Living With The Liver

For having only reached this season's fifth episode, it feels like we've chewed through a lot of plot already, right? Think how much has changed since the premiere. Fiona hasn't just moved on from Sean: she's met and married another guy. Frank's gone from waiting impatiently for his insurance payout to having burned through it all. Sheila's gone from trying to be a good wife to Frank to...well, she's gone to parts unknown in her luxury RV, and she's almost certainly happier than she ever was in the house he blew up for her. Lip's given up his summer job. Deb's given up on Matty (admittedly not her choice, but still). And now, Fiona's mysterious benefactress has reunited Fiona with Jimmy, which seems like a plot point we've been waiting to pay out for a while, but seriously, it's only been five episodes since it was confirmed for us that he was actually still alive.

How do this week's events affect the happiness quotient for the Gallaghers and Gallagher in-laws? Let's count them down from who's having the best week to who's having the worst.

1. Deb
   A Gallagher has a natural talent for beating the shit out of her peers: hands up, anyone who's surprised? Sure, fighting bitches for money is kind of antisocial, but on the other hand, we should all be pleased that she's possibly found her life's true calling.
2. Fiona
   It's a pretty clear indicator of how grim this show can be that the woman who had to break into a friend's apartment after said friend ODed is having the second-best week. I mean, Jackie didn't die! She just...isn't going to get her kids back! Sigh. Anyway, my favourite scene of the episode comes after Gus finds Fiona at Patsy's the day after their aborted attempt to tell her family about their marriage. She's apologetic about having missed it, but he's completely understanding about her having needed to look after Jackie. Fiona takes this moment to express her fears about their impetuous nuptials: "You make me so fucking happy, every time you play a song or say my name, but there's a little part of me that wonders if we didn't make a big fucking mistake, and that part of me just won't shut up." Gus gives her the perfect response: "Did it ever occur to you that I might be thinking the exact same thing? I can't tell you that this is definitely going to work out -- there's no guarantees -- but if this turns out to be a big mistake, then let's make it the most fun big fucking mistake we ever made."
   

   Fiona, thank God, does what we all wish we could do: throws her arms around Gus The Perfect Man and squeeze him until he's almost dead.

   Then fucking Jimmy shows up, and he just better not ruin everything. I am serious.

3. Lip
   Lip's plotline in this episode gets a little Afterschool Special: he witnesses one of his co-workers on the construction site suffer what could have been a fatal injury due to insufficient safety measures. When Mickey makes Lip his scapegoat for the neighbourhood's gentrification and peer-pressures Lip into joining him for what Lip thinks will be a simple hipster coffee shop vandalism but turns into a machine gun attack, Lip decides not to enter into a Southier-than-thou contest with Mickey and goes back to school early instead. That trip to Miami really seems to have had an impact on Lip and changed his own conception of what kind of future he might have. Good.
4. Frank
   I'm being very serious when I ask this: is Frank literally immortal? Does he have magic powers? Does he exude a hallucinogenic pheromone that makes people do what he wants? When he ends up homeless (again) after losing all his money, he tracks down the easiest mark he knows: Wade Shelton, the bereaved father of Paul, donor of Frank's new liver. Because Wade has some idea that Paul's liver donation has led to a kind of All Of Me situation where his essence is living on in Frank, he is easily manipulated by Frank into letting him stay in Paul's old room. Fine: Wade is very sad and eager to cling to any shred of evidence that he can still spend time with his son, particularly since he's still guilty about not having been there to stop the home invasion in which Paul was killed. But when Paul's mother Laura pounces on Frank and fucks his brains out...I'm just saying, we have no evidence to suggest that Frank has showered since the night he blew through all his settlement cash, and somehow he's still total catnip? I don't get it.
5. Sammi
   The systematic destruction of Sammi continues as she gets notice that she's being kicked off the lot where she's parked her derelict trailer, hits on Mickey at The Alibi until he makes it clear what he's actually into...
   

   ...and pins all her hopes on Frank's promise that he's going to buy her a new trailer. When Deb informs her -- as she might to A SIMPLE CHILD -- that Frank is never going to come through with a trailer, she makes her way to the Sheltons' and tries to stab him to death. She is not successful, which is kind of a shame because at this point I feel like she'd have less of a daily struggle in prison.

6. Kevin & Vee
   Vee ordering Kevin to go get a handjob from a stranger to balance the scales after her dance-floor dry-hump last week is a pretty standard sitcom setup taken to a dirty extreme -- thanks, premium cable! But when he comes home, they start fighting about it, and she orders him not to leave him in order to go look in on their crying children, shit gets chilling. It's good, in a perverse way, that they're both being forced to confront exactly what's been happening and how serious Vee's antipathy toward the babies actually is, but I don't really know how a couple comes back from that moment. Yikes.
7. Carl
   If Carl doesn't learn his fractions and rate sheet soon, drug dealers will murder him. This is what happens when print dies and kids Carl's age can't just get nice safe paper routes!
8. Mickey & Ian
   As alarmed as I am for the future of Kevin and Vee (mostly because I love Kevin), there's no heartbreak like the heartbreak of a Mickey/Ian schism. Between the suitcase theft last week and Ian's acting out sexually this week, Mickey can no longer ignore the symptoms Ian is displaying, and with tears in his eyes, he does the only thing he can: orders Ian to check himself into the psych ward for treatment. Ian responds by doing the only thing (he thinks) he can: pretending to take a shower -- a reasonable action given that he just earned $600 doing bareback porn -- sneaking out, and taking off with Mickey's baby. Ian, I know you're not in your right mind right now. But please don't sell that baby for another $600.