S07.E12: Requiem for a Slut

[ElectricBoogaloo]

SEASON FINALE!

Quote

The Gallaghers grapple with the loss of one of their own. As Lip takes steps to improve his future, Debbie, Carl and Liam get roped into Frank's new scheme. Meanwhile, Kev and V get their revenge on Svetlana.

Promo:

 

Clips:

 

Edited December 12, 2016 by ElectricBoogaloo

[Dee]

The go to word this season has been FANFIC.

Tonight's episode was the most Six Feet Under inspired bit of Shameless fanfic that ever was.

Well acted fanfic, but still, fanfic.

[sazzat]

It really does seem like a group fanfic challenge, yeah?

[abstractstuff]

Coming up in season 8. Frank finds out where that meth is, and he'll end up dragging her carcass along the country in a tweaked out daze. It can be like An American Werewolf in London. Each time we see her, she's decomposing more and more. 

[BunnyBlueBrown]

I enjoyed this season along with this episode with the exception of the Kev/Vee storyline. It seemed like a scene for their story was cut... 

They did a good job writing a season finale and possible series finale at the time. 

Ian basically said hi Trevor I was out for days with my felon ex, want some drinks..?

I laughed so hard when Fiona was caught hitting Monica's body..

No Fiona relationships were my favorite part of this season.. 

Give me liberty or give me meth!

[whiporee]

So, back in the day, Magnum PI was almost cancelled. They wrote an episode where Thomas said his goodbyes and died at the end. And then they got renewed. I remember this because Tom Selleck introduced the episode as saying we thought it was the end, but it wasn't, but we still think it's a really neat episode. And to tell the truth, it was pretty good by Magnum standards, and a little bit better than the actual finale the next year. But what was set in motion in that episode skewed the narrative of the next and final season.

Each of the first three years of Friday Night Lights, the writers were pretty sure they were getting cancelled, so they wrote the season finale like a series finale, and set things in motion they'd wouldn't have to deal with the next year because the show would have been canceled. The story logistics of things  like Tammy being pregnant and Eric leaving for his college job didn't matter, because the show was moving onto the hopeful universe of fanfic. And then the show gets reuuped. So they had to de-age Riggins, Lyla and Tyra a bit, figure out what to do with Julie and Matt, and bring Eric back from a sweet college gig, not to mention a baby. Decide how to deal with Jason when clearly he would have moved on. Season two was just chaos because of the strike, but then in season three, you had Eric getting fired, then hired to rebuild East, and you just knew he'd do fine. But the show got renewed again and we had to deal with the realities of East versus Dillon (with the Panthers now as the bad guys, Tammy as principal and all that stuff). Either season one's finale or season three's finale would have been great series finales, but the show kept on going, so the writers had to deal with their neatly wrapped packages that then had to be unwrapped.  

That's what this felt like to me. I got the feeling that the writers and showrunners realized Emmy was walking, and Showtime wasn't going to pony up, so they decided to wrap it all up. Don't worry about the minor plots or the repercussions of them -- lets see them all moving on doing all right, which is all we ever wanted for the Gallagher kids. Some closure on both Frank and Monica, Lip stops drinking, Fiona's a landlord and moving in the right direction. Ian's a good EMT, Debbie's welding, life seems like it will work out for these crazy kids. 

And that's the problem. Because this is a story and a narrative drama, all they can do now is show them FUCKING IT UP. So instead of Fiona making a good business call and getting herself out, something will happen with the building. Instead of assuming that Lip stays sober and gets back into college, we'll have to see him struggle with both, and slide back into drinking because they've decided that being an alcoholic is his defining characteristic. We'll see Debbie in trouble of some sort again, Carl kicked out of school, maybe another Ian manic storyline. But if it had ended tonight, we could have had hope things worked out. Since it's coming back, we know they won't.  And because next season is probably the last, we'll be going from reset to happy ending quickly, without any chance to play out the pretty good stories that are out there. 

All that said, it was a fine episode. My only complaint is that the show description said that Kev and Vee get revenge on Svetlana, and there was nothing of the sort. Maybe that got cut out in favor of the ending montage when things seemed to be going south. 

And there is hope. FNL rallied to come up with the best finale I've ever seen, so maybe Shameless can do the same. But I wish Showtime and Emmy had worked their shit out earlier, so the writers' room could have kept stories going instead of bringing them to a quick close. I love the show, but I think next season will have quite a bit of heartbreak. 

