We’re now in the middle of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia‘s seventeenth season and already fan-favorite character Frank Reynolds has gotten in a great prank on the rest of the Gang. Specifically, one involving cake. We’ve even gotten an episode that pits him against the Lawyer, one of Sunny‘s very best supporting characters. What’s amazing about Danny DeVito is he can steal a scene with a particular delivery of a one-word line. You can tell that the rest of the cast love being around him just as much as the audience has grown to love Frank, no matter how depraved and disgusting he has become. For those who think Frank is the show’s best character, these following episodes are the best to show off as proof.
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1) “Dennis and Dee Get a New Dad” (Season 2, Episode 10)
While Dennis Reynolds and Deandra Reynolds are the characters with their names in the titles, “Dennis and Dee Get a New Dad” is dominated by Frank. And it’s all because of a single scene.
When Barbara reveals to Dennis, Dee, and Frank (in a yet-to-be-named Guigino’s) that Bruce Mathis is in fact the twins’ father, Frank goes into a rage. They way he approaches fellow patrons asking them if they “banged” his “wh*re” wife is great, as is his burst of “somebody’s gotta get stabbed” as he clings to a butter knife, and his subsequent collapse.
2) “The Gang Gets Invincible” (Season 3, Episode 2)
Season 5 was when Frank really started to go off the deep end. In fact, the next entry on our list is the exact point when he made a point of doing so. Throughout Seasons 2 through 4 he was a jerk, sure, but he wasn’t the grotesque monster he’s become in time.
But he would splurge every now and then. And, before Season 5, the best example was in Season 3’s “The Gang Gets Invincible,” an excellent and very fun early Sunny episode. We get to meet Charlie’s Green Man and the entire McPoyle clan. We also get to see Frank take way too much acid and get locked in the McPoyle’s camper’s bathroom…or so he thinks. He’s actually just standing in a trash can and thinks Charlie in the Green Man suit is a talking lizard.
3) “The Gang Gives Frank an Intervention” (Season 5, Episode 4)
The scene in “The Gang Gives Frank an Intervention” when Frank is walking down a suburban street in a drunken haze and gets startled by Mac, who has been walking alongside him the whole time, is the funniest in the show’s history. In fact there’s a strong argument to be made that this is the best episode of the show as a whole.
The episode starts with Frank telling the Gang (and the audience) that he’s going to willingly go down the rabbit hole of depravity. In the first five minutes alone, he makes the Gang believe that a funeral is a party in the park and then subsequently proceeds to smoke a joint at that funeral and then try and have revenge sex with the grieving widow.
4) “The Gang Wrestles for the Troops” (Season 5, Episode 7)
In his twilight years, Frank just wants to be a part of the Gang. When they decide to host a wrestling match to show off their patriotism, he wants to be one of the wrestlers. They make him the ref.
But Frank already has a character ready, and that character is the Trash Man. It’s hilarious when he chokes on an apple displaying the merits of the Trash Man’s appeal just as it’s hilarious when he tosses a trashcan at “Rickety” Cricket, slitting his throat, then raises his arms in victory with a growing smile on his face. Long live the Trash Man.
5) “Frank’s Pretty Woman” (Season 7, Episode 1)
It’s hard to tell if Frank ever loved Barbara, or if he just felt stuck with her because he thought Dee and Dennis were his kids. But he probably didn’t. The closest he’s seemed to ever actually loving a woman was Roxy, the sex worker who needs assistance digging crack rocks out of her rear, but even still the word “love” is a stretch.
But the fact he proposes to Roxy, who seems like she brings mostly STDs to a marriage, is right in line for who he was by the point of Season 7. It’s also right in line for him to think Charlie’s idea of a secret date is a good one. Specifically, the woman thinks Charlie is her wealthy date, but in reality, he’s going to feign illness at which point the woman would continue the date with their limo driver. In no reality would that work, but Frank thinks it will, and he’s excited for it.
6) “Frank Reynolds’ Little Beauties” (Season 7, Episode 3)
Sunny has some amazing cold opens. And, right up there with “Sweet Dee Gets Audited” and “Mac’s Mom Burns Her House Down,” there’s “Frank Reynolds’ Little Beauties.”
Frank runs into Paddy’s Pub and falls flat on his face. At that point he reveals that he’s thrown cash into a beauty pageant, and that it’s a disaster because his partner came onto one of the contestants. The Gang is confused. After all, a beauty pageant seems right up Frank’s alley. But then the contestants are introduced…and they’re kids. It’s a perfect situation for Frank to get himself into, and as Frank tries to legitimize the contest, his efforts are increasingly futile and hysterical.
7) “The Gang Gets Analyzed” (Season 8, Episode 5)
“The Gang Gets Analyzed” has a highlight for everyone. Mac sucks on a pencil, Charlie carries a deceased pigeon around with him, Dee does an awful Good Will Hunting impersonation, and Dennis pretends to be a therapist while only knowing a few keywords about the profession. But this is really Frank’s episode.
This is when we learn about “The Frog Kid,” which we eventually learn in a different episode was him. Becoming “the Frog Kid” was just his way of having a friend and coping after he was “shanghaied” up to the “nitwit school.” It was also where he got his certificate certifying him as a young man who does not, in fact, have “donkey brains.” We learn that in a later episode, too, but all of that Frank-related lore started here in this episode.
8) “Frank Falls Out the Window” (Season 11, Episode 2)
The moment in “Frank Falls Out the Window” when Frank says that his head feels fine then spins around to reveal a heinous, blood-soaked gash on his bald head is a disgusting chef’s kiss. It’s so good and so gross.
This episode has Frank do exactly as the title implies, he falls out his and Charlie’s window. Afterwards, primarily thanks to his massive concussion, he’s under the impression that it’s once more 2006, which was the year he wormed his way into the Gang. From there, the Gang tries to alter history, with the ultimate goal being, on Dennis and Dee’s part at least, to get Frank’s money (or have him not sleep with the two strippers, in Charlie and Mac’s). But history ends up repeating itself fully. Dennis and Dee don’t get his money just as Mac and Charlie are once again left in the hallway outside Charlie and Frank’s apartment, as Frank does what he does with the two strippers.
9) “Being Frank” (Season 11, Episode 6)
It may not be one of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia‘s very best episodes (it’s more average), but “Being Frank” is required viewing for Frank fans. We literally see the world through Frank’s eyes, and, by episode’s end, we finally get a taste of what Night Crawlers is.
In this episode we get a sense of how Frank sees his role within the Gang. Specifically, he’s basically just along for the ride, whatever shape that ride takes. He barely even knows what the Gang’s plan is half the time. And it’s not so much that be barely keeps up as it is he doesn’t keep up at all but, hey, sometimes things work out anyway.
10) “Frank vs. Russia” (Season 16, Episode 4)
As a whole, Season 16 showed that It’s Always Sunny hadn’t really missed a beat, with countless rock solid episodes. And, for Frank fans, there was “Frank Shoots Every Member of the Gang” and “Frank vs. Russia.”
Consider this entry an endorsement of them both. The only reason “Frank vs. Russia” got the entry title was because the above image was too hard to resist. “Frank Shoots Every Member of the Gang” is a better exploration of the character. Specifically, we see Dennis and Dee take the man through his idea of a perfect day, which involves hanging out under a bridge and urinating on a fire hydrant. “Frank vs. Russia,” however, goes to show that even at 80 years old, DeVito is still diving all the way into Sunny and having a blast doing so.
