Category: Uncategorized

Introduction

On television today, there are a lot of situational comedies and realities, but one this there isn’t a lot of is dramedies. Well one dramedy that is very prominent today is Shameless. Shameless began in 2011 and is still continuing on production now on eighth season.

Thesis

Shameless is a show that really depicts the poor life in America that some people have. It is based around the south side of Chicago. The show follows one family, The Gallaghers, and a few of their close friends. It follows the family over many years showing their constant struggle to stay afloat, since in this show the father of the Gallaghers doesn’t exactly believe in taking care of his children. This show depicts the struggle of trying to get above the poverty line and actually succeed in life with being given absolutely nothing. It shows how all things must be earned and worked for, most of the time. It shows the struggles of gender, race, sexual orientation, and many different mental issues.

Purpose

This critical analysis is to really look deep into all the interesting aspect of Shameless. It is going to take a look into all of the social issues that the show covers. This analysis is also going to cover the different familial aspects and social issues of the show.

Description of Shameless

Shameless is aired on Showtime and can be streamed on Netflix. Shameless currently has a rating on Rotten Tomatoes of 93% and an audience rating of 88%. Shameless is a show that has reached a very wide, captivated audience. The show takes place in Chicago, specifically on the South Side and centers around one family and a few of their close friends, with occasional love interests of different people in the show. It shows the struggle of living below the poverty line and the fight to keep living each day. This show gives into the enigma of the different ways that a family with nothing can continue to live on. It is also a genre bending show that combines drama with comedy to help depict a family today, which most are filled with dramatic and comedic moments. i also feel that this show is somewhat filled with contextual reality because, while it is not based off of an actual real life family, I feel that it really does depict a family you would see.

Production Information

Shameless is actually originally a British television series created by Paul Abbot.  It was developed for the US by John Wells who is also one of the Executive producers. The cast is led by William H. Macy and Emmy Rossum. Some of the other main characters are played by Justin Chatwin, Ethan Cutkosky, Shanola Hampton, and Steve Howey. There are many more characters that help to make this show great and can be found here   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shameless_(U.S._TV_series)

Questions for Analysis

1. What are the familial dynamics and how does it affect the show?
2. How does this show depict mental illness?
3. How are gender issues identified in Shameless?
4. How is sexual orientation represented in this show?
5. How does Shameless address issues about race?

Analysis

What are the familial dynamics and how does it affect the show?

This show centers around one family, the Gallaghers, and some of their close friends and occasional love interests. The Gallaghers are made up of  alcoholic and drug addict parents and six children who take care of everything themselves. Their mother, Monica is only around when it suits her and same goes for their father, Frank. The oldest daughter, Fiona, takes on taking care of her younger siblings at about 13 years old. As the siblings get older, they begin to take on more responsibilities, but for the most part Fiona is like a parent to them. This adds a very interesting element to the show. Not only does Fiona have to give up her own life to raise her sibling, but for the most part she takes care of her father as well. This is a different spin then we see on a lot of shows. This helps to shed light on how serious child abandonment is and how it really is wrong.

How does this show depict mental illness?

In Shameless, mental illness is covered quite extensively.  Bipolar disorder is the most covered mental illness in the show. The mother to the Gallaghers, Monica, is bipolar and this really affects the family. She will come and go as she pleases, but she always makes a splash when she is there. One of her visits, she was so happy, in a state of mania, but unfortunately that is followed by a state of nasty depression. In one of her states of depression she actually attempted to kill herself on Thanksgiving, in front of the whole family. This shocked all of the characters, especially the younger ones. The worst part isn’t even that Monica, who most people simply tolerate, is bipolar, but that one of the siblings, Ian, is diagnosed bipolar. This really affects all of the members of the family as they have seen what their mother has been through, they don’t want that for Ian.

How are gender issues identified in Shameless?

Gender is addressed mostly through how the woman are treated. Quite often in the show is the oldest sister, Fiona, treated terribly. In the very first episode, she is being discussed by two men that are within earshot of her. They say how she would be “bangable” but you would need to make sure to wrap it because “project girls don’t abort”. Not only are they disrespecting her and acting as if she is a piece of meat, but she is also made fun of because of where she comes from. Another time in the show is when one of the siblings, Lip, acts as if woman are interchangeable and forgets names of girls that he slept with because he has been sleeping with so many.

How is sexual orientation represented in this show?

Sexual orientation is addressed very early on in the series. In the beginning of the first season, the audience discovers that one of the siblings, Ian is gay. When his brother discovers this, he tries to force him to be heterosexual, but doesn’t succeed. Ian begins to have a beard or a pretend girlfriend to hide himself. Later on, Ian comes out, but not to everyone. He and his boyfriend, Mickey, hide their relationship from his boyfriend’s dad. When he finds out he begins to beat Mickey and forces him to marry a Russian whore to make him straight. Ian feels betrayed by Mickey, as he doesn’t even try and fight to still be with Ian.

