as a lot of you know, we don't really have television here at chez naked. but i have a small (or maybe not so small, maybe it's as big as me) obsession with the television show, gilmore girls. such is my obsession, that as the premiere for this season grew closer, i actually chatted with dearsweetdave about getting cable television for chez naked so i could watch my beloved show. i used to watch it every tuesday night at gail's house. she lived just 110 steps away and it made it quite convenient because she was just as obsessed as i was. as my gilmore buddy, we used to actually plan meals around the show. this is not a joke. we would watch the preview for each week's episode, determine what kind of meal would be most appropriate for that evening's episode and then one or the other of us would be in charge of either preparing or procuring the food. our gilmore tuesdays were sacred. and when she decided to move to santa barbara i don't know if i was more sad that she was leaving santa cruz or that our gilmore tuesdays would no longer be.
my dear friend tree, who is also my biz partner in the travel agency venture, just so happens to also be a gilmore girls fan, as well. so when i started to have a slight nervous breakdown on tuesday evening (we elected NOT to install cable here at chez naked as it would involve moving lots of furniture into lots of different configurations and we happen to like the current configurations) tree agreed to tape the episode for me. thank goodness for tree and vcr's, huh? i watched the premiere episode last night. what follows is my review of gilmore girls. and if you haven't seen it, stop reading now. because i'm going to write about it. right now.
first off, with the exception of gail, i'm not sure there is anyone on the planet who is quite as passionate about this television show and its characters as i happen to be. i actually chat about them as if they're real people who exist. in my head, they DO exist. i worry about them. i think about them. i'm sick, yes, but for me, they are my friends who live in stars hollow, just down the road from hartford (where i went to college) and who have lives not so very different from my own.
that said, the premiere episode for this season was a shadow of its former self and so were all the characters. blech.
it is not unlike when aaron sorkin was ousted from the west wing and the writers scrambled to figure out how to write a show that was just as intelligent and witty and engaging in the wake of his departure. those were big shoes to fill. i'm sure amy left some pretty stylish and fab pumps to fill, as well.
amy sherman-palladino has most definitely left the gilmore. and what we're left with is empty storylines and ridiculous dialogue that you don't even want to hear.
when i first started watching gilmore i drooled over the repartee between rory and lorelai. DROOLED all over my own cashmere sweaters. i couldn't believe what i was hearing. the double entendres. the obscure pop culture references. the vocabulary! the rat a tat stacatto. these people talked like i talked. it was brill. just plain brill. i found myself leaning forward on the couch just to be sure i really heard every.single.solitary.word. i didn't want to miss a single second because i was certain if i did i'd surely miss something fantastically sublime.
in this premiere episode we were given a rory who was stumped by a gift of a rocket ship from her wealthy boyfriend logan. now, okay, perhaps she was stumped at first. but when she figured it out? please tell me that lorelai is NOT going to immediately know the episode from twilight zone that rory is talking about and that the two of them would not fall right into a lightening fast back and forth tit for tat that included a reinactment of the entire twilight zone scene? it was so difficult and painful for me to watch and believe that all lorelai could do was say, "what??...who??...oh, you should go to london!" come on, people. at the very least she'd have picked up her telephone while rory was saying..."i have never felt so loved!" and been calling an airline to book rory a ticket.
i felt so sorry for the actors. they were all so flat. like they had their feet stuck in molasses and were trying their hardest to unstick them. to move faster. to make it all just a little bit more like it used to be.
this was no where more clear than in the final scene with luke and lorelai. luke arrives at lorelai's front door with his truck packed to the gills. this is after kirk has driven taylor's 1964 cherry thunderbird into his diner in a completely silly scene that really was totally unnecessary, but was obviously the writers trying to figure out a way to just a) fill time and b) make sure they included as many of the extra actors who work on gilmore girls in the premiere episode as absolutely possible. but, as i said, totally unnecessary!
luke arrives at lorelai's. he says in 9000 words, asfastashepossiblycan, that he understands that he needs to catch up and that they should go to maryland to get married. or if not maryland, a boat. or to vermont to camp. or whatever. whatever she wants. and the entire time all lorelai keeps saying is, "luke, stop." or "luke, wait."
lorelai doesn't say, "luke stop." she butts in. BIG TIME. in fact, in that scene, luke would have been giving his entire speech and at the same time, lorelai would have been giving her entire speech. luke's would have been WHY THEY SHOULD BE TOGETHER. lorelai's would have been WHY IT'S OVER. and it would have ended like this, both of them simultaneously speaking:
luke: "and we belong together, because, without you, i'm nothing."
lorelai: "and we can't be together, because, last night, i slept with christopher."
and then luke HEARS that, they stare at each other in a long silence and luke gets in his truck and drives off. fade to black.
that's gilmore girls, people.
whatever it was we all saw in the premiere is a good attempt at an imitation of gilmore girls. of course, i'm going to stick around and hope that it gets better. HOPE. because i love those people. they're very real to me. and my little visits to stars hollow every tuesday evening really do make me smile.
dear gilmore girls show runners,
let's keep it real. and witty. and smart.
and i'll keep watching.
love,
nakedjen














