July 5, 2025 • 9 mins
💳🤣 In this episode of The Rank Podcast, John continues his Sitcom Rankings journey with a look at the classic 1987 sitcom Married... With Children, reviewing Season 2, Episode 16 – “Master the Possibilities.”
When a mysterious credit card offer arrives in the mail addressed to Buck—the Bundys' dog—Al sees a golden opportunity. Against all reason (and legality), the Bundys start living large on Buck’s new credit line. But as always, the high life comes with a hilariously disastrous price.
John breaks down the episode’s clever take on consumerism, its absurd premise, and the sharp performances that helped cement Married... With Children as one of the most subversive sitcoms of its era. Does Master the Possibilities swipe its way into the top of John's rankings? Or is it declined at checkout?
Tune in to find out!
E-mail your fan questions, comments and suggestions to TheRankwithJohnandZac@protonmail.com.
Support the show by becoming a patron at Patreon.com/TheRankPodcast.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Buck is going to be the focal point of this episode because
Buck starts getting mail and Al decides he's going to get credit
from another credit card company, right?
But no credit card company wantsto give Al a card, but of course
Buck ends up getting one. Now you'd think, well, obviously
they can't use that card becausethat's fraud, right?
Only if we get caught. Welcome back to another episode
(00:38):
of the rank. I'm John and today we're going
to be doing another episode in my married with children rewatch
slash watch along and ranking it.
So if you're enjoying these episodes, if you're just a fan
of married with children and enjoy consuming content about
it, please subscribe and or follow like the episodes
comment. You can send me an e-mail with
your suggestions and complaints.I guess please also consider
(00:59):
becoming a patron on our patreonpage@patreon.com/the rank
podcast where you can get all ofour archived episodes.
Now today we're ranking the 16thepisode of the second season of
Married with Children, titled Master of the Possibilities,
written by Michael G Moy and RonLevitt and directed by Linda
Day. Now this has been out for a long
time, so there will be spoilers.That is my spoiler alert for
you. So that being said, let's go to
(01:21):
The Potent Notables. This episode aired on Sunday,
February 7th, 1988. Married With Children, up from a
5.1 rating to A5, so pretty muchthe same.
It beat its lead in Werewolf once again, and it beat the two
that came after it, The Tracey Ullman Show and Duet, whatever
that is. It didn't beat 21 Jump St.
though. Still Fox's best performer.
(01:41):
I couldn't find the competition that ABC put up.
Wonderful World of Disney said it only went from 7:00 to 8:00
PM, but if it was more normal and labeled correctly then
Rock'n'roll Mom got a 13.6. Sounds great.
No, it does not. Its other competition was My Two
Dads on NBC, which had a 14.7, and Murder She Wrote, which had
a 21.5 and won the night. The episode title is a reference
(02:05):
to Mastercard's advertising campaign slogan of the 70s and
80s. Funnily enough, I actually went
looking for a commercial or or something from this ad campaign
and the first one I found was Angela Lansbury starring in it.
For you who don't know, Angela Lansbury is the star of Murder
She Wrote, so she thought that was kind of fun since she kicks
(02:25):
Married with Children's ass every week.
The next notable and last is theskateboard the bud buys at the
beginning of the episode is a Vision Psycho Stick, a very
popular model of boards in the late 80s and sought after by
skateboard enthusiasts. It was known for its unique WAVY
shape and distinctive graphics designed by Andy Takakjian.
(02:46):
Sorry, Andy, if I said your namewrong.
They gained popularity in the 1980s and became a pop culture
icon, even appearing on the cover of the INXS album Kick.
The design was inspired by a Real Vision employee.
All right, so those are all the potent notables.
Let's go to the episode overview.
This episode has a really similar plot to the anniversary
episode from the first season inthat Peggy Max's out their
(03:09):
credit cards again. I will say that one, the one in
the first season, was much more tender than you would expect
from Married with Children, and this one is much more exactly
what you'd expect from Married with Children.
We opened things up with Peggy and Bud coming home, having a
ton of bags in their hands. Of course, the idea was to go
grocery shopping, but they didn't buy any food, just stuff.
Just things like the skateboard mentioned earlier in the Pope
(03:32):
Notables by Bud and A bone for Buck.
Of course, it's all fine becauseit's Daddy's money.
This is what Peg says. I just want to point out that if
she's not working and he's providing for the family, then
it's the family's money. OK?
Just saying, you know, I mean, she's not spending it
responsibly for sure. You know, I'm not saying he
should be pleased with how irresponsible their being with
it, but you know, still their money.
(03:53):
I will say he takes it pretty well.
He just kind of, he just kind ofhas a resignation about him.
He knows they maxed out the cardbecause he couldn't pay for a
grilled cheese and I had to workthe debt off by unloading
lobsters. Of course.
