#especially chardee macdennis

[groovygrub]

[hoss-bonaventure]

small brain is shipping macdennis and big brain is constructing a whole l word based narrative involving charlie, dee, and the waitress and their intertwined romantic afflictions with one another

[ghostboyhood]

since we dont know the gangs birthdays (except franks) its fair to say they share it with the actors (until said other wise) right..

do you guys know how much fucking drama that would cause between mac and dennis and dee? their birthdays are one day apart

[sunnykeysmash]

Ok so, the new trailers got me curious, especially here with the whole... trap thing.

Let's just go on a little chill journey about it together, no strings attached.

So... something I do casually to pass the time while deep in sunny fixation is keyword searching in episode transcripts, to see if there's fun connections I can do. So naturally, I look up "trap", to see where else it comes up outside of Gets Romantic and Flowers for Charlie (the first two episodes that come to my mind when talking about traps).

What I found was an interesting connection between three specific episodes:

Mac is a serial killer

Dennis looks like a registered sex offender

Flowers for Charlie

And I wanna go through it. Kind of in random order because I don't know how to structure this (lmao).

Now, these episodes obviously have come out in seasons throughout the years, with the earliest two on s3, and I'm gonna be talking about things I think might happen in relation to these episodes. Parallels, metatext, about things that haven't aired yet. So I may be wrong. Let's get that out of the way. Usual disclaimer, get out now if you don't like rambling, and I'm not responsible for building anyone's expectations, that is on you. This is how I have my own fun. Let's move on.

But talking about these episodes in such a way requires me to acknowledge macdennis as something that's been not only intended, but planted, am I gonna be arguing that this was all intentional the whole time? ...No. ...Yes? Maybe. This pains me to say more than it pains you to read, believe me.

Now by planted I don't mean they ever really planned to have it happen necessarily. I'm talking about the trap aspect of it all. The will they, won't they. The question, the mystery of what's inside the crate. You get me.

I wanna start from the fact that there's fifteen severed heads in the fridge. Severing heads being a metaphor very prevalent in season 15 as we've seen, but especially...

And that's the scene.

Yes, I'm aware.

I'm done. I was in character before, but I'm me now, so you can tell me how good I was.

Oh, okay. Well, you just cut in front of 15 other actresses.

You're welcome. I took a gander at 'em and... ( sever head gesture )

Plus, I do feel like that's what the character would have done, and I've been in character all day. As a matter of fact, don't want to brag, but I've been in character all week.

Fifteen, like the seasons? It could be they were hoping to reach that number to break the record, just like Charlie is shown doing at the start of DLLARSO, attempting to break a record to see how long he can hold his breath for.

Dee: What is going on in here?

Mac: Just laying low and breaking world records. Don't even think about breathing, b¡tch.

Dennis: All right, so here's the deal. Got rid of that child molester. The sеxual predator guy? Yeah, he's gone. He's out of the situation, so my problems are solved. You had a thing too, right?

Dee: Mac's dad. I want your dad out of the bar.

So three things, breaking records, the second Dennis leaving (you know, Dennis Double Life thing), and I do think Luther might be dying this season, as well. It seems to line up to me... we know Mac is going to "collect his inheritance", which he wouldn't really have unless a parent died like Charlie's. He also walked out, so.

But that's impossible, that's season 3. I thought so too.

So I want to bring another example of severed head onto the table... Chardee Macdennis 2. Season 11.

They're asked to sculpt "clues" for the game, and what does each of them sculpt?

Mac: "Cupid's arrow". Which Charlie keeps calling a penis, and which looks strikingly similar to a RPG missile to me, I'll add.

Frank: A heart. Like the heart shaped lock?

Dennis: A woman's head in a freezer, which he says, and I quote, represents "the preservation of love forever and ever".

Keep in mind, there was no theme given for the sculptures, the whole goal was for the teammates to guess what the other was sculpting. Now why are they... love themed?

I just want to say right out of the gate, I don't know what everything means, I'm more so here to draw parallels that I've noticed. I think it's interesting that everyone can draw their own conclusions too.

So, to summarize all three episodes:

In Mac is a Serial Killer, the gang see Mac acting weird, so they start suspecting he's a serial killer.

(I do want to point out Carmen scratches Mac (during sex), which is one parallel with Dennis, but not my overall point.)

Frank and Charlie scour for clues in Mac's apartment, while Dennis tries to use Dee as bait to catch the serial killer. Frank gets a confession out of Mac's mom, and then the gang starts to hatch a scheme (which they call a trap) to "catch" Mac about this, and drive a confession out of him. The truth though, is that Mac is dating Carmen, and doesn't want the gang to find out.

