Warning: This post contains NSFW language and video clips.
That show about the worst people you’ve ever met continues to chug along. Wednesday, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia returns for its 16th season.
It’s an impressive run for a show whose pilot was filmed for $200. It’s Always Sunny narrowly avoided cancellation after its first season, added Danny DeVito to the main cast in Season 2 and has emerged an iconic constant in the television landscape ever since. For nearly two decades, the gang — Mac, Dennis, Dee, Charlie and Frank — have been the genesis of several terrible, nearly brilliant ideas. They’ve created products like Kitten Mittens and Fight Milk, multiple unlicensed Lethal Weapon sequels, brought the worst parts of America to Ireland and above all else, yelled a whole bunch.
In respect of these accomplishments, it’s time to separate the wheat from the chaff. There are currently 164 episodes of It’s Always Sunny that have been broadcast. Roughly 160 of them are pretty good (sorry, “Frank’s Brother” and “Charlie’s Home Alone”). But some clearly rise above the rest, and what began as a top 20 quickly swelled into a top 40-plus.
As a warning, this list is full of NSFW language and clips. You knew this coming into a rundown of It’s Always Sunny episodes. But since this is a family website, particularly when it comes to swears, there are gonna be some PG edits involved that, uh, fail to do some of the best quotes justice.
As for the order of my top 10 however? No regrets. No hesitation. No surrender, and no man left behind.
44
Honorable mention: Who Pooped the Bed?, The Gang Makes Lethal Weapon 6, The Gang Reignites the Rivalry, Charlie Got Molested, Charlie Gets Crippled, The World Series Defense, The Gang Gets Stranded in the Woods, Frank Reynolds’ Little Beauties and Flowers for Charlie
Listen, there are more than 50 very good episodes of It’s Always Sunny. That meant some tough cuts had to be made. Artemis’s thorough (and incorrect) unraveling the poops that have plagued the gang? Sorry, gone. Frank’s introduction in season two? No room for it. Mac’s earnest plea to “have a catch” with Chase Utley, then Dennis following through on that whilst most of the gang is stranded in the woods? Couldn’t make it work.
You’ll also notice this list is a top 43. Why the weird number? Well, some episodes have aged badly and, as you might expect, there’s a lot of offensive topics that come out of a nearly two-decades old cable comedy about terrible people.
Some episodes were considered but ultimately scrubbed from the list due to sensitive (and occasionally downright offensive) language and themes, such as “Dee Reynolds: Shaping America’s Youth” and “The Gang Finds a Dumpster Baby.” So if you’re wondering where your favorite episode is, well, it’s not forgotten.
43
Chardee MacDennis 2: Electric Boogaloo (season 7, episode 7)
Best remembered for: A sequel that doesn’t quite live up to the original but does give us the hideous game “[expletive]s and ladders.”
Choice quote: “All accents are dropped the minute someone gets caught cheating. Yeah, yeah, we have to be able to break them in our native tongue to allow for maximum shame.”
42
Thunder Gun Express (season 7, episode 11)
Best remembered for: Bringing “hanging [expletive]” into the lexicon. Mac’s looks like a button on a fur coat.
Choice quote: “Charlie. He’s my buddy. We sleep together. We hang out together. Once I pooped in the bed. I blamed it on him.”
“I don’t understand this tour.”
41
Mac's Banging the Waitress (season 4, episode 4)
Best remembered for: The introduction of Project Badass.
Choice quote: “What about Connect Four? Connect Four’s a fun game.”
“I don’t like counting.”
“It’s not that much counting. It’s just one, two, three, and then four, you win.”
“But a lot… a lot of times, you got to count that much.”
40
The Gang Gets a New Member (season 6, episode 8)
Best remembered for: Jason Sudeikis, immediately cutting through the gang’s bull[expletive].
Choice quote: “Sir, I am not gonna let you down. I mean, I am gonna start cleaning immediately, immediately! Uh, but first, can I eat the eraser?”
39
The Gang Gives Back (season 2, episode 6)
Best remembered for: An extended basketball montage in which children put the violence they’ve been taught by the gang to proper use (zero points are scored).
Choice quote: “All right, these are for you. And there’s a steel toe in there. Don’t be afraid to use it.”
