Shameless season 5 will feature the return of Jimmy/Steve, who was previously presumed dead.
The character, played by Justin Chatwin, appeared in the closing credits of the season 4 finale, in a vehicle that rolled up to the Gallagher house.
“Jack, are you going to go inside?” the female driver asks, but Jimmy/Steve declines.
Executive producer John Wells described to TVLine how he decided that Jimmy/Steve was still alive.
“The audience kept telling us that they didn’t know what had happened at the end [of last season with the character], so we thought, ‘I don’t know, maybe we’ll take advantage of that and go with it.’”
The rest of the cast didn’t even know about the surprise, because they shot it before everybody else arried in Chicago, and put Chatwin in a different hotel.
“And people enjoyed being in on the secret, so the people who were in on the secret were excited about keeping it secret,” said Wells.
In other casting news, Emily Bergl (Sammi Gallagher) has been promoted to a series regular for season 5, reported Deadline.
It’s probable that guest star Jeffrey Dean Morgan will feature in at least a couple episodes of the next season after welcoming Fiona to her new job at a diner.
Production for Shameless season 5 will start later this year in Los Angeles.
