Lorelai Gilmore: The 10(+) Things I Hate About You

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, Melancholy said:

For other business fuck ups, Lorelai is lucky that none of the celebrity chefs that she treated like garbage got on their powerful social media and TV followings and humiliated the Dragonfly. Add Lorelai's general ignorance on the kitchen and flailing idiocy whenever Sookie couldn't/wouldn't work. 

This made me think of something that irritates me whenever I see the episode- in Season 5 when she's bored and lonely, she reorganizes Sookie's refrigerator.  She put the raw meat on a shelf ABOVE the raw vegetables.  This would get you shut down if an inspector saw it! Yet when Sookie tells her she shouldn't mess with the fridge, Lorelai says her way is better and instead of pointing out the error, Sookie says she prefers it messy (paraphrasing).  I really wish Sookie had said "Well, your way would get us shut down by the Health Department" or something, anything.

[racked]

1 hour ago, TwirlyGirly said:

Because, you know, making her parents miserably unhappy is the most important thing to Lorelai. Always.

Ha, thanks for the detailed explanation! I do remember that Lorelei quote now.  Ah, to have people throwing gobs of money at you, the injustice. 

[Viqutorious]

20k would have been a bargain for Chilton. My son was in a private school in Pittsburgh about the same time and tuition was 25k for a far less prestigious private school in a less affluent area. Chilton is based on the school Choate Rosemary and current tuition in 37k a year. I always assumed she had nothing left over after paying back her parents for 3 years of tuition. I was always bothered that they never discussed scholarships or financial aid. Schools like that have big bucks available for students who qualify.

11 hours ago, Melancholy said:

 Lorelai still had money left over from the 75k after paying her parents. She was going to spend that on Rory's tuition for Yale until Rory got the grandparents to pay for Yale. The math is fuzzy. I'd imagine Chilton had to be over 20k a year. That's not a lot of seed money to buy and thoroughly renovate an inn to start even if Sookie kicked in the same money. Rory wouldn't have had college paid for if she followed Lorelai's strategy to just pout and fume about any way of raising money. 

[TwirlyGirly]

6 hours ago, CheeseBurgh said:

I was always bothered that they never discussed scholarships or financial aid. Schools like that have big bucks available for students who qualify.

 When Lorelai received Rory's Chilton acceptance letter and learned the tuition was due immediately, the way Lorelai reacted was as if she thought "Wait a minute. You mean it costs MONEY to go to Chilton?"

Um...yes. All the financial information (tuition cost, payment due dates, financial aid, etc.) was in the packet sent to you by the school when you requested an application, Lorelai....

[Guest]

And then Lorelai seemed surprised that her charm wasn't enough for the admission's office.  

[nclpllm]

On 4/2/2017 at 4:17 PM, hippielamb said:

I thought it was because ASP herself is Jewish. I don't know why she didn't just write Lorelai and Co as culturally Jewish.

That's my thought too. If a culture is notoriously repressed and polite, but you specifically have no use for those traits, why bother?

I need some non-sugarcoated opinions on Lorelai; I think you all are the right people to talk to. I'm getting ready to write a fic- my version of Rory full circling at the end of TOS, except ending things at S5, with the back end altered to reduce contrivances (i.e. things with Logan never progressed beyond casual). My premise is Lorelai raises the kid so Rory can fulfill the big plans (she won't suck as a journalist). Another factor into Lorelai taking charge will be that she and Luke never got back together (unpopular and blasphemous, I know, but I like to be different), so she saw this as perhaps her last chance to raise another kid. The story takes place during the daughter's senior year of high school, and Rory decides it's time to stick around. 

So my big question is, if Lorelai did it all again, would she parent another kid the same way--as besties?

I'm thinking of a lot of things discussed here, about how her self-esteem is wrapped up in Rory. She wants to be the cool mom, the anti-Emily, doesn't even like pulling the mom card. But reading up on being friends with your kid, it's not the best idea. And this will not be mini-Rory. She'll have more of the head strong rebelliousness of Lorelai and Logan, and also push back from parental figures like normal teenagers. Lorelai had everything figured out and didn't want anyone else to have a say in her life when she was 17, how would she handle a kid who was the same way? I know she warned Luke of Jess being troubled, and told Chris he needed to tell Gigi no, and generally thought herself a beacon of parental expertise. But Lorelai didn't really need Jess and Gigi to like her the way she needed Rory to like her. Rory never got punished for anything. Lorelai might know in theory that some kids need boundaries (not her perfect Rory, of course), but would she actually stick to rules and consequences? Remember how much she hated when Rory shut her out (the Gilmore's greatest weapon). 

It's also been mentioned here how Lorelai, for all her complaining about the master manipulate Emily who wants to plan and control things, Lorelai has her own style of running the show. She definitely didn't want anyone else to have influence over Rory, and she managed relationships, came up with the Harvard plan (unless we're really supposed to believe 2 year olds have that goal). When Lorelai tells Dean that Rory 'has her own mind', it makes me laugh. She wanted to know all the details of Rory's life, while recoiling from Emily wanting to know anything about hers.  