Peggy says she bought something for everybody, including Buck,
just not Al. At this point, Al calls Buck a
throw rug that eats, which I thought was a great line, but.
(04:14):
But actually Buck is going to bethe focal point of this episode
because Buck starts getting maleand Al decides he's going to get
credit from another credit card company, right?
But no credit card company wantsto give Al a card.
But of course, Walk ends up getting one.
Now you'd think, well, obviouslythey can't use that card because
that's fraud, right? Only if we get caught.
But you see, earlier Marcy had brought over a package that was
(04:37):
addressed to Al, and it was something that nobody had
ordered. And Marcy said you don't have to
pay for a package you didn't request, and you can keep it and
use it. So the Bundys use this same
logic with the credit card and go on a shopping spree.
They purchased a ping pong table, a pool table, a ski
exercise machine thing, a basketball hoop, fur coats, a
boom box, and on and on. Then Al and Peggy decide to use
(04:59):
the card to get a nice hotel suite nearby and order a ton of
room service. We find out later that it was
$1500 worth of hotel services, which is just a lot.
They end up ingratiating themselves with a rich patron in
the next suite, becoming fast friends with them after Al
purchases them some champagne. Naturally, it's a super old rich
guy and a very young attractive wife, which Al is very excited
(05:22):
about. So here's where it gets a little
weird. As if this isn't already weird,
because they intimate that both the old guy and attractive young
woman get naked and join Al and Peggy in the tub.
But then later Peggy is being fed grapes by a bellboy and Al
is between the rich guy and the lady, so she's supposedly naked
next to him, and Peggy's seemingly fine with that,
(05:43):
although she doesn't like when she keeps accidentally touching
Al. Where is she touching him?
Well, we can only guess, but Peggy isn't bothered by it
enough to get up. It's just very odd.
Either way, the rich guy ends upliking Al so much that he kind
of sort of offers Al a 100K per year job managing his
operations. But before he can take the
offer, Bud finds out that this is all illegal and calls them at
(06:05):
the hotel, ruining their fun andtheir future.
Don't worry though, they're not going to jail.
The credit card company is so embarrassed that they gave a dog
a credit card that they decided not to press charges.
They just repossess everything. Of course, you can't repossess a
hotel suite, so Al has to work that debt off, which is, you
know, a nice book ad because he has to work one debt off and
then at the end he has to work another one off.
(06:27):
But that's the whole episode. Let's see how it ranked.
I'll rank the rank is where I ranked the episode based on five
categories, story, acting, dialogue, episode coherence and
character relatability. I ranking on a scale of one to
five, one being the worst, five being the best.
And then we also have a laugh counter where I tally up the
amount of times that the episodemade me laugh out loud and that
gets added to the score one point per laugh out loud.
(06:49):
So first category is story, which I gave a 3 1/2.
So the story is that the bunniesare too stupid to understand
that they're committing fraud bybuying a bunch of stuff with a
credit card in their dog's name.It sounds stupid because it is,
but it's also pretty good. So let's go to acting, which I
gave a three. We featured David Faustino
pretty heavily in this one, which is a detriment to this to
the acting score here for sure. The rich guy's wife was insanely
(07:11):
vapid, but but I suppose that was the point.
And Ed and Katie are good. No real standouts here.
So it's just, it's very sort of middle of the line.
So then we go to dialogue, whichis I gave a 3 1/2.
The thing about a married with children is that it's ridiculous
and has very silly plot lines and sometimes the characters
make decisions that just make you scratch your head, but it's
still pretty damn funny. So next category is episode
(07:32):
coherence, which I gave a three,mostly just that the fraud they
committed was so ridiculously implausible.
Like how much credit did they give the dog?
I mean, they spent thousands of dollars.
It just stretch believability a little too much.
And I mean, it's fine because, you know, it's married with
children, but like just it's a little wild.
So let's go to character relatability, which I gave a
four. I mean, I don't know that I
(07:53):
would have committed fraud, but I can understand the desire, I
guess. Like I can fathom if you general
genuinely thought it was legal, just going for it.
Being poor is not fun. And unfortunately, material
goods make being poor feel like less like you're poor while at
the same time impoverishing you further.
Thanks, capitalism. All right, well, those are the
rankings. Let's go to the laugh counter.
(08:15):
I had 16, so it's a pretty decent amount of laughs.
This puts the episode total at a33, which makes it and I'd watch
it again for the series. The average is now at a 33.
So this average matches the score of this episode, which
keeps the series as and I'd watch it again.
So thanks for listening and or watching.
If you'd like to see a list of our episodes and series
(08:35):
rankings, you can do that on ourwebsite at the rankpodcast.com.
Remember to subscribe, review and comment, and please consider
supporting us on our Patreon site@patreon.com/the Rank
podcast, where you can get exclusive perks and access to
all of our archived episodes. But I'll leave you with this.