Edited December 21, 2016 by whiporee

[CarolMK]

Is it definitely renewed? I haven't seen confirmation yet by Showtime if it was or not.

Surprised to see Frank talking about having been in college, I don't think we ever heard that before. I didn't think he'd even graduated high school.

The 7 pounds of meth , while an interesting storyline, is not realistic. Monica was an addict, there is no way that she would have been able to save that much of it since she never had a job as far as we know. Even living in the storage locker, where would she get the money? Working as a prostitute would take some time to accumulate $70,000  and sorry, I don't think Monica could earn very much given her age. 

I liked seeing Carl is his military uniform, though I'm sure he'd have shorter hair if he was really in military school. 

[Dee]

Judgmental Trevor, useless Sierra & creepy Neil all need to go ASAP.

[scrb]

Why devote so much time to a character who made a handful of appearances over the years?

Frank tells the kids that they are the way there are because they have some of Monica in each of them.  You mean impulsive and unreliable?  No the kids pull together for each other to pay the bills.

A junkie who bails on her children is probably going to be a lot more hard boiled than this vulnerable (almost needy) person that we saw.

It would have been false to end the show with that montage of each of the kids putting in the work, hinting at them heading towards success or at any rate, getting out of the neighborhood, heading towards some kind of middle class or better lives.

Because the show has repeatedly shown them getting derailed, often from self-sabotage.

So why would the last minute of an episode about how Monica affected the Gallagher be about them sticking with something, heading towards actually building something meaningful?

[Dee]

37 minutes ago, scrb said:

So why would the last minute of an episode about how Monica affected the Gallagher be about them sticking with something, heading towards actually building something meaningful?

Because a ridiculous amount of viewers of the American version of Shameless are overly invested in the Gallaghers "succeeding," as a means of justifying their emotional investment to the characters, even if it means betraying most (if not all) of the core tenets of the show.

[whiporee]

I thought about this last night, and now I'm mad at the finale a bit. 

The fight made no sense on a bunch of levels. First, we've never seen Frank act like a junkie before. Never, in all our Frank-dom, has he ever acted out of control in anger. So his attacking Debbie didn't fit. But more importantly, there is no way -- no way at all -- that Lip and Ian (and maybe even Carl) wouldn't have beaten him nearly to death if they saw him grab Debbie by the neck. And then to hurt Fiona, too? They would have hit him and hit him and hit him, and that would have been a degree of catharsis for all of us who mostly wanted to see them hit him and hit him and him him for seven seasons. And it would have been a good, realistic moment to see -- maybe Kev -- have to stop one of the boys (probably Lip) from actually killing Frank. There was too much pent up emotion there for them to just let hold him back (also, it takes two young men in good shape to hold back a barely functional drunk old man) so Debbie can slap him? No way. Too much long-standing anger there for them to let that slide as easily as they did. Nothing about the meth stuff felt real at all, and especially if they thought it was the end, it was a lot of time and characterization wasted. 

[Dee]

Frank has acted out of control in anger at the family before, and like before, Monica was the impetus for that fight too.

When Monica ditches the family at the end of Season 2, ostensibly for good, Frank is so bereft he attacks Ian over a case of beer, until Estefania knocks him out with a frying pan & the family dumps him in the backyard.

The difference with this fight and that one, is that this time Monica really is gone for good, and this fight was their collective catharsis, instead of just Frank's. That's why they followed Frank outside in the aftermath of the fight & let him remain in the fold afterwards.

I do agree the meth stuff was a deus ex machina, because if Monica had that earmarked as the kids "inheritance," what was the need of her pulling stick up jobs to leave them each $5,000?

The meth's only purpose was to provoke a contrast between the rest of the Gallagher siblings questionable decision making against Fiona's new "morals"; as if Fiona didn't just spend the year buying her house with drug money, embezzling from her job and scamming a senile old woman out of her business.

Edited December 20, 2016 by Dee

[BunnyBlueBrown]

I don't see how it is unrealistic that Frank didn't get beat up or that he was impulsive & aggressive towards the kids. It seemed obvious to me the kids were taking it easy on Frank since he just lost Monica. The fact that he was allowed to stay in the house showed that. Also, when people experience death it is normal to do things you usually don't do. 

Edited December 19, 2016 by DOBABYR

[iMonrey]

Quote

Is it definitely renewed? I haven't seen confirmation yet by Showtime if it was or not.

