History YMMV / ShamelessUS

* SeasonalRot: After a score of high-quality seasons, season five was considered one of the weakest seasons of the show, especially in terms of writing. [[spoiler:Bringing Steve/Jimmy back was an especially high point of contention, and is often criticized for being a contrived and pointless arc that was never going to go anywhere.]] Fortunately, season six was much better received as a return to form.

** Debbie has gone significantly down in popularity since Season 6. [[spoiler: She deliberately gets pregnant, ignores Fiona's warnings/pleas to get rid of the baby, and refuses to accept the consequences of her actions or even take help from Fiona (who was proven right about Debbie not being ready to take care of a baby)]].

* AndTheFandomRejoiced: [[spoiler:After a lot of complaints about how fan-favorite Mickey was written off, his reappearance (and escape from prison) near the end of Season 7 led to a lot of rejoicing from the Gallavich fanbase.]]

* JerkassWoobie: Mandy and Mickey Milkovich both. Frank and Monica, horrible as they might be, have their moments as well.
** Fiona veers into this territory in season four when she goes off the deep end, [[spoiler:leading to Liam's hospitalization after he accidentally inhales her cocaine. Her rant to Lip about her being glad that "something's finally about her" (as she ponders trying to defend herself in court over the accident, which was completely her fault) is a rare moment of pure selfishness, but she's not incorrect.]] Fortunately, she "gets her shit together" by the end of the season.
* JustHereForGodzilla: Horrible as he often is, Frank's character is a draw in itself for some people.

** Fiona's popularity dropped a lot in seasons four and five; even after she got her shit together after her nosedive in season four, her actions in season five led some fans to believe that she was turning into Frank, and that she was losing [[AllLovingHero all the qualities]] [[BigSisterInstinct that made audiences want to root for her]] in the earlier seasons; other fans thought it was an inevitable turn due to the massive stress brought on by [[ParentalSubstitute her responsibilities]] combined with the fact that she was still only in her early twenties. Other fans (and even Emmy Rossum herself) were just sick of her plots being frequently intertwined with boyfriend troubles and wanted her to stay single for a while; because of this, season seven has been praised for giving Fiona a more independent arc.

** Trevor has been getting this treatment as well in season seven, with many fans disappointed that the show introduced a trans charaater whose writing gives little to no insight to his personality, hobbies, or characterization outside of his identity, and are ''still'' waiting and hoping for Mickey to make a return.

* ReplacementScrappy: Caleb [[spoiler: for Mickey]]. Fan reaction against him was guaranteed from the start. But the perception that the relationship is leading to [[spoiler: shitting all over Mickey and painting Ian as totally innocent in their break up]]

* BrokenBase: [[spoiler:Bringing Jimmy/Steve for a brief storyline in season five. Some were ecstatic to see his return and to have closure on his and Fiona's relationship, while others felt it was a forced and pointless arc for drama that only serves to derail Fiona's attempts to stay on the right track.]]

* ReplacementScrappy: Caleb. [[spoiler: for Mickey]]. Fan reaction against him was guaranteed from the start. But the perception that the relationship is leading to [[spoiler: shitting all over Mickey and painting Ian as totally innocent in their break up]]

* [[HeReallyCanAct She Can Really Act]]: The series really turned around critical opinion of Emmy Rossum.

** The Season 6 finale really removed any good karma Frank built up with Debbie. He crashes Fiona and Sean's wedding to air out all the Gallagher's faults. He drops a bomb by saying Sean [[spoiler: is doing heroin again.]] TheStinger has all of the Gallaghers, Kevin, Veronica and Shetland dumping Frank off a bridge into the river.

* TheSeason 6 finale really removed any good karma Frank built up with Debbie. He crashes Fiona and Sean's wedding to air out all the Gallagher's faults. He drops a bomb by saying Sean [[spoiler: is doing heroin again.]] TheStinger has all of the Gallaghers, Kevin, Veronica and Shetland dumping Frank off a bridge into the river.

** Sheila Jackson when she goes through her agoraphobia.

** Frank has done pretty bad things for money but using a dying women who need a new heart to get her pension is low even for Frank. [[spoiler:Later he destroys her chances to get a new heart and help her killing herself by having sex with him.]] Granted this is BlackComedy though.

** By Season 3, its really hard to root for Frank anymore. [[spoiler: After a drunken bender, he crashes at the house where he messes up things with some of his drunk or high "friends", and then crashes in Debbie's that results in a fight and Debbie's Abraham Lincoln log cabin project to be ruin and dismisses it as being stupid, leading to Debbie losing her shit and attacking Frank.]] And if that's not bad enough, [[spoiler: after he had been tossed out of the house, Frank ''then'' calls up social services and reports on his own family.]] It really says a lot when one of the bartenders tells him that he "hit a new low even for him".
** Terry Milkovich has crosses the line so many times, its hard to target the precise moment of his MEH. [[spoiler:Beating his own son up because he was gay, forcing a hooker to have sex with him, and later, its established he screwed his daughter one night in a drunken state, causing her to become pregnant counts.]] However, the real kick in the ass happens in Season 4's ''Emily'' where he outright tries to murder Mickey after he came out of the closet. If it wasn't for Ian, his father would have surely murdered the kid.

** And most recently, SAMMI. While she seemed more or less enjoyable during Season 4, in season 5 alone she has become even [[UpToEleven more horrible]] than Frank. She manages to [[spoiler:get Carl arrested, then in the process, uses her son to become a Nazi so he would not have get beaten up in juvie hall.]] While Frank is a horrible parent, he can still make up for it by still being caring at times. Sammi is shown to be one horrible woman, who doesn't realize it and is called out for it.

** And most recently, SAMMI. While she seemed more or less enjoyable during Season 4, in season 5 alone she has become even [[UpToEleven more horrible]] than Frank. She manages to [[spoiler:get Carl arrested, then in the process, uses her son to become a Nazi so he would not have get beaten up in juvi hall.]] While Frank is a horrible parent, he can still make up for it by still being caring at times. Sammi is shown to be one horrible woman, who doesn't realize it and is called out for it.

*** [[spoiler:This troper may be alone here, but my feeling was that Dottie (Butterface) had in that moment decided to take her life anyway and that essentially Frank had the option of either leaving her and letting her kill herself by some conventional method, or screwing her to death for $2000 and a flat-screen. I suppose he could have stuck around and comforted her and talked her out of suicide, but that's not exactly in his nature. It was certainly inspired by greed, and was not good, but I would certainly rank that below ransoming out Liam to Monica and Bob.]] Emmy Rossum would seem to disagree though.

* CompleteMonster: Frank is lying, manipulative, cowardly, dishonest, an alcoholic and a drug addict, a moocher, selfish, self-interested, and several more negative adjectives. He does PetTheDog occasionally, but this is usually revealed to either be a part of a scheme, or something he did while not conscious of it (such as donating several thousand dollars to a charity that provides prosthetic legs to homeless children, then trying to steal back one of the legs from the girl using it.