‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’: This Is the Worst Thing the Gang Has Ever Done to Dee

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia just returned for its sixteenth season, an impressive feat no other live action sitcom has accomplished. Premiering in 2005, the show follows what the opening title cards always call “the gang,” made up of friends Dennis (Glenn Howerton), Mac (Rob McElhenney), Charlie (Charlie Day), Dee (Kaitlin Olson), and Frank (Danny DeVito).

Together they run Paddy’s Pub, but this is not anything like Cheers or your usual sitcom. If you’ve never seen it, to sum up It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, imagine the self-centered, horrible characters in Seinfeld, and then make them as depraved as possible. “The gang” are the worst people in the world, but we love them because they’re so funny being awful. They treat everyone bad, but they save the worst for poor Dee Reynolds. For a decade-and-a-half, she has received some of the worst treatment imaginable, but nothing tops the episode where she was purposely set on fire — not once, but twice.

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Dee Receives the Worst Treatment on ‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’

Just as Elaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) was the only woman surrounded by men on Seinfeld, so is Dee on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. While Elaine may have been frustrated by her male counterparts and put upon by them sometimes, she wasn’t relentlessly mocked and treated like crap like Dee is. It doesn’t matter that Frank is her dad (yet not biologically) and Dennis her twin brother. You can’t really consider it sexist though, as they’re mean to everyone. Even Dee is cruel. Still, she seems to be exploited the worst.

Some of it is light, like the amount of times she’s been called a bird for supposedly looking like one. Most of it goes way over-the-top in moments that would be considered criminal if this was reality. Frank and Dennis drugged Dee and tied her to her bed so that Frank could take care of her — that way she’d feel like she had to take care of Frank when he’s old. When Dee’s cat gets lost in the wall of the apartment, they obliterate the wall. They steal her car, they poison her in a beer game, they trick her into thinking she’s become famous, and when she was pregnant, they didn’t care at all. Even as heartless is that last situation was, it’s still not the worst she’s endured.

“Frank Sets Sweet Dee on Fire” Is One of the Most Bonkers Episodes

To see Dee’s worst moment at the hands of her friends, you have to go to Season 3, Episode 8 of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. It begins with Frank arguing with Dee and Dennis at the pub about the value of newspapers. It’s then that Mac and Charlie storm in, excited to show them a newscast that Mac was interviewed for. Mac and Charlie are livid when Mac’s twenty-minute speech about the traffic system is cut down to one sentence. It’s then that they decide to start their own news show. Frank’s bored and says he wants in on it. Dee tells him, “No, that’s a bad idea. Usually when you get involved, somebody gets hurt.” Frank is offended by this. “That’s ridiculous. I’m just palling around with the guys. How’s anybody gonna get hurt?” One of It’s Always Sunny‘s best gimmicks has always been the transition to their title card after the cold open. The title is always some hilarious reference hinting at what’s to come. This episode may have had the best, as the screen goes black after Frank’s question, and then up comes the title, “Frank Sets Sweet Dee on Fire.”

The gang doesn’t really care about news. They just want to be famous. Frank, Charlie, and Mac decide to go to a nursing home to find a story, because as Mac says, “A lot of shady shit goes down at nursing homes.” They interview the residents, but find them to be incredibly boring and unnewsworthy. For some excitement, Frank suggests setting the nursing home on fire. They don’t do that, but the plan they come up with involves Mac running into an abandoned warehouse to save a box of kittens from a fire that Frank and Charlie are going to set. Mac doesn’t want to do it, but then Dee walks by, who’s been out at clubs hoping something will happen to make her famous there. She hasn’t had any luck though. “I can’t get into any of the clubs, then how in the hell am I supposed to get famous?” Cut to their news segment, with Dee being sent into the warehouse to get the box of kittens. Once inside, an unsuspecting Dee yells, “It smells overwhelmingly like kerosene in here.” At that, Frank lights a match, tosses it in, and runs. Dee saves the kittens but runs out covered in flames before the gang puts her out with an extinguisher. She’s somehow more singed than badly hurt. She’s understandably angry until she sees the footage. “I do look really heroic.” The gang isn’t happy though because while on fire, Dee threw the box of kittens. They’ll have to do a reshoot.

Next up is a box of kittens at the bottom of the well. What’s a better story than that? Dee agrees to do it, but says, “Don’t set it on fire, okay. I feel like this is dangerous enough.” Frank and Mac say that they can’t set the well on fire because it’s filled with water. As soon as Dee’s at the bottom of the well, Frank chucks in a match and blows up the well. Dee comes up in flames again and tosses the box of kittens, upsetting everyone else, because she’s ruined the segment by throwing the box of kittens again. The end of the episode shows Dee and Dennis at a club on the public television channel. The two drunks are dressed up as babies and dancing. Everyone cringes. “Congratulations guys,” Mac says, disgusted. “You’re famous.”

What the Cast of ‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’ Has Said About the Episode

Glenn Howerton, Charlie Day, and Rob McElhenney have their own podcast called The Always Sunny podcast. In one episode a year ago they covered the “Frank Sets Sweet Dee on Fire” episode. With it having occurred almost over a decade ago, they didn’t remember most of it going in. Howerton discussed part of the episode coming from years before watching public access TV in New York and how far it pushed the limits, including the time he saw someone about to shave in between a guy’s butt cheeks as the camera slowly zoomed in. He also spoke on how the episode was meant to be about how, in 2007, what was considered to be news was changing. You’d have real stories at the same time you’d have the media’s obsession over someone like Paris Hilton. In 2007, what fame even was had changed. It was no longer about being in a movie or show or achieving something. Someone could be famous just by going out to a club and acting stupid like Hilton did. She was famous for being famous. Charlie Day wasn’t as big a fan of the episode as fans are, saying a lot of the logical issues in the writing don’t work for him. “A lot is working, but there’s like some logic things that I feel like just aren’t as good or as thought out as they could be. I do like the episode, there’s a lot of big laughs in it.”

Charlie Day might not have been a big fan of “Frank Sets Sweet Dee on Fire,” but audiences were, as it’s one of the most popular episodes in the series’ run. Whether you liked it or not, it’s definitely the worst thing that the gang has done to Dee. And as It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia is known to do, there’s often a message about society hidden beneath the mayhem. That was 2007. Just imagine how the gang would have reacted to the Kardashians and the lengths they would’ve gone to reach their fame. Poor sweet Dee might not even be with us anymore.