In Sex Offender, Luther is finally out of jail and is visiting a bunch of people. Mac and Charlie see that Luther has a list with their name on it, and panic thinking he's been killing these people and is gonna kill them next. What is really happening though, is that he was actually making amends with the people listed (something that comes back in S16!), and had a surprise prepared for Mac, who "ratted him out". The B plot has Frank moving out because he thinks he can do better than Charlie, so he gets with Bonnie, his "bang maid". Both Charlie and Mac hatch a plan (again called a trap here), a romantic dinner, with very different goals. Charlie wants Frank back and to expose his mom as a cheater (in a situation that actually reminds of the s15 dinner, with the turd in the soup), Mac wants to pair his parents back together so they can raise "happy boys". In the end, Luther gets with Bonnie, which coincidentally does drive Frank back into Charlie's arms, but in the end Luther gets carried away by police. Additionally as we've discussed, there's a second Dennis in this episode, a fake, who is threatened into leaving at the end of the episode.

In Flowers for Charlie, scientists are running an experiment on Charlie who becomes their lab rat, while Dee Mac and Dennis are dealing with a rat problem in the bar, discussing ways to catch and kill it. Charlie starts thinking he's too good for his friends and notices that "they've been using him", Frank enlists the help of the Waitress by setting up a dinner between them, hoping Charlie's deep infatuation with her will pull him away from his new life and the corner he's turned and back to Frank, and when that doesn't work, Frank tells Dee Dennis and Mac that he wants to "drag him back down into the sewer where he belongs". Dee thinks she's stuck to the rat glue trap, but after the rat eats the cheese and scurries away unaffected, thanks to Frank's help she finds that by letting go of the trap, she becomes unstuck. In the end we find the experiment didn't make Charlie smarter, only more arrogant, and perhaps more fascinatingly some other things, like he believes to be a mathematical genius, and writes:

X = 9 + 9 = Box... that's where the cat is.

(9 + 9, like 18? Like the seasons we have confirmed, 18?)

And more.

And in the space of an hour, the subject has lost all interest in a woman with whom he had been in love for years, because of a perceived upidity relative to himself. Perhaps the most interesting were the series of side effects that he believed himself to be having. Uh, debilitating aches and pains. It was all in his mind.

According to this, the more arrogant someone is, the more he forgets about the people he loves, and the more he suffers various pains. Therefore, you need to knock someone down a peg to remind them of their feelings, and make them feel better.

In Mac is a Serial Killer, at the end, Mac is also accused of being two people.

Charlie: I'm sorry, Mac. You can't keep running from this thing. You gotta face this head on! (whispers) I'm gonna get you off this. Don't be afraid to show me your ugly side. All right. Put that away, Frank. You don't need a chain saw. You're talking to an innocent man. All right, Mac. I'm gonna ask you now 'cause I'm tired and hungry. I want to go home. I want to wash my hands of this whole stinking mess. Did you or did you not snap into an alternate and distinct personality... causing you to go on a serial killing rampage?

Mac: What? No.

Charlie: What? Yes, you did. You... All right, Mac. You're crazy, right? You're a crazy person. Sometimes you're two people. Let's see the other guy. Let him out.

Mac: Let who out?

Charlie: The serial killer, Mac! Let the serial killer out!

Mac: I'm not a serial killer!

Frank: Then why all the shady behavior?

So, what is the trap... so far, we've seen that you trap someone either to set them up with someone else (the romantic dinner in DLLARSO, but also the trap in Gets Romantic, and also when Dee sets them up in Break Up by using a lady with giant breasts as bait!), or to draw a confession out of them (like in MIASK, but also Catches a Leprechaun). Perhaps both, at the same time, as there may be multiple people scheming the same thing with different end goals, or different things with the same end goal. Either way, that's the conflict of the trap.

Brief intermission to talk about another episode where the trap comes up. Charlie's Home Alone.

Charlie empathizes with a rat, and saves him from a trap.

'Cause I know what it's like to be caught in a trap now, and it's not okay. I won't let you get caught in a trap, okay?

Takes him in his hand, and eats him (DLLARSO also has talk about Luther looking like he eats people, but I don't have a thought on that yet aside from basic cat eat mouse type stuff, also not everything is Something, but I digress!).

Later a real trap is introduced as part of the rituals, and Charlie steps on it and must free himself. The release lever is at the bottom. He frees himself, but once Brady has the ball, he has to step right into the trap again.

This stepping in and out, again it reminds me of Dennis in Gets Romantic, but since it was a season 13 episode, it may also be Glenn about the show.

But here's something I think, just to spice it up, I think the trap may also be, more in general, a relationship. Right? Dennis has been in one (with Maureen), didn't like it, yada yada. Now Mac talking about banging, that's one thing. Mac getting in a relationship? Suddenly he's ruining everything, getting locked in, that's different. And the scene between him and Dennis in Flowers for Charlie, implies to me that we have two rats and one bait, that the trap involves two people. Like a relationship. Now am I married to this idea, pun not intended? Not really, but it's possible.