The jokes on the show, sometimescorny.
The repartee between Al and Pegg, sometimes cruel.
(08:56):
Being able to watch any episode of Married to the Children
anytime I want. Priceless.
It's not very good so. San Antonio I don't know if you
(09:23):
had the MasterCard commercials in Jamaica.
We're not savages. But that was like a whole ad
campaign. The MasterCard did was was they
would say three things and the third thing was always
priceless. Don't worry folks, we're not
going to be explaining all the jokes.
Buck is going to be the focal point of this episode because
Buck starts getting mail and Al decides he's going to get credit
from another credit card company, right?
But no credit card company wantsto give Al a card, but of course
Buck ends up getting one. Now you'd think, well, obviously
they can't use that card becausethat's fraud, right?
Only if we get caught. Welcome back to another episode
(00:38):
of the rank. I'm John and today we're going
to be doing another episode in my married with children rewatch
slash watch along and ranking it.
So if you're enjoying these episodes, if you're just a fan
of married with children and enjoy consuming content about
it, please subscribe and or follow like the episodes
comment. You can send me an e-mail with
your suggestions and complaints.I guess please also consider
(00:59):
becoming a patron on our patreonpage@patreon.com/the rank
podcast where you can get all ofour archived episodes.
Now today we're ranking the 16thepisode of the second season of
Married with Children, titled Master of the Possibilities,
written by Michael G Moy and RonLevitt and directed by Linda
Day. Now this has been out for a long
time, so there will be spoilers.That is my spoiler alert for
you. So that being said, let's go to
(01:21):
The Potent Notables. This episode aired on Sunday,
February 7th, 1988. Married With Children, up from a
5.1 rating to A5, so pretty muchthe same.
It beat its lead in Werewolf once again, and it beat the two
that came after it, The Tracey Ullman Show and Duet, whatever
that is. It didn't beat 21 Jump St.
though. Still Fox's best performer.
(01:41):
I couldn't find the competition that ABC put up.
Wonderful World of Disney said it only went from 7:00 to 8:00
PM, but if it was more normal and labeled correctly then
Rock'n'roll Mom got a 13.6. Sounds great.
No, it does not. Its other competition was My Two
Dads on NBC, which had a 14.7, and Murder She Wrote, which had
a 21.5 and won the night. The episode title is a reference
(02:05):
to Mastercard's advertising campaign slogan of the 70s and
80s. Funnily enough, I actually went
looking for a commercial or or something from this ad campaign
and the first one I found was Angela Lansbury starring in it.
For you who don't know, Angela Lansbury is the star of Murder
She Wrote, so she thought that was kind of fun since she kicks
(02:25):
Married with Children's ass every week.
The next notable and last is theskateboard the bud buys at the
beginning of the episode is a Vision Psycho Stick, a very
popular model of boards in the late 80s and sought after by
skateboard enthusiasts. It was known for its unique WAVY
shape and distinctive graphics designed by Andy Takakjian.
(02:46):
Sorry, Andy, if I said your namewrong.
They gained popularity in the 1980s and became a pop culture
icon, even appearing on the cover of the INXS album Kick.
The design was inspired by a Real Vision employee.
All right, so those are all the potent notables.
Let's go to the episode overview.
This episode has a really similar plot to the anniversary
episode from the first season inthat Peggy Max's out their
(03:09):
credit cards again. I will say that one, the one in
the first season, was much more tender than you would expect
from Married with Children, and this one is much more exactly
what you'd expect from Married with Children.
We opened things up with Peggy and Bud coming home, having a
ton of bags in their hands. Of course, the idea was to go
grocery shopping, but they didn't buy any food, just stuff.
Just things like the skateboard mentioned earlier in the Pope
(03:32):
Notables by Bud and A bone for Buck.
Of course, it's all fine becauseit's Daddy's money.
This is what Peg says. I just want to point out that if
she's not working and he's providing for the family, then
it's the family's money. OK?
Just saying, you know, I mean, she's not spending it
responsibly for sure. You know, I'm not saying he
should be pleased with how irresponsible their being with
it, but you know, still their money.
(03:53):
I will say he takes it pretty well.
He just kind of, he just kind ofhas a resignation about him.
He knows they maxed out the cardbecause he couldn't pay for a
grilled cheese and I had to workthe debt off by unloading
lobsters. Of course.
Peggy says she bought something for everybody, including Buck,
just not Al. At this point, Al calls Buck a
throw rug that eats, which I thought was a great line, but.
(04:14):
But actually Buck is going to bethe focal point of this episode
because Buck starts getting maleand Al decides he's going to get
credit from another credit card company, right?
But no credit card company wantsto give Al a card.
But of course, Walk ends up getting one.
Now you'd think, well, obviouslythey can't use that card because
that's fraud, right? Only if we get caught.