“Thanks, Dad!”
“I’m not your dad.”
38
The Gang Goes to a Water Park (season 12, episode 2)
Best remembered for: Dee and Mac, crammed into a waterslide tube, a mounting wall of children — and urine — behind them.
Choice quote: “You’ve got like 10 minutes of clean water and then every slide’s basically a urine-delivery system.”
37
The Gang Gets Analyzed (season 8, episode 5)
Best remembered for: Dee ambushing her poor therapist to figure out who’ll wash the dishes.
Choice quote: “She was an angel. Always smiling. That’s because she had no lips, but her mouth was still very much in play.”
36
The Gang Carries a Corpse up a Mountain (season 15, episode 8)
Best remembered for: The gang splintering before coming together in Charlie’s hour of need (featuring a legitimately touching monologue from Charlie Day). And then horribly botching their sole task.
Choice quote: “Are there kids? Oh, [expletive].”
“Oh, that’s good, then. They’ll find the body, and they’ll call the cops. It-It’ll be sort of like a Stand by Me situation.”
“Ah well, that’s nice.”
35
McPoyle vs. Ponderosa: The Trial of the Century (season 11, episode 7)
Best remembered for: Guillermo Del Toro as Pappy McPoyle, commanding a Pocono swallow to claw the eyes from Brian Unger’s perpetually cursed lawyer.
Choice quote: “I’m not an executioner. I’m the best goddamn bird lawyer in the world.”
34
Dee Day (season 14, episode 3)
Best remembered for: Dee getting her own Mac Day and summarily destroying Dennis.
Choice quote: “Do you like hard candy? I have candies. Oh, you know what? Actually, I don’t. Scratch that. I … I threw all the hard candies at those idiot children.”
33
The Maureen Ponderosa Wedding Massacre (season 8, episode 3)
Best remembered for: McPoyles and Ponderosas, coming together over bath salts-spiked milk (and setting the stage for No. 35 on this list).
Choice quote: “Oh my god, Maureen. That was terrible.”
32
The Gang Hits the Slopes (season 11, episode 3)
Best remembered for: A pitch perfect Ski School homage, right down to Dean Cameron.
Choice quote: “Actually, uh… the whole Snow Palace thing was, uh, all for show. I needed to distract the local environmentalist groups while I fracked the mountain.”
31
The Gang Goes on Family Fight (season 10, episode 8)
Best remembered for: An increasingly infuriated Keegan-Michael Key and Charlie’s unlikely cheat code for Family Feud (apologies, Family Fight) answers.
Choice quote: “No! I don’t eat dragon ’cause, uh, it’s-it’s not a meal for peasants, it’s a meal for kings, and I’m sort of a common man.”
30
The Gang Gets Invincible (season 3, episode 2)
Best remembered for: The entire McPoyle clan, dancing around the newly introduced Greenman.
Choice quote: “Hey guys, I’m Donovan McNabb. Whoo. I play quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles. And I’m here to tell you can, too, if you start everyday with a hearty breakfast from McDonald’s. Uh, like the new Sausage Egg McGriddle Value Meal available now for a limited time for under five dollars. Remember guys, real champs eat at McDonald’s. I’m lovin’ it.”
29
The Gang Broke Dee (season 9, episode 1)
Best remembered for: The absolute lengths the gang will go to in order continue gleaning joy from insulting Dee.
Choice quote: “Describe the ways in which you find him attractive.”
“He’s got… he’s got all of his skin, still.”
“Well, I would hope so.”
28
Paddy's Pub: Home of the Original Kitten Mittens (season 5, episode 8)
Best remembered for: The aforementioned kitten mittens, Mac’s obscene towel company and penchant for eating contracts.
Choice quote: “EGG.”
27
The Gang Gets New Wheels (season 13, episode 5)
Best remembered for: Mac and Charlie, absolutely beating the ever-loving (expletive) out of children (who deserved it).
Choice quote: “Oh, well, well, I am gay, but he’s not my boyfriend, ’cause I could do much better than him.”
“Really? Then why don’t you, Mac?”
“It’s difficult out there.”
