shoots Every Member of the Gang.” Both of these titles bode well for the genuinely wonderful episodes that ensue. It’s likely the best premiere that Sunny has had in a couple seasons (the dreadful Mindy Kaling guest spot premiere of season 13; the mostly forgettable “The Gang Gets Romantic” of season 14; the ham-fisted, topical 2020 satire of season 15). In the season 16 premiere(s), the Gang gets back to basics. No gimmicks or high concepts — just simple, hair-brained schemes and various other little shenanigans with less overbearing focus on “timely” social commentary.
On their podcast, Howerton, Day, and McElhenney have plainly discussed the criticism they’ve received against their later seasons with regards to the social satire some fans feel is a bit forced. The guys rightly counter that criticism with the fact that, well, they’ve always been commenting on real-world issues. Still, I largely agree with the fan complaints. I don’t know what it is about the current era that just doesn’t feel like it gels on Sunny (honestly, plenty of shows and films since the Trump era continue to fail to satirize the moment in a way that elicits anything but desperate eyerolls). But their take on the zeitgeist is rarely as good as it was in their older episodes like “The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis” and “The Gang Solves the North Korea Situation.” Though, not to admonish completely: “The Gang Solves the Bathroom Problem” is pretty funny.
So, “The Gang Inflates” and “Frank Shoots Every Member of the Gang” both feel like a welcome return which plays to the shows strengths, with light timely topics that don’t overwhelm the episode. In “The Gang Inflates,” Dennis and Mac fail to understand the economic (ECONOMIC) concept of inflation as explained by Frank, after the duo reveals to him that they had been renting their last sofa to “save money.” Couches are expensive, after all, but Frank helpfully lets the guys know that they have actually blown nearly $20,000 on their couch over the course of fifteen years. Finding themselves out of a sofa, Mac and Dennis decide to purchase temporary inflatable furniture in the meantime, in order to “decrease their monthly nut” (“nut” is used to refer to “monthly expenditures” here) and “””save money””” by not renting. They end up replacing all the furniture in their shared apartment with inflatables, while cooking up an unclear money-making scheme in which they rent out and/or sell inflatable furniture (it is never really clear what exactly this scheme entails—obviously intentional).
This episode is a particularly ingenious one when it comes to the interwoven B-plots. Dee gets evicted from her apartment, so she starts showing up in her friends’ homes, supergluing her hand to their walls in order to make them let her stay; Mac’s face becomes increasingly swollen due to his unwillingness to part from a tub of rancid “fancy nuts” that he purchased from Costco as a literalized companion piece for his and Dennis’s nut-decreasing goals; Charlie concocts his own scheme that he just wishes everyone would let him explain, teased out as if Charlie has dived into the cyrpto world (the gag here becomes that Charlie doesn’t know the difference between the words “crypto” and “cryptic”). But Frank discovers something huge: Charlie’s notoriously ramshackle apartment has been hiding a full bathroom and bedroom, which Charlie intentionally kept hidden because he likes to “live simple” and not have to “walk a mile” to get to the front door. This portion of the episode is tremendous, and Charlie gets a number of great lines to deliver (the episode’s writing credit has been given to Nina Pedrad) including “I don’t like sleeping in a room with an empty room behind me—it’s creepy,” “I’m gonna have to get a butler,” and, when Frank decides to make the new room his office: “It’s an office now? Are we even zoned for that?”
“The Gang Inflates” wraps up on a high note, and the hits keep coming with “Frank Shoots Every Member of the Gang.” Dennis and Dee devise a plan to part the progressively manic, trigger-happy Frank from his gun, so that he doesn’t kill himself before he can get senile enough to re-write the twins into his will. With the topic of legacy on everyone’s minds after Dennis and Dee return to the bar, having both been accidentally shot in the face, Charlie and Mac both consider what they’ll have left behind to them by their families. The pair stops by the Old Lady House to retrieve an heirloom jar of teeth that had been passed down in the Kelly family, but find that, after Mrs. Kelly starts to remove some of her own teeth as horrific penance, that she gave it away. So, Charlie, Mac, Mrs. Day, and Mrs. Mac, end up embarking on a road trip together to obtain the missing teeth, as well as some letters that Mac’s grandfather had written his father currently in the care of Mac’s Uncle—Donald MacDonald.
The bombshell in this episode is the return of Charlie’s sisters, who are the ones Mrs. Kelly gave the teeth to. That’s right: a single, throwaway line from one of Sunny’s earliest seasons about Charlie having sisters, the effects of which were completely abandoned seemingly in favor of making Charlie an only child, makes a shocking comeback. As a Sunny Pod listener, I have to assume this decision was made sometime after one podcast episode in particular, where the guys laughed about their early-season plot holes and continuity mistakes, implicating Charlie with siblings that were never spoken of again (similar thing with characters on Seinfeld, I’m pretty sure). The decision to make them real, in my humble opinion, was a great one, excusing their prolonged absence to moving to Northern New Jersey, changing their names, and a clear, general distaste for one another. The sisters, Bunny and Candy—twins—live together in a giant house bought with OnlyFans money, part of which involves ASMR videos of them putting their hands in that sacred jar of teeth.
