Shameless - Recap: You Make Justin Bieber Look Straight

Episode 7 of Season 4 of Shameless, “A Jailbird, Invalid, Martyr, Cutter, Re**** and a Parasitic Twin,” continued to show us the fallout of Fiona’s (Emmy Rossum) negligence as her case came to the point of sentencing. Meanwhile, Lip (Jeremy Allen White) took almost too much responsibility in caring for his younger siblings and getting his home in order, partly because it was the right thing to do but also because it meant sticking it to Fiona. Kev (Steve Howie) and Veronica (Shanola Hampton) suffered two major losses this week, while Debbie (Emma Kenney) only dealt with one, though that I was happy to witness. Carl (Ethan Cutkosky) stressed over Liam’s potential long-term brain damage, while Sammi (Emily Bergl) continued to bend over backwards to care for Frank (William H. Macy). In the end, it was perhaps Mickey (Noel Fisher) who stepped up to the plate most tonight, rescuing Ian (Cameron Monaghan) from the pits of gay club despair. Here is the Recap and Review of Season 4 Episode 7 of Shameless, “A Jailbird, Invalid, Martyr, Cutter, Re**** and a Parastic Twin”!

Showtime "Shameless"

Carl:

So, I’ll just get this out of the way; the r-word was thrown around quite a lot during Episode 7. Shameless handled it well, I thought, in typical Shameless fashion, but I’m not necessarily too comfortable with peppering this recap with it. I’ll do my best to fill you in on all that went down during Carl’s arc this week.

After word spread of Fiona’s disastrous birthday party, Carl suffered through some lame bullying on the bus ride to school. No one pushes around Carl Gallagher, though. A head-butt and a jab to the face put an end to that; however, this mainly served to plant seeds in Carl’s mind. Would Liam suffer from some permanent mental damage to do the coke overdose? Carl spent Episode 7 doing his online research and observing his little bro’s behavior, only to eventually find that, according to some bogus online questionnaire, he might be the one struggling with some sort of intellectual disability. Of course, you can imagine the kind of website Carl would dig up from the bowels of Google, so take that with a huge grain of salt. By the close of this week’s show, though, he was fully embracing his own particular perspective on things, and we love Carl exactly as he is.

I also liked his interaction with Fiona this week. Carl was one of the more welcoming members of the Gallagher clan, probing Fiona for information on her trip to jail. If all of the tragedies in Carl’s life have a silver lining, it’s that by the time he’s an adult, he might actually be more stable than any of these other people having already been sideswiped by all of their errors in judgment.

Frank:

Speaking of folks who seem to only serve to challenge and hurt the ones they love, Frank is simply deteriorating at this point. Sammi remains the only supporter of her father, but her daddy issues run so deep that she’s almost completely blind to Frank’s manipulative and egomaniacal ways. Lip and Debbie were quick to both threaten Sammi’s place in the family and warn her of their father’s awful habit of landing them in foster care without any remorse. Basically, as Sammi’s bond with her siblings continues to slowly grow (Though, by the end of Episode 7 she took several steps backward.), she also grows increasingly agitated and impatient with her father’s harsh behaviors.

Frank began writing his memoirs on Tumblr this week, though he adamantly refused to admit to doing so. The mere mention of his lack of time sends him into an enraged tantrum, and Sammi mostly took the brunt of it. With social services breathing down their necks, Sammi was instructed not to allow Frank to smoke weed in the house. Instead, she slipped him some heroin to numb his pain as a special “gift.” Frank nearly overdosed, crapped his pants, and was promptly tossed to the curb, along with Sammiy, by Lip. Sammi, realizing that she had nowhere appropriate to keep her father safe and warm, broke into Sheila’s house to use her shower. Their arc this week closed with Sammi bathing Frank, who continued to slip closer to death.

It’s strange to watch this relationship grow because it continues to have incestuous undertones, but Sammi really does seem to be an honest and positive character. She’s well-meaning, and even Frank doesn’t deserve to die entirely hated and alone. I hope she’s not hurt by all of this when push comes to shove, as things usually turn out with Frank.

Debs:

Debbie continued to force a relationship on Matty (James Allen McCune), who’s remained simultaneously frustratingly ambiguous and refreshingly supportive of Debbie up until this point. I’ve said it before, but I don’t understand a twenty-something man zipping his lip when it comes to a strange friendship with thirteen-year-old little girl. It’s a pretty simple conversation to have regarding the inappropriateness of this all, even if it means hurting her feelings; however, Matty had previously done a decent job of diffusing Debbie’s come-ons and helping her through her time of need. Though Debbie’s anniversary dinner went up in smoke, I’m glad to see that Matty finally stepped in and nipped this situation in the bud once and for all, even if it meant pissing Debbie off.

Debbie’s arc also had a bit of social commentary this week. Her pregnant friend cut herself after getting dumped, but the entire explanation really served to make a point about society’s numbness and apathy towards such heinous actions as self-harm and mental health issues among young people today. It’s not ever cool or appropriate to hurt yourself, and Debbie learned that the hard way when she ran home post-“breakup” to “try” it, just for a second, for herself. Her immediate reaction of pure pain after a single poke said that she’d never make that mistake again.