How do you think all this would play out with a kid who is not docile and malleable, who doesn't want to share everything with Lorelai, or have all the same pop culture tastes, and is fully aware that Lorelai wants to be liked and perceived as cool??? 

Edited April 25, 2017 by nclpllm

[junienmomo]

2 hours ago, nclpllm said:

 

I'm thinking of a lot of things discussed here, about how her self-esteem is wrapped up in Rory. She wants to be the cool mom, the anti-Emily, doesn't even like pulling the mom card. But reading up on being friends with your kid, it's not the best idea. And this will not be mini-Rory. She'll have more of the head strong rebelliousness of Lorelai and Logan, and also push back from parental figures like normal teenagers. Lorelai had everything figured out and didn't want anyone else to have a say in her life when she was 17, how would she handle a kid who was the same way? I know she warned Luke of Jess being troubled, and told Chris he needed to tell Gigi no, and generally thought herself a beacon of parental expertise. But Lorelai didn't really need Jess and Gigi to like her the way she needed Rory to like her. Rory never got punished for anything. Lorelai might know in theory that some kids need boundaries (not her perfect Rory, of course), but would she actually stick to rules and consequences? Remember how much she hated when Rory shut her out (the Gilmore's greatest weapon). 

It's also been mentioned here how Lorelai, for all her complaining about the master manipulate Emily who wants to plan and control things, Lorelai has her own style of running the show. She definitely didn't want anyone else to have influence over Rory, and she managed relationships, came up with the Harvard plan (unless we're really supposed to believe 2 year olds have that goal). When Lorelai tells Dean that Rory 'has her own mind', it makes me laugh. She wanted to know all the details of Rory's life, while recoiling from Emily wanting to know anything about hers.  

How do you think all this would play out with a kid who is not docile and malleable, who doesn't want to share everything with Lorelai, or have all the same pop culture tastes, and is fully aware that Lorelai wants to be liked and perceived as cool??? 

Recalling the Emily-like behavior toward a rebellious Rory, and her sense of knowing that she's the only expert mother ever, I expect she will be rather like Emily trying to raise Jess. 

[JayInChicago]

To back track a little to ASP's Jewishness, I thought I remembered ASP being the child of a mixed marriage like me (well sort of--both my parents are children of mixed marriages). I could easily google but let me just assume I'm correct about ASP. :)

[Minu49]

As i continue to watch in repeats, it becomes glaringly obvious how ill behaved lorelai is in most social situations. At the b&b (rude to everyone not named rory), at the Harvard alumni dinner (she didn't even take a token gift for the hosts), Fran's funeral (the jumping at the end, both she and sookie were deplorable), at town meetings (childish behaviour), at Luke's (annoying other customers, using mobile phone despite his requests). Gosh,i could go on and on!!!! She really believes her own hype, doesn't she? All that cutesy begins to wear thin after à while! It's like no matter where she goes, she can't feign politeness for a few minutes.

[Kohola3]

I might add talking at funerals and concerts as well.  Just the person I loathe sitting near.

[shron17]

Don't forget the town meetings!  Although those were usually times I enjoyed Lorelai acting out.  I read a blog review not long ago that speculated Lorelai's personality was largely formed from being a hurt child who was trying to prove she was different and better than her parents.  It does make sense of her behavior in social situations, where Emily's voice was probably always telling her how she "should" behave, and even the times she went way over the top trying to prove her point (calling Pennilyn Lott her almost-mommy and her wildly inappropriate story at Richard's funeral come to mind).  The reviewer went on to say that Lorelai did Wild in the revival not because of her relationship with Luke but in an attempt to resolve her mixed feelings about her father, and that she finally grew up and found closure and healing with both of her parents when she called Emily.  I know it seems late to achieve maturity, but she's not the only person of that age to have yet to do it.  Better late than never.

[Minu49]

I haven't seen the revival, so cannot comment on that, but if she has matured, i would say good on her. During the original run, she never did outgrow her teenager persona and really just wanted to be the anti Emily at any cost! And it somehow appears that she may have low self esteem too. She always was eager to criticize everyone else's parties/events and had such a need to be seen as ultra cool.  Plus the over reliance on Rory for friendship and peership was detrimental to Rory in fact. As many others have pointed out, she never did play the mum card often enough. 

[junienmomo]

On 5/6/2017 at 5:38 PM, shron17 said:

The reviewer went on to say that Lorelai did Wild in the revival not because of her relationship with Luke but in an attempt to resolve her mixed feelings about her father, and that she finally grew up and found closure and healing with both of her parents when she called Emily. 

That opinion would have more strength if I could recall her actually discussing her father during the revival. My opinion is that it's much more the everyday 'industrial forklift' stuff. She spent the years of the original series using her scorched earth policy of 'I'll do what I want and still get what I want regardless of the cost to others (there are several notable exceptions; see the note at the end). 