Either way, the trap is something that catches rats. Thanks to Flowers for Charlie, both Mac and Dennis can be rats, due to said dancing scene...

Dennis: He scurried away.

Mac: All right, well, when he comes back, I'm gonna smash him up good. Dennis: No, no, Mac, come on. We're smarter than that. That's just gonna spread rat blood and disease all over the place. It's not about brute force. It's about seduction. See, I'm gonna place some enticing tunes for the little guy. And then I'm gonna bait this glue trap with some Brie cheese.

Frank: Because drawing a confession out of someone... is like doing a beautiful dance... a beautiful dance with a chain saw.

When Charlie is framed as the rat in Flowers for Charlie at the beginning, he's dead set on getting the cheese he can't have, and has no interest in the one under the green light. Which reflects the chase. Like cat and mouse.

This experiment, that's being talked about as groundbreaking and that will revolutionize the field, is all about making the subject feel smart due to the constant encouragement, but the subject really isn't.

Mac is not the serial killer. He's not smart enough. He's a dumb person. And dumb people are not capable of serial killing.

In Chokes, it's said that Dennis will see through the ruse, because he's smart, but the truth is that he didn't, because he isn't. It's Mac that heightens his confidence, and it always has been.

And in the sideplot of Flowers for Charlie, Dee Dennis and Mac end up watching "cat and mouse" cartoons to understand how to solve this rat problem. But... a cat was never introduced in the episode prior to this?

The mouse always wins. There's... there's, like, no winning with mices. Cat keeps getting hurt. He gets hurt. Well, it's dangerous, yeah. What the hell are you guys doing? We're trying to watch cat and mouse cartoons to find out how kitty cats deal with their rat issues.

But historically, the cat has always been Dennis... the cat in the wall (through framing and dialogue), and then ongoing with like the painting in s15 and the dead cat in the room and so on. This cat may get out of the wall, or he may die in there. That duality belongs to Dennis. But how can he both be a cat and a mouse? No, I don't have an answer, but perhaps it's up to confidence. If you bring it down low enough for both Dennis and Mac, they're finally both little mouses, and you can catch them in your trap. Not that the trap ever works? In all episodes where it comes up, it either fails (Flowers for Charlie), is painful (Charlie's Home Alone), complicates things (Gets Romantic), or a combination of those (Serial Killer and Catches a Leprechaun).

It's also about method.

How do we lower this guy's confidence, how do we reach rock bottom.

In Flowers for Charlie, Mac's solution is to bash the rat.

In Mac is a Serial Killer, they want to draw a confession out of Mac by torture when they catch him. Using a chainsaw even.

And in Dennis Looks Like a Registered Sex Offender, Dennis takes a good beating because he's mistaken for an awful man that looks like him, as per Dee's plan.

And this in Mac is a Serial Killer:

Dennis: This is the fun part, Dee. This is the part that we've been working up to. This is what all the work has been for. We're gonna follow our victim. And then we're gonna jump her. And then I'm gonna strangle her and you're gonna chop her into pieces.

Dee: Okay, but what are we really gonna do?

Dennis: Huh?

Dee: We're not really gonna kill her. What are we gonna do?

Dennis: Oh, yeah. Oh, shit. That's a bummer. Yeah, you're right.

Dee: Let's just follow her for a little. We'll throw a good scare into her. Figure out what to do later.

Plus, in Charlie Catches a Leprechaun, which is another episode in which a man gets captured with the goal of driving a confession out of him...

Mac: Nasty little son of a b¡tch, isn't he?

Charlie: There's, like, a real bite to him.

Mac: You know what I think we should do? We just rough him up a little bit. You know, just get the truth out of him, just a little bit.

Charlie: It's a great idea.

Mac: We don't want to bruise him up, I just wish we had, like, a hose or something. You know, we could blast the truth out of him. Right?

Charlie: That'd be good...

Setting aside the episode insisting a lot about ancient authentic irish traditions and other parallels I don't have time to get into, this ALL reminds me of course of the plan from the castle about the irish doctor in S15, you know, pour scalding liquid from the murder hole (a predecessor to the glory hole!) and char him.

Dennis: Yeah, so you'll lure him under the hole, where I will, uh, douse him with boiling oil or hot tar or really any scalding substance.

Frank: Wait, you're gonna char the guy? Gonna char him up?

Dennis: Yeah. I'm not gonna kill him or anything, but it's got to be hot enough to be annoying as shit, right? You know what I mean?

Frank: Yeah. Burn him.

Dennis: Uh, he's gonna get burned. But, I mean, Charlie's got to see him lose his cool, so we can expose him as the child-abandoning monster that he really is.

In s15 later, Dennis talks about that incident as "taking care of him". We all giggled at the gay implication of that, but the thing is, Mac is a Serial Killer and Dennis Looks Like a Registered Sex Offender both play with that duality of meaning, as well.