Yes, Rossum settled her money issues with Showtime and if officially starts filming next May.

This definitely felt like it could be a series finale though, with the exception of leaving Kev and Vee's storyline unfinished. I liked the little montage showing everyone moving on. 

Overall, I enjoyed Fiona's storyline this season, mostly because it didn't involve yet another love interest or her spiraling out of control. I have mixed feelings about Kev and Vee's storyline but I didn't hate it. But - I hated Lip's storyline, Ian's storyline and Debbie's storyline, and I'm just plain sick of Frank. I missed Carl too.

Realistically the show should end. I kind of wish the network had just thrown in the towel and ended it rather than settle with Rossum, but apparently it's still the highest rated show they've got after Homeland. I just think the writers have run out of ideas at this point. Most shows struggle to maintain a decent narrative past five seasons and this one is no exception.

[tennisgurl]

I have enjoyed this season more than last season (and even parts of the one before it), but I mostly feel like the writers are spinning their wheels. I kind of wish this show would just end so the actors could go onto to newer, better projects. They deserve better. 

[sazzat]

I just don't know where they can take it. I don't always like how they moved characters to new places, but they've done it; everyone is in a more or less settled position for the time being, so it will be annoying, not to mention repetitive, if they have everyone fuck it up just to give them something to do.

14 hours ago, whiporee said:

And there is hope. FNL rallied to come up with the best finale I've ever seen, so maybe Shameless can do the same. But I wish Showtime and Emmy had worked their shit out earlier, so the writers' room could have kept stories going instead of bringing them to a quick close. I love the show, but I think next season will have quite a bit of heartbreak. 

I appreciate the comparison to FNL, a show I loved but which also did a lot of convenient forgetting of events/playing with the timeline. They had the excuse of the strike, but even so, there was a whole killing the rapist, Tyra/Landry romance, Santiago, etc. that they never built on (or in Santiago's case, even mentioned again). Why is it that I can forgive FNL but have a harder time forgiving Shameless? Maybe just the sheer volume of rebooting/we will not speak of it again on Shameless, or the sense that characters are deeply affected by their upbringing but are somehow not affected by the experiences we see them undergo on the show itself?

[jbrecken]

The scene where Fiona tells off Frank is proof of why Emmy deserves to be paid the big bucks.  She went through just about every human emotion.

[Gulftastic]

Yes. Emmy is wonderful. 

[lgprimes]

Well ok then. 

That was an adequate ending for me. I can be done with this show now. I don't need any more seasons of watching them screw up/rinse/repeat.

 Not sure if even the return of Joan Cusack woukd get me back.

It had a good run, but enough is enough.

[Empress1]

1 hour ago, sazzat said:

I appreciate the comparison to FNL, a show I loved but which also did a lot of convenient forgetting of events/playing with the timeline. They had the excuse of the strike, but even so, there was a whole killing the rapist, Tyra/Landry romance, Santiago, etc. that they never built on (or in Santiago's case, even mentioned again). Why is it that I can forgive FNL but have a harder time forgiving Shameless? 

FNL is a much, much better show, in my opinion (although I do not forgive its second season - I don't own it and it lifts right out).

I might not watch next season - I'm only interested in Lip and Kev & Vee at this point, and I don't think the show is interested in Kev & Vee. And Fiona is a hypocrite- the only reason she has any success is because of drug money. Carl bought the house with drug money, which gave her the collateral for the laundromat, and then she lucked into a big profit. Literally nothing she's doing now would be possible without drugs, so for her to grandstand about how ashamed she was of the rest of them was rich.

Edited December 19, 2016 by Empress1

[scrb]

Yeah but she is trying to clean up her act, at least for now.

She busted her butt to get the diner running well and then was inspired by her boss and got an inspiration about the laundromat.  She assessed where she is in life and decided to pursue a better path.

Hopefully she learned a lesson about inspections before buying the property.

[Dee]

Last night's episode was a perfect encapsulation of why the Gallagher kids still tolerate Frank. He stayed. And as we've seen, time & again, the Gallagher kids prioritize loyalty above all else.

Yes, he's a revolting human being who disappears for months and/or years at a time, but when the rubber meets the road, he desperately wants to be a part of that family.

Monica, not so much. The kids were shiny new toys to her. As soon as the luster wore off, she was out the door; leaving a trail of immense destruction in her wake.

That said, I wonder if Grandpa Bill will be sticking around. He seemed awfully cozy during the family's post-funeral dance party.