Then the revival opens, she's had ten years of a stable relationship with Luke, Rory has had a good career, she even gets along with her parents, and then Inn is doing fine. What in the friggin' world does she have to be ängstig over? The Dragonfly has gotten a little harder and not as much fun since Sookie left, she only now thinks about babies, and Rory isn't asking for help, but is foundering. Her father dying seems to be more a plot point than the core of her questioning. 

Note: many things didn't go her way. The long separation from Rory, her panicked elopement demand, her relationship with her mother. But for the most part, she got what she wanted in the end.

[shron17]

8 hours ago, junienmomo said:

Then the revival opens, she's had ten years of a stable relationship with Luke, Rory has had a good career, she even gets along with her parents, and then Inn is doing fine. What in the friggin' world does she have to be angstig over?

She gets along with her parents?  It was pretty obvious that she hadn't been getting along with Emily at all since Richard's funeral, in fact, hadn't spoken with her since then.  The conversation with Luke re: kids was a direct result of retelling Rory about what happened with Emily.  After the funeral, Lorelai's relationship with her father was like the elephant in the room that she didn't want to discuss, or even think about.  How many therapy sessions did she sit through with Emily when she could have easily brought any of it up for discussion in a safe place but only offers Emily a blanket apology?  Except for the therapy she only contacted her mother when Rory pushed for it.  Another red flag was when the therapist asked why she hadn't married Luke and Lorelai replied she just didn't do things like her mother.  That made it pretty obvious her relationship with both of her parents still had a profound influence on her life.

[junienmomo]

2 hours ago, shron17 said:

She gets along with her parents?  It was pretty obvious that she hadn't been getting along with Emily at all since Richard's funeral, in fact, hadn't spoken with her since then.  The conversation with Luke re: kids was a direct result of retelling Rory about what happened with Emily.  After the funeral, Lorelai's relationship with her father was like the elephant in the room that she didn't want to discuss, or even think about.  How many therapy sessions did she sit through with Emily when she could have easily brought any of it up for discussion in a safe place but only offers Emily a blanket apology?  Except for the therapy she only contacted her mother when Rory pushed for it.  Another red flag was when the therapist asked why she hadn't married Luke and Lorelai replied she just didn't do things like her mother.  That made it pretty obvious her relationship with both of her parents still had a profound influence on her life.

The fact that we didn't hear about them being estranged during the ten year gap, plus that Luke felt comfortable enough to awkwardly hug Emily tells me that those ten years were nothing like Emily's deplorable behavior towards Lorelai after Richard's death. In contrast, regardless if Rory suggested it or not, Lorelai provided real comfort to Emily with her visit as Emily was emptying her house. 

The therapy was never about Richard. It was always about Emily's and Lorelai's relationship. Lorelai suggested grief counseling from an open heart and Emily manipulated her into coming too, then quit and blamed Lorelai for not changing because of the therapy. 

[shron17]

44 minutes ago, junienmomo said:

Lorelai suggested grief counseling from an open heart and Emily manipulated her into coming too, then quit and blamed Lorelai for not changing because of the therapy. 

That's what I thought at first too.  And yet, Emily wasn't wrong for being upset about what Lorelai said about Richard, especially at his funeral, a time where you put aside your differences and do everything you can to support each other.  Sure she was manipulated into therapy but would it have killed Lorelai to try to talk about some of their issues, maybe at least apologize again?  Her blanket apology was pretty worthless without any specifics.  It seems now like Lorelai refused to talk so she wouldn't have to admit to any fault in their relationship.  It's possible Emily really did want to try to improve their relationship and Lorelai more or less stonewalled her.

And the therapy was about Richard in the sense that Emily needed to know Lorelai loved and appreciated her father and being a part of the family.  Otherwise, Emily was grieving all by herself if she believed her only daughter could care less.

Edited May 8, 2017 by shron17

[junienmomo]

13 hours ago, shron17 said:

And yet, Emily wasn't wrong for being upset about what Lorelai said about Richard, especially at his funeral, a time where you put aside your differences and do everything you can to support each other.  Sure she was manipulated into therapy but would it have killed Lorelai to try to talk about some of their issues, maybe at least apologize again?  

It was an inappropriate story, but Lorelai had been asleep. Everybody close to the deceased tends to be irrationally upset over the smallest things, and Emily's freeze-out in that level, but Lorelai didn't deserve to be crucified for it. 

Would it have killed Emily to tell Lorelai why she wanted her there? Lorelai was honest when getting Emily to grief therapy in the first place. Emily is the mother, and even with parenting of adults, the actual parents should take a guiding role. Emily was Wedding Bell Blues-level manipulative here.

[shron17]

3 hours ago, junienmomo said:

It was an inappropriate story, but Lorelai had been asleep.

So?  That's a valid excuse for telling a story about Richard at his own funeral that implies he was neglectful parent?  I don't think either Richard or Emily deserved that kind of treatment from their only daughter.  My point was that a lot of Lorelai's behavior is directed at proving she was justified in leaving home when she did, and it really shows in that scene.  I'm glad Lorelai left home when she did, and feel it was somewhat justified.  But hurting your loved ones at a time like that over things that happened years ago is taking it too far.

