When a TV show runs into its ninth season, it’s sometimes hard to remember that the people who populate this universe don’t know everything about these characters that we do.

When a main character exits a long-running series, it’s typically a time for reflection: for more than eight seasons, Ian Gallagher has been a critical part of Shameless, and one of the longest-running primetime explorations of homosexuality in the past decade. There are fans of the show who were drawn in by Ian’s…

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter last week celebrating Shameless’ 100^th episode, executive producer John Wells—who developed the show for American television—was optimistic about the show’s future beyond Emmy Rossum’s departure at the end of the ninth season.

It’s hard to imagine a more politically fraught environment than our current unending news cycle in the wake of the 2016 Presidential election, and this weekend has been no exception, as across the dial Christine Blasey Ford and Brett Kavanaugh’s respective testimonies dominate the airwaves and social media feeds. We…

Ian spends the entirety of “Weirdo Gallagher Vortex” searching for answers, waiting for “Shim” to speak to him like they did when he was in prison.

Frank Gallagher is, at his core, ideologically opportunistic. He will be whatever he needs to be in order to get ahead, shifting his beliefs in whichever direction is necessary to scam a place to stay or scratch together a few bucks. We’re meant to find this kind of behavior abhorrent, I think, but at the same time …

If you’re reading this review, there’s a good chance that you’re the type of person who consistently reads about the television show Shameless on the internet. As a result, I feel like it would be disingenuous if I pretended as though the Showtime series’ ninth season doesn’t have a recent piece of news hanging over…

After seven years of backsliding, grifting, and a cavalcade of nigh-constant family bullshit, Emmy Rossum has declared herself to soon be Shameless no more. Rossum announced (or strongly implied, and then had it confirmed) on Facebook today that she’ll be leaving the Showtime series at the end of its upcoming ninth…

Showtime’s Shameless comes back for its ninth season in September, and, after a lackluster eighth season, it sounds like the ever-resourceful, ever-awful Gallagher clan is recruiting a couple of ringers to get people interested in their entertaining bullshit once again. Variety reports that TV vets Courteney Cox and…

One of the central criticisms of the past few seasons of Shameless has been its attempts to rewrite its own history—the end of “Gallavich” (Ian and Mickey’s relationship) was necessary due to Noel Fisher’s exit, but the way the show reframed their relationship as purely destructive and worked to basically erase Mickey…

Here’s what’s happening in the world of television for Sunday, January 28. All times are Eastern.

The penultimate episode is always a difficult one to review. More than any other episode, the effectiveness of this hour of television depends on what happens in next week’s finale. There is always the possibility that you could critique a show like Shameless for not doing something, and then the finale reveals that …

Here’s what’s happening in the world of television for Sunday, January 21. All times are Eastern. It’s an honor just to be nominated.

This late in its eighth season, Shameless is past the point where it can reasonably course correct. The middle section of the season introduced a number of storylines that failed to highlight the show at its best, losing track of pretty much every character but Lip heading into “Church Of Gay Jesus.”

Here’s what’s happening in the world of television for Sunday, January 14. All times are Eastern. All the things that make us laugh and cry.

No city is a “character.” As much as creators like to elevate their stories by claiming a location, it’s just a clichéd attempt to make something sound important without earning it. Cities are complicated places, and nowhere is that more obvious than in Showtime’s new drama series, The Chi. As much as recent headlines…

As I’ve discussed before, Showtime’s choice to sell streaming rights to Shameless to Netflix has had a clear impact on the show’s audience. With each new season, there will be a group of viewers who binged through the entire series without breaks, experiencing it fundamentally differently than those of us who have…

Note: This week’s episode of Shameless is now streaming and OnDemand from Showtime ahead of its linear airing in the show’s regular timeslot on Sunday evening.

We need to talk about Ian Gallagher.

Here’s what’s happening in the world of television for Sunday, December 17. All times are Eastern. Seven more shopping days until Christmas!