Edited December 26, 2016 by Dee

[jww]

So how old are Frank and Monica suppose to be (Macy is 66) ?  Supertramp  was active around 1975-80 so if Frank was a junior in college and 21 in 1980  he would be 57 today and if Monica was close in age that means she had Liam  when she was 50.  Spill the Wine would be appropriate for Macy’s age as it came out  around 1970

I was also puzzled  by  why  Frank   could not have entered the security code; it would look a lot more suspicious  for a little kid to enter the code and then  have the group rush in and be seen on the monitor and if Monica was living in it, security should have been use to a sketchy  looking character coming and going.  A storage locker that size would be expensive and based on years  watching Breaking Bad  the wholesale price they would get for the meth  is a lot less than retail/street value.

[stagmania]

5 hours ago, sazzat said:

I appreciate the comparison to FNL, a show I loved but which also did a lot of convenient forgetting of events/playing with the timeline. They had the excuse of the strike, but even so, there was a whole killing the rapist, Tyra/Landry romance, Santiago, etc. that they never built on (or in Santiago's case, even mentioned again). Why is it that I can forgive FNL but have a harder time forgiving Shameless? Maybe just the sheer volume of rebooting/we will not speak of it again on Shameless, or the sense that characters are deeply affected by their upbringing but are somehow not affected by the experiences we see them undergo on the show itself?

Not only was FNL a much better show, but the things they erased/elided were things the audience wanted to pretend never happened, because they were clear missteps. I'd say just about the opposite is true for Shameless, where they're constantly dropping good stories and retconning beloved parts of the show's canon. 

[Empress1]

6 minutes ago, stagmania said:

Not only was FNL a much better show, but the things they erased/elided were things the audience wanted to pretend never happened, because they were clear missteps. I'd say just about the opposite is true for Shameless, where they're constantly dropping good stories and retconning beloved parts of the show's canon. 

Yeah, even the FNL showrunners acknowledged that the misstep stories were just that (e.g. the Tyra & Landry murder plot). They course corrected and improved (although S1 is still the best). The Shameless showrunners don't seem to do much course correcting.

[TV Anonymous]

I do not get it. What is Kev and V revenge on Svetlana?

[Emily Thrace]

17 hours ago, scrb said:

It would have been false to end the show with that montage of each of the kids putting in the work, hinting at them heading towards success or at any rate, getting out of the neighborhood, heading towards some kind of middle class or better lives.

I would have been profoundly disappointed if that was the case. I don't think Shameless has ever been the story of the Gallaghers becoming "middle class" and I don't think it should be. I think Shameless has always been a story of the underclass and why they stay that way. I wouldn't mind seeing one of the Gallaghers succeed but I would be pissed off if they all did. Actual people like the Gallaghers don't go from Junkie to CEO in one generation. It doesn't mean their stories aren't worth telling. In fact I think one of my favourite things about the show is that it shows a lot of middle class cable subscribers why "bootstraps" isn't really an answer to cross generational poverty and addiction.

Its why I actually have mixed feelings about Lip going back to school. I want to see him succeed but i have to wonder if he would actually survive at a tech start up. The pressure and crazy hours those places demand seem like a very bad place for someone with his addictive personality. For all derision about the "Best Buy" path I wonder if that might be a better or at least happier option for Lip. I get that means not "living up to his potential" but Lip has never really seemed that driven to me. Smart but more of a dreamer than someone to roll up his sleeves and work hard. I can actually see Lip being happy with the wife and 3-4 kids and a "World's Greatest Dad" that he actually earned. Lip is a very nurturing person in his own way I can see him getting more out of taking care of his family than whatever job he chooses.  As long as it was his choice and not something that just happens like if he knocks up Sierra or someone like her. I've never really thought Lip would be happy as a mogul especially if it takes him out of the neighborhood or away from his family.

Seeing the kids lose Monica was brutal and honest and beautiful. Even if her role on the show was to simply be the annual hurricane she helped make the kids who they are and has always been a part of the fabric of the show.

I like the funeral homes reaction to Fiona no shame and no judgement.

I wish we had seen the regulars like Tommy and Kermit boycott the Alibi because of what Svetlana did to Kev. I feel like Kev is beloved enough for that to happen plus it goes with the sense of communal justice the neighborhood has always had. A great laugh would be to see them show up at Kev new bar.

Also it was good to see Anspaugh from ER again. He actually seemed to like Carl maybe he will turn up again sometime.