4 hours ago, junienmomo said:

Emily is the mother, and even with parenting of adults, the actual parents should take a guiding role.

And as an adult, Lorelai should have had the compassion to realize her father's funeral was not the time to try to prove to everyone there she had a negative childhood.  Emily is always going to be manipulative.  If Lorelai sees that a problem she should have brought it up in therapy and talked about how it affects her instead of sitting there and saying nothing.

[Guest]

I've never woken up and had a burning desire to tell my parents' friends terrible stories about them or about my sex life.  I thought Lorelai was so inappropriate there.  Remaining quiet would have been hard, but not inexcusable. Her behavior was inexcusable in my opinion.

[Taryn74]

34 minutes ago, deaja said:

I've never woken up and had a burning desire to tell my parents' friends terrible stories about them or about my sex life. 

Little bit ashamed at how hard that made me laugh.

[Melancholy]

Emily wasn't Wedding Bell Blues level manipulative when it came to therapy. She was There's The Rub level manipulative. Big difference. 

I thought Emily was too harsh in the Winter flashback. She exacted her revenge by mercilessly giving Lorelai a verbal beat down in every area of her life. I also thought Lorelai was contemptible to dishonor her parents as she did and her own choice to get sloppy drunk wasn't an excuse. I also thought it really took some balls and heartlessness for Lorelai, on her first FND back, to dig and dig to mock Emily over getting the portrait dimensions wrong but hanging the painting anyway. And in her "apology", Lorelai continued dishonoring Richard with the " Never gave me a doll. Never took me to the park" grudge instead of acknowledging that Richard did give her good father-daughter anecdotes. They were both bad. 

Edited May 9, 2017 by Melancholy

[junienmomo]

Well, I'm going to stick with my apparent UO of Lorelai being more mature and caring in the Revival. I attribute her bad story to waking up and starting on a story that was going to end badly, but not having enough brain cells to correct the train wreck. And I don't blame any of Richard's intimates or relatives for drinking too much at his wake. Not Lorelai, not Emily. Taking as a model my excessively direct-speaking German family, I felt her painting comments were embarrassing but not out of the norm for such a person.

In the OS she was selfish and truly took every opportunity she could imagine to get revenge on her mother. Not so in the revival. I found her compassionate to Emily, which was inexplicable given that she was unutterably cruel. Emily had crossed my line many years before. I would have made my kid work her way through college before I'd take a blackmailed cent from that woman.

Lorelai didn't seem to know how to be happy in the revival. She'd gotten her desired future of successful daughter, successful inn and successful relationship, and wasn't unhappy, but didn't ask the question that she could not put into words: what do you do when you get want you want, but it's imperfect? Tough life question, but one many people have the good fortune to face. 

[FictionLover]

55 minutes ago, junienmomo said:

Well, I'm going to stick with my apparent UO of Lorelai being more mature and caring in the Revival. I attribute her bad story to waking up and starting on a story that was going to end badly, but not having enough brain cells to correct the train wreck. And I don't blame any of Richard's intimates or relatives for drinking too much at his wake. Not Lorelai, not Emily. Taking as a model my excessively direct-speaking German family, I felt her painting comments were embarrassing but not out of the norm for such a person.

In the OS she was selfish and truly took every opportunity she could imagine to get revenge on her mother. Not so in the revival. I found her compassionate to Emily, which was inexplicable given that she was unutterably cruel. Emily had crossed my line many years before. I would have made my kid work her way through college before I'd take a blackmailed cent from that woman.

Lorelai didn't seem to know how to be happy in the revival. She'd gotten her desired future of successful daughter, successful inn and successful relationship, and wasn't unhappy, but didn't ask the question that she could not put into words: what do you do when you get want you want, but it's imperfect? Tough life question, but one many people have the good fortune to face. 

What exactly do you think occurred to Lorelai that made her think clearly overlooking that vista? Maybe by giving her mom what she wanted with a nice story of her dad and she could let go of past resentments? Then she could admit she wants to marry Luke? The marriage part didn't ring true to me because of how badly she wanted to marry him in Season 6. It would have made more sense to me if she was afraid to jinx their relationship due to past engagement and their past and failed brief marriages.

[Melancholy]

I also thought Lorelai was more mature and kind in the Revival than the OS. She grew. A lot. Especially since she was at her lowest and least likable place in the last two seasons of the OS. But she did pull mean and selfish crap in the Revival too and that included dishonoring Richard at his funeral. But to continue the There's The Rub comparison, Lorelai showed growth in how she followed through with therapy even though she was tricked into it instead of making a big obnoxious show of taking Emily's spa weekend gift but figuring any way to spend no time with her mother on a mother-daughter trip. 

