Shameless S4 Ep7 – A Jailbird, Invalid, Martyr, Cutter, Retard and Parasitic Twin

With Fiona out of a job again and Lip making the school lunches, it’s back to “generics from Food 4 Less.” I figured that the Gallaghers would eventually be back to square one when Fiona got her job at Worldwide Cup, but I didn’t think it would take a coke overdose in a toddler and some jail time to get there. Now the big concern is an impending visit from social services. With Frank back at home and Sammi enabling his drug addiction, tensions are running high between the Gallaghers and their newfound sister and nephew.

Mandy, before going off to work at the waffle house wearing a hat with a squirrel on it, confronts Mickey about Ian’s disappearance. She reminds him that it’s his fault Ian left, so he should step up and go find him. Mickey is all about giving off the impression that he doesn’t care about anything or anyone, but Ian might be the one person he has a soft spot for.

Fiona awakens and immediately tries to clean up, likely trying to wash the smell and feeling of jail away. She finds Liam and gives him a big hug while apologizing profusely, while Lip is getting Liam ready to go with him for the day. Fiona tells Lip she was planning on taking Liam out with her, but Lip passive-aggressively says he is going to take Liam with him to school. The rift between the two is the source of most of the conflict throughout the episode, and I’m thinking it won’t be going away anytime soon. It’s strange to see a power shift from Fiona to Lip now being the head of the family, with Fiona’s guilt keeping her from being able to challenge him. While she might not be in the position to be making any demands about Liam’s whereabouts, Lip seems to be partially using Liam as a tool to make Fiona feel even worse.

At the bar, Kev comes in to work to see that city construction outside the Alibi is still going on. When he goes inside, he gets robbed at gunpoint by two men who know that Kev stashes his money in a keg somewhere in the bar. I guess his very pregnant wife not wanting to have sex isn’t the worst of his problems at the moment.

When Lip gets to school, he finds Amanda, his roommate’s girlfriend, changing in the dorm. Despite the awkward encounter, Amanda takes to Liam pretty quickly and offers to watch him while Lip is out to class. Seeing as we’ve only ever seen Amanda be a cold to Lip before, I’m interested to see where her character goes since we’ll likely be seeing more of her.

Sammi is still doing her best to take care of Frank, but as usual for Frank, he seems pretty unappreciative. Sammi is easily one of my favorite new characters. Even after Lip and Debbie don’t exactly roll out the welcome mat for her and Chuckie, she still defends the family when talking to Frank. She doesn’t know Frank’s history; all she knows is that she wants to be a good daughter to her new-found father in his last dying days.

At Fiona’s court hearing, she gets a bit of good news. The judge asks that Fiona’s court-appointed lawyer and the DEA sit down to find a plea bargain out of court. Her lawyer comes back and tells her that she has suggested three years’ probation, but the DEA is also pushing up to 90 days of jail time in addition. The idea of Shameless without Fiona for three months sounds pretty unlikely, so I wasn’t really on the edge of my seat for this part of the storyline.

Sammi and Frank have an interesting conversation where Sammi (and the audience) get to learn more about Frank’s childhood. Unsurprisingly, he also came from a broken home. His father beat him to take out his frustrations against his mother. Sadly, this heart to heart gets cut short when Frank flips on Sammi for suggesting that they have “limited time,” still in denial about him dying. In an act of desperation to win him back, she offers him what she was saving for his last days. She asks, “Did I do good?” which clearly shows her actions come from deeply rooted daddy issues. She wants her father’s approval—something that was impossible before finding him—and so she goes against her better judgment to get it.

At the Alibi, Kev asks the patrons who stole his money, knowing it must have been a regular who knew where he kept the money. He pulls out a gun he got from Mickey to be taken seriously, but everyone else in the bar just pulls out a gun of their own. “The Bible says we have the right to bear arms, so I bear arms.” “It’s the Constitution.” “No shit…” Then Vee shows up to tell him that at her ultrasound appointment, she found out the third fetus has been absorbed by the other two. I’d consider this to be good news since they don’t have enough money to feed all those mouths, but they seem to take it pretty hard.