[CarolMK]

Sorry, what show was FNL?

[Empress1]

Friday Night Lights

[whiporee]

How deep into the South Side do you think the Gallaghers are? I ask because Monica seemed to come from middle class -- her father owned a sheet metal company -- and Frank was in college when they met. Plus, Frank's brother (Ian's father) seems to live a nice middle-class existence somewhere in the burbs, if I'm remembering correctly. But the house and other relatives are deep in the neighborhood. So I'm not sure the kids are as deeply rooted in the South Side (or a trapped mentality) as it sometimes seems. Both Frank and his brother went to college, after all. 

Carol, FNL was Friday Night Lights. If you haven't seen it, you might want to take a look. Great, great show. Even the maligned second season was better than a lot of things on the air (Though i have to argue a point. The murder wasn't my least favorite thing that they did that year. I thought while the act was too much, the scenes dealing with it -- especially Landry's building sense of guilt and final admission to his father, and then his father convincing Tyra to get him to lie, and in the end cops covering for each other -- were well done. I hated Matt and the nurse, though. But I digress). 

Dee, I had forgotten that scene with Ian was prompted by Monica. Maybe it's just chauvanistic of me, but I thought the boys would have a much more visceral reaction to seeing Frank attack their sister than they showed. 

Edited December 20, 2016 by whiporee

[islandgal140]

Okay I guess I need to put FNL in my viewing queue huh?

I liked this episode and yes it did feel like an ending, however, yeah, I hate that it didn't deal with thieving ass Svetlana. 

13 hours ago, Emily Thrace said:

I wish we had seen the regulars like Tommy and Kermit boycott the Alibi because of what Svetlana did to Kev. I feel like Kev is beloved enough for that to happen plus it goes with the sense of communal justice the neighborhood has always had. A great laugh would be to see them show up at Kev new bar.

So much this.

Debbie's welding instructor was indeed quite handsome. Poor Neil. 

[iMonrey]

Quote

Carl bought the house with drug money,

Just a point of contention: Carl got the money from illegal weapon sales, not drug sales. The drug thing was before he went to juvie. :-)

[Empress1]

6 hours ago, iMonrey said:

Just a point of contention: Carl got the money from illegal weapon sales, not drug sales. The drug thing was before he went to juvie. :-)

D'oh! You're right. But wasn't he dealing when his friend went to prison for killing the boy who stole his bike? I thought I remembered he gave the murdered boy's parents a couple of grams (of what, I'm not sure) to help with the expenses?

[NotChu]

On 12/19/2016 at 0:20 AM, CarolMK said:

Is it definitely renewed? I haven't seen confirmation yet by Showtime if it was or not.

Surprised to see Frank talking about having been in college, I don't think we ever heard that before. I didn't think he'd even graduated high school.

The 7 pounds of meth , while an interesting storyline, is not realistic. Monica was an addict, there is no way that she would have been able to save that much of it since she never had a job as far as we know. Even living in the storage locker, where would she get the money? Working as a prostitute would take some time to accumulate $70,000  and sorry, I don't think Monica could earn very much given her age. 

I liked seeing Carl is his military uniform, though I'm sure he'd have shorter hair if he was really in military school. 

Remember one of the kids mentioned it looked like a man was living in the storage room, too.  I think it was Carl rummaging through a black motorcycle jacket.  I bet the meth really belonged to that guy and he'll be looking for it in subsequent seasons.

[Emily Thrace]

15 hours ago, whiporee said:

How deep into the South Side do you think the Gallaghers are? I ask because Monica seemed to come from middle class -- her father owned a sheet metal company -- and Frank was in college when they met. Plus, Frank's brother (Ian's father) seems to live a nice middle-class existence somewhere in the burbs, if I'm remembering correctly. But the house and other relatives are deep in the neighborhood. So I'm not sure the kids are as deeply rooted in the South Side (or a trapped mentality) as it sometimes seems. Both Frank and his brother went to college, after all. 

. 
 

From everything we heard from Gram (Franks Mother) about her and her husband I would say the Gallaghers are at least at three generations of Southside addicts. (Aunt Ginger was a hooker remember?) I think they were probably blue collar or working class at one point but when that was gutted in the seventies they never recovered much like the neighborhood itself. I wouldn't be surprised if they have been in the Back of The Yards for several generations though. Especially given the "Nobody fucks with the Gallaghers" reputation that tends to take a couple of generations to develop. I don't see Frank earning that one on his own.