Dee: Could you come take care of me?

Charlie: I'll allow it.

Mac: Uh, yeah. Yeah, I can take care of you.

Dennis: What were you planning on doing to Sandy?

Mac: What do you think, dude?

Dennis: Well, according to this phone transcript, Mac... you were going to "take care of her"?

Mac: Yeah. Take care of her.

Mac: He told me these are people from his past, and he's got to take care of them. And once he takes care of them, he's gonna take care of me.

And it really is like that sick extended metaphor where on one side we have Mac and Dennis, on the other we have death. Same as Dennis' Double Life. You know, "give me dong or give me death". That you can either love someone, or kill them. It reflect the concept of the trap, I think.

But speaking of which...

Frank: Stay away from my bang maid.

Charlie: Damn it, Frank! This isn't about them... Charlie... or Mac or anyone else... this is about you and me, bro. This is about dudes living together, hanging out, sharing their bed and their life...

Mac: No. That's not what this is about! This is about people meeting back up after many years and sparks flying... and families getting back together and raising little boys so they can be happy again!

Much like Clip Show, that same duality. On one side living with Mac (dudes living together, plus Charlie and Frank are often a parallel for Mac and Dennis), on the other, raising Brian Jr (families getting together and raising little boys).

Charlie: Shut up, Frank. You don't know what she wants any more than she knows what you want. You know who knows what you want? I do. I've always known what you want. And I can give you want you want. Just let me give you what you want.

I don't like jumping into specific event predictions because I always get them wrong, and I don't find any fun in that. And while the trap and rats meta is real, I may be completely off with it here. I just like drawing connections.

But speaking of traps and ruses, here's another bit of dialogue that comes to me, in times of need.

Charlie: I see you all fell for my ruse.

Dee: What ruse? You asking us to go on a hike with your dad, and us saying "yes"?

Charlie: Oldest trick in the book.

Dennis: Asking someone to do something?

Charlie: Exactly.

Dee: And then, them doing it?

Charlie: Precisely, yes.

I think traps usually are something you hatch to uncover a ruse.

That's why in all of these examples, the goal of capturing someone is to draw a confession out of them. But they don't work that way, because what the capturer and the captured hold as truth doesn't align. Mac is a serial killer, they expect him to confess to serial killing, but he was just dating Carmen. Catches a leprechaun, they expect him to admit that he is, but he really isn't. Even in Worst Bar in Philly, another ep where they kidnap a guy, they are trying to extort a fake review from the journalist.

So if the trap succeeds, it'll have a different result than intended by who hatched it, and uncover a truth that wasn't the expected one. Just based on statistics, I guess...

If the intended goal is really to hatch a plan to humiliate Dennis, char him or whatever, then what it may actually do is break his cold, calculated shell. But I don't know...

Frank, I am thinking on the physical level, the metaphysical level, the pataphysical level.

So we've all talked about meta and that's fun, but let's talk pataphysical too since Flowers for Charlie mentions it.

That's difficult, as there are over one hundred definitions of pataphysics according to wikipedia.

A few are:

"Pataphysics will examine the laws governing exceptions, and will explain the universe supplementary to this one"

"Pataphysics is patient; 'Pataphysics is benign; 'Pataphysics envies nothing, is never distracted, never puffed up, it has neither aspirations nor seeks not its own, it is even-tempered, and thinks not evil; it mocks not iniquity: It is enraptured with scientific truth; it supports everything, believes everything, has faith in everything, and upholds everything that is."

"Pataphysics "the science of the particular" does not, therefore, study the rules governing the general recurrence of a periodic incident (the expected case) so much as study the games governing the special occurrence of a sporadic accident (the excepted case). Jarry performs humorously on behalf of literature what Nietzsche performs seriously on behalf of philosophy. Both thinkers in effect attempt to dream up a "gay science" whose joie de vivre thrives wherever the tyranny of truth has increased our esteem for the lie and wherever the tyranny of reason has increased our esteem for the mad."

"Pataphysics is science, albeit one with an aesthetic sensibility; it regards “humor” and “the serious” with the same imperturbable gaze. "

"Pataphysics is simply an awareness that everything, including our very selves - is what we pretend it to be."

In other words, truth is not what's actually real, what we do or our past, truth is what we believe it is. Much like identity.

One more.

"You have seen that far from regretting the past I would simply suggest that we improve it…’Pataphysics will always be plunging ahead, precisely because it is static in time, and because time, itself, is retrograde by definition."

So if one is dissatisfied with their past, they can simply change it... by going there. This concept is played around plenty in Clip Show, but I want to talk about something else. I want to talk about Dee Day.

That is the episode where we take off Dennis' make up, but there's something else too.

This is where Dee talks about wanting to do a "retrospective" of her characters.

