Well I was filling in your start of sentence, I wouldn't phrase it that way exactly.

"Empire is not a "quality drama" it's a…well made and acted nighttime soap with original music."

Well they definitely set it up for us to think that, deliberately one would assume.

LMAO.

Interesting, I think Hakeem looks way younger than Jamal on the show. IRL Jussie is 10 years older than Yazz (31 vs 21)

Yes, I thought it was just a motherly "I will make my child well, he's okay" snap reaction and shock/denial. No Mom wants to hear her child has something that can't be 'fixed' permanently. She immediately started to research bipolar, you know she wants to be there for Andre and help him. Her very first reaction may…

I certainly hope so, I laugh with it a lot. The scene with Cookie in the dining room on the phone with Malcolm, that is just pure comedy, the show has lots of scenes like that.

This was a nice 'calm before the storm' episode and the stuff with Jamal & Hakeem (Jamal bopping along to Hakeem's song & them singing to Lola) was so, so great.

I thought she carried that scene as well.

The show works much better when the Lyon Cubs (™ someone more clever than me) are sticking together against Lucious.

It was so clearly a joke (and a good one at that). It was Hakeem realizing that that would be the LAST song to sing to a child. How this went over Joshua's head is a mystery.

I completely saw it this way. I think the Gus thing is done.

I agree with those 100%.

Someone somewhere pointed out that Mickey & Ian haven't had a conversation since the scene where Mickey said he was taking him to the hospital. Rather impressive considering how much has been conveyed.

JAW has always been amazing with emotionally raw material, he just hasn't had much of it lately, so it was nice to see. I must admit the sexy times with Sasha Alexander that are apparently coming up I say yes to just for aesthetics alone…

I'm still upset about Kev and V but am impressed that (for Shameless) they did it in an 'understandable' way. I'm still hoping they work it out. As for Ian and Mickey, I think they have a lot of story left with them as a couple but I remain paranoid that Ian is going to kill himself.

Of course, but it's still not rock bottom to me. Rock bottom is when in that moment you have no where to go but up. Fiona getting arrested after almost killing Liam would be her rock bottom on the show, I doubt she'll ever do something THAT awful again. Lip has way way waaaay further he can sink besides having bad…

While I'm sure no one will be checking in this late, I finally had time to watch the ep last night and it was shockingly good, in that I was interested in everyone's storylines. As annoying as I find Sammi, her being at the house makes her a little less so because at least she's interacting with people other than…

That was not rock bottom at all. The credit card thing isn't going to negatively affect his life right now. Trying to turn tricks on a street corner after being kicked out of school is rock bottom.

Exactly.