11 hours ago, islandgal140 said:

Debbie's welding instructor was indeed quite handsome. Poor Neil. 

Its not shocking though, I always thought Debbie was rather young to give up on sex. I do agree though poor Neil.

[Dee]

1 hour ago, NotChu said:

Remember one of the kids mentioned it looked like a man was living in the storage room, too.  I think it was Carl rummaging through a black motorcycle jacket.  I bet the meth really belonged to that guy and he'll be looking for it in subsequent seasons.

The last time Monica was around, she was dating Walter, who just happened to be running a meth lab on his grandmother's property; so you may very well be right.

[Lemons]

On December 19, 2016 at 5:28 PM, scrb said:

Yeah but she is trying to clean up her act, at least for now.

She busted her butt to get the diner running well and then was inspired by her boss and got an inspiration about the laundromat.  She assessed where she is in life and decided to pursue a better path.

Hopefully she learned a lesson about inspections before buying the property.

She didn't. That guy is on his way to scamming her.  It was obvious when he said that she could use his lawyer and she agreed. She also seemed impressed when he showed his inspections of the property instead of letting him know that she'll do her own inspections anyway.  

 It will be disappointing if she ends up getting cheated on this building.  She's not supposed to be a dummy like vee's husband.  

[Tatum]

On 12/19/2016 at 0:01 AM, whiporee said:

 

Each of the first three years of Friday Night Lights, the writers were pretty sure they were getting cancelled, so they wrote the season finale like a series finale, and set things in motion they'd wouldn't have to deal with the next year because the show would have been canceled. The story logistics of things  like Tammy being pregnant and Eric leaving for his college job didn't matter, because the show was moving onto the hopeful universe of fanfic. And then the show gets reuuped. So they had to de-age Riggins, Lyla and Tyra a bit, figure out what to do with Julie and Matt...

No kidding? I always wondered why they did that, since I am pretty sure it was heavily implied during the first season of FNL that Riggins, Lyla, and Jason were all seniors. I could possibly buy that Riggins and Lyla were juniors during the first season, but by the third season, all suspension of disbelief was gone. We're supposed to buy that Tim Riggins was 15 when the show started?  When he's driving around and having absolutely no trouble buying beer from any store clerk or bartender? That drove me crazy. Also annoying was the rewrite of Julie and Matt's romance, when Julie sobs that she and Matt dated for 4 years and he just up and left her without an explanation. Uh, how about 2.5 years max, Julie, and in that time you broke up with him so you could date other guys and he had a serious romance with his grandma's home health aide. Total cumulative dating time was maybe 12 months, over that 2.5 year period.

 

Sorry to wander so far off topic but that drove me nuts, so thanks for the explanation!

[whiporee]

Quote

She didn't. That guy is on his way to scamming her.  It was obvious when he said that she could use his lawyer and she agreed. She also seemed impressed when he showed his inspections of the property instead of letting him know that she'll do her own inspections anyway.  

 It will be disappointing if she ends up getting cheated on this building.  She's not supposed to be a dummy like vee's husband.  

I think that goes back to the finale question. If this is a series finale, then we can assume that the guy is above board and she did her due diligence (mostly because a bank would demand inspections and appraisals for a real estate purchase). She would also see revenue streams and leases and all that fun stuff before she purchased, and before she could get a loan for the other 95 or so she needed (also, she'd be hard pressed to not pay off the mortgage, but I digress). And we could all happily imagine Fiona moving up in the world, at least a tad, building something that resembles her South Side empire.

Now it will have all been a plot-point mandated scam. 

But maybe -- just maybe -- they'll SORAS the situation and take a time jump, and instead of seeing everyone struggling in this period of their lives, we can see them in the next. I doubt it, but you never know. 

My other random thought is this: if they want to complete the Frank-Lip parallel, there's only one thing that can do that. Karen, who's every bit as much Monica as Monica was. That could be interesting to watch, to see if Lip could actually reject his father's path. Frank's path wasn't alcoholism nearly as much as it was reckless hedonism, and Karen's the right impetus for that. 

Edited December 23, 2016 by whiporee

[Chaos Theory]

On 12/19/2016 at 5:01 AM, scrb said:

Why devote so much time to a character who made a handful of appearances over the years?

Frank tells the kids that they are the way there are because they have some of Monica in each of them.  You mean impulsive and unreliable?  No the kids pull together for each other to pay the bills.