Lorelai told TWO embarrassing stories- the steamer trunk and the sex at the July 4th event. She didn't just start one embarrassing story and had to finish it. I will agree that Lorelai didn't exactly say the stories to hurt Emily. However, Lorelai has made a lifetime habit of thinking of her parents in terms of OTT comedic insults and she gets a kick out of saying it because it's a way of capturing attention for being so outrageous and she likes dwelling on how she's the heroine to her parents' villains. Lorelai was cranky from the drinking and being put on the spot so she reverted to her tactic of reaching for the funny to be a star and she went with resentful stories because she herself resented this Gilmorian forced homage to Richard. Even though I don't believe Lorelai was calculating how to hurt Emily as Emily accused, her actions were still mean and selfish and it was the result of decades of being so bent on her feelings of victimization that she doesn't have ideal parents that she couldn't appreciate how her parents did repeatedly come through for her. 

Edited May 10, 2017 by Melancholy

[Taryn74]

48 minutes ago, Melancholy said:

Even though I don't believe Lorelai was calculating how to hurt Emily as Emily accused, her actions were still mean and selfish and it was the result of decades of being so bent on her feelings of victimization that she doesn't have ideal parents that she couldn't appreciate how her parents did repeatedly come through for her. 

This.  So much this.

[JaggedLilPill]

It's always harder for me to sympathize with Emily when it comes to Emily V Lorelai. 

Don't get me wrong. I think Lorelai's remembering Richard moment at the funeral was 100% cringe-worthy, but if not for Kelly, I'd legitimately hate Emily. As it is, I think I would loathe having a mother like her. 

I think Kelly did her best to humanize Emily and make her more nuanced, but she has a harsh side to her. I'm not saying Lorelai didn't have a harsh side either and that she didn't contribute to their yo-yo-ing relationship, because she absolutely did, but even in the revival, Emily's still belittling LL's relationship and Lorelai by extension. "Roommates" "Booty buddies." 

Obviously I wanted LL to get married and deep down, Lorelai did want to be married to Luke, but say she honestly didn't. Say they were totally comfortable just being together. What would be so wrong with that? At some point, the excuse that Emily grew up in a time where people got married rings hollow and just makes her seem like a judgmental meddling manipulative shrew.  In those moments, I fail to see why I should feel bad for Emily when's she's consciously being demeaning. 

However, with that being said, I want to make it known that I'm not absolving Lorelai of all responsibility regarding her relationship with Emily nor am I denying that she hurt Emily in the OS and in the revival, but I also can't entirely begrudge Lorelai for how she felt about Emily and Richard as parents. What I can begrudge her for is not dealing with those feelings in a more productive way versus the way we saw most of the time in the OS with deflecting inappropriate humor, etc.

That is one of the reasons I was happy that they had Lorelai going to therapy. But well, we all know how that turned out. 

[junienmomo]

On 5/10/2017 at 5:26 PM, FictionLover said:

What exactly do you think occurred to Lorelai that made her think clearly overlooking that vista? Maybe by giving her mom what she wanted with a nice story of her dad and she could let go of past resentments? Then she could admit she wants to marry Luke? The marriage part didn't ring true to me because of how badly she wanted to marry him in Season 6. It would have made more sense to me if she was afraid to jinx their relationship due to past engagement and their past and failed brief marriages.

When a person is in deep self-reflection, which I think was intended by the trip, it's a struggle. For Lorelai I think she was cycling through all the questions she never answered for herself about why she kept fighting her parents or never was able to bring up marriage or not-marriage to Luke. 

If a person is lucky, they reach an epiphany about those things. Frequently that epiphany is simply 'this is what it is, and I'm spinning my wheels looking for the "right" answer when it simply doesn't exist.'

When she accepts that epiphany, it suddenly becomes easier to make decisions where she was stuck before. There was no angst about getting married; she just realized that's what she wanted right now. There was no angst about her Richard story; it was an honest, imperfect good moment that she didn't allow herself to appreciate until she was past her epiphany.

[perfectlover2012]

In the revival, Lorelai definitely matured and I had high hopes until I saw that after funeral scene. It was so cringeworthy and hard to watch because you just know that Emily is going to rip her to shreds. Most of the traits I dislike in Lorelai appear in Emily and Richard i.e. snobby, selfish, immature, and judgmental. I still really like the character because she's flawed but entertaining for the most part, the actress really saves her worst moments, and she has the other characters to keep her in check(not always of course). The worst moments for me are Fran's funeral, Sookie's baptism, and ruining Thanksgiving Dinner because she's oh so shocked that Rory applied to more than one university. Insert eye roll here mostly because I find it laughable that a. Rory didn't tell her this before dinner when she already experienced the Yale blow up and would want to avoid another fight b. Rory somehow had enough money to pay for all of those applications without telling her c. She didn't see Rory working on them at all and d. Chilton wouldn't inform her of that rule. I also agree with the posters who point out that Emily and Lorelai are both controlling. Lorelai has a more passive aggressive approach to maintaining control but they both demand things be done their way 24/7. I loathed the way she treated Logan simply because he came from money. There are worse things in the world. Rory didn't grow up rich and she was still a spoiled brat. Lorelai would also be a terrible stepmother. She didn't care where Gigi slept because Rory needed her room, she didn't want to move at all, and she wanted Chris to change everything about himself to fit in with her town. 

