moonb

I think Lorelai and Rory's men work well for me as deliberately unsuccessful relationships - not sure if ASP intended it that way, though. Lorelai and Christopher, while fun to watch, were the couple permanently stuck at 17, even mirror images of each other in needing things their own way and in their self-involvement without regard to their child together. As for Lorelai's other boyfriends, well, who doesn't enjoy being admired and knowing deep down that admiration and sexual attraction isn't love (Max)? Or having similar backgrounds and rebelling together without that being enough for a romantic relationship (Jason)? The fact that Lorelai is arguably a little old to be going through that is, I guess, part of her character - she doesn't get the other "important life events," education, then marriage, then pregnancy, timed right, so why shouldn't she be behind in romantic relationships? Plus, this is a woman who didn't even date seriously (as far as integrating her family life with her sexual/romantic relationships) until her 30s, so she's learning like a younger person would. I'd have been happy whether Lorelai ended the series single or with Luke, because I can make the case either way. And I loved Rory's 3 boyfriends in their wrongness as far as being together forever - Dean for the dull and obsessive high school boyfriend, Jess for the bad boy that would irritate a more mature girlfriend, and Logan for the serious college boyfriend you think is your forever guy and then...isn't. If I'd married the guy I really loved at 22, we'd be divorced by now because of some serious incompatibilities I didn't get at the time. Some college couples last, others don't, and I liked that Rory got to be single and starting her professional life. My unpopular opinion: I like the first half of season 6 and the Lorelai/Rory rift, and rewatch those episodes a lot. I like all of Rory's bad moments - it seems in character for her not to stumble until college or later, given her upbringing and her easy skate through life thus far and that attendant selfishness. Lots of people are much more insufferable and obnoxious at age 20 or even later than at 16. I thought it was good for Rory, even if her storylines got resolved too easily. I also liked that Emily and Richard's relationship with Lorelai was always "two steps back" - it seems true to life for family dynamics. My mother, a less snobby and lower rent Emily Gilmore, who has to have things done her way, hasn't gotten over my sister's choosing to go to a college that didn't suit her (in my mom's opinion). She still talks about it as a rebellion - and this happened 30 years ago and my sister is 50 now. So the depiction of Emily/Richard/Lorelai as all similar in their drama queen tendencies totally works for me...even with the senior Gilmores' descent into cartoon villainery.

Ha, the amusing "they that dance must pay the fiddler," plus the strange interaction with the Boasts wanting to take Rose, are the really memorable fun and slightly creepy parts of The First Four Years. The rest of it is just so unrelentingly depressing.

I'm a school nerd, so besides the socializing and Laura's teenage fretting over her clothes and figure, I most enjoy the peek into 19th century schooling in LTOTP - it's really detailed. Doing long division in their heads in front of an audience at the school exhibition? Diagramming sentences? Memorizing all that American history - "great men" and US president-style. And of course, as Miss Wilder demonstrates, the main thing really is discipline; being able to learn something means memorizing and spitting it out, period. ETA: yes, I also really wonder why Laura didn't bother fictionalizing Eliza Jane just a little bit, the way she did with other people throughout the series.

The Long Winter is the book in which the libertarian business bothers me the most - from Pa and Laura's first conversation about that muskrat house to that heavyhanded bit in Loftus' general store when the town confronts him about overcharging for the wheat. Ugh. Also "ugh" to the portrayal of the old Native American man who comes to warn them about the long winter..."heap big snow come." 1930s stereotypes, anyone? On the other hand, I love the description of the green pumpkin pie. I have always wanted to try making one. And Cap Garland - LIW compares him to the sun, for crying out loud. And Pa's "we thank thee for all thy bounty" at the big Christmas meal in May after just surviving does make me teary. Reading it as a kid, I didn't pick up that feeling numb and half-asleep=starving.

Pa and Ma's seeming favoritism of Mary makes me wonder if Ma had miscarriages or other pregnancy complications before Mary was born, and therefore she was extra cherished - maybe her blindness further contributed to that? Of course, there's only conjecture as to why two healthy young 20-somethings who married in 1860 didn't have a child come along until almost 5 years later, but Mary's being the first healthy baby after a long wait might have contributed to her "golden child" status.

