Refugees

The episode opens with Frank ripping out the copper pipes of the house. How great is that? The man has won and there is no way to stay in the house, so prep to find a new place begins…only for the sheriff to show up and kick them out. This causes a minor Gallagher reunion.

Ian and Lip patch things up, Carl and Nick poke around for their own place with negative results. Debbie and Fiona are at least on speaking terms (“I’m still a Gallagher”) but Fiona still doesn’t know about Debbie and Frank’s in progress family replacement plan, The big surprise for Frank is that he’s found a person he can’t corrupt into a final voyage. Tyler’s wife (I don’t think her first name has been said and I can’t remember their last name) has done it all, so Frank’s go to debauchery tactics don’t work. He’s amazingly charming though and manages to show her around to start getting her affairs in order while Debbie tries to seduce Tyler (they think she’s 18). Frank is a great team member when he gets someone to work with.

Special shout out to Ever Carradine, the actress playing Tyler’s wife. William H. Macy is a brilliant actor, as just about every scene he’s in proves. They keep finding (props to the casting department) phenomenal actresses for him to play against and she goes toe to toe with him. The material isn’t easy and Macy as Frank sets a high bar. I give the award to best scenes this episode to these two.

Kevin works on his guilt issues about Yanis which leads to a gaggle of child refugees coming to live with him and V. Fiona focuses on getting a place for her and Liam to crash (cue dumb fight with Sean) and keeps delaying her abortion. “You didn’t think I was having second thoughts, do you?” Yes, we do, Fiona.

Good to see someone forcing Ian to grow up some. He’s been a tornado for some time and it’s exciting to see someone new check his shit at the door (and whoa, Tony shows up after a few years telling Ian “Your sister turned me gay.”) Speaking of blasts from the past, Amanda drops in on Lip and his dumb ass can’t see the fire in her eyes right from the start. Letting her into his room leads to the end of Mrs. Robinson. Not sure what the under over is of him ever seeing her again.

“Hello?” Chuckie! I’d like to say it’s messed up that everyone forgot about him, but I did after 50 minutes so I can’t hold it against them after the day they had.

Next week: NSFW

A lot of floating around in episode 3.

On Nassau, Max works toward converting the treasure and gets informed about the incoming trouble. This forces the rallying of the pirates to show a united front. Big stand out for this section was Max and Anne’s talk in the cave. Beautiful silhouette shot of Anne for her last line before she leaves.

Blackbeard makes a wise power move with results soon to come (meaning next week). I dig his time talking with Vane. Interesting history gives them interesting dialog. They work on screen together really well.

As Eleanor and her new “teammates” get closer to Nassau she discovers that Woodes has agreed to an accelerated takeover timetable from his financiers. The pressure is on more than she thought and when they reach Nassau, Eleanor proves her worth once more by sending out Hornigold as the messenger. Looks like Nassau loses a major foothold right out of the gate.

The horrors of being adrift at the mercy of mother nature with Flint. Fantastic makeup work sold the crews desperate shape. This episode covers 3 weeks and the look on John Silver’s face at the end of it really shows. Another awesome scene with just Flint and Silver and a killer last shot buttons up the episode. All hell might break loose on all fronts in episode 4.

Going Once, Going Twice

I’m glad they brought the Yanis plot line in for a landing. A bit predictable, but very Shameless. We’ll see what the fallout is next week, but I see some rough times for Kevin ahead.

Frank wheeling and dealing for Debbie continues to be awesome. For every downer, she manages to keep her head up. That’s an admirable personality trait. And it actually looks like he’s landed her a scam she can believe in.

Now for the brothers. Bumpy road for Lip, it looks like the Mrs. Robinson plot line is coming to a head soon. I’d like to see him move on. Did Ian find some inspiration at the firehouse (in more than one way)? It’ll be awesome to see him get some kind of foothold on his life. It could really give him purpose and a legit future if he can make it work. Carl makes some headway with Dominique in a legit adorable and funny way. Nick speaks! Love him and Carl together.

It wouldn’t be Shameless without money problems. V and Kevin have got a serious empty bar problem, but the Gallaghers are boned. Fiona managed to put a decent plan into motion but it wasn’t enough. What a devastating end to the episode. This is a major upheaval for the family that I’m not too sure how they are going to deal with (at least Lip is at school). They’ve talked about housing problems in the past and dodged a bullet with their cousin Patrick some time ago, but there’s no way out of this one. Our family is homeless.