[Melancholy]

I think Lorelai's epiphany was that she has the raw materials that she needs in order to become happy and it's on her to form those raw materials into the finished product of her life instead of waiting for other people to assume what that finished product should look like and deliver it to her. It's hardly the independent Wonder Woman that she claims to be and even embodies to a certain extent. However, Lorelai did fall into a trap in the last two seasons of the OS of regressing- failing to appreciate what she has in life and expecting people in her life to bend themselves around what she wants, even she won't express what she wants. This was mostly the case with Luke, but there were instances where Lorelai did it to Rory, Chris, her parents, even Sookie/Michelle. Even though she was still resting on her independent, scrappy laurels from when she actually did build a good life for herself with determination and goodness. 

Luke is a very good guy and she has him. If she wants marriage with him, she has to go for that. She has an amazing daughter. She needs to figure out how to maintain her fantastic relationship with Rory even when Rory does something that bothers her. She has a great inn and she very enviably gets to be The Boss, but that means that it's on her to figure out how to keep the Dragonfly relevant and amazing for as long as she's running it. And she actually had loving, devoted parents. They weren't the parents that Lorelai would have chosen if she was out shopping at a mythical Parent Store. But she had enviable raw material of devotion and love from her parents- it was on her to figure out how to fashion it into a reasonable image of them as they died/aged.

It's different from Rory's boat where, at least on the parent front, Rory had to figure out how to live with the burden that Christopher didn't and doesn't care about her. I resented the hypocrisy of Lorelai acting like both of her parents were evil despots who tried to ruin her life but Chris should be babied and coddled for being a deadbeat dad, only to be reassured on her Parent's Day for Rory's senior year of college that he will be needed in Rory's adult life to parent. 

Edited May 16, 2017 by Melancholy

[ZuluQueenOfDwarves]

Yale's an extremely prestigious university. It's part of the Ivy League, just as Harvard is. The rivalry between the two has often been compared to the Oxford/Cambridge rivalry in England. It's also one of the highest rated drama schools in the world, and overall ranks only one or two spots behind Harvard in terms of American universities. 

Yale is considered to teach more theory, while Harvard is considered to teach more application. Honestly, of the two, Yale is more of a natural fit for Rory. Harvard was clearly Lorelai's choice (all the prestige of Yale, plus the added bonus of being their number one rival). Kind of moot, as neither university has a real life journalism program. 

This has gotten positive response so I'm going to leave it here, but I actually intended to put it as a response in the UO section. It's been reposted there. 

Edited May 16, 2017 by ZuluQueenOfDwarves

[ALittleShelfish]

On 9/22/2016 at 7:11 PM, Taryn74 said:

ITA.  It was a horrible thing to say, and even more horrible because it was a direct insult against at least three people she loves and admires.  :(

Taken one step further... does she love them because she loves them or does she love them BECAUSE they love HER? 

I just realized this quote is from 8 months ago and I should finish reading all of the thread before replying but my brain won't let go of my Lorelai angst until I get this thought out of my head.  Sorry to drag you into it lol

[junienmomo]

1 hour ago, ALittleShelfish said:

Taken one step further... does she love them because she loves them or does she love them BECAUSE they love HER? 

I just realized this quote is from 8 months ago and I should finish reading all of the thread before replying but my brain won't let go of my Lorelai angst until I get this thought out of my head.  Sorry to drag you into it lol

Well, Sookie is her best friend as long as the plot doesn't require someone else to be her best friend, so I lean towards she really loves her, in spite of having made that cruel not dated anyone comment in S1. For Babette and Miss Patty, it could go either way, but she demonstrated more affection than condescension toward Babette with Cinnamon's death.

[Melancholy]

Yes, Lorelai genuinely loved Sookie. I also think I can only count on one hand times where Lorelai was less than great to Sookie. (Just the S1 cruel comment about Sookie's love life, the S2 blow-up over Sookie being a bad business partner, and getting into Sookie's face over not actively championing Christopher and their marriage in S7. I also think Lorelai was too blasé about how deeply Jackson betrayed Sookie by falsely representing that he got a vasectomy but I get that it was an impossible situation because Jackson's betrayal stemmed directly out of Sookie's mistreatment of him and they were married with two young children so Sookie had many reasons to try to figure out how to forgive Jackson and get excited about this unplanned for baby.) Other than that, Lorelai was so admiring and kind and generous to Sookie. 

I think Lorelai liked Miss Patty and Babbette some for themselves. Most of it was definitely because they loved her SO MUCH and they were both of the vocal proponents of "Rory and Lorelai are the celebrities of our town!" But also, Lorelai really enjoyed Miss Patty's Broadway "theah-tuh" randy-old-lady big personality. That's exactly the kind of the personality that Lorelai would find simpatico because she's also "loud and weird." Babette didn't have quite that draw for Lorelai even though I think there were more Babette/Lorelai scenes because Babette was her neighbor. But I got genuine fondness from Lorelai to Babette too. 

