Recap / Its Always Sunny In Philadelphia S 04 E 13 The Nightman Cometh

I just wrote a musical to write a musical, okay? I don't have an ulterior motive, here. I'm not trying to screw anyone or gain anything out of it."

— Charlie

Charlie writes a musical based on his Nightman song and casts the rest of the gang as characters in the sprawling production.

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This episode provides examples of the following tropes:

• Adaptation Expansion: When the episode was touring as a theatrical performance, it added three songs to The Nightman Cometh. A new Villain Song for Antonio, "It's Nature, Shit Happens", a Cut Song from the original episode, and the titular number from Sweet Dee's Dating a Retarded Person.
• And Show It to You: Dayman defeats the Nightman by ripping his still-beating heart out of his chest.
• …And That Little Girl Was Me: At the end of the play, Charlie sings a surprise musical number revealing to the audience (specifically the Waitress) that he was the Little Boy who became the Dayman.
• Animal Eyes: The Nightman has yellow cat eyes at Mac's insistence.
• Antagonist Title: The Nightman is the main antagonist of the play The Nightman Cometh.
• Back for the Finale: In-universe, both Antonio the Troll (Frank) and the Nightman (Mac) are revived to sing in the final "Dayman" number.
• Bad "Bad Acting": In both flavors — Dee provides the stilted wooden monotone variety while Mac provides the absurdly over-the-top variety. Dennis somehow manages to provide both.
• Black Comedy Rape: Mac and Dennis interpret the Nightman taking the Little Boy's soul as a rape scene, over Charlie's protests that it is not supposed to be that, and portray it as such
• Bragging Theme Tune: "Dayman!/Ah-AH-Ah!/Fighter of the Nightman!/Ah-AH-Ah!/Champion of the sun!/You're a master of karate and friendship for everyone!"
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: In-universe. During the musical itself, Dee runs out after her duet with Dennis to sing an improvised bit about how she does not find little boys attractive; she also remarks that "most guys consider [her] an 8 or 9," and even tells them that she'll be taking phone numbers after the show. And, of course, there's Charlie proposing to the Waitress at the end.
• Call-Back:
  • Charlie jumps out at the Waitress from behind a car in the same manner that Dee did in "Who Pooped the Bed?".
  • Dennis wears the same silver spandex bodysuit and codpiece that he wore in "Sweet Dee's Dating a Retarded Person".
• Coming of Age Story: The main plot of the musical is the Little Boy's transformation into the powerful Dayman.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?:
  • In-universe, all the Gang believe that Charlie is (unintentionally) working out his issues with Uncle Jack and potentially his mother implied to be the Troll.
  • Frank plays the pimp Troll to Dennis's little boy, and the live show is more explicit about the reminder of "The Gang Gets Whacked".
• Evil Is Hammy: Mac really hams it up as the Nightman.
• Flowery Insults: Frustrated that his actors keeps going off-script, Charlie threatens to "slap Dee's face off of her face" and later claims that he's going to "smash everyone's face into tiny little pieces".
• Her Code Name Was "Mary Sue": It's barely a plot twist that the all-powerful warrior Dayman is meant to be Charlie and the Princess who loves him is meant to be the Waitress. (By extension, it's easy to guess the Nightman to be based on Charlie's Creepy Uncle Jack.)
• Hidden Depths:
  • Charlie writes an entire musical by himself (although Dennis helped a little with Dayman's theme), and the entire gang get to show off their singing voices.
  • Artemis is able to understand Charlie's "picture language" to a point where she can easily translate it to English. Contrast this with the rest of the gang, who've known Charlie for years and can't even begin to read it.
• I Lied: Charlie promises to leave the Waitress alone for the rest of her life if she attends his musical. After she rejects his proposal, she reminds him of this promise.
  Charlie: Well, I didn't ever sign anything, so I'll see you tomorrow?
