The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis

"The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis"
Information
Season	Four
Episode	Two
Writer(s)	Charlie Day & Sonny Lee & Patrick Walsh
Director(s)	Matt Shakman
Air Date	September 18, 2008
Chronology
Preceded by	"Mac and Dennis: Manhunters"
Followed by	"America's Next Top Paddy's Billboard Model Contest"

"The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis" is the second episode of the fourth season of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

Synopsis

To profit from high gas prices, Mac, Dennis, and Charlie fill barrels of gasoline and sell them door-to-door. Meanwhile, Dee and Frank plot to brand Bruce Mathis a terrorist after learning that Barbara's inheritance money is going to be donated to a Muslim community center.

Recap

10:30 AM on a Monday

Mac and Dennis complain to Charlie about his use of a generator to power Paddy's Pub. He says electricity was expensive so he was using the generator to save money. They point out the flaw in his logic - gas is more expensive. Mac then decides, as the brains of the group, that they are going to solve the gas crisis. They also agree that Dennis is the looks and Charlie is the wildcard.

Dennis draws a chart with pictures of large-breasted women while Mac explains to Charlie their strategy: ask a bank for a loan, buy a bunch of gasoline, store it in Paddy's basement, and sell it a year later at a higher price. At the bank, this strategy doesn't pan out so Dennis tries to seduce the banker. Charlie jumps in (doing his role as the wild card), also trying to seduce her. All three men take their shirts off and ask the banker which one she would like to have sex with.

At a gas station, Mac pumps gasoline into a plastic trashcan, and states that Dee is stupid for keeping her savings in her sock drawer. The gas station attendant stops them. They then transport the gasoline to Paddy's via Dennis' land rover and Charlie siphons it out of the fuel tank. Six barrels later, they decide to try and sell it back to the gas station. The attendant refuses, so they attempt selling it at a stand like lemonade. Mac and Charlie start blowing fireballs to attract customers, but Charlie accidentally burns Mac's head.

At Charlie's apartment, Charlie duct tapes a towel to Mac's head. Dennis then takes control of the team, claiming to be both the looks and the brains, where Mac is the muscle. They steal Frank's rape van and proceed to sell gasoline door-to-door. Charlie's Texas oil man character frightens a woman and they flee as she calls the cops.

Meanwhile, Frank and Dee are upset that Bruce Mathis is planning on giving part of Barbara's inheritance to a Muslim community center. Frank buys a van with tinted windows on the inside and out to survey Bruce's apartment. The gas pedal is broken, so Dee accidentally runs into a car as she tries to drive away. Later, they break into his apartment and plant a baby monitor and fertilizer. They survey again, and after the baby monitor is discovered, they get out of the van to fight. Mac, with the towel taped to his head, takes the van but crashes into the same car Dee hit before. The owner looks out of his window, furious.

Back at Paddy's, Frank waterboards Dee in a urinal. Dennis, Mac, and Charlie enter, bickering about the gasoline. Mac realizes that the paradigm of the gang was off because they weren't including Frank - Dennis is the looks, Mac is the brains, Charlie is the wildcard, Frank is the muscle, and Dee is the useless chick. Mac orders the gang into the van to go get Bruce. There, he explains his strategy: frame Bruce, turn him into the cops for a reward, and buy more gas with the reward. As they approach the apartment, Charlie surprises everyone by playing the wildcard and cutting the brakes. They bail out, but the van - with trashcans full of gasoline in the back - rams into the same gold car, exploding into a fireball.

Alliances

• Charlie, Dennis and Mac—invest in gasoline.
• Dee and Frank—frame Bruce for terrorism to get his inheritance.

Cast

Bruce's "cameo"

Starring

• Charlie Day as Charlie Kelly
• Glenn Howerton as Dennis Reynolds
• Rob McElhenney as Mac
• Kaitlin Olson as Dee Reynolds
• Danny DeVito as Frank Reynolds

Guest Starring

• Zachary Knighton as Random Guy

Co-Starring

• Eileen Fogarty as Female Bank Clerk
• Jay Harik as Gas Station Owneer
• Melora Hart as Woman (Suburban House)

Trivia

• The theme song of Ghostbusters (by Ray Parker, Jr.) plays during
  the final scene of this episode. It is the most expensive song they've ever used in the show, costing somewhere between 70,000 and 80,000 dollars.
• Bruce Mathis does not actually appear in this episode, a photo of him does in a newspaper.

• In this episode we get another example of Dennis' hot drawings.
• Dee keeps her life savings in her sock drawer.
• This is the first appearance of Charlie's oil tycoon character. We'll see him again in "Frank's Pretty Woman". (In that episode, he'll give his name as "Hoss Bonaventure, CEO", and he'll claim to have made his fortune in a vast array of ventures, including boiling denim and bridges. Unfortunately, he is poisoned by his constituents.)
• Dee's desire for vengeance is so strong that she went and tried to ruthlessly ruin her own father's life, and was even willing to kill him.
• This episode references the use of the torture technique known as "waterboarding", which the US government used to obtain intelligence on terrorist activity—much of which turned out to be inaccurate. Kaitlin Olson was actually waterboarded in this scene, and her hands were tied to support her back as it had recently been broken. Similarly, Frank's use of waterboarding leads him to make wild accusations of Bruce Mathis being involved with terrorist activity. Probably, that is some sort of homage for Jack Bauer, which has been previously mentioned on the show.
  ^[3x14]
• At the gas station Dennis refers to Charlie, who they had designated as the "wild card" member of the group as a "mild card".
• According to The Always Sunny Podcast most of the "gas" that the cast had in their mouths was actually water, but when Charlie siphons it from the car, there was still remnants of actual gasoline in the tank.
• When Mac steals Frank's van, as he is turning the van around, he bashes the van multiple times into the driver's side of the car of the person that Frank thinks is Bruce Mathis. The camera cuts away showing Charlie and Dennis, but as it cuts back to Mac, the van is now behind the car, and the driver's side of the car shows no damage.
• This episode is very heavily referenced in the 8th season episode "The Gang Recycles Their Trash". That episode also revolves around a door-to-door business scheme: in that episode, the plan is to go door to door collecting trash for people, taking advantage of a sanitation workers' strike, though later they decide to revive the door-to-door gas scheme. At the end, Charlie tries his "wild card" act and cuts the brake of the van they are using, but Mac anticipates this and has had the brakes fixed.
• The Gang's scheme to buy gas at current prices and resell it later certainly is possible in real life: it's called a Futures contract.  It usually does not involve filling trash cans full of gas, however. Also gas only has a shelf life of 5-8 months.
• The Random Guy, whose car The Gang destroys in this episode, appears again in the Season Nine finale "The Gang Squashes Their Beefs ".  Apparently, The Gang's "intel" isn't getting any better, because Mac thought he was inviting Bruce Mathis to Thanksgiving.  
• This episode makes a lot of references to the movie "Ghostbusters ", directed by Ivan Reitman.  Ivan Reitman's daughter Catherine plays Maureen Ponderosa.

External Links

• Behind-the-Scenes video