26
Reynolds vs. Reynolds: The Cereal Defense (season 8, episode 10)
Best remembered for: Science, which is a liar sometimes.
Choice quote: “Then, best of all, Sir Isaac Newton gets born and blows everybody’s nips off with his big brains. ‘Course, he also thought he could turn metal into gold, and deed eating mercury, making him yet another stupid… [expletive].”
25
The Gang Goes to the Jersey Shore (season 7, episode 2)
Best remembered for: RUM HAM
Choice quote: “Ah! Rum ham! Rum ham! Oh, rum ham!”
24
The Gang Hits the Road (season 5, episode 2)
Best remembered for: Dee serenading a teenage hitchhiker with Soul Asylum hit “Runaway Train” thanks to her awful new car’s tape deck.
Choice quote: “I eat stickers all the time, dude!”
23
The Gang Gives Frank an Intervention (season 5, episode 4)
Best remembered for: Gail the Snail’s arrival and the advent of wine in a can.
Choice quote: “If I was holding a wine glass, I’d be spilling wine all over the goddamn place. It would get everywhere. We’re not intervening on Frank for a lack of good ideas.”
22
The Gang Gets Held Hostage (season 3, episode 4)
Best remembered for: A very loose interpretation of what Stockholm Syndrome is.
Choice quote: “Well, look, I don’t want anybody to have to die, but if somebody does, there’s no reason it shouldn’t be Dennis.”
21
Dennis and Dee Go on Welfare (season 2, episode 3)
Best remembered for: Dennis and Dee’s crack addiction and Charlie and Mac’s brief foray into the high life.
Choice quote: “Oh, I’m sorry. Did you get addicted to crack? Did somebody get addicted to crack?”
20
The Gang Dines Out (season 8, episode 9)
Best remembered for: Mac and Charlie’s longing glances across a crowded restaurant floor.
Choice quote: “That’s a classy move. I’m gonna stand up and bow.”
19
The Gang Buys a Boat (season 6, episode 3)
Best remembered for: The implication. Also, Dee’s inflatable tube man dance moves.
Choice quote: “… because of the implication.”
18
Chardee MacDennis: The Game of Games (season 7, episode 7)
Best remembered for: Mac, trying in vain to flip over a game board that’s been nailed to the bar for that very reason.
Choice quote: “Question: ‘Dennis is [expletive]. Why Charlie hate?'”
17
Mac Day (season 9, episode 5)
Best remembered for: Seann William Scott, everything Mac wishes he could be.
Choice quote: “All these years, I’ve been feelin’ like I hate karate and, like, I hate Project Badass, and, like… I hate God. But, like, I realized, you know what I really hate… is Mac.”
16
The Gang Dances Their Asses Off (season 3, episode 15)
Best remembered for: Charlie’s incredible dance to Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away.”
Choice quote: “Oh, that’s it! Your illiteracy has screwed us again!”
15
Mac Bangs Dennis' Mom (season 2, episode 4)
Best remembered for: Dennis trying, and failing, to bed his friends’ elderly mothers and Charlie’s single tear to end the episode.
Choice quote: It’s in the video above.
14
A Very Sunny Christmas (season 6, originally a DVD exclusive)
Best remembered for: A sweaty, naked Frank birthed from a leather couch and the intricate patterns of Simon.
Choice quote: “Of course they’re starting to notice. There’s a grown man crammed inside of a couch.”
13
Charlie Goes America All Over Everybody's Ass (season 2, episode 9)
Best remembered for: Charlie going America all over everyone’s ass.
Choice quote: “I’m gonna rise up, I’m gonna kick a little ass, gonna kick some ass in the USA, gonna climb a mountain, gonna sew a flag, gonna fly on an Eagle. I’m gonna kick some butt, I’m gonna drive a big truck, I’m gonna rule this world, gonna kick some ass, gonna rise up, kick a little ass, ROCK, FLAG AND EAGLE!”
12
The D.E.N.N.I.S. System (season 5, episode 10)
Best remembered for: The deep dive into Dennis’ sociopath behavior as well as Mac and Frank’s remora-like reliance on it.
Choice quote: “What is this ‘swooping in’ business?”
“Oh, that’s my system. The M.A.C. ‘Move-in After Completion.'”