[Smad]

Aside from the other myriad of problems I have with Christopher and L/C (this isn't a post about dissing either) whenever he is around Lorelai also turns into possibly the worst version of 'mother' Lorelai. Because her formative relationship with Christopher was pre-pregnancy and that's always the level they connect on later in life, she completely forgets that she is also the mother of a child with all the responsibilities that come with it. In the first Season she sleeps with him on the balcony of her parents home, not only with her parents in the house but Rory there as well. Either one one of them could have walked in them doing it. Can anyone imagine her doing that with anyone other than Chris? The same thing again at the end of S6, where it doesn't even occur to her that her sleeping with Chris could potentially mess up whatever fragile relationship Rory has with him. And then there is Gigi in S7 who she gives absolutely no thought to (the girl needs a room, ignoring her outright like during the x-mas episode) and what it could possibly do to Gigi should her relationship/marriage with Chris not be smooth sailing or outright fail.

 

Aside from all the other issues her Chris-fixation caused, I wish that Lorelai the mother who valued Rory over everything else had resolved the whole Chris thing years (if not decades) before she did. If for no other reason than her child's well being.

[Melancholy]

To add, Lorelai sleeps with Chris in S1 after Chris's grandparents insult Rory as a mistake and slut in the making. Lorelai bitches all the time about how Emily and Richard are horrible. I don't believe Lorelai ever expected Emily would look after Rory then. So Lorelai left her 16-year old daughter to stew in trauma in her grandparents' house who she was just starting to regularly see for hours while Lorelai left to her own moping and sex. 

Not as bad at the end of S2, but Lorelai and Chris promise Rory and Emily far too much by representing that they're going to settle down as a family after Chris just hooked up with Lorelai at Sookie's wedding. Even if Sherri wasn't pregnant, Chris was insane to start declaring that he'd been waiting to be a family with them and it was finally happening before they even had a non-sex date since they were teens. I guess Lorelai didn't directly promise Rory anything. She just used "Chris will be seeing his daughter" as a euphemism for Lorelai/Christopher romance which is dysfunctional enough. But since it wasn't discussed and Lorelai was already representing that she was seeing the hook-up as the beginning of being family, Chris promised Rory that this was the start of them being a full on family. Which was a set up for broken promises and pain even if Sherri wasn't pregnant. 

I also think Lorelai shouldn't have agreed to tell Rory about Sherri's pregnancy for Christopher. This was Chris's news and obligation to figure how to tell the news to Rory and figure how to preserve their limited and bourgeoning relationship. But Lorelai thinks about how to enable weak Christopher and how she wants control over spinning a bad situation before what Rory deserves from her father. 

Edited July 2, 2017 by Melancholy

[Smad]

As much as I harp on Lorelai's Christopher crutch as a hindrance to her romantic life in general by keeping him even subconsciously as a back-up plan in case she needs some loving/ego boost and that it stops her from entering the adult dating world, my biggest issue is actually that it makes her a worse mother (something I don't mention much). IMO her trying to always get Chris involved in Rory's life is more about reminding her safety net that she is still around and keeping herself in his orbit. Because quite frankly, Rory doesn't need Chris for anything. She pretty much grew up without a father and if Lorelai had cut her safety net years before, chances are Rory and Chris wouldn't even have weekly/monthly phone calls. But because Lorelai didn't do that, Chris also never let go of his fantasy of having Lorelai. Which is what created the many problems, let Chris come and go while wreaking havoc. Also Rory's relationship problems early in the show came from watching how Lorelai does it, she is after all the parent who is supposed to teach Rory about relationships. And she sees how Lorelai is with her father. Now we don't know how many times L/C came together before the show started but the fact that Rory knew right away in 'Christopher Returns' that Chris had asked Lorelai to marry him, it seems to indicate a pattern. If Lorelai hadn't kept Chris on a rope as a back-up (see how Rory handled Dean/Jess), Rory would have been spared both the disappointments (when her father didn't keep his word) and also the problems she would have with her father whenever L/C tried and crash and burned. Because Lorelai cutting that rope would have meant that the onus of a Rory/Chris relationship would be 100% on Chris due to Lorelai having no need to keep herself in Chris' orbit.

That, coupled with my earlier post about Lorelai changing into pre-pregnancy Lorelai in order to even be able to connect with Chris on any level, is why her Chris crutch made her a worse mother. And I hate that about L/C and more importantly Lorelai.

Edited July 2, 2017 by Smad

[jennyjams]

What got me was the episode where Luke's sister comes back on the scene. Lorelei comes into the diner on her phone, (despite the rule). She invites herself to sit by Kirk because it's so crowded (she's still on her phone and now disturbing his meal) and teases him with the girlfriend bit when he is clearly at least a bit uncomfortable with it.

Also, she insists on talking through any movie, play or concert she goes to and doesn't care or understand how this could bother people around her.

Putting the title of best friend on your 16-year-old child is also ridiculous. 

[Kohola3]

3 minutes ago, jennyjams said:

Also, she insists on talking through any movie, play or concert she goes to and doesn't care or understand how this could bother people around her.