How does Shameless address issues about race?

Shameless addresses the issue of race in a very interesting way. In season 6, they have one of the siblings, Carl, act as though he is black. He begins to act like all of the horrible stereotypes. He begins to act as though he has lived through an oppression just like African Americans and he understands the struggle. He acts as though he is a full on gangsta. He continues on acting like this until he realizes just how wrong his actions are. He finally gets hit with how dumb he has been acting by a very violent situation. He realizes that it isn’t just a game to play, it is real life and in real life you can’t go around acting like something you aren’t.

Conclusion

Shameless is a show that isn’t afraid to lay it all out there. It is a show that tackles so many social issues that some people are very nervous talking about. This show acts as though it doesn’t care how very crazy and in your face it can be. The characters do and say whatever they want. The characters aren’t afraid to do what they want, constantly disregarding the consequences. These characters live life how they want to with no shame, and little to no embarrassment. It is a show that truly depicts the struggle and harshness that is life in today’s world.

Shameless is a show that doesn’t lie about how life really is.  It shows that life isn’t full of rainbows and sunshine, but rather that it is harsh and truly unforgiving. Shameless shows the consequences for the actions and choices that we make. It is a show that shows the struggles of growing up having to fight for everything you have when you don’t have parents to fight for you. It gives people who live like this something to relate to and to cope with. By watching this show I have been able to cope with the realities of my own life and realized that I am not alone in having a really messed up home life.

While all of the episodes show perfect examples of how life isn’t pretty, one in particular has always stuck out to me. In Season 6, Episode 8 there is an episode entitled “Be a Good Boy, and Come for Grandma”. In this episode, Carl begins to realize that he doesn’t want to be living the life he is. He has been running with a gang, selling illegal weapons and he wants out. It isn’t that simple though. He begins to realize that it isn’t as simple as not showing up.

This is Carl after he tells one of the boys that he is taking a break. The man whips him with a gun and tells him that it ain’t that simple. He is told he needs to be at the next pick up or else. He goes to his father, Frank, for advice. Before Carl even gets a word in, Frank asks for money. Carl doesn’t have any because he hasn’t been making his rounds. Frank seems furious about this, he tells him he must continue doing the work because someone needs to live up to the Gallagher name. Carl still wants to quit, regardless of what his father says.

This is from the scene where Sean goes with Carl to try and get him out of that life. After Sean tells him that Carl will be working for him, gives up his clothes and his car, Carl’s clothes, too, they let them go. They walk all the way home with nothing, but boxers on.

This is just one of the many examples of how this show doesn’t just make everything work out perfectly, but rather messy and full of struggle. They don’t just have the gang agree to letting him leave or somehow make it so it all goes away simply with no consequences.

This show represents how life is not without hardships and regret.

The episode after this one shows how Lip’s drinking doesn’t just end with good memories, but rather a night in the hospital. Before the hospital, he is bar-tending a party where he himself never stops drinking and he mixes up girls names. He doesn’t even know how he got to the hospital.

This is a show that never stops showing hardships and perils. If there was an episode where it had all of the characters happy and just going about there day, it would shock and baffle all of it’s viewers.

The dialogue is also one that helps viewers connect with the show. They never bother to care what they say, if they swear, or even offend anyone. They always say it like it is, they are real about everything.

This isn’t a show I would recommend for young kids, they shouldn’t know what life is like so young. This is a show that is for older teens and young adults that aren’t really sure what life is like. This is a great example of the life you can end up with when you make bad decisions, like Frank the father did when he had all these kids and didn’t take care of them and made them take care of themselves and each other.

Picture Links:

SHAMELESS BLACKFACE

https://www.wattpad.com/445133642-shameless-imagines-gif-series-carl-gallagher

Shameless (U.S.)  is a television dramedy that airs on Showtime or on demand through streaming services such as Netflix or Hulu. This is the ratings for season six found on TV Series Finale .

Shameless target audience would be about 16-35 year-old’s, this is because that there is mature content, maybe too mature for younger than 16, yet there is still a good story line for an older generation to get into. The main characters are the people you would consider to be from the wrong side of the tracks, meaning that they were of a very low income. The characters in the show who have a higher income tend to only be in the show for a short period of time to show the differences in social classes

The episode of the season that I chose to use as the primary source for this post was Episode 7 called “Pimp’s Paradise”. This was the fourth most watched episode of the series, but I felt that it was a very powerful episode.

I think that race is very well represented in this season, but even more in this episode. Over the beginning of the season when Carl came back from Juvie he began to act very strange, wearing dreads and acting like he was hood. He was even called out by a girl he was trying to get with for acting in some way that he wasn’t.

