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always-sunny-mac.jpg

How Social Media Responded to a Touching, Showstopping 'It's Always Sunny' Finale

By Dustin Rowles | TV | November 8, 2018 |

By Dustin Rowles | TV | November 8, 2018 |

always-sunny-mac.jpg

In what is a first after 13 seasons of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, the series finale of the FX show literally brought many of its viewers to tears with a gorgeous, beautifully choreographed showstopping dance sequence featuring … Mac. It was truly something to behold.

The episode itself follows Mac as he tries to come to terms with being gay. He doesn’t know where he fits in as a gay man, and after Frank forces him to go to a bondage orgy and a drag show in an effort to help him find his pride, Mac is no closer to understanding. What he needs, he believes, is to finally come out to his father. It’s the first step, he believes, to coming to terms with his sexuality. Mac wants to “show” his father the struggle inside of him that’s eating him up inside, and in the rousing, tear-jerking final five-minute dance sequence, Mac does just that during a ballet routine on stage in a prison. It’s phenomenal.

As Rob McElhenney explained to Vulture, “We got a really overwhelming emotional response from the LGBTQ community last year. I took it seriously and I felt it would be completely unexpected to have this much more emotionally resonant end to the season. You would expect that Mac would express himself through the art of contemporary dance and it go horribly wrong, until you realize that’s not the direction we’re taking.”

It also explains why McElhenney is so ripped this season — both he and his character have been working on the dance routine for months. “His new diet consisted of no alcohol, no eating after 7 p.m., and no carbs or sugar. He also lifted weights six days a week, ran three miles a day, and stretched for an hour a day — and all that was before he also started training a few times a week for a couple of hours a day with choreographers Alison Faulk and Leo Moctezuma.”

The effort paid off, and not only did Frank give him a standing ovation, but so did It’s Always Sunny fans.



Dustin is the founder and co-owner of Pajiba. You may email him here, follow him on Twitter, or listen to his weekly TV podcast, Podjiba.


Header Image Source: FXX