Top 7 Shameless moments from Season 9

Top 7 Shameless moments from Season 9 / Image by Showtime

Shameless is on hiatus for the holidays, but we’ll still need something interesting to talk about with our family after the gift exchange.

While waiting for Showtime’s spring fling with the second half of Shameless season 9 — sit tight like Ian in a prison cell, and rest assured these seven moments were enough to get us through until 2019.

7. Frank and the PTA

Frank has always been causing trouble for others in the wake of his fun. Never has he needed to be quarantined, much less cause another the inconvenience.

So when Frank is fingered as the culprit causing the sexually spread infections running rampant through the private school PTA, the victims in his wake are able to gang up on him in retaliation.

It must be said, in fairness to Frank, a few relationships made some real progress towards compassion, understanding, and a new day of peace with their significant other(s).

6. Carl and military school

Veronica gets Carl over the top and into the breach of military school with a wonderful seduction of a fine veteran man upholding the finest of conservative Christian ideals.

With a gag, whip, and just a touch of force, Veronica convinces some Southside Chicago district representative that Carl Gallagher is the epitome of American ingenuity and grit.

He would make a fine soldier and needs to get as far away from Kassidy as possible to have a chance in this world. The discipline and routine would not hurt the boy, truth be told.

Top 7 Shameless moments from Season 9 / Image by Showtime

5. Ian’s day in court

Ian anxiously awaited his prison term for blowing up a van. The Gay Jesus movement went one bombing too far. Ian’s mental health issues have been used as the writer’s conduit to barely scratch the surface of any mental health commentary.

It’s been wise, as the mental health conversation is really just beginning in America, and so much is misunderstood. Perhaps it’s best if some things about the character being highlighted as dealing with the issues the most left some fringe level question marks to some of his decisions. Shim wasn’t replying as it was, so what could Ian really do but wait out the trial and sentencing.

After making and bold decision, one wonderful speech in court, and accepting his sentence, Ian spent his one last free day hanging in the Gallagher house. With the bars closing in, and Cameron Monaghan leaving he Shameless world for good, fans got one last heart touching moment.

Mickey had taken the long route to prison in America. His time in Mexico got a little dicey, and wanting a cushy prison stint, Mickey made a deal with English speaking federal agents concerning information on a certain Mexican cartel. In the deal, he requested certain privileges, including bunk station and cellmate

Is this moment too low?

4. Mo White and the election

Mo White’s description of what a politician must do once elected for office was perfect.

“Abostlutely nothing,” he tells Frank, when Frank ask what White planned to do. Mo White was the easiest, most obvious caricature of the increasingly toxic political scene of modern America.

Frank working both sides by scraping the bottom of the barrel for pocket change, and then angling the third party candidate for a more lucrative if short lived ride made all the sense. Well, more sense than reality.

3. Debbie and babies

Debbie has been the character doing the most growing up throughout Shameless. Debbie came into the world as a girl entering puberty as a middle child in the Gallagher household. In the first few seasons, Debbie was helping taking care of all the neighborhood babies, toddlers, and miscreants at least three years younger than her.

She had some control, in a world where she really had none.

As soon as Debbie had some freedom to be a rampaging teenager free of burdens, she decided to poke a hole in a condom. Along with taking care of Franny, Debbie used her vengeful side to help take up for Fiona.

When her and her welding friends bound and bolted Ford’s married, cheating, and “who cares about separated once you’ve been caught” lying booty out in public for a proper Irish shaming, it was worth one of the best laughs in the last couple of season’s.

She also gave Carl some insight on raising babies Catholic, with Carl asking “Christening… is that where you get the wine and shitty little cracker?” Debbie replied “That’s confirmation. Christening’s when you waterboard the baby”

The dark humor coming from the child with a child that fans watch grow up is hilarious sometimes.

2. Lip Gallagher

Phillip Gallagher, here under this tree lies the best of intentions wrapped in wasted potential. No longer does a tinge of whiskey smell follow him around, but Lip Gallagher is constantly haunted by the temptation. Lip keeps looking for rehab projects, in motorcycles and other peoples’ kids.

Giving away so much money to a stranger more likely to waste it than a Gallagher was foolish. It was authentic, and whimsical, and foolish still all the same.

Frannie could have used a college fund. Lip Gallagher does not really think things out, though he can explain physics books to college professors. Sometimes there is a difference between actionable knowledge and useless knowledge.

Lip needs to lean back towards his street smarts and realize he can still overcome even without a college degree and a NASA rocket. Working on crotch rockets is steady work.

1. Kevin

All season, Kevin carries Shameless when no one else can. He hits the highest notes of comedy, intentional and otherwise. He delicately addresses the tough issues, and knows when not to talk at all. Veronica may have him trained after all.

Kevin. A sexually liberated man who had helped clean up and consulted with many Southside bars to make them safe for women.

Kevin has been with the Alibi since the beginning, under multiple owners. Including himself as owner, though its best Vee keep him none the wiser. And what did Kevin eventually say when it came time to confront the woman’s convention? Nothing, because what could he say. Exactly. Dumb as he may be he got it.

Kevin might not be the brightest on some issues, but as the moral barometer of the show, he is wonderful.

Kevin might be at fault for being a protective dad, to the point of scaring away Veronica’s friends just to hoard the girl’s baby toys. Who hasn’t faked a chainsaw death to protect the children’s memories? Let them throw the fit Lego!

Kevin even wants to have another child. Veronica is warming up to the idea, but with certain conditions that arguably lends the writers a option towards one easy solution. Will it happen? Find out when Shameless returns to Showtime January 20, 2019.