‘Shameless’ Season 9, Episode 5 Recap: What Will We Do This Time About Ian?

For as long as Shameless has been on the air, the Gallaghers’ loyalty to each other has been at the heart of the series. These last few episodes had seemingly lost sight of that, but last night’s installment, “Black-Haired Ginger”, gifted us with some of the familiar family ties that made us fall in love with the show in the first place.

Before we get to it, a note: it is so frustrating how quickly the show continues to gloss over important details. It feels like they think we haven’t been paying attention these past eight years. Ian can visit Mickey’s dad and talk about prison without consequence? Lip threw away $10,000 and doesn’t feel the sting of its loss (and is now into illegal street racing)? Nessa and Mel still live in Fiona’s building and had their baby? Carl’s murdered wife is just never going to be mentioned? Apparently, we’re supposed to just roll with whatever the show throws us nowadays. It wouldn’t be so maddening if the show had been doing this all along, but this is a relatively new development, and we’re used to better. Anyway. Back to “Black-Haired Ginger”.

There’s some filler we have to wade through before we get to the good stuff: Debbie attempts to hash things out with Alex, gets bored out of her mind, and questions whether she’s even gay at all, only to have it confirmed by Mel, who plants a wet one on her. (Yeah, we’re still doing that. At least Franny was actually present for this episode.) Kev gets asked to speak at a Women’s March as a result of the Vagina-Safe Alibi and is *shocked* by the horror stories he hears from women, which continues to feel on the nose, if mildly sincere. Frank (once again) has abused his liver to the point of needing medication again, but he can’t afford the brand name, so he starts taking some generic that causes him to lose his sexual mojo. His solution? Enlist Liam to literally electrocute his junk. This puts him back in the hospital, where he gets that mojo back with the help of a woman who head butts him.

Liam, poor, poor Liam, continues to get the short end of the stick here, finding himself in a dark closet with his bully who convinces him that very same day he’s gotten her pregnant. (The Gallagher siblings later deal with her attempting to crash at their house by drugging her and dropping her off outside a family planning center). Lip, meanwhile, suddenly has the urge to hop off the wagon after the power blows and he gets the day off work. He tries to keep himself distracted by jogging (while showing off his sweet guns), trying out multiple brands of cigarettes in the bath, and illegal street racing. Just the usual stuff.

The death of his dogs well underway, Carl heads to a West Point mixer, where he clicks with Annapolis-bound Kelly, who offers to spike his punch. She passes out mid-makeout and Carl backs off, filming the incident as “proof” that he didn’t hook up with her while unconscious. She doesn’t buy this and chases him out of the house like a crazy person, seemingly throwing his chances at West Point down the drain, but she comes by Gallagher HQ later to apologize and sticks her tongue down his throat when she figures out the truth (and that he’s single, heeeeey).

The real meat of this episode is the Ian/Fiona/Lip stuff, the stuff that reminds us of how unified the Gallagher family once was. Fiona and Ford fight and make up once again, but that’s irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. She tries to convince Ian to plead not guilty by reason of insanity, but he’s so frustrated by her controlling nature that he considers running away, even dying his hair black to avoid being recognized. The entire episode is a lot of the Gallagher siblings trying to tell Fiona to stop “going all Fiona” on them, and she basically realizes none of them need her anymore. Sigh. Here comes the setup for Rossum’s departure.

Seeing the family come together for Ian’s court appearance is incredibly moving, and I’ll even admit I let out a sigh of relief when Ian pled the way Fiona wanted him to. But the best scene in the episode is far and away Ian and Lip’s conversation over ice cream in the Gallagher kitchen. It’s been a while since we’ve seen these two have a real heart-to-heart, and while their weirdly inconsistent bond has been a sore spot this season (Lip didn’t visit Ian in jail? Really?), this scene made up for all of that. It’s intimate and subtle, a perfect encapsulation of the good stuff Shameless used to deliver weekly. The camaraderie of these siblings is the stuff we’re here for, and the show would benefit from leaning into it more often. Whether or not the judge will buy Ian’s plea remains to be seen, but we’re just glad the gang’s back together again.

Jade Budowski is a freelance writer with a knack for ruining punchlines and harboring dad-aged celebrity crushes. She is also a member of the Television Critics Association. Follow her on Twitter: @jadebudowski.

Watch Shameless Season 9 Episode 5 ("Black-Haired Ginger") on Showtime Anytime