And the plan to make the ordinance pass, includes the gang stealing the councilwoman keys and setting her clocks back so she would miss the vote.

And look, we do have one flashback promised to us, in the bowling episode if I recall correctly.

"But is there any other canonical way of viewing the future (whether one calls oneself serious, in the profane or pataphysical sense of the word), than as a bouquet of imaginary Solutions – that is, potentialities?"

I forget if I've talked about potential in sunny. The seeds, the puppies, the eggs... always about the potential of life. I think it's fascinating. Like there is an infinite branch of ways in which macdennis could happen, right? And that's the potential. And by bringing it into the text, you're effectively killing it.

But are you, really?

The first time round is a bitter pill

But the second chance is better still

And then we find new seeds to sow

To grow our love we didn't know

There's always new seeds to plant...

But I'm not done with the pataphysical. Oh no, there's more.

There's also the fact that Flowers for Charlie talks about the structure and the foundation. When asked where the foundation is, they respond "on top", but Frank corrects them, on the bottom.

I have a feeling both answers are correct, just like both of Dennis' lives are true, and here's why.

Concepts that embody pataphysical include:

Antimony: An antinomy is the mutually incompatible. It represents the duality of things, the echo or symmetry, the good and the evil at the same time.

Clinamen: A clinamen is the unpredictable swerve of atoms that poet Christian Bök calls "... the smallest possible aberration that can make the greatest possible difference". An example is Jarry's merdre, a swerve of French: merde ("shit").

Syzygy: The syzygy originally comes from astronomy and denotes the alignment of three celestial bodies in a straight line. In a pataphysical context it is the pun. It usually describes a conjunction of things, something unexpected and surprising. Serendipity is a simple chance encounter but the syzygy has a more scientific purpose.

Absolute: The absolute is the idea of a transcended reality.

Anomaly: An anomaly represents the exception. Jarry said that, "Pataphysics will examine the laws governing exceptions, and will explain the universe supplementary to this one." Bök calls it "... the repressed part of a rule which ensures that the rule does not work".

Pataphor: The pataphor is a term for an unusually extended metaphor based on Alfred Jarry's "science" of 'pataphysics'. Whereas a metaphor compares a real object or event to a seemingly unrelated subject to emphasize their similarities, the pataphor uses the newly created metaphorical similarity as a reality on which to base itself. In going beyond mere ornamentation of the original idea, the pataphor seeks to describe a new and separate world, in which an idea or aspect has taken on a life of its own.

Once again this rings true for Clip Show in general, as a concept, but I would maybe dare say this applies to macdennis regarding many associated concepts such as the trap or the crate. In particular, Macdennis as a concept has been morphing and evolving separate to the textual plots, due to heavy metaphor use.

In particular, they're always placed in the role of married couple, in multiple episodes. Break up, Suburbs, Gets Romantic, Mortgage Crisis. It doesn't just say "you are like a married couple", it shows them behaving as one. Therefore, if looked at under a pataphysical lense, that's what they are. That's the reality of it.

Of course, since this whole spiel is born from one word in a single episode from season 9, there's no telling how much it actually matters. It may be a happy coincidence. Does it really matter? (Not in pataphysics).

In a similar sense, we spoke Mac into coming out as audience, because we believed in it as our reality.

And another thing, since I'm riffing a lil bit at this point.

But since Dennis has been intentionally led to portray two separate and apparently opposing realities, the audience is equally divided on him, and as a result both realities keep appearing as true.

So in DLLARSO Mac is stealing Dennis' car and using it without him knowing. If we go with the whole "Dennis' car is his identity" which is very dear and near to me and I basically think of as true at least since Misses The Boat (and this is a s3 ep, which is why I'm saying IF), I'm wondering how this extends in season 16.

Well for starters, we see Mac behind the counter twice just in trailers. That has been, typically, Dennis' spot as the bartender. Very rarely does Mac cross behind, even less so on his own. Notably, it happens in Mac Fights Gay Marriage AND Dennis Gets Divorced (which btw, these two parter titles make it sound like they're the two that got divorced lmao, but um).

Another way in which we see him possibly take Dennis' place (or walk in his shoes! wear his skin, whatever you want to call it), is by the fact Dennis is teaching him the DENNIS system (an altered version I assume?), like passing the torch on to him (and Dee, who wants that place in the gang hierarchy as well...).

Finally, something that may not be a thing at all, but he meets Chase in S16, only Chase thinks he already met Mac. Because Dennis gave him Mac's name in Stranded. I'm expecting some name shenanigans of some kind. (perhaps Mac will use Dennis' name? I'm not banking on that, but how's he gonna explain? that is, unless someone else already did, in his pursue to make amends... well, who knows. you know what they say about assuming)

It's funny because Stranded is an episode all about how saying no brings you misfortune, while saying yes brings you luck. And money. 10.000$ of them specifically, both in Stranded and, casually, the original amount won by Mac with the scratcher.

