If I were to rank the Gilmore episodes, the bookends were the best and the middle was ok. Spring and Summer have their moments, but for me, they fell a little flat.
Spring felt like a parade of throwbacks mixed in with very little plot movement. It gives us some funny therapy moments with Lorelai and Emily; particularly a moment when Emily accuses Lorelai of sending her a nasty birthday letter and Lorelai insists it never happened. We get to experience the full on crazy of Naomi as Rory is trying so hard to make sense of this woman, what she wants and what this book is going to be about. The biggest highlight for me was probably the 30 second cameo of Mr Kim. HE EXISTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Rory’s still hanging out with Logan and they run into Logan’s Dad. Mitchum manages to make Rory feel small every time she encounters him. He offers to call Conde Nast for her and also reveals that Logan is ENGAGED. Engaged. Logan is engaged. My tolerance for Rory and her bad decision making is waning thin. Rory ends up having to leave Logan’s earlier than she wanted to because the fiance is coming to visit. Rory is awful. Oh and she’s still dating Paul.
There’s a fun Town Meeting scene where Taylor berates Lorelai for The Dragonfly hosting B list actors filming a movie the next town over. Michel will later on complain about this as well. Something about Matthew McConaughy reading the paper and never bagging Jennifer Lawrence. We find out TJ and Liz have accidentally joined a cult. Because of course they did. I have to say, I was glad they didn’t appear on screen. The phone call was enough.
Kirk debuts his 2nd short film at the Black, White, and Red movie theater, which features Lorelai’s house and Lorelai who is not paying attention. During this, Emily calls to invite Luke for dinner. Upon arrival at said dinner, Emily repeatedly mentions that Lorelai wasn’t invited. She takes Luke into Richard’s study and talks to him about making sure he has a will so Lorelai will be provided for when he passes away. She also reveals that Richard left money in a trust for Luke to expand the diner.
Rory and Paris return to Chilton for Alumni day which features an entirely hilarious Paris freak out in the bathroom about her divorce from Doyle and her empty briefcase. Francie walks in for a snark session with Paris where we learn that Paris is an MD, a lawyer, an expert on Neoclassical Architecture, and a dental technician to boot! This whole scene was great, Paris at her best. But it was prompted by a Tristan sighting… which was… weird. So first of all, it wasn’t Chad Michael Murray and if we weren’t bringing Chad back, then why did we bother. Second, I found myself confused as to why Tristan would be invited to a Chilton Alumni event considering he was kicked out and sent to Military School (to go be Lucas Scott on One Tree Hill) sooooo yeah.
The Chilton Headmaster offers Rory a teaching job at the school, even he can see shes floundering in the wind. He mentions that he’s read all of her work in The Atlantic and Slate and so we are once again mildly touching on what Rory does, though I’m still not sure I fully grasp what she’s been doing for a decade. Rory and Paris end up back at Paris’ house, we get a quick scene of Doyle in his t-shirt and jeans, he’s a screenwriter now, a nice nod to Danny Strong’s current profession (He writes and produces Empire). There’s this whole funny gag about not wanting to lose a Nanny because she has to walk up 5 flights of stairs and there’s no elevator. I can’t help but wonder if none of them were wearing heels, this hike up and down the stairs might not be so awful.
