#shameless analysis

so i said i’d make this post a while ago and guess what? i lied. oops. anyways i finally did it so here you guys go!

also, i’m only doing season 1 here because season 1 is the season where the roles are the most clear. after that, some siblings share roles or change roles. in many, many ways, season 1 is much simpler, as we all know.

i most of my information from this article, and i copy and pasted some of it.

 the addict, is frank. you could also say that it’s monica, however she left the family/household years prior to the start of the show. as the consequences of addiction begin to form, the addicted family member will often portray negative behaviors to others in the family including lying, manipulating, and pointing fingers of blame; frank does all of this in season 1 constantly. he lies about where aunt ginger is, manipulates his family by assuring them that he is sober, and he puts the blame on other members of his family, such as ian or monica. half of the family views him as a nuisance, and the other half views him as beloved.

the enabler, is debbie. enabler’s don’t set boundaries and excuse a lot of the addict’s behavior. for debbie, it’s not that she doesn’t understand frank’s addiction or how shitty frank is, she does (1x08), but she chooses to pretend like things are alright. she loves her dad a lot, and she wants to pretend like everything is okay. she wants to pretend like things won’t go back to the way they are, even though she knows they will. we see her caring for her dad, waking up in the middle of the night to check on him and bring him a pillow, asking him if he’s okay, she cares. nobody else really cares that much. we see her become more of an enabler in season 2/3 especially, but again, only season 1 here.

the scapegoat, is lip. many people would like to argue that it’s carl (or debbie or ian) and maybe later on, but not here. the scapegoat of the family often gets blamed for the family’s issues, usually the scapegoat is the second oldest (!!) or middle child. in many cases, this person feels their purpose is to provide their family members with an outlet for blame. so, they can take on a parent’s and other sibling’s blame in order to protect them from feeling these emotions themselves. commonly, the scapegoat of the family will eventually be unable to manage their anger and act out in avoidance behaviors, often leaving town and not returning. so, yeah, this can be season 3/4 ian, or season 6 debbie or carl, but overall, this is lip in season 1. however, lip doesn’t often take the blame. fiona does. he and fiona share the hero and scapegoat role, and eventually share the addict role, but overall the scapegoat is lip. he acts out, purposefully gets into trouble, and is blamed. does he accept the blame? no, but he gets it. and he goes off to do his own shit often, when shit hits the fan he either fixes the problem or just leaves. lip can’t manage his anger. ever. it’s something he never learns how to do from season’s 1 through 11. he uses avoidance behaviors (such as drinking himself sick) and anger to cope with his family’s hardships.

the hero, is fiona. fiona is basically the definition of the hero, which is: the hero of the family is the one who is most controlling and often a perfectionist. by keeping up with personal goals, they feel they can provide their family with the illusion that everything will be okay. normally, the hero of the family is the first child, as they are the most likely to have a type a personality and feel as though they are a leader to their siblings. because of the position they put themselves in as a leader, they may experience extreme amounts of stress. and, become unable to manage their anxiety. that all screams fiona gallagher. she works multiple jobs, attempts to control everyone and everything in her life, and provides for her five siblings. she’s the firstborn child, and the youngest child literally refers to her as his mother on multiple occasions. she dropped out of high school for her siblings, and basically risked everything for them. they are her life.

the mascot, is carl. season 1 carl is sort of hard to characterize because he’s almost never a very serious character, hell, throughout the entire show he cries like three times. but that unseriousness kind of makes him fit into the role of the mascot. the mascot of a family is the person who may utilize humor to try to resolve tension during family arguments or drama. this may be due to the fact that they require approval from those who surround them due to their fragility. most commonly, the mascot of the family is the youngest sibling. basically, they use humor as a defence mechanism in order to not have to experience the negative emotions which may be brought about by addiction in the family. carl wasn’t the youngest sibling, but he was for about seven years, so it kind of counts. at least at this point it does. carl isn’t as aware as debbie is when it comes to the issues in the family, (1x08), and in the first (or second technically) scene, debbie tells carl he’s almost nine and needs to begin pulling his weight. he doesn’t take on the same understanding or responsibility as the rest of the siblings do, but there is a possibility that he understands and masks it by acting clueless. or, he simply is clueless. who knows. either way, if anyone’s going to be the mascot, it has to be carl.