The amount that... after all the bills, ends up being only 14$ dollars. (like the seasons?)

Stranded is also interesting on its own... Frank avoiding the main road because he doesn't want to pay the toll... Okay, that's enough. Getting off track.

So, final notes, since this is a more speculative and rambly post, and I'm under the impression the metaphors discussed (rats, traps, severed heads...) aren't complete (meaning they're gonna expand on these more in S16), I'm very much hoping everyone chimes in with their thoughts and speculations... perhaps other episodes that you think may fit this... let's throw away the oars and get into it, like, who cares if it ends up wrong, you know? I may come back to this too after the season airs to see what else there was...

[emodennis]

Yeah I totally get what you mean, I am the same with ships unless it's something really bad like incest or whatever i respect peoples ship opinion, like Dennis being shipped with Dee would be the worse one. But i also get what you're saying they do retcon and change things, I am shocked no one ships Dee with the waitress or artemis, given I would think more people would ship Dee with them too. But i am the same I have more strong feelings for MacDennis then CharDee

yeah of course incest ships and especially deedennis are a hard no.

deetress (dee/the waitress) is actually a pretty popular ship you should check out the tag!! there’s also quite a bit of deetress on ao3 as well :) i like them but don’t have strong feelings about them. my strongest feelings are for macden, then charmacden, then charmac and charden hehe <3

[cruelplatonic]

forgive me for overanalyzing a minor thing that's treated as a comedic bit anyway, but a lot of the 'vox controls the finances/the vees rely on vox's credit cards' jokes don't land for me bc i feel like they all have independent income streams and are separately wealthy from their ventures. especially valentino who employs a lot of demons who are probably directly paid in cash

realistically i think the vees financial situation probably looks like sort of shared funds situation that they all, individually, embezzle from, even though it is wholly unnecessary to do that because 1. they're in hell, there's no legal body that would punish them. the only people they're beholden when it comes to this is each other 2. those are assets they functionally have access to no matter who is actually in possession of them. literally a chardee macdennis situation where they build cheating into the rules for each other because they all love cheating so much they construct a way to still technically be doing that. vox is still probably the guy that deals with the minute details of their common finances but both the other vees perceive that less as him controlling the money and more as him being the guy that fucking loves boring paperwork. because, again, they all separately have their own pools of wealth to draw from. vox funding the vees is only true in the sense that he's the one who most often handles the logistics and not in the sense that he's the direct source of their funds and is allocating their access to money

[good-realtor-bad-realtor-dynamic]

This is a much better selection of FYC episodes than their Season 10 Emmy FYC!

The DVD contains Mac and Dennis Move to the Suburbs and The Gang Goes to Hell parts 1 and 2.

For Outstanding Writing, The Gang Goes to Hell*

For Outstanding Directing, Being Frank and The Gang Goes to Hell*

Nice! I can get behind these choices. Suburbs, Goes To Hell especially part 2, and Being Frank are all top-tier classics!

More thoughts:

Not sure why the DVD contains Suburbs and not Being Frank though. Is Suburbs for the acting nominations then? In which case, how the fuck did they watch that episode and pass on Glenn Franklin Howerton III?

*I hope by GGTH for writing and directing, they meant the entire two part episode and not just s11e9, when everyone knows part 2 when they're all locked together in the brig is the superior episode! (By far, imo.) And isn't tank-filling-with-water filming more technical and impressive for directing? However, the s10 Emmy FYC taught me that RCG are 60/40 at picking good episodes to submit, so they may have been stupid here.

If only they could've just sent in one of the parts and then jammed in Charlie Catches a Leprechaun, Frank Falls Out The Window, Chardee MacDennis 2 or just something else in there too to show off how good this season was! But I guess the voting bozos need "context" or whatever. Anyway...

IASIP S11 would've been eligible for the 68th Emmys in 2016, so I looked it up and here are all the shows and people that did get nominations:

They had a real hard-on for HBO in 2016.

Emmy "FYC" DVD Presentation for It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia (Season 11)

[a-a-a-anon]

not a lot of people care about the prophecy anymore but here are my headcanons for a chardee macdennis double wedding:

they had to get married in a joint wedding, obviously. neither party would agree to getting married after the other. the topic was brought up and it led to hours of fighting and the threat of arbitration. each party presented their case to frank so he would be a deal breaker and pick who would get married first, but frank refused to get into that mess. they eventually agreed to do a simultaneous wedding

they frantically plan the wedding in one night, treating it like another scheme. during the course of that night they realize they don't really know a lot of people to invite. in the end dennis is appointed as dee's bridesman and dee as dennis' groomsmaid. mac's appointed as charlie's groomsman and charlie as his. they’re really pretending to treat it like a civilized affair. it's franks job to finance and to walk dennis and dee down the aisle (he's really involving himself for mac and charlie's sake. mac because he's proud of him because of MFHP and charlie because he's been his best friend for the last 20 years. he still thinks the twins are bastard crackheads)

they have 4 separate bachelor/bachelorette parties which are like mini versions of dee/charlie/mac/dennis days. frank complains he should be getting a party too and the gang yells at him that only people getting married get bachelor/bachelorette parties.

