Netflix recently added Shameless season 9 to their collection, something many users have been waiting for and looking forward to since its release on Showtime in September of 2018. If you’re not familiar with the show, it takes place in the South Side of Chicago and revolves around a poor family of six kids, the Gallagher’s, with a mentally ill MIA mother and an alcoholic father who comes around when it’s convenient for him. With that said, this isn’t a sappy TV show where you watch a family struggle, it’s more of a comedy-drama in a dark way. You see these kids being raised in such a way that is so messed up, you have to laugh. But you also know the struggles that these characters faced and what they’ve been through, so you get attached to them and you understand why they are how they are.
In this season, we see Ian Gallagher, a young gay man, being used as a symbol for the unjust treatment of gay people throughout the church. He struggles with bipolar disorder, and begins starting riots and protests to combat those pushing for conversion therapy and spreading hate towards the LGBTQ+ community. This is used in a satirical way as well, as Ian is called “gay Jesus” among the teens who look up to him for going against their parents and those in society who don’t accept them.
We also see Debbie, a young teen mom exploring her sexuality, who decides to begin dating women, and in turn tries to steal her brother’s girlfriend. Like I said, it’s funny because it’s ridiculous, but these characters really do have plots that you will find yourself entangled inside of.
This season by far was the most “woke” for lack of a better term, in comparison to the rest. They satirically had Liam, the youngest child who was part of the family and the only one who is black, finesse the South Side by charging the racist white people $1 per brick to “build a wall.” They also had an election in this season for their part of town, in which the infamous drunken father of the family tries to push a white candidate to go against the Latino runner, not because he cares, but because he wants to get money from the campaign to spend at the bar. The person he convinces to run is named Mo White, and he quickly had many other white men supporters. Here they had the best part of the entire season in my opinion, where all the drunk old guys in the bar are chanting “Mo White” and it sounds like ‘more white’—which is almost how it felt being in America during the 2016 election.
One of the main characters has a few things gone wrong in their lives, and in turn relies on liquor. Though this show is meant to be raunchy and funny for all the wrong reasons, it was hard to watch a character come so far in their development just to have them become an alcoholic and ruin everything for themselves.
The tenth season is set to be released on Showtime on November 10th, 2019. I won’t spoil anything, but it has been confirmed that one main character will be gone for this next season, so keep an eye out to see what else has changed! If you’re like me and have to wait until this new season comes out on Netflix to see it, it’ll be a few months before we find out what happens next, because it probably won’t be out until mid-late 2020.