the lost child, is ian. the lost child is a sibling who may not be as involved in family relationships as the others. this is due to the fact that they may not have shared as much family attention as the other siblings. typically, they’re the youngest or middle child. and, characteristically showcase behaviors like isolation and the inability to maintain lasting relationships as a result of addiction in the family. so, ian obviously does end up maintaining a lasting relationship, blah blah blah, but he literally doesn’t until like the last season so THAT DOESN’T MATTER. anyways. for like the entirety of ian’s adolescent years on the show (seasons 1-4), he is forgotten. he’s the stereotypical middle child, the least favorite, and forgotten. fiona never has to worry about him, monica is nowhere to be seen (but i made a post here that talks about their relationship that you should totally read), and frank hits him and simply doesn’t really give two fucks about him. ian isolates himself from the rest of his family, and rarely is actually at the house. he’s often with kash (a man in his fourties), or mickey or just doing his own thing. he becomes even more of the lost child later on (and eventually morphs into the scapegoat) but that’s irrelevant. ian’s hiding a big secret, ian is rarely home, the most attention ian probably ever gets out of frank is just getting hit or insulted. ian’s forgotten.

The fact that when Karen was upset about her dad she dyed her hair black and got facial piercings.

Then, Lip starts dating Mandy, a girl with black hair and facial piercings.

Or, whenever Lip goes to Karen's window it's because he genuinely wants to see her, but the one time he goes to Mandy's window it's because he needs a place to stay. (But he lets her think he WANTS or even NEEDS to see her, which breaks my heart every time because she looks so happy.)

Even Karen and Mandy's relationships with either of their fathers. Karen was emotionally abused by her father to an extent (public shaming, using religion as an excuse to demoralize her, all of the basic gross shit). When it all came to a head after the purity ball, Karen reacted by destroying herself and the lives of those around her. Mandy also has a horrible relationship with her father, it is heavily implied that he abused her brother and her physically, definitely emotionally, and her case sexually. However, Mandy responds only by partaking in self destructive habits (drug use, drinking, hypersexuality) and even some of these could be argued as 'normal' teenage behavior. (I'm not trying to say that one response was better or worse- except obviously Karen r*ping Frank was very not okay, and that scene with Lip and Mandy in the kitchen that could be argued as r*pe- honestly I hate how the Shameless writers talk about consent, especially when it comes to men, because I don't think they understand what it means).

Idk I just think some of these are interesting.

hear me out hear me out hear me out…

Lip and Debbie have one of my favorite sibling relationships in the show because we really see it change and evolve and mature as the seasons go on.in the beginning, it is a relationship very typical of a big brother and little sister (reminiscent of a father/daughter as well), he is quite protective of her and very sweet to her, protecting her from the truth about a lot of stuff. (side note: she like loved him so much when she was a kid and you can tell she really looked up to him and it is precious) however, it is evident that he does not know exactly how to support her emotionally in the same way Fiona does, so he does not really provide that emotional support in the beginning.

however, as the show goes on, we see Lip begin to treat her as more of an equal, rather than a child. for example, she goes with him to look for Ian and refuses to leave him even after they see things are getting pretty dark. he later thanks her for being there with him. this was a big turning point in their relationship, as he recognized she wasn’t this child that he needed to protect from the truth anymore. it really matured from this point on. 

another huge marker for their relationship is in the season 6 finale, she tells him that she doesn’t want him to end up like Frank. And while she said this with a childlike innocence, we all know that she is actually quite smart, so I interpret that as her knowing that would push him to get help. love Debbie or hate her, but she was the reason that Lip took that last step went to rehab in the first place. he saw that the harm he was causing to himself was hurting her too and decided to make that change. Additionally, Debbie is very sensitive to Lip when he comes home from rehab, making sure he’s okay around alcohol/asking if she should hide it to help him.

anyways, i love their relationship because it seems so balanced with him looking out for her in little ways and her doing the same throughout the series. it was really lovely to see this relationship mature as they grew older. AND THE FACT THAT THEY ENDED THE SERIES HAVING NEVER ACTUALLY MADE-UP FROM ALL OF THE FIGHTS IS DIRTY AND IN MY HEADCANON THEY ARE BEST FRIENDS AGAIN AND NEVER FOUGHT OKAY BYE.

First and foremost, i'm freaking out. 

I'm delighted that they originally did address him going with Mickey, and I want to break this down because I feel like Ian haters are probably going to have a field day with this. 

Video

Notice the way he's trying to be so dismissive about his experience. As though he's trying to convince himself that what he was doing was stupid, but when I look in his eyes I do not see that feeling there. I see an emotional wall that we see basically anytime something doesn’t work out. Both families in the show have a habit of dismissing what doesn't work out as stupid or unnecessary or otherwise undesirable so that they can put themselves above the hurt that disappointment inflicts. And I think that's what he is doing here. 