A junkie who bails on her children is probably going to be a lot more hard boiled than this vulnerable (almost needy) person that we saw.

It would have been false to end the show with that montage of each of the kids putting in the work, hinting at them heading towards success or at any rate, getting out of the neighborhood, heading towards some kind of middle class or better lives.

Because the show has repeatedly shown them getting derailed, often from self-sabotage.

So why would the last minute of an episode about how Monica affected the Gallagher be about them sticking with something, heading towards actually building something meaningful?

They will always have a little of Monica (and Frank) inside of them but that doesn't mean they have to BE either of them.  They don't have to spend their lives self sabotaging themselves.  Fiona can in fact do what is best for herself and still be there for her family.  It's never been an either or choice.  Lip doesn't have to always do things the hard way.  Ian can succeed even with his mental illness so on and so on.   I actually liked the ending because it wasn't a completely happy sunshine and puppy ending but the kids did all find some amount of peace with the choices they made.  

[Dee]

On a second watch, for a potential series finale, this episode was lacking.

No closure for Liam & Kev/Vee, Carl & Frank randomly paired together because the show had nothing else for them, the unnecessary (albeit amusing) addition of Grandpa Bill, the shoehorning of Sierra & Neil into the final Gallagher scene, and no resolution of the Svetlana issue.

[Christina]

If anyone has read my diatribe in the Teen Mom forum, they are probably rolling their eyes and saying, "Not this again!" but Fiona, welcome to a money laundering scheme! They telegraphed it throughout the last few episodes.

Monica was a great character for showing what mental illness being treated by drugs looks like. Her suicide attempt in the first season was one of my favorite scenes in this show, because it was unexpected and shocking. Every time she showed up, it was a whirlwind for the kids, just like what happens in real life. Her relationship with Frank, volatile and destructive, was also realistic. I'm glad they didn't shy away from Fiona pounding her at the funeral home.

[STFUFrank]

On 12/23/2016 at 0:08 PM, whiporee said:

I think that goes back to the finale question. If this is a series finale, then we can assume that the guy is above board and she did her due diligence (mostly because a bank would demand inspections and appraisals for a real estate purchase). She would also see revenue streams and leases and all that fun stuff before she purchased, and before she could get a loan for the other 95 or so she needed (also, she'd be hard pressed to not pay off the mortgage, but I digress). And we could all happily imagine Fiona moving up in the world, at least a tad, building something that resembles her South Side empire.

Now it will have all been a plot-point mandated scam. 

But maybe -- just maybe -- they'll SORAS the situation and take a time jump, and instead of seeing everyone struggling in this period of their lives, we can see them in the next. I doubt it, but you never know. 

My other random thought is this: if they want to complete the Frank-Lip parallel, there's only one thing that can do that. Karen, who's every bit as much Monica as Monica was. That could be interesting to watch, to see if Lip could actually reject his father's path. Frank's path wasn't alcoholism nearly as much as it was reckless hedonism, and Karen's the right impetus for that. 

Except the last time we saw Karen she was leaving town to be better cared for elsewhere after Mandy had hit her with a car causing brain damage. I don't see Karen ever returning. 

[whiporee]

I got the feeling she was faking to get a new start -- not the injury, just the extent and her inability to recover from it. She'd fucked over too many people to stay, she was out of options, and was still, to an extent, groggy. Could be wrong, but there was something in her face that said I get what's happened, and I'm getting out of here. She was equal parts smart and crazy. 

I'm not saying I expect her to come back any more than I expect to see Sheila, Sammie or Mandy again, but if they wanted to present Lip was the choice ot being Frank, Karen's his Monica. 

[Dee]

I'd venture that Mandy is Lip's Monica. Karen, weirdly enough, is his Sheila.

[whiporee]

Attempted murder(s) aside, I thought Mandy was the stabilizing influence in Lip's life. She pushed him into college, genuinely seemed to look out for and care for him, regardless. Karen did none of that, but he couldn't get her out of his system. He never was crazy for Mandy the way he was for Karen -- he'd have stayed with Karen after the baby, he'd have stayed with Karen through anything. Mandy he seemed to be able to cast aside. Not that he didn't like her a lot, but she was the port he stopped in while waiting for the next hurricane.  