11
Mac and Dennis Move to the Suburbs (season 11, episode 5)
Best remembered for: The incessant chirping sound Dennis ignores solely out of his hatred of Mac and Dennis the dog (and his dog grave).
Choice quote: “You ever been in a storm, Wally? I mean, a real storm?”
10
The Gang Tries Desperately to Win an Award (season 9, episode 3)
Best remembered for: The bar’s new Big Bang Theory lighting, Dee’s horrible comedic timing and Charlie’s incredible closing song, replete with spitting cues.
Choice quote: “I’ve had orgasms! I’ve had tons of orgasms! I’ve had one with your mom, dude! I will strangle you, I’ll stick my goddamn thumb through your eye!”
9
The Gang Wrestles for the Troops (season 5, episode 7)
Best remembered for: Rowdy Roddy Piper, pitch perfect as Da Maniac, living in a station wagon and eating chestnuts.
Choice quote: “They are not responding to the pageantry at all.”
8
Mac Finds His Pride (season 13, episode 10)
Best remembered for: A closing, extended dance scene unlike anything attempted in the series before it.
Choice quote: “Oh my god. I get it. I get it.”
An episode mostly devoid of jokes forced us to invest in Mac’s personal development, “Mac Finds His Pride” is a stunning departure from the 143 episodes that preceded it.
Mac is asked to be the mascot of the bar’s Pride parade float, which helps force him to confront who he is and where he belongs. He’s tasked with syncing his homosexuality, which has spent more than a decade not-so-subtlely boiling to the surface, with his often-obnoxious adhesion to his faith. Even worse, he’s forced to do so with zero support system, as his friends are awful, his mother is apathetic and his father is unloving, unaccepting and in prison.
His solution? An intricate five-minute routine with a dancer who stands in for God, him/her/whatever-self. The routine itself is complex and gorgeous, the two sides flipping between acceptance and antagonism even after Mac’s father walks out of the performance in disgust. In the end, Mac lands in the arms of his partner as she repeats, over and over, “It’s OK.” Cut to Frank, in the audience, eyes wide with the sudden realization he finally understands the man he’s spent the better part of the previous 15 years hanging out with.
After being told multiple times that the father figures in his life “never really got [him],” Mac finds a way to connect to, at the very least, Frank. It’s a beautiful moment of earnestness and personal growth, the antithesis of each and every surrounding thread in the show’s universe. It’s not funny — not especially — but thanks in part to that juxtaposition, it works wonderfully.
7
The Gang Saves the Day (season 9, episode 6)
Best remembered for: A genuinely tearful Pixar-style tale of Charlie and the Waitress’s (imaginary) romance, featuring rats.
Choice quote: “When I found out that Mr. Covington was actually a chick, yeah, I had to have her. I mean, look at her. She’s smart, she’s sexy, she’s hilarious.” — Josh Groban
Every story told is a reflection on what each member of the gang wants out of life. Mac wants to be a hero and spite everyone with his death before ascending to his own vision of heaven. Charlie wants a rat- and child-filled future with the waitress. Dee seeks very, very stupid fame. Dennis wants to be horrible.
Frank? He just wants hot dogs.
6
The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis (season 4, episode 2)
Best remembered for: Figuring out who the brains, looks and wild card of the gang truly are.
Choice quote: “Because I cut the brakes! Wild card, [expletive]s!”
It’s Always Sunny unleashed a rallying war cry for the self sabotaging among us: WILD CARD.
But while that’s the indelible image from this episode, it’s truly a showcase of everything terrible that pollutes each tendril of the gang. Frank destroys an innocent man’s life because he can’t be bothered to do his homework (he also waterboards Dee). Dennis sets an entirely misogynistic plan to buy gas into place and, when getting a loan fails, falls back on stealing the money from his sister.
Charlie tries on a new character to horrifying effect, lowkey terrifying an upscale housewife with his insistence on filling her up. Mac’s attempts to be macho lead to injury. It’s awful. It’s wonderful.
5
Mac and Charlie Die, Parts I and II (season 5, episodes 5 and 6)
Best remembered for: Mac’s wedding dress, the surprising durability of a Dodge Neon and the enduring grossness of the Paddy’s bathroom.
