Through a Glass, Darkly

KARI: Sweeps.

MIKE: *works on computer*

KARI: February sweeps.

MIKE: *works on computer*

KARI: Valentine’s Day, February sweeps.

MIKE: *smiles* Is that when it’s gonna happen?

KARI: That’s when it’s gonna happen. Luke and Lorelai, back together.

I’m flabbergasted to think that anyone could take last night’s episode as a positive sign for Lorelai and Christopher. Which, of course, means I liked it. tee hee hee.

I’ve actually been liking Rory a lot more this season. I think part of that is because her storyline isn’t just about her relationship with Logan, but also about her senior year meltdown and finding new friends. As well as some good Lorelai/Rory scenes. That’s a lot more satisfying, I think, than Felon!Rory and all Logan’s friends. And, can I say, I get why some people hate Rory’s new friends, but I like them. I can’t help it. I think they are funny, and they genuinely want to be good friends to Rory, which I like. Other than Lane, we haven’t really seen that. And a lot of Lane’s screentime was about her relationship with her mother and her band, so the scenes of Lane and Rory just hanging out have gotten fewer and fewer over the years. I like Rory just hanging out with her girlfriends.

I also liked that Logan called her on her attitude. I think that Rory’s been needing someone to say that stuff to her for a while, at least since the beginning of season 5, when she was dating Dean and got dumped by him because she was drunk with Logan at her grandparents’ house. Rory needs to realize that she does have a lot of advantages, and the point is to be responsible with them. She wasn’t being responsible when she stole a boat, dropped out of Yale, and lived in the poolhouse. Logan wasn’t being responsible when he partied his way through college. But now I think there’s hope for both of them. And I’m glad they actually had that conversation.

I’ll keep on stalling. How much do I love Luke and April scenes? SO MUCH. The only thing that could possibly have been better than him freaking out about it being a kissing party would have been him trying to give her the sex talk. I like how all Luke’s best qualities come out in those scenes - his compassion, his goofiness when he doesn’t exactly know what to do but he wants to do the right thing, his devotion to his family. I like how he calls her “sweetie.” I can’t help it.

You know, one of the things I read this season about the show was talking about April, and the author put forth the theory that April was the one who pulled Luke and Lorelai apart, so she’s the one who has to bring them back together (on Valentine’s Day, during February sweeps). I kind of like that theory, and that would be a good explanation for why we’re getting so much Luke-and-April time right now. I just thought I’d toss that out there.

Anyway, that brings me to Lorelai and Christopher. I think that, yet again, the story is that Christopher doesn’t fit in Lorelai and Rory’s life. Lorelai has never lived with a man (it seemed like Luke was moving in, but then the Palladinos backtracked on that), and it’s a big adjustment to her very independent life. Does Christopher try to make that easier? No, the day after they get back he’s trying to banish Rory’s stuff to the garage. And I know the stuff at the beginning with the waterfall and the TV was a joke, but I think that it’s telling just the same, that Christopher comes in to Lorelai’s house, her house! and tries to change things right away. Dude, if this “marriage” is going to last, you’ve got plenty of time to make it more your home, too, while also being patient and sensitive to what your “wife” and daughter need to adjust. Why the big rush? Supposedly, you have the rest of your lives together.

Except, you know. Not really.

It’s telling, I think, that Lorelai kept talking about doing instead of planning and acting instead of waiting. That has more to do with Luke and what happened there than it does Christopher. I am firm in my conviction that if Rory could have talked Lorelai out of the wedding, it isn’t going to last.

What’s so frickin’ sad is that . . . Lorelai desperately wants to be happy right now. I think all the doing and acting is about just getting somewhere, being happy. And I think she’s kinda convinced herself that she is happy. Except, I don’t think it’s working. I think the cracks are showing too much. And, if anything, the problem I see with the show right now is that the fans don’t know what they’re supposed to think. Everything in the show was pointing to the fact that Lorelai is now in way over her head, except some of the stuff with Rory made it sound like this is what she really wants. I just . . . I don’t think that’s true. I don’t think it’s true because we’re focusing so much on, “Oh, twenty years in the making,” etc. And I don’t think Lorelai feels regret about not being married to Christopher when she was sixteen. I don’t think she has ever said that’s what she wanted. So I don’t buy the “long time coming” theory at all. I think that, if anything, the “long time coming” and “I’m so happy” bits lead me further down the path of believing that Lorelai has lost who she is in the midst of all of this. Emily (not Gilmore) and I were talking earlier about the difficulty of watching the show with Christopher fans (I must confess that every time it looks like Lorelai and Christopher are going to embrace, I don’t watch the screen. Is that weird?), and I’ve read some Christopher fans over on the TWoP boards and on other fansites, but . . . I honestly can’t believe that Christopher fans could possibly feel good about the way their guy is being portrayed. It seems so obvious to me that his pushy, insensitive, money-throwing ways mean . . . he’s not Mr. Right.

How about that scene at the hospital? I made Mike rewind it, just to see the look on Luke’s face again. Poor guy. I wish he hadn’t had to find out that way. And I’ve never seen The Philadelphia Story, but the wedding that was “originally and most beautifully planned?” That’s Luke and Lorelai’s. You can count on it. I felt like that was a bit of a promise, a shout-out to the fans. When people talk about the show, they talk about the language being that of the movies from the 40s. I felt like it was a bit of a promise that things on the show are . . . going to be normal again. Maybe that’s a stretch, but that’s what it made me think of, right away.

(Question. I thought there was another room upstairs in Lorelai and Rory’s house. A small one, not Lorelai’s room. A room that could be Gigi’s, or where Rory’s stuff could be so she still has a room when she comes home. Is that not true? Did the renovations change all that? Was it ever that way? Am I going to have to bust out my season 1 DVDs to try and figure it out?)