Yeah, BTSOSL is a placeholder upon rereading - I used to think of it as the start of the Dakota books, but it's really a lot about Laura becoming adult, maybe a little before her time. Mary goes blind and Laura has to be her eyes, Laura has to teach now. Jack dies, Laura and Lena go horseback riding but Laura has to be careful to be ladylike....and so on. Not that there aren't flashes of little girl Laura - the chapter with the sliding on Silver Lake, for one - but there's this subtext about Laura being Pa's little girl (brown hair, his favorite) versus Ma's young lady (she can't play as much, she has real duties and responsibilities)...and maybe she can expect a life like Ma's?

The Namesake is by far my favorite of the three of her works I've read. I haven't read The Lowland yet, however.

I've read only maybe 1/3 of King's books, and most of those are pre-1990s - I think I was done after Desperation. Like others, I loved The Stand, but I've only read the Uncut edition and I wish he hadn't updated it to the 1990s - it works so much better as an apocalyptic late 70s America story. I do think he writes bleakness and poverty in a compelling way - I'm thinking mainly of The Body and the boys' crappy and indifferent families - but Cujo is another example. It's not really a horror novel at all, just people feeling trapped in their circumstances. I only read Pet Sematary a few years, and it scared me so badly I could hardly finish it, probably because even though I'm not a parent, I had recently lost my dad. Awful read.

I love the read-along idea. Like a lot of others have mentioned, Ma was so much more sympathetic to me as an adult, having to take her 4 kids and trail behind this husband who couldn't really support his family. Which was his entire job - "men's work" and all. I don't remember which biography I read it in (maybe Zochert?), but I got the impression that young Pa was considered very charming and Ma was thought to be plain and didn't have her pick of marriageable men. I wonder about that, though, since it sounds like a biographer getting close to fiction there. I think of Little House on the Prairie (flu! dropping a log on Ma's ankle!), On the Banks of Plum Creek (Pa in a snowbank) and especially The Long Winter (asking the Wilders for food) to be the most harrowing reads through adult eyes. LTOTP and THGY are at least a little more about teenage Laura having fun, if you can forget the Brewsters.

I thought book Mr. Edwards was another mix of a couple different characters the Ingalls family came across over the years, a la book Nellie Oleson. I could be wrong, though. I thought the only true part of the story was his meeting the Ingalls in Kansas.

I thought RL Almanzo's hotness was a given...I"m not usually into looks, but damn. He and Laura were really a beautiful couple. Although Dean Butler was nice and doofy, of course.

Tom: So wait a minute, this Maris guy he kept mentioning...is a woman? Frasier: Well, um, the jury's still out on that one.

Ha, yep! Even both my favorites are right out of the pilot - as though the snark train and bongs started just a few episodes into the series.

Not my favorite season by any means, but I have a soft spot for "Momma Mia," 7x1. Hester's appearances throughout the show were always pretty touching to me, since my dad died several years ago, and I found the throwaway moments where she was mentioned pretty true to life when you've lost a loved parent. You're not thinking consciously about them a lot of the time, but then they just pop up. The last few minutes of that episode....sigh. Of course, I didn't consistently watch "Cheers," so the lack of continuity in Hester's overall character isn't much of an issue for me.

I have a couple - "4 Rms ocn vu," for one. "That is my plan." "There was a kangaroo in my living room." Still funny after all this time. Also, "It's My Party," where Jennifer acts like a valley girl to fit in. Steven and Elyse reading Jennifer's note, again, always cracks me up. "....like Stacy's ok. Stacy's ok?" "Maybe it's a dude ranch." All in the delivery.

I know we snark because we love, but this thread is for genuinely good moments, scenes, actors, and the like. To start off: like so many posters have mentioned, Karen Grassle is a great Ma. Too soft for the Little House series, yes, but it would be REALLY difficult to translate RL Ma's 19th century child rearing to 1970s TV with any warmth. Just too big a gap there. The first scene I think of is in the Pilot when Mr. Edwards brings Laura and Mary their Christmas gifts, and she beams at him. Aw. That scene, both in the book and TV show, was really boring to me as a kid, but as an adult it makes me teary. The Pilot: Like previous posters have mentioned, this has some great writing in it, including Laura's VO at leaving the big woods: "I knew there would be rivers to cross and hills to climb, and I was glad; for this is a fair land and I rejoiced that I would see it." The pilot gets as close as the show ever would to the real dangers of life in the 19th century - including not knowing what would happen next.