Of all the television programs I’ve wasted my youth watching, not a single one of them has dragged me back as frequently and relentlessly as It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. I didn’t catch on fully until about season six (to be fair I was in like seventh grade) but I’ve definitely made up for it with my addictive viewing habits over the past seven years. I’ve gone through the show from start to back dozens of times, if I had to guess I’d say about 50-60 times. My favorite episodes (top 20-30) have definitely gotten over 100 views each, and that’s on the conservative side. At this point, I can listen to most episodes without actually watching and enjoy them just the same. Of all the things I feel comfortable writing about and making absolute opinions on, it is this show. So here are a couple of my introductory and more basic Sunny takes just to get the feet wet, more to come of course.

1.  Season Rankings

For me, It’s Always Sunny’s peak ranges from season two to season seven. Season one is amazing, obviously, it sets up a lot of the show and comes with some pretty incredible schemes and antics. Season two takes off like a rocket, bringing the show to a completely new level. The first four episodes of the season (Charlie Gets Crippled, The Gang Goes Jihad, Dennis and Dee go on Welfare, and Mac Bangs Dennis’ Mom) is the strongest, most hilarious stretch of television I’ve ever seen, with some of the most perfect and hysterical debauchery that has ever been put together on screen. If you haven’t gotten hooked on the show by that point, funny shows just aren’t meant for you. The next season continues to up the absurdity while still churning out unbelievable episodes one after another. Eventually, the absurdity comes at a slight hit to overall funniness, but that doesn’t come until after season seven. From what I’ve seen around the internet, season four is considered their strongest season, which isn’t a bad opinion, but I would argue that the show reaches its highest peaks during both seasons four and five. By this point, the gang has perfectly combined their sheer ridiculousness and scumbaggery with five unbelievable characters and amazing stories each episode. The next two seasons, six and seven, continue to up the ante while still hitting on almost every episode. Season eight is the first season where I really see the absurdity taking a bit of a toll on the overall product, a trend which definitely continues in seasons nine and ten. In my opinion, season eleven starts to right the trend with some more spot-on episodes, but that opinion might change once I run through that season a few more times. In terms of rating, the lowest I went was a seven which is still overall great television. The eights are amazing, the nines are classics, and the tens are literally television perfection crafted by the golden gods themselves. Here’s a graph I made:

2. Overall Character Rankings

I’m not going to go too deep in explaining my choices here, mostly because they’re pretty subjective and based on my personal preferences, but correct nonetheless. I couldn’t settle on the top spot so it had to be split between Dennis and Charlie. Both of them start out hot and continue to stay hilarious as the seasons go on. Frankie Fast Hands is second  (third technically but I’ll call it second). He comes out of the gates running to start season two and fits in perfectly with the gang, while bringing it every episode. In my opinion, his character benefits the most from their descendance into ridiculousness. Next up is Dee. Useless chick, bird woman, most of her acting/character stuff is more annoying than funny, but still full of hilarious lines on a pretty regular basis. Also nobody is better at falling and flailing around violently than Sweet Dee. Mac takes up the last spot in my book, he definitely suffers the most as a funny character as the seasons go on. His first few seasons are great, but his schticks get old and unfunny more faster than the rest, between the karate/tough guy stuff, religion stuff, the gay stuff (I know it’s hard to keep it clever and subtle after all the years but it does get pretty weak), and that whiny baby voice he does during some of the later episodes makes me cringe.

Here’s another graph, this one’s super unnecessary but I like graphs:

Now these are some general takes that stay pretty basic as far as the show goes, but I’ve got all sorts of Sunny takes that I need to get on the internet. I’m eventually going to put up a real top 25 episode list because all of those lists I’ve seen across the internet suck ass, and I’d like to bet that I’ve watched more of It’s Always Sunny than any of those jabronis.

So yeah, thank for reading, if you disagree let me know so I can tell you why you’re wrong.