WARNING: Spoilers for Gilmore Girls Revival! Stop reading if you haven’t watched!
Okay, I should be grateful that my childhood show that I lived and breathed on came back for four lengthy, stylistically beautiful episodes on Netflix, and that the original characters I loved all were there. I should consider myself relatively unscathed as my fave character Paris Geller was back and better than ever, that Luke and Lorelai finally tied the knot, that there were many wonderful tributes to Richard Gilmore, and that Emily Gilmore’s character development was so satisfactory is almost makes up for all my tiny frustrations. And yet… here are a few things that have my head spinning about these new Gilmore Girl episodes.
1. The Musical
Hands down the most criticized part of the new series, and I get that it was there to show off how quirky and fun Stars Hallows is, but come on! It was so long. We didn’t even know the characters who were singing, I had absolutely no investment in it. Sure, maybe one song would have been fine, but why was there so much singing?!?
2. The Tribute to Wild
Okay, it did lead to one of the best scenes where Lorelai calls her mom to tell her a story about her father, but kind of like the musical, it dragged a little long until that point. I did not particularly care about the other women on the journey, and seriously, why tease a Luke and Lorelai breakup when it’s clearly not going to happen?
3. Who wrote the letter to Emily Gilmore?
Early on, Emily accuses Lorelai of writing a nasty letter on her birthday. It’s never resolved and just kind of is forgotten in the midst of the story. Why make a big deal of it when it is never to be brought up again?
4. RORY
This new Rory is a stranger to me! The cheating, the lack of motivation, the flip-flopping from being a journalist to writing a book were all things I did not recognize. Especially the moment when she casually states “journalism didn’t work out” and she’s looking at new opportunities. This was baffling to me because the Rory that was on my television for seven years (albeit some fuzzy episodes in season 6) lived and breathed the dream of being a journalist. It kind of hurt to see her nonchalantly give it up. It was almost like the creator of the show Amy Sherman-Palladino was tired of people being unable to decide if Rory or Lorelai was their favorite character and decided to make it easy for us. I get that she is going through a difficult time, but characteristics that made her so Rory to us just weren’t there in this revival. I missed her.
5. The Last Four Words
Really, Amy Sherman-Palladino? These were really the last four words all along? You mean the entire series about a mother providing and working her butt off to giver her daughter a different life than her winds up in the same position? Rory – smart, determined, career-driven – ends up in Stars Hollow with the similar love triangle her mother grew up in? I’m not mad that she’s pregnant – I’m mad that it happened through an affair and is very much unlike Rory. I get that the series has “come full circle,” but the 10-year-old in me who thought Rory was the smartest, coolest, and most inspiring Yale student hurts to see her not be who she was always determined to be.
However, a few plot missteps and my confusion on Rory’s character development does not deter my love for the Gilmore Girls – it was great hearing the fast talking, pop culture-infused, and quick-witted mother daughter duo back at it again!
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