The five main characters of Its Always Sunny In Philadelphia are often described as the worst people in the world. And, sure, they pretty much are. Scanning around their Paddys Pub HQ most weeks, one can hear the ghostly echoes of Ben Kenobis pronouncement about Mos Eisley as a wretched hive of scum and villainy bouncing off the ill-washed glasses and even more ill-washed regulars. And the Gang, of course, variously huddled in ever-changing factions to hatch whatever plot its members imagine will satisfy the selfish needs of their twisted psyches.

Still, the Gang isnt really the worst, is it? Making a sitcom about actual evil people would be an even harder trick than the one the creators of Sunny have pulled off for 12 seasons. The secret of Sunnys dark comedy is that the main characters live in their own awfulness. They create it, they cause it, theyre product and victim of it, and, ultimately, they can never escape it. The Gang is a gang because there are no other people in the world who would, or could, have them.

That interdependent hell that is the Gangs daily existence comes to a hilarious head in Hero Or Hate Crime, where a stray breeze, a wayward $2 scratch ticket, a falling piano, some dog shit, and a gay slur cause Dee, Charlie, Frank, Mac, and Dennis to run through a series of very expensive professional arbitrators in order to settle their latest dispute. Normally, the argument over ownership of a potentially worthless (they havent scratched it yet) lottery ticket would be taken care of, as Charlie puts it, in-house. Like their legendarily nonsensical and horrifying rainy day board/endurance game CharDee MacDennis (The Game Of Games), over the years the Gang has developed an elaborate system of jurisprudence to hash out its constant, hysterical squabbling. Motion for sub-arbitration to determine whether or not thats sad! cries Mac, after Dee explains that she hadnt scratched the lottery ticket, because as long as you dont scratch it, then youre not a loser.

As arbiter here, Ill say that is sad, though less in the mocking way that Mac, Dennis, Charlie, and Frank accuse Dee of being, and more in keeping with the idea that, on some level, the Gang is aware of how awful its awfulness makes each of their lives. As Dennis explains to the first of their referees tonight, This ticket represents hope, okay? Potential. Promise. The very foundation upon which this group rests. Glenn Howerton gives Dennis spiel the maniacal edge of one brazening out a position to avoid the yawning abyss of ugly truth, something that goes a long way toward explaining the Gangs signature, hair-trigger enthusiasms. Every scam, every scheme, every newfound obsession and pursuit is the thing that will lead them out of the darkness that is their daily existence. As we see, eventually tonight, even the genuine victory of a $10,000 winning scratch ticket will ultimately be consumed by the inescapable reality of the fact that their 17 hours of professionally arbitrated backstabbing to obtain it have eaten up all the money they were fighting over. The pursuit has to be the point, because the reality is that happiness is simply not something these people will ever know.

Luckily for us, theres plenty of joy in watching these characters and these actors play out the inevitable. The circumstances surrounding the lottery ticket form a filthy Rube Goldberg device of disaster, as Charlie and Mac interrupt their argument about whether Charlie intentionally stepped in a pile of dog crap (he did) to almost get creamed by a falling piano. Fortunately(?), Frankout looking up womens skirts with his trusty shoe-mirrors like the dirtbag he issees this and screams out the full-throated warning, Look out, faggot! allowing Charlie to karate kick Mac out of the way. Sure, this leaves a shoe-shaped dog crap imprint on Macs shirt, but alives alive. And potentially rich. Well, potentially, potentially rich, as Dees windblown, unscratched ticket ends up in Macs hands, sending the Gang off to the lawyers offices. (Sadly, we dont get an appearance from Brian Ungers unnamed, always-funny lawyer. Hed find a way to cheat the Gang out of that ticket, especially after it may have blinded him.)

As far as the legal arguments go, the labyrinthine circumstances surrounding the tickets ownership are enough to test the wisdom of Solomon, including as they do, Dennis bribing Dee to overtip the barely legal shopgirl hes grooming as sexual conquest; Franks offensive but life-saving warning; Charlies heroic (if poopy) kick; and the fact that Mac actually has possession of the thing. The actors playing the lawyers (especially Karen McClain, whose character hears the bulk of the argument) are all excellent at deadpanning their way through the shenanigans. (As is revealed, they know theyre getting well-paid.) As for the arguments themselves, the pressures of avarice and a ticking clock sees the Gang turn on each other with all the chaotic ingenuity their feverish minds can muster. Which is a lot.