Ian has never really expressed how he feels about Mickey to Lip. Through the whole show, the only exception is when he talked about Mickey getting married and blurts everything he is thinking and feeling clearly without thinking about who he’s talking to... but look at what happened when he did that. Lip dismissed how Ian was feeling and dismissed any validity in Ian's feelings about Mickey. He told him to go fuck someone new, remember? He wasn't concerned about Mickey’s safety after Ian told Lip what happened with Terry, wasn't concerned about Ian’s feelings for Mickey... He just told him to get over it. Any time that Lip talks down about Mickey, Ian never defends him and I've maintained to this day that the reason is he doesn't want to start that argument because he knows it's going to get ugly if he ever does try to defend Mickey. I think Ian just always told himself that he knows the truth about Mickey and that’s all that matters. This situation is no different. 

When Lip asks why he didn't do it, Ian immediately looks hopeful that maybe Lip supports him for once. He looks hopeful that maybe someone will agree that he made a mistake in not going with him across the border. Of course that is way too much to hope for with Lip, and Ian quickly realizes that mistake when Lip says of course he shouldn’t have gone with him, that he was surprised he didn’t finish out the trip. But notice that Ian second guessed. He probably had been battling this since Mickey took off without him. I saw it when he was on the busride home, and was disappointed that it wasn’t addressed from there... But it was!

Now notice Ian’s smile as Lip is making fun of how pale he is and what he would have had to do to survive down there, and Ian almost looks fond at the thought. Like he would have been glad to do that because that was the last of his worries at that moment. I think that Ian also smiled fondly because Mickey teased him about burning up like a mother fucker (even though Mickey is kinda paler than Ian???), and also because he can see it. I think Lip being so descriptive about what he would have to do down there for his skin is putting an image in Ian’s head and to me he almost looks longing, like he would have been completely satisfied with doing all of that if it meant being there with him.

  I don’t think that I need to say anything about Lip’s line about Ian going “loco” with Mickey around... But I’ll say it anyway and I swear I’ll try to make it quick. We all know that the only reason it appears Ian went crazy when Mickey was around was because Ian was manic before anyone realized that he was manic. Of course I would love to remind Lip that Mickey wasn't the one shoving narcotics down his throat or up his nose, he wasn't the one who got Ian a job at gay gentlemen's club, and Mickey wasn't the one who told him to steal a helicopter. Mickey wasn't the one who told him to steal his baby, Mickey wasn't the one who told him to steal suitcases, he wasn't the one who told him to do basically any of the things that Ian did when he was manic. I don't blame him for those things and neither does Mickey, because he was unmedicated and out of control of his actions. It's just really damn annoying that everyone puts the blame on Mickey when Ian’s life goes wrong, as though Ian played absolutely no role in it (and might I add that nothing in Ian's life really went wrong before he was manic due to Mickey, either. Mickey didn't really affect his life except giving him someone his own age to hang out with and have sex with. He was punched by Terry, but I think that's pretty minor compared to everything that Mickey suffered Pre 3x666 indirectly due to Ian. Getting shot twice, going to Juvie twice, being outed twice...) I’d also like to add that of course it would look like Ian went crazy whenever Mickey was around because NO ONE ELSE WAS AROUND IAN WHEN HE WAS MANIC SO OF COURSE IT LOOKS LIKE THAT WHEN MICKEY IS THE ONLY ONE AROUND HIM!!!! *deep. breath* 

i'm going to go ahead and wrap up because I feel like this argument is obvious, and add it to the list of times that Lip tore Mickey down for absolutely no reason. 

At the very end of the deleted scene, after Ian very excitedly relayed that the sex with Mickey was "fucking fantastic" (of course we all knew that... ;) ), Lip says he's glad Ian came back, and as the scene ends, Ian doesn't look so sure. The clip I have looks minorly incomplete so I don’t know if that was definitely the end of the deleted scene, but that teeny glimpse we do get definitely doesn’t look like Ian is super happy to be home.

  My overall thoughts on the scene are that I am very resentful that they cut this, even moreso than the 5x01 deleted scene, but I think they did it because they knew the direction they were going to take with Ian chasing Trevor, at least in the beginning. And I think they included it on the DVD, i'm assuming that's where this person who uploaded the scene got it from, because they want to bait Gallavich fans into watching season 8. I think they want us to see that look on Ian's face, and hear the way that Ian loved his time with Mickey, and hold on. And I don't know if I'm delighted or disgusted, it depends on where they go with season 8, I guess. 

can we talk about this photo for a second?

