Recap / Its Always Sunny In Philadelphia S 11 E 01 Chardee Mac Dennis 2

Charlie: We tend to get a little competitive when we play.
Dee: Yeah, we're not exactly a mellow bunch.

The gang agrees to a temporary truce in order to pitch Chardee MacDennis to an interested executive from Mattel Games, but things quickly spiral out of control.

---

This episode provides examples of the following tropes:

• Ambiguous Ending: Did Mac and Charlie really win the game, or did Charlie really break down and lose the game as Dennis and Dee claim? Neither Mac or Frank are there to verify one way or the other, and it would be totally in-character for Dennis and Dee to lie in order to keep their winning streak.
• Bag of Kidnapping: Dee brings in the Waitress with a bag over her head at the end of the game.
• Bread Milk Eggs Squick: Frank's weird childhood games.
  Frank: We used to play Purple Nurples, Sock Full of Quarters, Kick the Jew...
• Bring My Brown Pants: Charlie soils himself during the "horror" round after digging a hole in his arm with a pair of tweezers attached to a car battery.
• Call-Back:
  • Several to the first game of Chardee MacDennis:
    • Dennis and Dee always win.
    • "Gentlemen... suck my dick ."
    • Mac and Charlie once again do their "no puzzles" chant. This time around we get to see why, as they actually draw a puzzle card which requires them having to glue a bottle back together after Dennis smashes it.
    • The gang explain that they're mainlining the alcohol due to cheating in the previous game.
  • The promo video that the gang show is bookeneded by footage from Mac and Charlie's fight milk video.
  • Andy calls Frank a "donkey-brained maniac".
• Calvin Ball: Once again, the game's rules are almost impossible to follow for the newcomer.
• Comically Missing the Point: When Andy expresses concern over the gang's alcohol IV drips, Dennis assures him that it's fine because they're not mainlining beer.
• Competition Freak: This is the reason that the gang didn't actually want to play the game while pitching it to the executive, as they're aware of their tendency to get carried away by the competitive aspects.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance: One of the games Frank fondly remembers from his childhood was called "kick the Jew."
• Even Evil Has Standards: During the flag raising ceremony at the start of the game, Frank reveals his flag.◊ Dennis is... less than impressed.
  Frank: It's four Fs. I didn't know it would turn out like that.
  Dennis: ...pretty sure ya did.
• Global Ignorance: Charlie has apparently never heard of Brazil, pronouncing it "Braysial." Additionally, none of the Gang knows what a Brazilian accent actually sounds like, prompting them to declare that any Latin American accent is acceptable, so they settle on a Los Angeles cholo-style accent.
  Dee: Oh, real racist with it, huh?
• Impairment Shot: From Charlie's perspective as the Waitress begins to lay into him while he's suffering from blood loss.
• Incest Subtext: Dennis responds to Andy asking why keeping their hands on Dee, a nice lady, is supposed to be a challenge by crossly demanding that he not "sexualize" her. Frank promptly asks Dennis if the reason he's so uncomfortable with having to keep his hand on Dee is because it's making him want to have sex with her. Also, their team flag once again consists of their faces photoshopped onto a romance novel cover.
• Lame Pun Reaction:
  Dennis: Regular board games should be called I'm bored games.
  Charlie: I don't get that one.
• Informed Deformity: Lampshaded; Andy is bewildered by Mac and Dennis's disgust over having to keep a hand on Dee's body, pointing out that she's actually very attractive.
• Manipulative Bastard: It's revealed that Andy isn't a Mattel executive at all; he was actually hired by Frank to allow him to win the game.
• Oddly Named Sequel 2: Electric Boogaloo: Referenced in the episode title itself and discussed by the gang.
  Dennis: What made you just think of that? It's not a break-dancing competition.
  Charlie: There's no electricity involved.
• Oh, Crap!: The gang's reaction when they realize that Frank's "horror" round does comply with the game's rules as it's based on an existing board game: Operation.
• Pet the Dog: Dennis and Dee visit Charlie in the hospital at the end of the episode and tell him that they weren't even thinking about winning the game as their only concern was for his safety after he passed out. Of course, it's subverted almost immediately when they bring his and Mac's game pieces into the room and smash them up in front of him, justifying it as he's now conscious again.
• Playing Pictionary: One of the challenges involves one member of each team having to sculpt something representing the word "love" out of clay while the other member guesses the word they were given. Mac sculpts what's clearly a penis (though he insists it's "Cupid's arrow"), while Dennis makes a woman's head in a freezer.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Dennis and Dee bring in the Waitress to give one to Charlie for the emotional battery challenge, and she doesn't hold back.
  Waitress: Charlie Kelly, I have been waiting for this for a long time. You poop-smelling trash person... Your face, it looks like a troll, you have troll features! ...You scare me, there's something wrong with you, your brain is broken! I hate you! I hope you die! I hope you go to hell!
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Andy quickly flees once he realizes his and Frank's ruse is up.
• Sequel Episode: To Chardee MacDennis: The Game of Games.
• Shout-Out: Frank's "horror" round is modeled after the Saw franchise, complete with him wearing a Billy mask and delivering a video message to the gang, who are handcuffed in the basement and instructed to dig out a key that's been sewn into their forearms.
• The Sociopath: When asked to create something out of clay representing the word "love", Dennis sculpts what looks like a woman's severed head in a box.
  Dennis: This is not a woman's head in a box, you sick freak! This is a woman's head in a freezer! And it's supposed to represent the preservation of love forever and ever.
• Sore Loser: A popular fan theory of the final scene is that Dennis and Dee are lying to a dazed, hospitalized Charlie because he and Mac really did win the game.
• Spotting the Thread: The Gang catches onto Andy being a plant by Frank when he calls him "donkey-brained".
• Stylistic Suck: The promotional video that the gang made to pitch the game.
• Toilet Humor: One of the challanges is called "shits and ladders" and involves the players taking a laxative before sitting atop a ladder for as long as they can manage before shitting themselves. We don't actually get to see it, however, as Frank derails it by drugging the rest of the gang.
• Visual Innuendo: Mac creates a very phallic sculpture during the game. Although Mac claims it's meant to be Cupid's arrow, Charlie points out that it has a vein.
• The Watson: Andy fills the role, allowing the gang to explain the rules to him.
• What the Hell Is That Accent?: The "body" round involves the gang spinning a globe and having to talk in the accent of whatever region they stop it on for the entire round. Mac and Charlie's "Brazilian" accents are predictably inaccurate (as Dennis points out, they sound more like Los Angeles Mexican), while Dee's attempt at a Philadelphia accent is somehow even worse.
• Yank the Dog's Chain: Dennis and Dee say they weren't even thinking about the game and wouldn't smash Charlie's game pieces while he was unconscious. Within minutes of regaining consciousness, however, they smash the pieces right in Charlie's hospital room.

---