Monday Countdown: "Wild Card, Bitches!"

By Paco McCullough

In honor of last Friday’s film, Horrible Bosses, and its star Charlie Day, we’ve decided to do a list of the 5 greatest Charlie-based episodes of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

#5

The Gang Goes Extreme Makeover: Home Edition

While it could be argued that this is not a Charlie centric episode of It’s Always Sunny, it’s included because Charlie delivers one of the greatest lines the series has ever written. When trying to figure out what to do to the little Mexican girl’s room, he suggests making a taco bed, where the girl gets to be the meat in the middle. The level of ignorance displayed perfectly sums up It’s Always Sunny’s style of comedy.

#4

The Nightman Cometh

After the sheer brilliance of the first episode involving the Dayman and the Nightman, “The Nightman Cometh” feels like a bit of fan service. But that doesn’t matter when the fan service is this good. The episode presents Charlie’s struggle to put on a full play of his Nightman rock opera and all the foibles and follies along the way as he deals with the gang and other regulars. Of course, the real joy of this episode is watching songs about the Nightman, obviously a reference to childhood molestation. Besides this, it’s excellent to see others reactions to the insanity of these songs. Danny Devito as the Toll Troll is especially fun.

#3

Charlie Gets Crippled

When the Gang hits Charlie with their car, he ends up in a wheelchair. While Charlie’s miserable, the rest of the Gang realizes just how easy it is to pick up women (men in Dee’s case) if they simply act crippled. While most of the humor in this episode comes from the others acting selfishly, it also gives Charlie a chance to become indignant. As always, Charlie needs a costume if he’s going to act angry- for this episode it’s a Vietnam vet, in later ones a flag jacket or a Serpico costume. This episode is the forerunner to a whole subgenre of It’s Always Sunny shows- the ones where Charlie yells a whole lot.

#2

Sweet Dee’s Dating a Retarded Person

The first episode involving Dayman and Nightman, this episode is highly ranked because of the surprise of seeing Charlie’s insane songs. It’s not just how funny the songs are, but also the fact that they are surprisingly catchy. I remember singing “Dayman” with a buddy days later as we walked around downtown. Charlie and Dennis’s outfits are pretty damn funny too.

#1

The Gang Solves The Gas Crisis

Possibly the greatest episode of the show ever. Mac, Charlie, and Dennis come up with a horrible plan to stockpile gasoline so they can sell it later. When they realize what a stupid plan it is, they realize that they all need specific roles: Brains, looks, wild card, etc. Charlie is, of course, the Wild Card The most classic scene in the run of this show comes at the end of the episode, when they discover that the brakes are cut on the car full of gasoline. Charlie yells, “Wild Card Bitches!” and jumps out of the out-of-control car. Easily the funniest moment of the whole series.


© Tanner McCullough, 2011