The Gang from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia are always getting into crazy schemes, either in an attempt to get rich or an attempt to get even with an enemy. Most of the time, these schemes blow up in their faces.
Dennis’ car will end up submerged in the ocean, or Frank’s spy van will get destroyed, or Mac’s dad will get sent to prison. They always managed to screw things up. However, on the odd occasion, the Gang’s schemes have actually worked out. It’s incredibly rare, but it has happened. So, here are 10 Times The Gang’s Schemes Actually Worked.
Sweet Dee Has a Heart Attack: Get health insurance
In the cold opening of “Sweet Dee Has a Heart Attack,” Dee suffers from a heart attack (like it says on the tin) and the rest of the Gang become concerned about their health. Since Frank refuses to provide health insurance for any of them, they won’t be covered if they suffer from a medical emergency like Dee did.
Mac and Charlie decide that the best way to get health insurance is to get a couple of low-paying jobs. They apply to a mailroom gig at an office and end up scoring two minimum-wage paychecks. For the few short days that they have those jobs, they do get health insurance.
Paddy’s Pub: The Worst Bar in Philadelphia: Force Lyle Korman to write a new review
In the season 4 episode “Paddy’s Pub: The Worst Bar in Philadelphia,” Charlie kidnaps a critic named Lyle Korman, who published a negative review of Paddy’s in a local Philly newspaper. The plan is to force him to write a new review that sheds a more positive light on the Gang and their business.
At the end of the episode, he actually does write another review. It’s not as glowing as the Gang was hoping – Korman wrote it to describe the ordeal he went through in lieu of pressing criminal charges – but they did get him to write a new review, and since it barely mentions Paddy’s, it won’t put off potential customers as much as the first one did.
The Gang Recycles Their Trash: Make money with door-to-door garbage collections
Season 8’s “The Gang Recycles Their Trash” is a meta commentary on TV shows that get to eight seasons. Usually, when shows go on for this long, they end up sucking. The writers run out of ideas, so they start rehashing old storylines. In “The Gang Recycles Their Trash,” the Gang repeats their plan from “The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis.”
Whereas in that season 4 episode, they went door to door selling gasoline, in “The Gang Recycles Their Trash,” they go door to door collecting garbage as the trashmen are on strike. The business ends up being genuinely successful.
Mac and Dennis: Manhunters: Catch Cricket
Mac and Dennis become inspired by Frank in the season 4 premiere “Mac and Dennis: Manhunters.” Frank has been hunting animals for their meat, and Mac and Dennis don’t think that hunting an animal is a challenge. They think that the mark of a true hunter is their ability to hunt something that can hunt them back, like a man.
Mac and Dennis decide to hunt Cricket, figuring his malnutrition and weak bones will make him an easy target. However, he turns out to know parkour, so he’s harder to catch than they thought. Still, they do manage to catch him in the end, thanks to Frank’s interference.
Frank’s Back in Business: Sell Fight Milk
In the season 8 episode “Frank’s Back in Business,” Mac and Charlie create their own alcoholic, “crowtein-based” sports drink, Fight Milk (“For bodyguards!” “...By bodyguards!”), and pitch it at one of Frank’s investor meetings.
However, it fails to gain any traction. We wouldn’t find out that the product actually succeeded until the season 12 episode “Wolf Cola: A Public Relations Nightmare,” in which we learn that a few major UFC fighters have been drinking Fight Milk. They’ve been drinking it to throw up enough to pass the weigh-in, but they’ve still been drinking it; Fight Milk has been selling well.
Charlie Work: Pass the health inspection
This was more Charlie’s scheme than the Gang’s. Every year, when Paddy’s has to pass an inspection from the health board, Charlie has to work like he’s never worked before to cover up the bar’s many health code violations, from the glory hole in the bathroom to the carbon monoxide in the basement.
Shot and edited to look like one long, continuous take, “Charlie Work” chronicles Charlie’s annual struggle to pass the health inspection. And he faces an uphill battle as the Gang plans a steak-and-airline-miles scam on the same day. In the end, he manages to pull it all off, and gets zero credit for it.
The Gang Beats Boggs: Break Wade Boggs’ beer-drinking record
Baseball legend Wade Boggs claims that he once drank more than 100 beers in one day as he flew out to a game, and then managed to hit three home runs. The more reliable claims have the record at 50 or 60 beers. In It’s Always Sunny’s season 10 premiere episode, “The Gang Beats Boggs,” the Gang attempted to break Boggs’ beer-drinking record on a flight of the same distance.
Frank is out early on, Dennis takes himself out of the game when his mile-high hook-up gets too attached, and Mac is the commissioner (“the Bud Selig”). But Charlie and Dee are really close by the time the plane lands. Dee ends up passing out on the luggage conveyor at the airport, but Charlie beats the record. He even knocks a ball out of the park.
Sweet Dee Gets Audited: Stage a baby funeral to get the IRS off Dee’s back
Dee thinks she’s successfully conned the system in “Sweet Dee Gets Audited,” when she begins claiming benefits for the baby that she had as a surrogate. However, the IRS soon catches on and sends an investigator to make sure the baby actually exists. Dee panics and has to somehow find a baby to pass off as her own.
When she fails to do so, Dennis comes up with a plan that will solve Dee’s problems and prevent the IRS from poking around the bar, where they’ve been cooking the books: fake the baby’s death and stage a funeral. It was a harrowingly dark idea, but it did work.
PTSDee: Get even with Mike the stripper
In the season 12 episode “PTSDee,” Dee sleeps with Mike, a male stripper, who then declares her his “rock bottom.” Offended by this, Dee sets out to prove to Mike that he can sink a lot lower than sleeping with her. She organizes a ladies’ night at Paddy’s and hires Mike to dance there.
He grinds in the face of the birthday girl on the front row, only to discover that she’s his estranged daughter that he wants to reconnect with. She’s so horrified that she never wants to see him again. Hauntingly, Dee reveals that she planned the whole thing to get back at him.
The Gang Gets Extreme: Home Makeover Edition: Give “the Juarez family” their dream house
In “The Gang Gets Extreme: Home Makeover Edition,” when the Gang’s get-rich-quick scheme inevitably failed, it actually ended in the result they were going for. Inspired by a self-help book about vision boards and Ty Pennington, the Gang decides to give their Mexican neighbors, “the Juarez family,” a home makeover, in the hopes that it’ll give them good karma.
They fail miserably – Mac and Dee terrify the family, while Dennis and Charlie burn the house down – but in order to settle the suit, Dee has to give the family the mansion she inherited from her mom. Ergo, the Gang did succeed in giving this family their dream home.