TV Review: Shameless (5×09) “Carl’s First Sentencing”

The living and the dying take up most of this week’s episode of Shameless, which doesn’t do much to further the ongoing storylines, but gives a lot of hints of what’s to come as well as setting up new storylines for the last three-episode stretch.

Carl’s sentencing takes up the largest part of the episode and it’s easily the least interesting despite the A game the cast brings in their reaction shots to his hijinks. Over the years, Carl has developed from violently mischievous to likely psychotic, so him being arrested and then sentenced to a year in juvenile hall isn’t particularly surprising. The characters seemed to know this was coming and so did we. It isn’t particularly interesting, though, because it’s so frustrating to witness a character make such stupid decisions. Carl’s never been a character who I’ve needed more screen time with, working better as a character on the periphery.

Elsewhere, Fiona continues to get much of a storyline but shares a nice scene with Sean who’s found out he’s going to be separated from his son due to travel restrictions. It’s a nicely acted scene and one that showcases drug addiction in a manner of subtlety that Shameless isn’t often known for.

To combat that subtlety there’s Kev’s storyline that simply irked me. The title “rape walker” is one that could only work onShameless and still I could help but be irritated at the idea of it. However, it ends with Kev realizing he loves Veronica and that he was dumb to sleep with anyone else in the first place so at least that got wrapped up.

Lip is once again thrown into a storyline that seems to have little bearing on the rest of the show which is a shame considering how much they could do with the character. I’ve never had a hard time believing that Lip Gallagher could charm his way into women’s lives. He does have the roguish, perpetually hung over look that created a heartthrob in James Dean and he’s intelligent, very much so as he arrogantly displays in his Critical Theory class. I don’t mind the idea of Lip hooking up with his professor and then his professor’s husband being totally cool with it…on paper. It’s funny and it’s nice to see Shameless allow comedic scenes every once in a while to characters who aren’t Frank. However, we’ve spent a lot of time this season with Lip figuring out his place at home and school and there has to be a meatier storyline to laden him with that isn’t once again geared towards his womanizing. He’s an interesting character and sometimes I wonder if the writers realize this.

Oddly enough it’s Frank who get’s the most interesting storyline this week.

There’s a lot of talk about life and death in this weeks Shameless and I cant help but sense an element of doom looming around the corner as the season creeps closer and closer to the end. Despite an overall atmosphere of calm, Carl’s arraignment aside, it’s the calm before the storm element that makes me as a fan all the more fearful. Things are going as well as to be expected in the Gallagher family and that never bodes well for end of the season stories. Is anyone else guessing a death on the horizon? Frank spends much of the episode telling a woman he’s befriended with stage three pancreatic cancer about how often he’s dodged death’s door. Ian is told to create a suicide watch list while he and Mickey learn the severity and longevity of his condition. Carl and Chuckie are both facing seemingly perilous situations in a juvenile delinquent center and Sean is sitting out in the cold, a split decision away from picking up the needle again. Frank in particular stands out as someone who could possibly not make it to season six. He’s actively cheated death since the shows creation and as he plays along into this young woman’s last wishes you have wonder why someone like Frank keeps surviving while a woman in the peak of her life is being told it’s about to end.

Frank may be the easiest prediction but again, death seems to be lingering in the corners of the show. Sean seems like the most expendable character but after this week’s episode I’m worried about Ian. Will Ian be the casualty of the Gallagher family? His dawning realization of how his disorder isn’t something that will necessarily change in his lifetime is chilling as both Cameron Monaghan and Noel Fisher play the shock on their faces. Even more upsetting is Lips talk to Ian where he tells him he’s strong enough to handle it. It’s a nice, brotherly sentiment but look at Ian’s face and try to tell yourself he believed a word of it.

It’s odd that an episode that danced around so many narratives struck be as so grim but maybe it’s simply the nature of the show and it’s fans at this point to expect the worst when things are seemingly going fine. The low key nature of the direction, how every setting from near the lake where Frank shouts at God, to the holding cell where Fiona talks to Carl are all bathed in gray, certainly doesn’t help with the lifeless feeling of the episode.

Excluding Carl of course but, by the looks of it, he seems to be fine.

7/10