Looking forward to episode 5.

Awesome episode. A little bit of everything. Some politics on Nassau with the pirate crew trying to hold it down, Rackham and Max’s move makes sense, but doing anything on the sly without Vane knowing is not good. Got a good dose of Eleanor’s past as she navigates her own political traps. Blackbeard steps out of the shadows and lays down some old school law, (much to the embarrassment of the kids) which was a great scene.

The show stopper was every scene of the tempest. The most exciting bit of TV I’ve seen in some time. Looked amazing and was super intense. The mast taking off was insane. It must have taken 6 months to finish that sequence. They set the bar high on this one and it’s only the second episode of the season. I hope they can meet it.

It’s season 3! For some reason, I always forget when Black Sails comes back, so this was a pleasant surprise. It usually takes BS some time to get going so this first episode was a ton of set up.

There’s just a ton of bad news coming to wash ashore Nassau. The pirates have a finger hold on that island. It’s a much steeper hill to climb for Max, Rackham, Vane and Anne than I think they ever imagined. Max had a fantastic line to Anne about their situation that went something like this: “We stole a mountain of Spanish gold and are keeping it on English land we stole. We can’t protect ourselves from what’s coming.” Her thoughts of being known simply as “the whore who lost everything” is probably going to come true.

Meanwhile, Flint is going bananas taking on the world on the ocean and John Silver is trying to hold it down on one leg. Oh, and a major name from the past is en route and no one knows about it. Serious dark horse.

Eleanore has flipped! She’s always wanted the best for the island, but if she gets caught with the people she’s now rolling with, she’s going to be turned into chum by her old crew.

The F Word

A lot to love this week. Carl hitting on that girl all episode was hilarious. Frank rallying around Debbies cause brought out the best/worst things about him. It’s been awhile since we’ve seen him as happy as helping Debbie sign up for welfare. Him catching the clerk on missing paperwork (and knowing the exact form) was brilliant stuff (and shows how smart Frank is when he actually applies himself).

Some great writing was done for Fiona this week. She’s got so many complicated things going on, I love seeing how they handle each part. The crushing weight of three of her siblings spiraling around her finally came out to V in a much-needed talking to (I like seeing Fiona talking to her friend about stuff). The scenes with Debbie continue to be great. Debbie can throw down a convincing argument, but she continues to go head first through barriers. Despite getting some sense knocked into her, she’s still a stubborn Gallagher. I loved Fiona giving Debbie that ultimatum. “Having Frank’s support on this should worry you.” They had a real heart to heart and sorta mended the bridge but they both stuck to their guns. I’m thinking Fiona is going to get the news that she won’t be able to terminate next week. She was super dense going to see Gus though! He says he wrote a song about her and she sticks around for it? She asked for both guns blazing on that one.

Ian and Lip fight! That “earned my own space” line from Lip crossed a serious line that was hard to watch. Ian has always been able to count on his brother, so this was some shocking stuff (even if Lip did have to tell him off when it came down to it). I don’t think Ian has ever felt more alone.

#AbortionRules

Rough episode! Starts on somewhat shakey ground and then the Shameless slide slams everyone down right to the credits.

With Debbie’s “I’m not pregnant” lie blown, Fiona is all about getting her kid sister to the clinic. A episode long battle gets underway to the point of the sisters rolling around on the sidewalk in front of the Gallagher home. Debbie takes some lumps when she finds out things aren’t going to be nearly as easy (or simple) as she thinks it will be. Finding out Derek took off on his own rocks her the most (losing the flour child might have broken her though).

Fiona in trouble again and it’s her own version of Debbies ordeal. Common sense would be to do a cut and run (literally and figurativly) but it won’t be that simple for her. Some more head butting with Ian, I have no idea where he’s going to end up. He’s so lost I don’t know how he’s going to cope.

It’s impossible for Frank to be down forever! He finds his next angle and then has to run from it as fast as possible! I like Hotair Balloon Frank a lot. When he’s off on his own and interacts with the kids here and there. They always dismiss him because they’re so tired of his nonsense and he heads back out to get into more trouble.

Carl is totally going to get arrested and never be let out of jail.

Do Kevin and V keep their mouth shut or admit to what happened? Better believe Yanis is going to go after the lesbians.