Frank pretends to be a girl with “huge cans.” Seems about right.

This week on It’s Always Sunny… the gang gets hooked on technology. This is a big transition for them because, though they are loopy and narcissistic, they still primarily live in the physical world. It’s Always Sunny… has, in fact, always been an analog creation, standing tall against shows with whizz-bam special-effects and scientific conjecture in lieu of good, wholesome slapstick.

So, it’s fitting that when the gang descends into technology on “Charlie Rules The World,” out pops the worst episode of the season.

The plot begins with Charlie taking Dee’s bribe to play her character on Techpocalypse, a RuneScape like internet game with avatar versions of yourself, for a few hours while she runs some errands. Upon returning, though, she discovers that he is significantly better than her, spending money wisely on food and supplies rather than accessories.

Feeling slighted by Charlie abandoning them for Dee, Dennis coaxes Frank and Mac to join him at a local bar for some dancing and drinking – a welcome change from all of this petty tech talk. This scene proves to be hilarious as they’re the only ones who show up, boogeying alone on the dance floor while the afternoon light peers in through the windows to remind them that they’re nuts for doing this now.

Pretty soon, Mac and Frank get hooked on Techpocalypse too, with Frank becoming one of the more successful players in the game because he’s moonlighting as a member of the opposite sex via his avatar. “I’m a gorgeous girl with huge cans,” exclaims Frank, while chowing down on a peach that was sent as a care-package from one of his “internet” friends.

Meanwhile, Charlie becomes the best player in the game as the king to Dee’s queen character. But, in atypical Charlie fashion, he is the one bossing her around, yelling at her to not waste their virtual money and as a result ruin his mean-streak.

After that, things get really muddled. Dennis goes soul-searching in a shopping mall, dumbfounded at everyone engaged in their cellphones and not the world around them. Then he discovers a gleaming, white, sensory deprivation tank. Entering this, we see him surrounded by nothingness, except for another Dennis with a British accent. He seems wise and insightful at first, but then, in a manner identical to one of Dennis’ prior sex-tapes that the show often references, he pushes our American Dennis’ head down to his waistline and forces him to perform fellatio. We don’t know whether this sequence is a dream or just a enigmatic nightmare, but either way, it proves to be unfunny and forced, like most of the episode.

The final few minutes are pretty predictable as well: The gang gets to meet actual people from the game and things don’t go too well. One of Charlie’s competitors, the “Queen of Thrones,” shows up at Paddy’s, bearing gifts (the city’s best cheesesteak, she claims) and a friendly attitude. But Charlie only wants to talk about the virtual world, claiming that he destroyed her property and raped her people, only inviting her to Paddy’s to tell that to her face. It’s impossible to not feel sympathetic for her as all she wanted was to strike an accord with a fellow gamer. And as she gets up from the barstool and tosses a cup of Hawaiian Punch on Charlie’s shirt in frustration on her way out the door, we can only wonder whether Dennis was right: Maybe we are too disconnected. Maybe we have neglected the palpable.

And it is, inevitably, Dennis’ vision that pervades all here, as he deletes their game characters, bringing things back to some temporary normalcy.

Overall, there isn’t really much to say about “Charlie Rules The World,” except that it isn’t funny in its attempt to pepper comedy and wit with a serious message. Here’s to hoping the next time they foray into such territory, they do it with pizzazz.

Tidbits:

–I can only imagine the mess that Frank was making with the peach slather.

–Dee mentions at one point that she wants her to fly to Florida to get her lips inflated. She’s quite the materialistic one, hasn’t she?

–What are in the energy balls that Charlie was eating?

–Why, for the love of god, did we have to watch part of Dennis’ sex tape?

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