A major theme in the arguments is Franks slur against Mac. Macs tortured relationship with his sexuality has been mined for jokes for well-on a decade, and, yes, the revelation that hes constructed a makeshift pleasuring device out of a decrepit exercise bike and a fist-topped dildo isnt the subtlest gag. (There is a moment where the seat-mounted dildo rises unexpectedly that is timed to absolute comic perfection, though.) But the joke, as the rest of the Gang asserts, has never been that Mac is gay (Hes into the closet, hes out of the closetwe dont like you either way, explains Dennis), but that Macs contortions to deny his homosexuality have turned him into a joke. (He explains that hes been working out on the machine with assless bike shorts for air flow.) Like Dennis desperate assertion of the meaning of that unscratched ticket, Macs denial about just what he gets up to down in Paddys basement partakes of that strain of humanizing denial that keeps the Gang, for all its undeniable awfulness, relatable.

The same goes for the Gangs long digression here about hate speech. Like most social issues that Sunny incorporates into its plots, political correctness isnt on trial as much as its used to examine the Gangs various double standards and blind spots. When Frank protests that his use of the word faggot wasnt disqualifyingly offensive, its due to Franks adherence to old-school, pragmatic assholery. There was a lot going on. I needed something that would cut through. As soon as I said the slur, everybody knew to look at Mac, says Frank. Macs response that a bigot should not be entitled to a heros payout is self-serving (he really wants that ticket), but also points to how, within the Gang, finding offense in the others actions is often the best offense against them. When Dennis cautions, You know what, were treading on some dangerous territory, his objections to hate speech are more about standing (in the Gang and as the upstanding citizen he fancies himself) than about whether Franks assertion that Youre allowed to use any language to save a mans life extends to the word nigger in a similar situation. (McClains arbitrator, who is black, still manages to maintain her impartiality, which deserves some sort of medal.) So when all four of the guys turn on Dee for trying to apply the same logic to the word cunt, the shouting match that ensues (We cant lose that! Especially when its directed towards a woman when youre trying to insult her, yells Charlie) illuminates the shifting nature of the Gangs outrage. On Its Always Sunny, morality is, indeed, a moveable feast, depending on whos doing the eating.

In the end, the ticket comes down to Frank and Mac, the final arbitrators ruling finding that they have to split the ticket, since Franks claim can only be nullified if his hate speech was actually directed at a gay person. (Again, Im not saying these are necessarily good arbitrators.) Heres where things get just a little bit tricky, explains Dennis, before bringing in that bike (The Asspounder 4000, according to the deliberately oblivious and proud Mac) to show that Mac is, indeed, gay. (Or, at least, as Dennis puts it, a sexual deviant.) Sunny lives on the edge, and, if the bike gag is crude, the payoff of Macs dilemma is transcendent.

Seeing a way to get the whole ticket (now worth 10 grand), Mac quickly proclaims his gayness to snatch the prize. (Gay Mac rules! Rich, gay Mac!) But given the chance to renege on his claim once the cash is safely in hand, Mac demurs. Rob McElhenney makes Macs hesitation one of those improbably affecting character moments that Sunny wields so expertly. After the others sneer that hell retreat back into the closet now that hes won, McElhenneys look of clear-eyed relief is genuinely heartening as Mac says softly, I dunno, maybe Ill just stay out. No, I think Im out now. Yeah, Im gay. Actually it feels pretty good. See you guys. Naturally, the Gangs momentary, shocked silence is swept away by the revelation that all the fighting has cost them all but $14 of Macs winnings (which theyll make him pay), but, even then, Dennis says, Maybe lets make him pay this tomorrow. Lets let him have this. In the Gangs Philly, the smallest of victories are not victories at all. Not if youre trapped there.

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Political correctness is life and death on a hilarious It's Always Sunny - A.V. Club