Written by Charlie Johnson
The season finale for Philly was, in a single word, amazing. But the word amazing doesn’t do it justice. It was so much bigger, so much bolder, so much more complicated than any single word can possibly describe.
For the past nine weeks, the show has taken a slightly different turn from its regular formula. A lot of the content has been cutting edge social satire and while this isn’t a new concept for the show, the contemporary political context has been what made this season so awesome. I might sound like a fanboy at this point, but I personally guarantee that you will have some kind of emotional to this week’s episode.
So, if you haven’t seen it yet, STOP READING THIS NOW AND WATCH IT! Spoilers lie ahead, and you need to experience the show yourself before you can read anything about it.
Metaphors Are Everywhere
The episode opens with Frank trying to break down the door to Mac’s apartment. It swings open, bounces off the radiator and hits him in the nose causing him to bleed uncontrollably. Mac is sitting on the couch surrounded by peaches. Some of them are half eaten and litter the table, floor and couch. The reference here is twofold. While it may be a cinematic call back to Call Me by Your Name (A sexually intense scene involving a lonely guy and a peach), as Twitter user @ihatethatguy11 points out, there is a peach seller in the U.S.A. called Mac’s Pride.
— christina (@ihatethatguy11) November 8, 2018
Pretty neat either way. As Frank is running around the apartment trying to find something to stop his nose bleed, he reveals that The Gang have made a float for the pride parade and need Mac to dance on top of it in order to attract some gay money to the bar. Mac isn’t interested because “I don’t know where I fit in as a gay man,” and “I’m not feeling very proud.” Poor old Frank doesn’t get it and vows to help Mac anyway. Together they set off to try to find Mac’s pride.
“Let’s Try and Blend In”
Frank suggests that Mac might feel better if he spent time around some regular gay men. So, he leads Mac down a set of stairs in an old warehouse and into a homosexual S&M club. So much for regular. While scoping out the buffet, Frank says that you should find someone you like and get smacked around a bit. Mac objects. He doesn’t feel comfortable. While it’s totally fine for these guys (who represent a small subculture in the gay community) it’s too intense for him and doesn’t want to be there. Frank needs to restuff his nose and pulls out the bloody newspaper, places it in the bowl of chicken on the buffet and shoves some chicken into his nostrils to keep the blood plugged. Disgusting! A man in a gimp mask politely asks them to leave, not because Frank is straight, but because he violated the chicken. He tries to pay the man to have sex with Mac but can’t understand that the masked man is not a prostitute and does this for fun.
“These Fairies Could Poke Me Full of Holes”
That’s what Frank says when he and Mac are sitting in Pookies Drag Queen Bar. 10 points for trying to help. -5 points for homophobic language. Keep trying Frank, you’ll get there. While at Pookies, Mac reveals that he hasn’t come out to his father yet. For those of you who don’t remember, Luther Macdonald has been in prison most of Mac’s life and generally resents his son’s existence. The reason he hasn’t told Luther yet is because he has been struggling to verbalise his feelings. He explains it to Frank as this: “There’s like this storm inside of me and it’s been raging my whole life and I’m down on my knees and I’m looking for answers. And then God comes down to me. And it’s a very hot chick and she pulls me up and we start dancing.” It sounds like classic Mac channelling his old hypermasculinity. Frank brushes it off as the fault of Catholicism before trying to sterilise his nose with some of the Mimosa they’ve been drinking.
Out of The Closet and Into the Frying Pan
Frank’s next grand idea is to take Mac to prison to finally confront his father. While they’re sitting, waiting for Luther, a swollen and sick looking Frank is shoving insulation sheeting up his nose and securing it duct tape. The conversation gets off to a great start when Luther tells how he cut out his cellmate’s tongue for ratting on him. Mac nervously reveals his convoluted dream about the sexy, dancing God and Luther assumes he’s going to be a grandad. Finally, someone to carry on his name because he never really got Mac either. That one stung. Luther walks away, leaving Frank and Mac calling to him through the prison glass. That could’ve gone better.
The Stakes Are Raised
Frank makes it back to the bar where Charlie finds him trying to close his cut nose with lemon juice and a hot-glue gun. His face is now unbelievably swollen, and his eyes are bruised. Charlie takes him out back to see the pride float they’ve been working on. They need a genuine gay man to do the dancing otherwise the “press will murder us”. You can see, just like his father, Mac’s friends don’t really care for his pride. They’re willing to accept it for the sake of profiteering but have no vested interest. With the stakes now raised and the pressure on Frank to persuade Mac, he goes over to the apartment only to find a fit young woman leaving. He walks in and sees a shirtless Mac, getting back into some sweaty clothes. Frank thinks that Mac has gone back into the closet after his encounter with Luther and has just had sex with the girl. Mac refuses to ride The Gang’s float because he isn’t ready yet and Frank storms out. In an attempt to get someone on the float, he drags Rickety Cricket over to the bar and dresses him in some leather straps. Guaranteed to get people bothered, not necessarily hot.
Reluctantly Charlie and Dee allow Cricket onto the float and Frank (who is struggling to see because his eyes are swelling shut) ends up driving the float. In huge amounts of pain and struggling to function, Frank realises that he can’t keep the blood bottled up any longer and removes his clogging agents. He runs over to Mac’s apartment covered in his blood to tell him something important. “Sometimes you have to let the blood flow in order to start the healing.” Who would’ve thought that Frank would have the answer to Mac’s pride problem. Together they resolve to go and tell Luther about his son, this time on Mac’s terms.
The Most Powerful Television Scene This Year
If you’ve read through until this point and still haven’t seen the episode, please go and do it. Watching the build up to this point is half of what makes this final scene so powerful. If you have seen it, read on, free of guilt. So, Frank arranges for Mac to have the stage in the prison for his own performance and saves a space for Luther in the front row. He gets up in front of the crowd of hardened inmates and tells Luther that he is gay. The lights go out. When they come back, Mac is kneeling, soaked by water in the centre of the stage. What follows, I can’t describe. I can only show you.
The episode finally ends with a crying Danny DeVito whispering “I get it,” before the prisoners explode into applause. All except for Luther, that is.
Conclusion:
It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia has never been afraid to touch taboo subjects or openly discuss political ideologies. In fact, it normally does so with tongue firmly in cheek. Not this time. While many jokes have been made about Mac’s sexuality, they’ve normally been about how weirdly confused he is. They never attack him directly for his choices. This episode highlights so well how some people are okay with non-hetero-sexualities but never bother to try to understand the people themselves.
Like it or loathe it, Philly has once again gotten us talking about important issues and deserves to be recognised for the ground-breaking comedy that it is. I am sad to see the end of the series and look forward to another season, however unlikely it is to arrive. If this is the last episode, what a note to finish on. A Perfectly Triumphant Finale.