• Incestuous Casting: In-Universe siblings Dennis and Dee are cast as the Little Boy/Dayman (the protagonist of the play) and the Coffee Shop Princess (the Love Interest) respectively, leading to much awkwardness. Charlie explains that he specifically cast Mac as the Little Boy and Dennis as the Nightman in an attempt to avoid this, but they were the ones who insisted on swapping roles so that Dennis could have the larger part and Mac could play the "badass" villain.
• Intercourse with You: Dennis and Dee's duet as the Little Boy and the Coffee Shop Princess is full of this.
• It's All About Me: Charlie accuses the rest of the gang of taking his musical and making it all about themselves, and he kind of has a point.
• "L" Is for "Dyslexia": It's mentioned that Artemis had to translate Charlie's original script into actual words so that it could be understood by the rest of the gang.
• Made a Slave: The Little Boy is enslaved by Antonio the Troll after the Nightman takes his soul.
• Martial Arts and Crafts: Mac inserts random karate moves into his performance for no real reason other than that he thinks it looks cool.
• Mistaken for Pedophile:
  • Dee is worried about this happening due to her character being in love with a "little boy", despite Charlie insisting that it's a metaphor and the Little Boy is actually a young man.
    Dee: You're wanting me to say that I want make love to a little baby tiny boy?
  • It isn't supposed to be, but due to a combination of Charlie's writing making the Little Boy seem like a very young child, Frank repeatedly mispronouncing "boy's soul" as "boy's hole" and Mac's attraction to Dennis, both the Nightman and the Coffee Shop Princess end up coming across as this.
• Modesty Bedsheet: A rug is thrown over Mac and Dennis for the rape scene to make it more "tasteful".
• Mondegreen Gag: Frank keeps mispronouncing "boy's soul" as "boy's hole" in his song, giving it a very different connotation to the one intended.
• Musical Episode: The second half of the episode, in which the gang performs the musical. The first half is them rehearsing it.
• Narm: In-Universe example: Charlie meant for the whole play to be taken seriously, but the audience clearly finds it So Bad, It's Good at best. Special mention goes to Mac's portrayal of the Nightman - he intended to come across as legitimately scary ("Laughs are cheap, I'm going for gasps!") but his Large Ham acting, constant hissing, impromptu karate moves and cats-eye contact lenses all result in a performance that the audience finds hilarious, much to Mac's chagrin.
• No-Sell: The Waitress's reaction to Charlie's passionate proposal; she crosses her arms, stone-faced, and stares dead at him. "Is that it?"
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Charlie promising to stop stalking the Waitress if she goes to his play is what motivates her to watch it. Of course, he goes back on that promise at the end of the episode.
• Painful Rhyme: Some of Charlie's rhymes, such as rhyming "matrimony" with "bone me," count as this.
• Pet the Dog: Frank reassuring Charlie that he did a good job with the play after he's rejected by the Waitress, especially in contrast to Dennis, Dee and Mac not giving a shit.
  • Frank's also the only member of the Gang who doesn't try to steal the spotlight and make the show about himself — note that of all of the performers, he's the lone person who doesn't add lines or improvise, basically doing what Charlie tells him without arguing. He does repeatedly sing "boy's hole" instead of "boy's soul," but he genuinely believes that he's pronouncing the phrase correctly. Even in the beginning when Charlie was casting the parts, Frank was thrilled with the part Charlie gave him, even as everyone else was trying to drop out or switch parts.
• Platonic Writing, Romantic Reading: In-Universe. Thanks to Charlie's lack of writing skills, the relationships involved in the play are laden with unintentional subtext; both the Coffee Shop Princess and the Nightman come across as pedophiles, when one is intended to be in love with a grown man and the other is intended to be a Grim Reaper figure with no sexual interest in his victim.
  Mac: Ummm... I think we have to be very careful about how we do the rape scene.