Kev and Veronica:

Kev and V suffered through two major losses this week. First, the Alibi was robbed of $600 that Kev couldn’t afford to lose, though it did inspire him to pick up a gun from Mickey for his family’s protection. That was all Veronica needed to zap her empty sex drive back into full force. Veronica, meanwhile, got some twisted news regarding her pregnancy. After heading in for another checkup and ultrasound, V learned that nature had, unfortunately, taken its course through fetal absorption, a process among pregnancies involving multiples that ends with one fetus getting absorbed by the other stronger ones. Kev and Veronica shared a tiny shameless moment in which they both admitted to being just a little relieved.

Ian and Mickey:

Showtime "Shameless"

Thanks to some aggressive persuasion from Mandy (Emma Greenwell), Mickey spent Episode 7 hunting through a string of affiliated gay clubs from Ian. It’s always equal parts entertaining and sad to witness Mickey struggle with accepting his sexuality, but watching him man-handle the first club’s manager following the man’s lack of assistance and total callousness was pure hilarity.

You make Justin Bieber look straight.

It's, needless to say, not insulting to be gay, but if there was ever one thing not to say to Mickey, it was that.

Eventually, Mickey managed to find Ian giving an older man a lap dance a the club’s second location. Ian, who’s coped with losing his relationship with unhealthy help from tons of drugs and dangerous sexual situations, forced Mickey to pay for his time like anybody else looking for a dance. At first, it seemed Mickey had come all that way simply to relay information regarding Fiona’s epic screw-up and Frank’s impending death, but what happened next was probably the best moment of the week.

While we thought Mickey simply left the club in a huff and returned home after getting all spiffy to see Ian, we were promptly clued in to the fact that Mickey is not so willing to simply give up on Gallagher in favor of his own ego. Ian, dragged from the club by a much older man looking to get lucky with the underage boy who was clearly intoxicated behind comprehension, was rescued from another night of abuse by Mickey. Mickey fights with fists, not words, of course, but all of that was trumped when Mickey scooped up Ian, who’d passed out, from a snow bank and carried him over his shoulder to a nearby cab. At home, Mickey’s wife was made upset by the sight of her husband’s ex-boyfriend incapacitated on their bed, and even Mickey couldn’t help but well up with tears, no longer willing or able to hide from who he is.

Lip and Fiona:

We know how Lip operates at this point, and Episode 7 was no different. When Lip Gallagher reaches his boiling point, he punishes with the silent treatment and burdens himself with responsibility or, sometimes, a lack of responsibility. In this case, though, he took over the role of Gallagher family guardian, even going as far as to protect Liam from Fiona by taking him to his college dorm for safekeeping. I’m sure you’ve detected the small amount of sexual undertones to his relationship with his roomie’s girlfriend, Amanda, at this point, but this week the two finally had a nice moment in the dorms. Amanda offered Liam a clementine and then continued to go as far as to offer to babysit while Lip went to class, complete with complimentary thirty-minute photo updates. Lip took her up on her offer, trusting Amanda with Liam even considering the terrible family crisis they’d just suffered through. Lip, of course, got to know the girl better in the process, and it’s safe to assume this is only the beginning of a new friendship that will probably blossom into an affair.

Both Jeremy Allen White and Emmy Rossum had some great acting moments this week, but their dramatic explosive argument in the Gallagher kitchen probably took the cake. Watching Lip blow up at Fiona as she attempted to explain her adamant refusal to accept jail time was great. Fiona is guilty, though she failed to recognize that her lack of an intention to give her little brother drugs didn’t change the fact that he did, indeed, get into her cocaine due to a lack of protection. Being sorry doesn’t change the fact that Liam nearly died. Lip sees this as Fiona’s disastrous existence poisoning his own bright future, as though Fiona’s life is to be chained to the suffering on the South Side, while he’s meant to escape. It’s interesting to watch Lip finally admitting that he’s had a sense of this all throughout his friends and family pleading with him to embrace his potential, which was always previously met with outright animosity.

Fiona, meanwhile, spent this week on Shameless going over her options with her lawyer, Maria. As Fiona previously put it in her conversation with Carl, the jail system treats people like cattle, and it seems like the court system did the same. It was almost as though everyone involved from the government simply wanted to get this thing over with, though to Fiona, her entire life was on the line. Would she end up with five years in prison or get the plea deal she was hoping for? Even the threat of, say, a month in jail was too much for her to even begin to contemplate. The idea of three years on probation sounded like a free pass.

Showtime "Shameless"

In the end, Episode 7 of Season 4 of Shameless closed with Fiona’s sentencing following her lawyer’s discussion with the opposing side. The judge dropped any jail time whatsoever, a ruling that initially excited Fiona beyond belief; however, the subsequent list of probation requirements and the true weight of being a convicted felon regardless had the opposite effect. Fiona’s life is forever tremendously scarred by this ordeal, and if she couldn’t see the need to change her destructive ways up to this point, the tears in her eyes certainly let us know that things just clicked. She admitted to being guilty.

What did you think of Season 4 Episode 7 of Shameless, “A Jailbird, Invalid, Martyr, Cutter, Re**** and a Parasitic Twin”? Will Frank make it out of this, or will Shameless actually let go of William H. Macy? How will Fiona handle house arrest until further notice? What does this week mean for Ian and Mickey?

Thanks for reading my Recap and Review of Season 4 Episode 7 of Shameless, “A Jailbird, Invalid, Martyr, Cutter, Re**** and a Parasitic Twin”!