on the wedding day, the twins get ready together and charmac get ready together:

the twins are snide - "jesus christ sweet dee u should've gotten something with sleeves. that dress does nothing for ur fat bird arms" "well that blazer makes u look like a duck. it's too small" (she's right, the lapel bulges. for a moment dennis stops applying mascara:) "wha- i- why would you say something like that to a man on his wedding day..." or something like that. they're also weirdly competitive and are trying to have a Better wedding than the other, something that is both normal to want and possible to achieve in a joint wedding

charlie and mac are in the other room, incredibly anxious and sweaty and trying to keep each other from freaking out. they're trying to huff glue without getting any on their tuxes. dee made mac promise he won't let charlie eat so much cheese before the wedding because it makes his breath repugnant. mac ignores this and actually decides to try stress eating cheese too in an attempt to quell his pre wedding anxiety. they also helped each other dress in their tuxes (they’re used to getting someone from a non-'white trash' background to help them dress for fancy events)

dee's vows include a bunch of bad dirty jokes, tailor written for the occasion. they are groan inducing

before the wedding, charlie was afraid his vows wouldn't come out good (because sometimes words get blocked up in his mouth and he don't say it no good). he felt pressured to write something and writing words in itself is scary to him. in the end, he does a short simple sweet song for his vows. he got artemis (artemis is there, obviously) to pull out a keyboard when he cued her.

a good chunk of his vows dennis devotes to himself

mac pulls out a goddamn STACK of cue cards when it's his turn to say his vows. the gang expects a repeat of the Gang Texts situation where mac has way too much to say. instead it plays out like this post

during the wedding frank does a speech for all of them and it's just like his awkward speech on the boat in thunder gun express. he somehow brings up the topics of the waitress and mandy and banging etc and the gang is like COME ON FRANK

afterwards they play chardee macdennis and all the fantastic points in this post takes place

none of them spend their ‘first night as a married couple’ uh consummating their marriage or anything. no, they get hospitalized because chardee macdennis always ends in disaster

and a bonus crack idea: artemis gets called in as frank’s emergency contact and the gang is like oh? we didn’t know she was your emergency contact. frank replies that of course she is, the wife is always the emergency contact. he nonchalantly explains he got married that morning before all of them. the gang is greatly angered because they had a whole discussion on who should get married first and they had agreed to do a Thing! but they’re stuck in their crutches/beds/neck braces/etc and are incapable of unleashing their fury on frank without immense pain (not that this stops them from attempting to do so)

and afterwards frank promises them ice cream or something

[autumnrory]

“time’s up ruined chardee” y’all are letting bad writing ruin ships for you?

[joeal-kaysani]

❝we have feelings and you don’t, and that’s why you hate valentine’s day.❞

[gay-rat-royalty]

Did Dennis and Dee actually win Chardee Macdennis 2: Electric Boogaloo or did they lie to Charlie to make themselves feel better?

The fact that they’re the only ones with him at the hospital at the end was always a little sus to me, especially after Charlie clearly remembers winning on screen

[macdennisofficial]

what do you think of the part where dennis told mac that he doesn't want him touching him and that it's never gonna happen?

I think everything that I can say about Time's Up has been said already by myself and others more in-depth if you're interested, but a few things:

The Gang sucks. Every last one of them. They are all equally guilty when it comes to sexual harassment. They have also all, in turn, been sexually harassed and/or assaulted. The thing with the Gang that separates them from literally any other decent human being is that after Charlie accused Dee of raping him and she admitted she had, they went out to eat together and laughed it off. Same with Mac and Dennis. Considering that since then Dennis has admitted his problem with Mac was that he wasn't being assertive enough, he feelings may have changed.

Most importantly though, I think the episode was more about making a Point about sexual assault and harassment than about supporting or not supporting ships. Women can be harassers just like men can be. Gay men are not exempt from harassment. (That was especially interesting given Kevin Spacey's really shitty attempt at distracting from being accused if rape - he chose to come out as gay, as of that somehow absolved him.)

Past, or future, consent to certain acts doesn't mean that the specific situation wasn't rape. Given the way the Gang is with each other, I don't consider anything that happened in that episode a "death knell" for either Chardee or Macdennis, but I also think that the status of the ships wasn't really the focus nor the important part of the episode.

