The List: #24 It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia

#24
Number of Seasons (To Date): 3
Years Active: 2005 - Present
Network: F/X

It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia is often referred to as Seinfeld on crack. The show follows a gang of young, selfish people in a big city (the gang expands in Season 2 to include the father of a few of the members) who have misadventures due to their callous attitudes. However, the Sunny gang makes the Seinfeld 4 look like the family from Full House. Dennis, Dee, Mac, Charlie and later Frank are vain, sleazy, vindictive and largely uninformed about current and past events.

The gang spends their days running a bar in a bad neighborhood in Philadelphia and getting themselves into bizarre situations. The adventures deal with underage drinking, the situation in North Korea, pedophilia, gun control and cancer. However, due to the complete moral bankruptcy and stupidity of the group, they face these issues in completely inappropriate ways. For example, when Charlie and Mac's old gym teacher is accused of molesting some of his students, Mac is upset that he wasn't molested (he feared that he wasn't as cute a kid as he thought). There was also the time when the group rationalized selling alcohol to minors, by reasoning that it would be better for them to monitor the drinking instead of allowing teenagers, who would be drinking anyway, than to let them drink in the streets.

It's incredible that a show with no likable characters (in the traditional sense) could be so funny, not to mention popular ENOUGH (it has a fan base just large enough and a budget just low enough to survive) to get a fourth season. This is not a series for the faint of heart, but it is certainly a great show if you can deal with a little inhumanity.

Up next: #23...