Shameless Recap: The Hobo Games

Frank and Mikey O’Shea continued to vie for the $50,000 first prize in “The Hobo Games,” (Shameless S9 E11). Fiona continued her downward spiral, only this time, the repercussions of her behavior affected Lip’s chances of being a foster parent to Xan (if he has any to begin with).

You can’t ask LeBron James not to play in the playoffs ~ Frank Gallagher

Ingrid Jones decided she was lonely in the middle of the Hobo Loco contest. She called Frank and demanded that he come home. Mikey encouraged Frank to do just that but Frank refused to quit, pronouncing himself “The Hobo Loco Mofo.” For the begging challenge of the contest, Frank and Mikey decided to work together. They put up a ‘Homosexual War Veterans” sign and were the immediate recipients of the generosity of a large gathering of sympathizers.

The two vagabonds also teamed up on the Southside Emergency Room challenge. They had to get in to see the doctor in less than an hour. It was a tough task for sure since the typical waiting room time is 11 hours, but Frank and Mikey are nothing if not resourceful. They cut their hands and drank their own blood, convincing the staff that they were a tuberculosis threat and were whisked out of the waiting room faster than you could say “Hobo Loco.”

They were the last two standing when it came down to the nitty gritty: hopping on a moving freight train. At this point, Ingrid showed up in person and wanted Frank to come home, claiming she was miscarrying one to six embryos. This was a test suggested to her by Kelly and Debbie to prove that Frank was never going to put her first. Supposedly, Frank was trying to win this $50K to take care of her and her babies and she was all for it before so why she pulled this stunt right before the last challenge will remain a mystery. Frank went back to slamming down 4 shots of Hobo Loco.

Mikey suggested that whoever got on first should pull the other one up and they would split the money. Frank probably pulled that same trick on more than one person so he wasn’t buying into it. So they ended up sabotaging each other. Dax informed Frank that when no one wins the final event, the rule is the person with the most social media followers wins. That was Gloria because she posed topless with fans. Frank and Mikey flipped the bird at each other. So much for best friends.

Frank went home to find Ingrid getting into Randy’s car. She told him that she was going to reduce the embryos to two and Randy was going to work full time. After the test he didn’t know he was taking, she knew that he would always put something else ahead of her. “She means alcohol,” Randy offered. “I got that,” Frank replied. Randy whipped out some paperwork for Frank to sign away any paternity rights he might have (like none!) but Frank wanted some money. Randy offered him $5K and when Frank upped it to $10K, a disgusted Ingrid got in the car. Randy gave him the check. The way Shameless just drops storylines, we may never see Ingrid again. That means we’ll never find out which of the already-named embryos Carl might get a knock on his door from someday. Will it be George, Gordy, Glenn, Gladys, Gina or Gabby?

I don’t buy 1% milk instead of 2% without asking Cami. ~ Brad

Lip had a 10 a.m. appointment to start the process to be a foster parent to Xan. Tami was supposed to drive them there but she disappeared for the rest of the day. Lip was advised that aside from the fact that he couldn’t just start fostering a child, they weren’t big on putting children Xan’s age in the care of single guys his age who were not related to the child. The process involved a lot of paperwork and a lot of rules. Lip thought he could just get a bunkbed and make Debbie share her room with Xan. Debbie nixed that. Then Xan said the rule was she had to have her own room, so he wanted Debbie to bunk with Fiona. Debbie nixed that, too. Fiona came home and gave Debbie some money she just made by selling an Oxy prescription she stole from some people she was partying with in a motel room. Lip was upset to see that. He ordered a bunkbed anyway and went off to the motorcycle shop to borrow some tools to put it together. Lip asked Brad if he knew what was going on with Tami. Brad suggested that he ask Tami directly if she was put off by him seeking legal custody of Xan.

Your tetanus is up to date, right? ~ Fiona Gallagher

While Lip was on that errand, social worker Peter Naylor showed up at the Gallagher home for an unannounced inspection and Fiona answered the door drunk! She let him in and things went south in a hurry. There was that big hole in the floor where Debbie and Kelly removed the old furnace. Frannie and Kev and V’s twins were unsupervised in the playpen and when they finally located Debbie, she and Kelly were outside, laughing and spraying each other with the water hose. Lip came home as Naylor was about to leave and was appalled. He tried to get Naylor to let him explain a few things or at least come back after the bunkbed was delivered but the social worker refused. Lip lit into Fiona for being drunk in the middle of the day and letting Naylor in the house. He said the old Fiona would have handled it and covered for him. Fiona said it wasn’t her fault. She didn’t know the guy was coming or that Debbie left the kids unsupervised. She said she was tired of being Susie Sunshine and if she wanted to get drunk in the middle of the day, that was her business. Xan just looked pitiful.

Fiona felt bad about this but her bad day was far from over and neither was Lip’s. She went to the motorcycle shop to find Lip and apologize. Only Jason was there. (Remember him?) He had just celebrated 100 days of sobriety. Fiona poured out her troubles to Jason while she poured out some vodka and, knowing nothing about his history, when he asked her for some, she didn’t mind at all. Evidently, after Jason helped Fiona polish off the bottle, he called up his heroin dealer and scored. Then he called Lip, who by this, time had caught up with Tami. She informed him that she was pregnant and she was sure he was the father!

After Lip did what he could to comfort Jason, he went home and got into angry confrontation No. 2 with Fiona. She didn’t even know who Lip was talking about at first when he came in and said: “A hundred days he was sober, Fiona.” Lip put the entire blame for Jason’s relapse on Fiona. She didn’t see it that way– she didn’t know Jason was Lip’s sponsee or that he had an addiction problem. Lip said he wanted her out of the house and stormed off. As Fiona thought that over, you could almost read her mind, as though she was thinking of all the times that Lip was drunk on his arse and how she didn’t kick him to the curb but helped him get back on his feet. Fiona was always family first but now here’s Lip, putting Jason and Xan ahead of all the Gallaghers.

Other Storylines

Veronica decided that she and Kevin could not have any more children after what the twins did to Santiago so Kev had to get a vasectomy. Reluctantly, he went in for the procedure, signed the necessary paperwork and got the anesthetic. While waiting for the doctor to come in, Kev heard another patient screaming so he left and told V that it was all done. They went and got his pain meds and he sent V off to the Alibi and the twins to Debbie under the pretense that he was in too much pain to work or mind the kids. At work, V got a call from the clinic trying to reschedule his appointment and Kev was caught out there.

At Captain Bob’s Shrimp Shack, Lori’s fry guy quit so Carl got a promotion. Debbie and Kelly spent the day getting the old furnace out of the basement and finding a new one at the junkyard. Their playful and flirty interactions made Carl mad and it didn’t help when his co-workers told him his sister was macking on his girl or when Debbie told him that Kelly might be the type that comes out later in life.

Three more episodes left, according to the coming attractions.