After receiving a call from Naomi’s lawyer dissolving the book partnership, Rory calls Logan and asks if his Dad can make that call to Conde Nast and she ends up in a meeting with Jim. He talks about this piece on Lines. People stand in lines all over NYC… what’s the angle on this? This story seems awful and so obviously other people haven’t wanted it. Rory is desperate and calls Jim later on saying she wants to do the piece. This leads to Lorelai coming down to the city to wander around with Rory while she researches lines. This was such a poorly done part of the episode, I thought. Rory is running all over NYC is a skirt and heels? She sits down on one of the lines and falls asleep, but no one steals the cell phone from her hand. Oh and we had to parade cameos through this. The most annoying being Mae Whitman. The only reason for this is so Lauren Graham can have a scene in which she’s standing next to her 2 tv daughters. I care not. This is Gilmore Girls, not Parenthood (more on that later). At the end of this, Rory returns to the hotel room she’s sharing with Lorelai and proclaims she slept with a Wookie and shes all upset about it. So I have A LOT of problems with this scene. First of all, Lorelai and Rory aren’t snobs, they love quirky stuff and I feel like they would love comic con’s and people dressing up, so Rory being all horrified she hooked up with a dude who was previously wearing a Wookie costume was dumb. Then Rory tells Lorelai about Logan and Lorelai doesn’t even flinch. She says NOTHING about the sitatrion. She isn’t upset that Rory has been lying all this time. She says NOTHING about Rory dating Paul for 2 years while sleeping with Logan on the side. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. It was bizarre and completely out of character. She even tells her that what she’s doing with Logan is “way sluttier than a one night stand”… I… but… what?
This episode gives us a few of the chef cameos, apparently since Sookie left all different celebrity chef’s have been cooking at the Dragonfly for 2 weeks at a time. Rachel Ray makes an appearance talking about Sammies, flailing her arms around distractedly and reminding me why I can’t stand her and why I’m suddenly annoyed shes infiltrating Sookie’s kitchen. Michel is visibly annoyed with Lorelai because she keeps firing the chef’s and Lorelai becomes concerned that Michel is going to leave.
Rory goes to a meeting at SandeeSays, the website that’s been hunting her down to come work for them. She meets with Sandee (the chick from Bunheads… again. This is Gilmore Girls, not Bunheads. I don’t care about these dumb cameos), and she has absolutely nothing prepared. NOTHING. Sandee gets annoyed at her, rightfully so. Whether she wants “Rory Gilmore’s voice” or not, she’s not about to just hand over a job to someone and Rory is pissed. She’s annoyed that Sandee “wasted her time” and I’m looking at her like WHO IS THIS CHICK???? Is she serious? How do you go to a meeting for a potential job and have absolutely nothing to say? No ideas? Nothing? It’s a bit ridiculous. And I can’t help but feel like if Rory was 23 years old and this was the storyline, I could believe it. But 32 year old Rory doesn’t know this simple job search etiquette? And it just made me want to punch her in her face. Of course this is all a plot device that will lead us to Rory having to sit down with Jess while he tells her what her life should be, because heaven forbid Rory ever make a decision on her own. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Emily quite therapy on Lorelai, but Lorelai stays and doesn’t tell Luke. Luke goes all over town looking at expansion places with Emily, but doesn’t tell Lorelai and a chasm between them begins to form. What I found most interesting in this episode was Lorelai alone with the therapist after Emily attacks her for being nothing more than a roommate with Luke because they aren’t married. Lorelai reflects that she “doesn’t do things like her mother” but that “its was always supposed to be Luke” and we get a little insight into why Luke and Lorelai aren’t married after all this time. There was a lot of flack given to this by reviewers and I just took it that, Lorelai knows marrying Christopher was the wrong decision. She was supposed to marry Luke and she ruins that by marrying Christopher and so I think she won’t allow herself to marry Luke or bring it up because getting married has been tainted. Tainted by Christopher and tainted by Emily. We do get to hear about how Richard died. It was a massive heart attack and his last words were to the nurses, “get away from me. This is not how Richard Gilmore goes down”. Lorelai laments that neither she or her mother got that goodbye moment with him.
About the grief: Lorelai is making the most strides. She’s opening up in therapy and beginning to admit that all she ever really wanted from her father, that “I love you Lorelai, I love you Dad” moment will never come. Emily is stuck in denial mode. She’s moving about, trying to be Richard, do what Richard wants her to do. Rory is painfully Rory. She’s also in denial of her failure and hasn’t quite yet begun to grieve her failing career. She’s pretty angry at the end as she moves back home.
Fireside Chats with Mimi 
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