But you see, earlier Marcy had brought over a package that was
(04:37):
addressed to Al, and it was something that nobody had
ordered. And Marcy said you don't have to
pay for a package you didn't request, and you can keep it and
use it. So the Bundys use this same
logic with the credit card and go on a shopping spree.
They purchased a ping pong table, a pool table, a ski
exercise machine thing, a basketball hoop, fur coats, a
boom box, and on and on. Then Al and Peggy decide to use
(04:59):
the card to get a nice hotel suite nearby and order a ton of
room service. We find out later that it was
$1500 worth of hotel services, which is just a lot.
They end up ingratiating themselves with a rich patron in
the next suite, becoming fast friends with them after Al
purchases them some champagne. Naturally, it's a super old rich
guy and a very young attractive wife, which Al is very excited
(05:22):
about. So here's where it gets a little
weird. As if this isn't already weird,
because they intimate that both the old guy and attractive young
woman get naked and join Al and Peggy in the tub.
But then later Peggy is being fed grapes by a bellboy and Al
is between the rich guy and the lady, so she's supposedly naked
next to him, and Peggy's seemingly fine with that,
(05:43):
although she doesn't like when she keeps accidentally touching
Al. Where is she touching him?
Well, we can only guess, but Peggy isn't bothered by it
enough to get up. It's just very odd.
Either way, the rich guy ends upliking Al so much that he kind
of sort of offers Al a 100K per year job managing his
operations. But before he can take the
offer, Bud finds out that this is all illegal and calls them at
(06:05):
the hotel, ruining their fun andtheir future.
Don't worry though, they're not going to jail.
The credit card company is so embarrassed that they gave a dog
a credit card that they decided not to press charges.
They just repossess everything. Of course, you can't repossess a
hotel suite, so Al has to work that debt off, which is, you
know, a nice book ad because he has to work one debt off and
then at the end he has to work another one off.
(06:27):
But that's the whole episode. Let's see how it ranked.
I'll rank the rank is where I ranked the episode based on five
categories, story, acting, dialogue, episode coherence and
character relatability. I ranking on a scale of one to
five, one being the worst, five being the best.
And then we also have a laugh counter where I tally up the
amount of times that the episodemade me laugh out loud and that
gets added to the score one point per laugh out loud.
(06:49):
So first category is story, which I gave a 3 1/2.
So the story is that the bunniesare too stupid to understand
that they're committing fraud bybuying a bunch of stuff with a
credit card in their dog's name.It sounds stupid because it is,
but it's also pretty good. So let's go to acting, which I
gave a three. We featured David Faustino
pretty heavily in this one, which is a detriment to this to
the acting score here for sure. The rich guy's wife was insanely
(07:11):
vapid, but but I suppose that was the point.
And Ed and Katie are good. No real standouts here.
So it's just, it's very sort of middle of the line.
So then we go to dialogue, whichis I gave a 3 1/2.
The thing about a married with children is that it's ridiculous
and has very silly plot lines and sometimes the characters
make decisions that just make you scratch your head, but it's
still pretty damn funny. So next category is episode
(07:32):
coherence, which I gave a three,mostly just that the fraud they
committed was so ridiculously implausible.
Like how much credit did they give the dog?
I mean, they spent thousands of dollars.
It just stretch believability a little too much.
And I mean, it's fine because, you know, it's married with
children, but like just it's a little wild.
So let's go to character relatability, which I gave a
four. I mean, I don't know that I
(07:53):
would have committed fraud, but I can understand the desire, I
guess. Like I can fathom if you general
genuinely thought it was legal, just going for it.
Being poor is not fun. And unfortunately, material
goods make being poor feel like less like you're poor while at
the same time impoverishing you further.
Thanks, capitalism. All right, well, those are the
rankings. Let's go to the laugh counter.
(08:15):
I had 16, so it's a pretty decent amount of laughs.
This puts the episode total at a33, which makes it and I'd watch
it again for the series. The average is now at a 33.
So this average matches the score of this episode, which
keeps the series as and I'd watch it again.
So thanks for listening and or watching.
If you'd like to see a list of our episodes and series
(08:35):
rankings, you can do that on ourwebsite at the rankpodcast.com.
Remember to subscribe, review and comment, and please consider
supporting us on our Patreon site@patreon.com/the Rank
podcast, where you can get exclusive perks and access to
all of our archived episodes. But I'll leave you with this.
The jokes on the show, sometimescorny.
The repartee between Al and Pegg, sometimes cruel.
(08:56):
Being able to watch any episode of Married to the Children
anytime I want. Priceless.
It's not very good so. San Antonio I don't know if you
(09:23):
had the MasterCard commercials in Jamaica.
We're not savages. But that was like a whole ad
campaign. The MasterCard did was was they
would say three things and the third thing was always
priceless. Don't worry folks, we're not
going to be explaining all the jokes.
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