He begins to realize in this episode that it was wrong for him to get involved with the people who made him want to act so strange. I think another interesting thing in this episode that pertained to race was to do with the Gallaghers cousin and reading a book report in school that was pro-Nazi. He was sent home from school because it was found offensive. However, Frank worked his magic and got the school to okay it, since it wasn’t actually wrong, just super insensitive.

The representation of class in this episode is somewhat different then the rest. As said before the main characters, meaning the Gallagher, are a very low income family, and often in each episode they are clawing there way through the day financially. In this episode, the Gallaghers actually now own the house they live in. Something that isn’t very usual for them financially, but how the money was procured was clearly illegally, because it was given to Fiona by Carl, so they still manage to keep that low-income, wrong side of the tracks vibe.

This is what Carl has decided he wants to do with the house he believes to be his because it was his money.

Gender was addressed in this episode by Frank and his new/old honey Queenie. Queenie was a lover from Frank’s past and she comes in to take over care of her daughter’s son, also Frank’s daughter’s son. While she has to wait for papers to be processed she begins to get very involved with Frank, while also pressuring him to state his “man of house” position. They both believe that he should be able to control his kids, even though he doesn’t even take care of them. He isn’t even there most of the time and because he is a man who produced all these children, that gives him the right to tell them all what to do.

I think this episode also did really well in representing sexuality. We have the character of Ian who is invited to a wedding by his boyfriend, but what he doesn’t realize is his boyfriend just wants to shove his homosexuality in his very religious family’s face. This I find interesting because they then begin to make a spectacle of themselves which I always thought is exactly what they didn’t want, a giant spectacle made over them.

Picture Links:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5090596/

http://recapguide.com/recap/15/Shameless-US/season-6/episode-7/

Episode Breakdown

In this episode, more Gallagher shenanigans unfold. Frank is trying all episode to successfully make his own beer. To do so, he offers up his daughter, Sammi, to get supplies and continually is squashing Sheila’s dream of going and seeing the world, rather than staying in Chicago forever.

Lip is facing the harsh reality of working a hard labor job. He is also faced with a situation he feels he needs to involve himself in. His former girlfriend is debating moving away from her family with her abusive boyfriend because he got a job. So he decides to go talk to her, but only confuses her more.

Carl is trying to help get rid of the lesbians he feels are invading the neighborhood. He begins to try and make the place look really dangerous. He leaves used up needles everywhere and he also takes out no parking signs to get the lesbians to park there so their cars get towed when he puts the signs back.

Debbie is tired of everyone treating her like a little girl and decides to throw a party. She needed to get booze, so of course she looks to Frank and ends up with a case of his homemade highly potent beer. Well, it seems to much for Debbie’s friend Matty, so Debbie takes him upstairs and lies next to him. She notices that he has had a certain biological arousal, so she takes this opportunity to finally loose her virginity……with an unconscious man.

Fiona is just trying to not screw up anymore since breaking parole. She decides she deserves a little fun and goes to see the band of a guy who hasn’t stopped flirting with her. She gets there only to see he has a girlfriend, so she is suddenly dating one of the other band members and is all over him. Turns out that band member, Gus, liked it as he asked her out.

Kevin and Veronica end up getting their second business, first being the bar, busted. The police officers pulled all the girls from the “Rub and Tug”. So to make up for the loss of income, they begin to brainstorm. They hear that there are a lot of woman who pay top dollar for breast milk. They decide to go with that idea.

Ian is off making Mickey crazy. Ian hasn’t been diagnosed yet, but they are pretty sure he is bipolar like his mother, Monica. Mickey comes home to quite a bit of his personal things being thrown out. Ian has decided to do some cleaning….of the whole entire house.

Shameless and Narrative Theories

Aristotle Narrative Theory- This show and this episode definitely fits the description of this theory. Aristotle said that the plot is the most important part. The plot to this particular episode I feel really fits that. This script is all over the place, but yet it is all connected. This episode also fits the time suggestion that Aristotle had that the best time gap is 22-44 minutes. This episode ends similar to how Aristotle has laid out the order of a good episode.

Propp’s Narrative Theory- This one I find not only applies to this episode, but all episodes. As stated in the theory, there is a villain throughout the story. It then proceeds into a hero taking stance against the villain and triumphing. Now, this episode shows which is the villain, but doesn’t have a giant battle. Like stated, it does show the villain, Frank Gallagher, and while he does get defeated there isn’t a human victor, unlike other episodes when his children triumph over him, solving his latest, grotesque problem.

Picture Links:

http://www.ibtimes.com/shameless-season-5-spoilers-episode-3-synopsis-promo-video-released-1790270

http://collider.com/shameless-season-5-shanola-hampton-interview/

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