Shameless Season 6, Premiere recap: “I Only Miss Her When I’m Breathing”

Shameless is back, yay!
Will it be as good as seasons past?
Let’s dive in and see with the Shameless Season 6 premiere recap: “I Only Miss Her When I’m Breathing”

Frank: Still mourning the loss of Bianca, we find him passed out at her grave. The nice crypt keeper tries to kick him out, but Frank is blabbing on about Bianca. The cemetery worker in turn expresses sympathy for Frank’s loss and tells him that his daughter would want him to move on. Frank explains that she wasn’t his daughter, but was the light of his life, his sun, his moon, his dusk, his dawn, the spring in his step … and blah, blah, blah. Puke. The sad thing is, I don’t even think Frank is drunk! I miss drunk Frank. While he starts gathering his belongings, he kisses Bianca’s headstone goodbye and says he’ll see her tonight.

Back at the Gallagher household, Frank is weeping and annoying everyone by telling them how much he loves them. And annoying them with all of his Bianca stories. So he starts yammering on about how they all lack compassion for him in his time of need. Trying to find some spiritual peace, he goes to confession. By the way the priest is acting towards him, it seems as if Frank is going several times a day. He rambles on in confession about how no one is helping him, how her family kicked him out of the funeral, and how his family isn’t helping, either. The priest tells him to light a candle just to get him out of there. Frank is mad that he can’t find solace in the Catholic church; maybe it’s time to give the Lutherans a try. Storming out of the confessional, he has some choice words for other parishioners. Before exiting, he has a one-on-one stare down with Jesus on a cross who seems to be staring him down, as well. Now on a spiritual journey to find someone who will help him, trying out just about ANY religion, Frank finds no one seems to want to listen. Eventually, he lands at The Alibi, where he is on a strict provision of only 6oz. of beer every 24 hours; everyone seems to be amazed that he is sticking to that. Frank then asks why there are so many lumberjacks at the bar, and since everyone is sick of hearing his Bianca woes, he decides to blab to the hipsters, who are just amused by a local drunk and have their selfie sticks out to pose with him.

Again the next morning, Frank is back at Bianca’s grave and is having a little bit too much fun getting intimate with Bianca’s clothes, as if she were there. I don’t know about you, but this part was a tad uncomfortable to watch. Sheesh! The guy needs some friends to listen to him! Instead he gets a rude awaking from the now not-so-nice cemetery worker spraying him with a hose and chasing him out, threatening to call the cops.

Carl: Getting released early from juvie for good behavior, sporting new cornrows, Carl high fives the whole place on his exit as they chant “White Boy Carl.” At least that’s what I got out of it. Until he hits Chuckie and his neo-nazi clan — they just have a little stare down and Carl is on his way. I am pretty sure Chuckie is still a little clueless. And hey, why isn’t he getting out for good behavior? I can’t see him being a hellion while in there. Anyway, Carl hasn’t told anyone about his release, and just comes strolling back into the Gallagher house like he was never gone. I hope you caught the interaction Carl has with Liam when he gets home, the writing was brilliant! Fiona, of course, is ecstatic to have Carl home. She convinces him that they should have a party and he asks if a friend can stay over — a new kid he met in juvie. At the party Frank is trying to schmooze Carl, since he is the only one not sick of Frank’s crap yet. He doesn’t get too far though, since Carl’s sleepover pal showed up and they bailed on the party. When they return, Fiona finds out that Carl’s new pal Nick was in juvie for trying to set his dad on fire. Yeah, great new best friend! Carl has certainly gotten himself into a gangsta crowd while being in juvie.

Debs: Checking herself out in the bathroom mirror in the morning you can tell she is clearly excited to be pregnant. Fiona forces her to go to the clinic to find out if she really is pregnant. Once there, Debs tells Fiona she prefers to go into the appointment alone, she doesn’t need Fiona there. Back in the exam room, we find out that Debs is pregnant but when she walks out, she tells Fiona that she is NOT pregnant. Say what? Like, she isn’t going to find out; duh. (Sidenote: did anyone catch the HPV poster in the clinic that Fiona was standing next to? The girl in the picture looked a lot like her and had same expression? My feeling is that this was some foreshadowing for Fi’s character!) Fiona is beyond excited that Debs is not pregnant; she proclaims jelly doughnuts on the way to school! At school, Debs tells Derek about the baby, and he says that their families need to get together to discuss it. Debs isn’t quite ready for that yet and asks if they can wait just for now. She is just super excited about the whole thing, talking baby names, Lamaze classes, etc… She reminds Derek they have an appointment at 4pm at Planned Parenthood which he conveniently doesn’t show up for. Storming to his house after, Derek’s mom fesses up to Debs that he is moving away to live with his grandma in Florida and that she won’t be hearing from him again. Of course Debs is beyond upset by this, her idea of a perfect little family just got shattered.

