Pgh Lesbian Correspondents

I have been blogging daily, but not sticking with the prompts. However, I refuse to be a #NaBloPoMo drop-out.

This coming Friday, I will not be shopping. Instead, I will sleep-in and then settle in to binge watch The Gilmore Girls ‘Year in the Life’ special on Netflix. Fortunately for me, Ledcat’s friend has asked her to go have lunch because she is not a fan. And she’s noisy which will interrupt my special time in Stars Hollow. I suggested they have lunch AND coffee so I can get at least 3 out of 4 of the episodes in. Ahem.

I’m not a Gilmore Girls fanatic. I’ve only watched the full series one time through on Netflix. I’m in the midst of my second go-round as part of my anxiety management. I can’t recite any of the dialogue. My favorite characters are the recurring townies. OK, Sookie was my favorite until she grew up to become move-star famous and bashed trans people on her next show. Ahem.

So here are my pressing questions that I hope to have resolved on Friday.

1. Why did no other Gilmores or Emily’s family live near them? They are supposed to be a founding family of Connecticut, but all evident relatives live in Europe. Did they establish Connecticut and leave it in the capable hands of Emily? It is a yawning gap to not give us more Emily family background and Marion Ross playing the entire cast of extended family.
2. Why does no one date on the show except the Girls? All of the other characters are either firmly in long-term relationships (Emily/Richard, Sookie/Jackson, Babette/Morey) or just single (Michel, Taylor, Miss Patty)  Obviously, Luke and Christopher have other love entanglements to create angst for Lorelai. Same with Dean, Jess and Logan. The only people who really evolve as daters are Lane and Paris. And Lane ends up a pregnant married teen while Paris has an affair with a much older professor and then there’s Doyle. Sigh. Gilmore Girls needed a little Samantha and ended up with Kirk and Lulu.
3. Rory and Lane lose their respective virginities in terrible storylines. Rory sleeps with her married ex-boyfriend in her childhood bedroom and gets discovered by her mother. She then throws a temper tantrum b/c Lorelai ‘ruined it for her’ by disapproving (of the married part.) Lane had sex for the first time on her honeymoon with her husband and hated it. Then she got pregnant. Of course she did. Because this show doesn’t deal with women’s sexuality at all. They are either boozed up over the hill hussies like Miss Patty and Babette or uptight repressed good girls. Again, more Samantha. Just a wee bit.
4. How much money does Lorelai actually make? They eat out constantly. They buy lots of weird things. They shop for groceries in what’s surely an upriced smalltown market. They have to repay the Chilton debt, the home renovation loan, car insurance jacked up after a 16 year old wrecked her car, and no child support from Christopher. Plus pay for Lorelai’s college classes. Also, how rich are Emily and Richard? It seems weird that his retirement would cramp their style since they both have family money.
5. This is the big one – sigh. Gigi. Georgia Hayden, Christopher’s daughter with Sherry and Rory’s only sibling (that we know of.) The worst storyline ever was Lorelai abandoning Gigi when she divorced Christopher. That was completely out of character. She took such great pains to keep a boundary around her dating life while raising Rory, never even introducing her to boyfriends until Max (whom Rory already knew.) The impulse marriage was okay, but Lorelai would not be so careless about moving Gigi into her home. It made ZERO SENSE. Lorelai had an ongoing quasi-aunt/quasi-stepmother relationship with Gigi since birth so it was just a crap storyline.

Sadly, I understand Gigi will not be included in the Netflix special. And that’s too bad because this issue needs to be addressed with a confrontation where Lorelai has to face the damage she did to her daughter’s sister. And we really need a big scene of Lorelai with her girls – Rory, April, and Gigi and Emily – eating ice cream. And all the junk food.

Because they all grew up. They grew up and created a new family that included stepfathers and half-sisters and so forth. The new family can still revolve around Lorelai, but it can be a land where Emily buys Rory, April and Gigi the same Christmas gift because she understands, at last.

Whew, I got this one in at the last minute. See you after Friday for follow-up discussion!