Just sayin'

If you’re reading this it means you haven’t yet installed the Charlie Sheen Browser Blocker for Firefox or Chrome. Yeah, I can’t bring myself to use it, either. I do so love me some Schadenfreude.

Besides, as a formerly avid fan of Two And A Half Men , I’ve been waiting for Sheen to see what’s been obvious to everyone but Sheen for quite some time now: regardless of whether he shows up on time, regardless of whether he knows his lines (though I can’t imagine Sheen ever passing up an opportunity to do a line of any kind), regardless of the size of his bank account and the number of grams in the rocks he’s banging, regardless of the number of cars he owns and women he’s simultaneously sleeping with, regardless of how attractive his kids are or how many rooms there are in his mansion, the only difference between him and some Ozark mountain meth-head is that Sheen puts his fake teeth in before going to work.

So today’s news that Rob Lowe is in talks to replace Sheen on the show makes me very, very happy. Sure, John Stamos’ name has been floated, too, but Stamos lacks the true bad boy tint needed to balance Jon Cryer as uber-anal rententive Alan Harper. Yes, I know Stamos played airquote-rocker/bad boy-end airquote Uncle Jessie on Full House, but where’s his sex tape, hmm??? (No, seriously. I’d love to watch it.)

But how should Chuck Lorre write it?

If it was me (and, sadly, it’s not), I’d enjoy having the last laugh by inflicting an (unseen) Charlie Harper with repeated impotence after which he downs so much booze that he topples off of his deck and dies on the beach, where he remains undiscovered for days as Alan, Jake and Bertha enjoy his absence. Follow with a funeral scene similar to the episode in which Sheen’s real-life brother, Emilio Estevez, appeared. Queue the women spitting in Charlie’s casket. (James Earl Jones performing the eulogy in this one, too, would be icing on the cake.) Then, as Alan prematurely celebrates inheriting Charlie’s house, car and money… enter Rob Lowe as an old drinking buddy of Harper’s to whom Charlie left everything… including the responsibility of housing Alan and keeping Bertha employed.

BOOM. You’ve got a (much better looking) new bad boy (who may or may not catch Evelyn’s eye), a reason for Alan and Jake to remain in the beach house, Alan’s continued money envy and the ongoing jokes about his freeloader ways, and a reason to keep Bertha around.

But that’s just what I would do and, folks, if I could write a sitcom I sure as hell wouldn’t be sitting here wearing my pajamas and bunny slippers at 11 o’clock in the morning pounding the keyboard on an outdated computer while wondering just how hard-and-fast that 24-hour time limit on my 24-hour deodorant really is.

Or maybe I would.