as the seasons went on, one of the things made most clear about mickey milkovich, was his love language, acts of service. the way that mickey views love is that loving somebody is doing grand gestures to keep them with you. throughout the entire show, this is made clear, for example: robbing a man’s house for ian then kissing him (overcoming a huge fear of his), getting terry off of ian so that he would get more hurt than ian would, kissing ian in public, coming out for ian and getting the living shit beat out of him, (almost) murdering ian’s half-sister for calling the military police on him, snitching on a huge cartel and getting himself thrown back in prison for ian, attempting to escape prison again for ian, and eventually, faking marrying ian’s sister so that he could marry ian.

however, ian isn’t the same as mickey in that way. does ian love mickey? fuck yeah. but is ian as willing to do as much crazy shit in the name of love as mickey is? not really. it’s not that ian doesn’t love mickey or doesn’t risk a ton for mickey, because he does, he just loves mickey in a different way.

so, since mickey views love as doing grand gestures that could possibly risk everything in your life, he has a hard time understanding that people can love people in different ways that don’t involve a lot of danger. so when ian doesn’t go to mexico and doesn’t sign the marriage license, mickey feels as if ian doesn’t love him. his thought process is kind of just like i’ve done so much for ian, i’ve done everything to keep us together, but he still can’t commit, and that hurts mickey! it’s so obvious that he feels that way in 10x08 when ian says, “i wanna know how you feel!” and mickey just looks beyond pissed and hurt. and in the next episode, ian tries to explain himself, but mickey says, “no, you’re just saying that you don’t love me enough now”. to an extent, he understands that he and ian have different minds that work in very different ways, but he can’t grasp the thought of ian not signing those papers, because to him that’s a grand gesture, and a grand gesture = loving somebody.

but the reason that ian doesn’t sign the papers isn’t because he doesn’t love mickey, it’s because he’s afraid to commit. debbie tells him that he’s scared of commitment, and ian tells mickey himself that the reason he’s scared is because of his parents. and truly, it makes sense. from what we’ve seen of frank and monica, it’s been stated that they’ve been married many times; and ever since season 4 the show has made a point of showing ian’s fear of becoming his mother. and historically throughout shameless ian hasn’t had the best romantic history. he’s been with so many men that he tells a nurse that he doesn’t even know how many, we’ve seen him with men old enough to be his father- possibly even grandfather, and every single of age boyfriend (including mickey, sorry) has treated him like actual dog shit at one point. it makes sense that he’s afraid. he grew up seeing his parents fight with each other and leave each other (and their children) and then seeing his sister get into toxic relationships with men who, in ian’s words, weren’t very nice to her. his view on love is warped, and yes, he does love mickey, but loving mickey scares ian, and believe me, it scares mickey, too.

literally every time I listen to grace, Ian listening to this album pops into my head 😭😭

who else do you think he can listen to? maybe lana(omg i headcanon that him and debbie talked about her music and she didn't expect that he knows her lmao), nirvana, the doors or something? I completely ignore his taste in the show too🫡🫡

oh anon i am so late to this and i apologize😭 i have no excuse other than laziness so… anyways!

ian definitely would like jeff buckley. i know that for a fact. i know that john wells showed us him listening to like… techno shit and lady gaga which is fine, but i don’t see him listening to that, i see everything that you listed, jeff buckley, lana del rey, nirvana, the doors, possibly oasis (based on carl’s shirt in 1x01), and maybe even radiohead (mickey canonically likes radiohead so…). 

i could see him liking grace, especially around season 1. like, another thing about ian and his “techno” music taste is that season 1 goes against it because we heard him listening to music in the van and he seemed to value music based on him saying he gave kash cds so that they would be interested in the same things. maybe he showed kash grace? i don’t know, i don’t want kash to know what grace is because i despise him but i could see ian loving that album. i don’t know if he would like sketches for my sweetheart the drunk just because i somehow feel like he wouldn’t have discovered it😭 like maybe later on around season 7 he would’ve listened to it, and if he did, he would like “nightmares by the sea” and “yard of blonde girls”, i think.

i personally associate ian with a few songs on grace, and if this post actually gets any attention and people want to know i could post about it like i did with mickey and nude by radiohead, but here are some songs that remind me of ian/i think ian would like (off of grace):

- lover, you should’ve come over; romantic song, i feel like ian would listen to it and think of mickey because he’s a fucking sap. he would have this song, “at last” (etta james, their wedding song) and some other love songs in a playlist titled “mickey” or something like that. this song i kind of associate with mickey in season 4/5, just because of how much of a hopeless romantic he is, but mickey would probably not listen to jeff buckley. early seasons ian would probably resonate with this song a lot, especially in season 2/3 when his love for mickey is growing stronger and it’s making him a bit miserable at the same time. the whole “so i’ll wait for you, love, and i’ll burn” thing reminds me of both of them, but especially season 2/3 ian because he was kind of always left waiting for mickey to the point where it started to really break him. just the intense feeling of love in this song is so ian and it’s just… such a beautiful song and also gallavich coded i can’t even