The actresses cast as Charlie’s sisters, Olivia and Isabella Cohen, are pitch perfect as siblings of Charlie Kelly. Diminutive, loud, and as cruel as any member of the gang (they call Mrs. Kelly a slut and Mac the f-slur; “This is so distasteful,” Mac mumbles to himself). Prior to this, Mac had shunted clear efforts from Uncle Donald to form the kind of father-son situation Mac had been robbed of with his dad, the same kind, they discover, Donald had been robbed of with Mac’s grandfather. Donald is also played by Mac’s dad’s actor, Gregory Scott Cummins, but as the complete opposite kind of guy, which is funny in and of itself (Donald makes them a quiche upon arrival). But when Mac and Charlie find out that Donald is also gay and also neglected by his father, Mac shuts him out. It’s incredibly tragic but also, of course, very funny, and marks the return of one of my favorite characters: “Reasonable Charlie.” “This is literally all he’s ever wanted,” Charlie repeats plainly, annoyed, over and over to Donald, as the old man’s efforts to form a relationship with Mac, including having a hallowed game of catch, go bypassed.
Danny DeVito looks to display a renewed sense of joie de vivre in these two premiere episodes. DeVito has occasionally seemed to be sleepwalking through much of the show’s late seasons, appearing somewhat out-of-it compared to his earlier energy levels years ago as Frank. It was likely something he was intentionally doing with Frank’s character, who tends to be very dazed and “not all there” in general. But I had partly chalked it up to DeVito gaining on 80 (please God no), and not having the same spring in his step as he used to. Regardless, at the ripe current age of 78, DeVito displays much of the same vigor as Frank had 10 years ago in these first two season 16 episodes. This is particularly showcased more thoroughly with his Dennis and Dee plot on “Frank Shoots Every Member of the Gang,” in which the siblings take Frank around Philly to give him one last day with his gun, where he increasingly behaves like a dog, pissing on fire hydrants and ends up believing his children want to kill him—which, bleakly, he’s ready to wholeheartedly accept.
I’m realizing I’m fast approaching 2,000 words here. I’m sorry, is this long for a TV show review? I guess I shot myself in the foot by choosing to review two episodes at once, but what else was I supposed to do??? It was a two-episode premiere!!! I’ll try and wrap things up.
My consensus on these first two episodes of Sunny’s sixteenth season are overwhelmingly positive—I laughed out loud for a good chunk of both episodes, found myself both surprised, impressed, disturbed (positive), and, of course, comforted by the return of my TV friends. I would suggest that any longtime fans who chose to abandon late period Sunny (if you’re one of my friends reading this: I’m talking to you) rethink their decision, because this feeling has only been bolstered by the premiere of the new season. Quite frankly, the guys still got it. They know what works, they know what they’re good at, and they know that it’s still funny to the people who love the show—which just also happens to be what makes they themselves laugh. There’s nothing wrong with aiming higher with a better budget and better resources (“The Gang Turns Black” is quite funny). But the show is at its best when it plays things simple, sharp, and darkly, darkly funny (as with “Frank Shoots Every Member of the Gang”), allowing the writers to home in on the absurd minutia that makes the show really tick (like, for example, the “rules” of Mrs. Mac). With the upcoming third episode in this season titled “The Gang Gets Cursed,” I have complete and total faith in what the Gang has in store for us in 2023.
Sorry—not done!!! If you want to keep reading, here are some assorted thoughts/favorite moments from both episodes:
Season 16 seems to be employing “clean-shaven” Mac. I’m not a fan—he needs to have some facial hair. I also don’t like that Rob is so jacked now! Not as jacked as before, but I think it makes Mac’s character less funny. And where the fuck are the Hawaiian shirts??? Other than Fat Mac, here is the ideal Mac Look:
Mac and Dennis immediately sleeping in their new inflatable couch together after replacing all their furniture will do wonders for the MacDennis community.
Also, Mac’s wheezing in his sleep from his allergic reaction to the nuts, and then that cut at the end of the scene to a close-up of Dennis feeling for Mac’s pulse in his neck, followed dryly by “He’s hanging on,” is so, so perfect.
“Move past it” is a line that the show has used before and it always gets me.
Mac fully looking like the Elephant Man at the end of “The Gang Inflates” with the allergic reaction prosthetics.
I really love the relationship that’s been progressively set up between Mac and his mom, even if it’s mostly horrible. I love how the writers have established that the gruff and terse woman contains multitudes through a system of communication that supposedly only Mac can understand—or, is he just imagining it? I actually think Mac’s weird linguistic connection to her is more real than it isn’t (he’s alleged before that she has a great sense of humor, and in this episode she does make a “joke”), and it’s kind of sweet—even though this episode introduces “the finger.” While Mac, Charlie, and the moms are en route for the letters and teeth jar, Mac’s mom puts her finger up at two moments. As Mac explains, this is to calmly signal that she is annoyed, and will burn their arms with cigarettes if further enraged. An already dark episode, it’s more proof that Mac was abused as a child. But obviously the show’s darkest moments are some of its funniest, and the car ride scene is overall a standout in an episode full of standout scenes. And I love the actress who plays Mac’s mom, Sandy Martin.
Dee is sidelined a little in these first two episodes—she’s featured more heavily in episode two but doesn’t get any of the funniest moments, and she’s featured less in episode one but her hand-glued-to-the-wall schtick is great.
Much to his abject shock, Charlie uncovers, when he explains to Mac that he will inherit the jar of Kelly family teeth at the age of 40, that he actually turned 40 a long time ago (Mrs. Kelly also had no idea that her Charlie was long past the age of 40).
There’s a lot of really good physical comedy moments in these two episodes: Mac’s nut allergy reaction, the Gang trying to sit in the inflatable chairs, Charlie mimicking Frank’s physicality while he explains inflation to Mac and Dennis, to make it seem like he also understands economics; of course, Dee’s hand glued to the wall.
“Donald MacDonald from Hamburg”
Their looks are my main gripe. Mac, Dennis, and Dee, all look too clean and put together. They have expensive haircuts and smooth skin. It’s just not believable that someone with perfect curtain bangs lives in a slum