“Mac Finds His Pride” is far from the first time that “Sunny” has broken its formula. Some of these big swings have resulted in the most popular episodes of the series, like “A Very Sunny Christmas” which, much like the season 13 finale, deals with very heavy truths about the gang’s parental relationships and ends on a touching moment, with a flashback to Mac and Charlie as children throwing rocks at trains together. Other times, their reception is more split. Regardless of how the fans feel about it, the series creators love to switch things up.
“Every year is exactly the same in terms of the approach,” McElhenney elaborated, “which is to try and do things that would be ‘stereotypical’ episodes of ‘Sunny,’ very ‘Sunny’-esque episodes with a similar structure, and then we try to mix up a few.”
McElhenney has also noticed that these stand-out episodes always get a lot of attention, but it isn’t necessarily always positive attention. Not only is that polarizing nature “part of the experience” of the show, but this variety is also what gives the series such longevity.
“I truly and firmly believe that if we were just giving something by the numbers week to week, that ultimately we wouldn’t be going into season 14,” the showrunner added. “It would just get tired. If they hate an episode every once and a while, that’s fine as long as they keep coming back to see what they might love or hate the following week.”
At 16 seasons and counting, “Sunny” is the longest-running live-action sitcom in television history, and that’s no accident. The very reason why people are so alienated by the series is the very reason it has stayed on air so long — it never fails to push the envelope.