[punchincorporated]

1,2,3,8,15 !!

yooo this took me all day bc i have adhd lets Go

1. favorite sunny ep? i love so many of them but, dines out 😭

Predictable i know... i love bottle episodes in any show, but this one is especially clever and well paced. and, macdennis,,

i love that every member of the gang gets screentime, we see monthly dinner and get valuable insight into dennis's character, "hes looking right at me" is fucking iconic, and mac demands respect, prompting dennis to basically propose to him in front of the entire restaurant. and then it ends with a win for dee and they all decide to eat together. chefs kiss

2. least fav ep?

crickets tale... borong

3. most underrated sunny side character? MAUREEN!! 😻

oh my god catherine reitman's delivery is Solid Gold, maureen is so funny and strange but also kind of cute?? she has this naivete about her. and i love what she represents as this Thing dennis has to deal with after fucking up his own life to get back at mac for being against gay marriage lskdfk

im so sad they killed her off rip <\3

8. rank all the sunny ships from fave to least fave

oh my god ALL what does that mean just within the gang right?? right???? please theres too many side characters

1. dee/cricket haha jk macdennis 💖 2. chardee 3. charden  4. charmac 5. charlie/frank 6. dennis/dee

15. fave reynolds twin?

against my better judgement i fucking love dennis and i think about him all the time

sorry dee love u too bitch <3

19. how has sunny impacted your irl life?

oh man. well since i got back into fandom about a year ago (To Cope) sunny has been my third go round on the hyperfixation coaster and uhhh my expectations from the media i consume are forever changed i think

from the outside sunny just looks like this edgy dudebro comedy for jocks to watch in their dorm room, right? but when you binge the whole thing and slowly fall for these characters, eventually you start to understand what the show really is: a subversive fucking masterpiece about class and mental health and Being Gay, and i love it forever for that. also its the funniest sitcom ever made

i forced my sister to watch it too and now we have matching paddy’s pub t-shirts. god bless 🙏

24. who is your problematic sunny fave?

lol theyre all problematic is that the joke

mac is my favorite character (maybe ever??) he’s my terrible son and i love him to death

but the MOST problematic sunny character i’m a fan of is uncle jack. when i saw mcpoyle v ponderosa for the first time and his giant fake hands flew off and he screamed NOBODY LOOK NOBODY LOOK i sobbed with laughter honestly & truly

thanks for the questions guys! @sadasrabbits @idknotmyartwork @woozapooza

[pollencoveredwoman]

Rewatching New Wheels and Bathroom Crisis knowing they immediately followed Times Up, felt so so good. (Especially knowing how S14 unfolds). It was like...

Mac was so unfazed by Den’s bullshit he was like “ima go ride bikes w my best frand. Ya we blew up your car, no I don’t want to talk about you being a shitty father...I also poop where I want and u can’t shame me for that...”

As much as I don’t care for the CharDee MacDennis destruction of Times Up, I think it was kind of necessary to fix a lot of the unspoken BS, and both couplings are kind of in a good place now and as a group they’ve agreed to focus less on “playing by the rules” and more on having a good time.

What that means going forward? Who knows. But re-watching S13 with new eyes felt really good, especially knowing how benign Dennis’s tirades are now. He talks a big game, but at the end of the day, he just wants to be carried home in Mac’s bumbling arms.

[woozapooza]

Just wanted to ask you what you think of the chardee macdennis episodes. I honestly don't care for them, but seems like a lot of people love them.

I LOVE the CharDee MacDennis episodes, especially the original! The original was actually one of the first Sunny episodes I ever saw, many years ago, and even though the show as a whole wasn’t to my taste back then, I still really enjoyed the episode. Of course, I enjoyed it much more the second time, having seen all the preceding episodes. What don’t you like about them?

[ostaramaclay]

I kind of still ship chardee??? Oops.  I'm thinking about creating a discord server for people who still ship chardee (at least pre s13). I know I'm probably gonna be attacked for this but I know there's got to be a few people who still ship it and are just scared to speak up, like me. At least there, we could talk about it.  We all acknowledge what happened was shitty, but they're all shitty people who do shitty things. Especially Dee and Dennis, who have both equally done awful stuff to other people. As long as you acknowledge that that was a shitty thing to do (it's not like we approve of it lmao, I'd much rather that'd never happened), I think it's okay. There are some surprisingly angry and righteous iasip fans out there considering the nature of the show. If you wanna take the moral high ground, we probs shouldn't be shipping macdennis either? Or stanning Dee because she always does stuff like this? And I ship and love both so... Oops? This is iasip we're talking about, the characters aren't good people and we're always meant to be thrown by how awful they are. You're not supposed to be comfortable, I'd say.  I miss the chardee content on Tumblr so much. I know the show is never going to be comfy but the fan theories and ideas were cute, and now they're mostly gone. So I'd say maybe DM me if you feel like this is a good idea/you wanna join? I know I'm scared to post this shit on here because I don't wanna be attacked by people, so please go easy. I'm not gonna respond to people trying to start arguments ♥️