Fiona: After last season’s dis by her husband, Gus and her boss, Sean, who is she going to be with this season? For at least the moment… drumroll please, it is… SEAN!

Waking up in the Gallagher household Fiona is still playing the mother hen getting everyone up and out the door – taking Debs to the clinic, on Ian’s case to take his bi-polar meds and get to work, and waking up sweet little Liam (who is finally older). Sean comes strolling out of her room and they have a cute, playful little interaction on how she is now separated and that he is not really sleeping with a married woman per se. Looks like Frank is back living at the house, too, since he has a shrine to Bianca burning in his room that Fiona immediately puts out so it doesn’t burn the house down. Down at breakfast Fiona is lecturing Debs about how she can’t be happy about the whole pregnancy thing, when from out of nowhere, Liam busts out a switchblade. Racing to take it away from him, Liam says he found it under Carl’s pillow. When Ian mentions they should go visit Carl, Debs says no way, she has no time for her degenerate brother. So out the door they all go.

Back at work after taking Debs to the clinic, Fiona is talking to Sean about the whole pregnancy thing and how Debs seemed upset to NOT be pregnant. Sean is rambling on about how the assistant manager Otis is late, but he does manage to ask Fiona to go on a fishing date later. Finally, Otis strolls in. Sean comments that he fears Otis is using again, so Fiona straight up asks him and he replies “no.” Shortly after, the cops show up and chase Otis throughout the restaurant until they get him outside, slam him up against the window and arrest him. Lucky Ian, who’s working at Patsy’s now, too, gets to clean up the blood and snot. Sean rambles on that he is going to need a new assistant manager. Geez, why is so hung up on this assistant manager thing? Turns out Otis was cooking meth, so I guess he won’t be back anytime soon. Now for sure needing a new assistant manager, Sean is really trying to convince Fiona to do it so she can get management experience. Melinda, another waitress, is a little ticked that he asked Fiona and not her since she has been there a lot longer. She’s feeling Fiona is getting special treatment since, well, you know…

On their “fishing” date, which turns out to be “hooking” up at the aquarium, Sean is still working on Fiona to take the assistant manager position. It would be good for her so she can get some life skills to work other places someday like, oh, a tire shop or something.  She finally agrees. Awwwwww.

The next morning Fiona wakes up to a soaking wet Frank sitting in her room staring at her and pestering her to get checked out for cancer. Fiona is obviously a little freaked out by his behavior. Meanwhile, Carl is downstairs screaming for Fiona. Once down there we see it’s because Derek’s parents are there to talk to Fiona about Derek and Debbie’s baby. Oh snap, guess she just found out the ugly truth that Debs is INDEED pregnant. Carl just laughs and says “What else did I miss?”

Lip: Hottie professor Helene is still in the mix and we can see him becoming ever more infatuated with her. As she is laying asleep in Lip’s bed, he snaps a nude picture of her. She wakes and they talk about his drunken professor that he is a TA for. Lip then asks if he can come over later and she declines. Lip questions why and all she says is that she’s busy. Waa-waa. He then goes to track down his drunken professor, and finds him passed out in his car. Waking him up, they decide that since there is no blood or hair in his car’s grill, he must not have been too bad. Along comes the dean and he tries to straighten his act up; I’m guessing she is onto him. Now waiting for his professor in class, Lip decides to just start teaching the class rather then just watch everyone sit there. (Minus the hot chic who is silently suggesting that they should, eh hem, get together, of course.) FINALLY the professor shows up and takes over his teaching duties. After class, some geeky kid comes up to Lip and asks if he graded his paper or if the professor did. Lip says it was him and he got the grade he got because it was plagiarized. Feeling bad for the kid, Lip tells him that if he re-does the paper in his own words, he can raise the grade. Drunken professor catches on to this and asks if he’s a friend, because since he is only a TA, the kid should have been expelled. They then chat about how Lip should maybe just become a teacher,  since it would be a good challenge for him, rather then being a rich hedge fund manager.