- forget her; ian’s feelings towards mickey in seasons 6-8. i think people often look down on ian for how he felt about mickey in those seasons, and i understand why, but i also feel so awful for ian because the way he acted was so clearly him just trying to forget. wanting to push down all feelings he had for mickey and pretend that the situation was something it wasn’t because he undoubtedly has avoidant attachment issues (which i want to talk about more in depth sometime). “don’t fool yourself, she was heartache from the moment that you met her” is so ian, there is no way he went into that relationship and thought it would all end up okay. whether we’re talking about ian or mickey being the “heartache”. because ian always expected mickey to get himself thrown away again, and ian always expected himself to fuck things up. so he goes out with other men and he convinces himself he’s okay when he’s not, that he’s over mickey when he’s not, he has this whole façade on and not many people could see through it, but the second mickey saw him in season 7 (or even in the visit in season 6) he saw through it. the lyrics “oh, i think i’ve forgotten her now” remind me of ian’s date with caleb or just the whole caleb thing in general where he’s clearly trying to be someone he’s not and saying things he wouldn’t have said.

- lilac wine; season 3 ian. but like, 3x06-3x11 ian. the downfall, the heartbreak, the start of it all. “i lost myself on a cool, damp night, i gave myself in that misty light, was hypnotized by a strange delight under a lilac tree”, really just reminds me of the aftermath of 3x06 on ian’s part. the way he started to change, and drink, and cry. he was hurt, physically and mentally, and i don’t know how to really explain these lyrics in association with him during that time they just are ian. the whole song is kind of just like, drinking and missing someone. “lilac wine is sweet and heady, where's my love? lilac wine, i feel unsteady, where's my love? listen to me, why is everything so hazy? isn’t that she, or am i just going crazy, dear?” ian at the wedding, or after the wedding. just 3x11 in general. he’s drunk/hungover throughout the entire episode, and it’s really the start of it all. i mean, i think that everything had started a few episodes before that, but to me, that was the first episode where i saw ian and was like “holy shit”. he missed mickey, he drank a lot, and he was just so fucking heartbroken.

- dream brother; this song always reminds me of ian when i listen to it and i don’t even know how to explain it. i think a big part of it could be the fact that it’s believed this song is about child abandonment, and not only that, but also self destruction. two things ian knows a lot about. “her green eyes blew goodbyes, with her head in her hands” reminds me so much of monica leaving in season 1. not only that, but the look ian gave her. the way his eyes looked everytime they landed on her. it’s so heartbreaking and that lyric really reminds me of that. another thing about this song is that it apparently was a warning for his (jeff buckley’s) friend not to walk out on his pregnant girlfriend because it reminded him of what his father did, which is why the song says, “don’t be like the one who made me so old”. to me, that’s ian to lip. specifically in 7x08, which is one of my favorite episodes/scenes ever and i have talked about it so many times. how the scene where lip grabs ian is a direct parallel to when frank headbutts ian, and how ian looks at lip the same way he looks at frank. how ian advises lip not to drink before ian goes off to prison, and like, i don’t know, how they both have always kind of worried about ending up like frank and monica, the people who hurt them both so much. “they're waiting for you like i waited for mine; and nobody ever came” just reminds me of how ian looked when monica hugged debbie and carl in season 1. when she says “please let me be your mommy again” you can tell that ian’s heard that 1000 things and he’s absolutely crushed.

i definitely think he would listen to lana del rey, and i intend on making a separate post about that (i also started a series on ao3 of shameless oneshots inspired by lana del rey but it’s on a quick hiatus because again, i’m a lazy fuck), he reminds me a lot of her album (or ep, i guess) paradise. especially the songs ride and cola. if he were to listen to her he’d definitely be a local but he would love the songs he knows. debbie definitely got him into her because i’ve literally made a whole in-depth post about why debbie is a lana fan (it’s basically canon, especially considering debbie’s age and her marina phase) and so she would introduce her to him. maybe ian has lana songs on that playlist i was talking about?? who knows

i could definitely see him liking nirvana, that’s pretty realistic and it makes sense for him. i made a post about ian and territorial pissings and i honestly could make a lot of connections between ian and nirvana, too. it’s worth mentioning that kurt cobain was bipolar and he had songs about it, and those songs always seem to remind me of ian (like lithium).