Choice quote: See the very NSFW clip above.
The first offering is superior to the second, but taken together they tell a complete tale. An incredibly stupid one, certainly, but one that weaves several elements together in a disgusting braid.
This is a launched roller coaster, accelerating in seconds after dropping us into Mac’s dad’s parole hearing with the cold open. From there, we get incredible gag after incredible gag.
Mac and Charlie’s video farewell, set to Bon Jovi? Iconic. Mac trying, and failing, to blow up a car in order to create a viable crime scene? Perfect. Dee, forced to take the bus, staring flinchingly into the horrors of Philadelphia public transit? Incredible.
None of that matches up to the complete inanity of the parole board testimony above. But still, the waking nightmare of Charlie’s surprised crows about his detachable teeth comes close.
4
Charlie Work (season 10, episode 4)
Best remembered for: Long, beautifully crafted shots that explain how Paddy’s has yet to be shut down by the municipal government.
Choice quote: “Did you flush your shirt?”
“Yep.”
Longtime director Matt Shakman went with something way outside It’s Always Sunny‘s comfort zone and thoroughly crushed it with his long tracking shots to shed light on Charlie’s value to Paddy’s Pub. Some clever edits make the whole thing look like one perfect 22-minute take, beginning with Charlie’s arrival at the bar to the conclusion of its health inspection — one only made possible by his hustle.
The long breathless story navigates through various twists and turns that showcase Charlie’s competence in this very specific arena. It ends the only way it can, with the rest of the gang willfully ignoring it and even giving Dennis credit for a perfectly crafted prank stool.
3
The Gang Beats Boggs (season 10, episode 1)
Best remembered for: Cindy Brady as desert trash and Wade Boggs as himself, somehow struggling to fill that role.
Choice quote: “Uh, Boggs didn’t just drink enough beer to kill a horse. He also suited up the next day and went 3-for-5, so you’re gonna have to do that.”
An incredible concept, executed to perfection. Tales of Boggs’ drinking ability rival only Andre the Giant’s. Of course the gang, with no real responsibilities and Frank’s bankroll, would see that as a challenge.
Boggs arrives to encourage Charlie en route to victory. Boss Hogg shows up to encourage Dee, who finishes an admirable second. And Dennis excuses himself from the competition for the most D.E.N.N.I.S. of reasons: to separate entirely from the woman with whom he’d just hooked up.
2
Who Got Dee Pregnant? (season 6, episode 7)
Best remembered for: The ostrich.
My god, the ostrich.
Choice quote: (Kaitlyn Olsen’s perfect ostrich noises)
Rashomon, as told by brownouts. Every edition of the story behind how Dee wound up with child is funnier than the last. This is wild, because the first edition — Dennis’ — is pretty damn funny.
Through repetition, Dee grows more bird-like, Frank and Artemis’s relationship more disturbing, Charlie more repulsive and Mac more of a misguided, violent doofus. Then the McPoyle brothers arrive to clear everything up with predictable grace and awkwardness.
“Who Got Dee Pregnant?” brings in a handful of the show’s most reliable supporting players at their peak (sadly, Rickety Cricket is missing) and deploys the funniest scene in the show’s history to date. That’s a top-3 combination, easily.
1
The Nightman Cometh (season 4, episode 13)
Best remembered for: Charlie Kelly writing a full-on musical.
Choice quote: “You want the baby boy’s soul, You gotta pay the troll toll, You gotta pay the troll toll to get in.”
All the best gleeful, glorious and outright stupid traits of this show, all rolled into one hideous musical. “The Nightman Cometh” was so popular it spawned it’s own modest touring production.
Each beat is played perfectly for maximum laughs. Charlie’s one savant talent, keyboards, intertwines with his life’s obsession with the Waitress. The initial — and accurate — suspicion there’s an angle behind Charlie’s play (“But who versus? Who are we doing it versus?”) pays off. Mac’s attempts to play tough guy result solely in laughs. Dee, disrespected as usual, goes rogue to clarify that she’s not sexually interested in children.
There’s a lot going on, and there’s no part about it that isn’t funny. Everything is grimy and hilarious and perfect. Exactly how Sunny should be.