Back in his dorm room, Lip’s  roommate calls him out for the affair he is having with hottie professor. The rumor going around is that she has some other guy on the side, so he might want to find some more age-appropriate girlfriend. Since Lip is a little crazed about her, after hearing this news, he stalks her house. Seeing her walk some guy outside and kiss him goodbye, Lip automatically pounces on the guy and asks if he BLEEPED her. They start brawling in the street and Lip tells him he better stay away from Helene. The poor guy screams something about why should he stay away from his mom? Whoops, turns out it’s her son that he just pounded. Next morning, Lip wakes up with the girl from the classroom in his bed, apparently haven taken his roommate’s advice. With Helene now pounding on his door, he lets her in and she starts screaming at him for beating up her son. He apologies, and they kind of talk about how not memorable Tiffany Thomas is, you know, the girl that was just in his bed trying to get the professor to remember her.

Ian: Poor Ian seems like he is having a hard time adjusting to  this new life of working and being yelled at to take his meds. While he’s working, Svetlana comes to the restaurant and begs Ian to come with her to see Mickey in prison, since that is the only way Mickey will see her. Ian’s not interested; he proclaims he is done with that part of his life. So, in turn Svetlana has to bribe him, saying she will pay him. Agreeing on $50, he goes. Turns out the reason she really needs to see Mickey is to tell him about an inside job and that there will be a lot more coming. Mickey really only cares about talking to Ian. Ian tells Mickey he was paid to be there. Mickey is trying hard to get through to Ian somehow and shows him a new tattoo he has of Ian’s name, which, of course, he spelled wrong. They have a little laugh about that, oh ho ho, you spelled my name wrong and it’s infected, ha ha ha. Aww, isn’t that sweet. So Mickey asks if Ian is going to wait for him while he is in there for the next 15 years — or, wait, eight, with overcrowding. Ian can’t seem to answer,  so Mickey begs him to lie if he has to. So he does, he says he’ll wait.

There has been rumors that this may be the only episode Mickey is in; I hope that’s not the case. Even if the Ian/Mickey relationship is over, he’s one character who will be missed!

Kev and V: Getting rudely awaken by the lesbian neighbors at the door asking them to sign a petition for a noise complaint on another neighbor, Yannis. Kev explains to them that is the ghetto, ghettos are noisy. In an effort to calm them down, Kev tells them that he will go and talk to Yannis before signing any petition. He goes to talk to him and Yannis goes off on Kev on how the rich lesbian bi***** are always in everyone’s business and that he has lived there for 20 some years so he has every right. Kev tries to calm Yannis down by asking what their sexual orientation has to do with him being so noisy. Yannis blames it on his pitbulls being able to tell they need a guy — that’s why the bark all the time (if you saw the episode, you know I am putting this whole conversation nicely). Yannis continues rambling on about the other neighbors, and Kev can clearly see he is going to get nowhere with him.

The Alibi: It getting its own headline for this week, and it turns out, it’s turning into a little hipster haven. Kev, catching on to this, buys some empty fancy vodka bottles and fills them with cheap booze, since all the hipsters drink is fruity drinks anyway. Brilliant! Meanwhile, the little lumberjacks (as Frank puts it), think they are pulling one over on Svetlana by slyly filming her boobs while they are ordering drinks. Boy, does she have the last laugh, since they are bleeding these hipsters dry! I’m guessing the gentrification of the neighborhood is still going on?

So there you have it. I will admit, the first time I saw it I HATED it. I had to give it another chance, and glad I did because there was so many layers to the episode that I just didn’t even catch the first time. However, there is one major timeline thing that I just can’t wrap my head around: Since Carl was supposed to be in juvie for a year, even though he was released early, no matter what the case is, wouldn’t Debs be far more along in this pregnancy?

Does anyone else have a problem with this? I know there has always been weird things like that with this show, but this one really gets me…

Photos Courtesy of Showtime