  Frank: Yeah.
  Charlie: Wh-what in God's name are you talking about? There's no "rape scene".
  (Mac and Frank give Charlie a confused look)
  Mac: ...Well, sure. I pay the Troll Toll and then I rape Dennis—
  Charlie: No! You don't rape him! You become him! You do not rape him!
  Frank: He doesn't?
• The Power of Love: The Little Boy's love for the Coffee Shop Princess is what enables him to defeat the troll and complete his transformation into the Dayman.
• Prima Donna Director: Charlie quickly becomes one, thanks to the rest of the gang's antics.
• Raging Stiffie: Dennis accuses Mac of having a boner during the "rape" scene. Mac doesn't deny it.
• Reading the Stage Directions Out Loud: Mac does this after the final musical number.
  Mac: Stage freeze!
  Dennis: Don't say stage freeze, just do it!
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Charlie gives one to Dee after she asks him to change her song.
  Charlie: I'm sorry, Dee, um, let me try and remember something. Uh, let's see, was it — did Dee write a musical and come to Charlie with it? No! Charlie wrote a musical and came to Dee with it, and the gang, and the gang likes to screw it up and make it about themselves, and take it away from Charlie and ruin his hopes and dreams! So let me tell you something, Dee, let me break down a scenario for you: I could cut the song, okay, because I wrote it. I could have Artemis do the song, okay, because you did not write it. Or I could strap on a wig and I could do the song myself. So you tell me, Little Miss All That, what do you want to do?! Song, or no song?!
• Saying Sound Effects Out Loud: Dennis repeatedly saying "bang" as he shoots Antonio.
• Scatterbrained Senior: Gladys, the elderly woman Charlie brings in the play the piano for the live performance.
• Sequel Episode: To "Sweet Dee's Dating a Retarded Person".
• Shout-Out: Deliberately invoked In-Universe: Dee's outfit as the Coffee Shop Princess is an Aurora costume. It makes sense — presumably, the Gang either made their own pieces (we know Dennis's "Dayman" outfit is his own) or rented them from a costume shop, so Dee would naturally choose a Disney Princess ensemble.
  • The Nightman's snapping through "Troll Toll" is highly reminiscent of West Side Story.
• So Bad, It's Good: This seems to be the audience's In-Universe reaction to the play; it gets a lot of laughs despite Charlie insisting that it's not really supposed to be funny.
• Sssssnake Talk: The Nightman speaks with a lot of hissing in his dialogue.
• Stylistic Suck: The musical ends up being this, what with the clunky writing and the gang constantly breaking character. Surprisingly, the actual music isn't half bad.
• Tenor Boy: Dennis plays one as the Little Boy/Dayman.
• This Is for Emphasis, Bitch!: When Dayman kills Antonio.
  Dayman: You know what it is, bitch.
• The Un-Hug: The "sexually charged embrace" between the Little Boy and the Coffee Shop Princess at the end of their duet ends up being this due to Dennis and Dee's discomfort at playing lovers.
• Villain Song: "Troll Toll".
• Wacky Marriage Proposal: It's revealed at the end of the episode that Charlie writing and putting on a musical was actually an incredibly elaborate way for him to propose to the Waitress. She says no, of course.
• Wag the Director: In-Universe, Dennis, Dee, and Mac repeatedly go against Charlie's instructions and perform their roles in ways they feel will make them look better.
• What Is This Feeling?: The Little Boy and the Coffee Shop Princess at the beginning of their duet.
  Princess: What is this strange feeling?
  Little Boy: I feel so strange inside!
  Princess: It's so strange but appealing!
• Would Hit a Girl: Charlie threatens to hit Dee if she adds her song.
• Write What You Know: In-Universe. The gang believe that the Nightman and what he does to the Little Boy is based on Charlie's experiences of having been molested in his childhood by Uncle Jack, despite Charlie's insistence that his uncle never touched him.
• You Keep Using That Word: Dee says this to Charlie verbatim when he keeps insisting that calling the play's protagonist a little boy is a "metaphor".

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