Frank's monologue about her made a lot of sense to me (much more than I'd care to admit). Some partners you just can't shed -- they get all the way into you and you'll forgive them anything just for the chance to be around them. I think for Lip that was Karen. Mandy, Amanda, Sierra -- they are all good girlfriends, good partners. But for addictive personalities like Lip and Frank, there are some you never recover from*, and I think that's a lot more Karen than any of the others. 

*I stole that line from Christine Lavin. If you like soft, slow but reasonably introspective modern folk, give any of her first five albums a listen :) 

[Dee]

Mandy filling out Lip's college applications being proof of her being a stabilizing influence in his life is overrated. From the time they get involved until the time she takes off to Indiana with Kenyatta, her incessant neediness is nothing but a constant source of drama for Lip. He can be very thoughtless, bordering on cruel, to her; but he spends the majority of their early relationship deflecting her suffocating expectations. Mandy's passive aggressive tantrums became so bad, it almost drives Lip & Ian to blows because Mandy had no concept of a non co-dependent relationship.

Even Lip, himself, says it's random destruction, specifically, that makes him think of Mandy, not love, and certainly not home & hearth. And Mandy has no problem with cheating on Kenyatta with Lip, with all the subsequent drama that entails, despite the fact that Lip is barely surviving his freshman year of college.

Prior to Karen's running away, she filled the same spot that Mandy eventually does in Lip's life; by helping Lip with his SAT hustle, and acting as an honorary Gallagher long before (most of) the Gallaghers become intimately involved with any Milkoviches. All throughout Karen's pregnancy, Lip is quite domestic and willing to take responsibility for a baby he isn't even sure is his (because of his own issues) while she spends the majority of her time pushing him away because he refuses to stop intruding into her life. It's quite telling that for all of Karen's various shenanigans (unlike Monica), Karen never once asks Lip for anything. The closest she comes to asking a favor of him, is seeking his help to trick Jody into signing a post-nup to protect her inheritance.

And even when Karen returns, she's way more concerned with fixing things with Sheila. She & Lip fall back into a no-strings sexual relationship, but she never exerts any undue pressure on him about anything. In fact, she's more eager to resume her own life, ie re-enrolling in school, than she is worried about winning Lip back. It's only after Mandy makes it quite clear she views Karen as a threat, that Karen begins to treat her as competition. Plus it doesn't help that the Shameless writers completely gave Mandy a free pass for running Karen over. That was one of the first (overt) signs that the show had no problem subverting the narrative to prop their favorite characters.

It's also telling that, aside from Ian, most of the Gallaghers don't have problems with Karen (especially Fiona) the way they do Mandy. Karen never once attempts to cause friction between the Gallagher sibs or invites herself into their home, like a glorified squatter, despite her own stressful home life ala Mandy.

Edited December 28, 2016 by Dee

[Tatum]

Too much to quote @Dee, but I agree with some of your post, particularly that I don't see a lot of parallels between Sheila and Mandy. Sheila, for all her limitations, was self sufficient in the early seasons. She had figured out a way to live with her phobia and needed nothing from Frank- in fact, Frank was the one who used her for her resources. Mandy, on the other hand, did rely on Lip emotionally and also admitted she hoped when he escaped the South Side, he would take her with him (although to her credit, she still helped him knowing this was a long shot and he would likely leave without her). But she was far more needy to Lip than Sheila ever was to Frank, so I agree with you there.

I think when Frank draws parallels between Monica and Karen, it's less about the women personally and more about how both he and Lip are drawn to them, even if choosing other partners would be better for them emotionally. Other than that, I don't think Monica and Karen have much in common, although hard to say with Karen because I still maintain the writers dramatically altered her character from S1 to S2 from a multi layered, deeply flawed but still redeemable character, to a straight up cardboard villain with a cruel streak. It would have been interesting if they kept Karen on the same path she was on at the beginning of the second season, but they turned her into such an asshole.

[Wings]

The season 7 finale was the perfect ending.   I am done with Frank.  If they take a turn without him it might be good.  Maybe focus on some degree of success and happiness for the kids.  .??

[aemom]

I finally saw this episode.  I am actually hoping that the next season is the last season.

I would enjoy seeing how the Gallaghers actually manage to rise above the hardships and find a modicom of success. There would be little hurdles along the way, but I'd like to see Fiona become successful with her real estate, Debbie to finish her welding course, Carl to continue succeeding in military school, Lip to stay sober and go back to school, Ian to continue being an EMT and stay on his meds,  and Liam to remain on the straight and narrow.

I really hope that they don't make it all come crashing down.