And two funerals!

[Guest]

14 hours ago, jennyjams said:

What got me was the episode where Luke's sister comes back on the scene. Lorelei comes into the diner on her phone, (despite the rule). She invites herself to sit by Kirk because it's so crowded (she's still on her phone and now disturbing his meal) and teases him with the girlfriend bit when he is clearly at least a bit uncomfortable with it.

Also, she insists on talking through any movie, play or concert she goes to and doesn't care or understand how this could bother people around her.

Putting the title of best friend on your 16-year-old child is also ridiculous. 

 

14 hours ago, Kohola3 said:

And two funerals!

And a baby baptism.

[JayInChicago]

It's too bad that Max Medina's "you should think about someone other than yourself" (or similar) from season 1 didn't stick! ;)

[txhorns79]

Quote

Putting the title of best friend on your 16-year-old child is also ridiculous. 

In fairness, there wouldn't be a show without it!  That being said, I agree that we saw the problems that can occur when the boundaries between "mom" and "friend" are blurred. 

[forever]

Quote

It's always harder for me to sympathize with Emily when it comes to Emily V Lorelai. 

Me too! Emily is significantly meaner and far more deliberately calculating and manipulative than Lorelai. Lorelai is an adult - at least in terms of her chronological age, lol - so there's little excuse for why she continues to make the same types of terrible choices repeatedly, but they usually stem from too much impulsiveness and too little thought and consideration, not a desire to inflict pain.  I think of Lorelai and Rory as mostly decent people who have a lot of terrible qualities and some awful moments, while I'd assess Emily, who so often deliberately chooses to be downright vicious, in an even less flattering way than that. :) It's possible that I'm just weary of all the TV critics and social media people who hold up Emily as by far the "best" Gilmore while to me she's an even worse person overall.  That's just my view of them. I'm not saying Lorelai didn't earn this hate thread, just that in my opinion some other GG characters are at least equally deserving! Anyway, time to join the snark :)

I mentioned this one on the unpopular opinions thread: that moment when an embarrassingly drunk Lorelai hijacks Lane and Zach's wedding to somehow make it about her, turning what should have been a toast to Lane and Zack into a humiliating, narcissistic diatribe about her own private life in front of all of Lane and Zach's nearest and dearest.  I'm blushing just remembering that scene. The secondhand embarrassment is intense. I know she's done worse things, but that one has me cringing more than almost any other part of the original series. 

As I mentioned, I usually understand Lorelai's point of view more than Emily's when they clash, but Lorelai was so awful in Secrets and Loans when Emily was just trying to help her get the money she needed. And it's not like Lorelai doesn't readily accept money directly from her parents at other points in the series anyway. But I should probably just block out everything having to do with finances and class on this show since like so many have said they are depicted in ways that are so unrealistic, inconsistent and just a mess. 

I agree that Lorelai is so rude and infuriatingly irrational at her parents' house during A Deep Fried Korean Thanksgiving that I have to skip those scenes every single time I rewatch that episode. 

Sometimes at town meetings and events, Lorelai has this way of mocking the other Stars Hollow residents in a way that crosses from playful to mean. She seems to have this ambivalent relationship with the town, wanting to be involved and to be adored but also holding herself above and apart somehow, like she not very secretly believes she's better than most of these "friends" of hers. A lovely self-superiority that she got from her mother and seemed to hand down to her own offspring. :) 

I should hate the way Lorelai froze out Rory when she left Yale, but it feels so out of character that I can't even bother getting too annoyed at anyone except the writers for contriving to keep the Gilmores apart even if it meant they had to be somewhat out of character for that to happen. I feel like Lorelai would be pestering Rory and initially making Rory's issues more about herself than her daughter, but not ignoring her and shutting her out entirely. That's more how Luke and Rory deal with conflict, not Lorelai.  The one exception is how Lorelai eventually dealt with Emily, but even that didn't last long. It's more like Lorelai to tell Rory 24/7 exactly why she dislikes her choices than to stop talking to her altogether. 

I really hate when Lorelai uses her attractiveness and what I think is supposed to be adorable charm to flirt her way into getting special favors that no one else is entitled to. And the older she got, the more the cutesy flirtatious routine and relying on everyone to do things purely because she's cute and easy on the eyes started to seem a little embarrassing. 

It feels good to vent! This is the kind of show I love intensely but with reservations, and it's hard not to criticize individual aspects of it no matter how much I love it as a whole. 

Edited July 20, 2017 by forever

[Taryn74]

28 minutes ago, forever said:

I really hate when Lorelai uses her attractiveness and what I think is supposed to be adorable charm to flirt her way into getting special favors that no one else is entitled to. And the older she got, the more the cutesy flirtatious routine and relying on everyone to do things purely because she's cute and easy on the eyes started to seem a little embarrassing. 

OMG yes.  For me the worst was in the Revival when she was trying to flirt with the park ranger so she could go on the trail or whatever it was.  I was like, honey, please, stop.  Just, stop.  It was embarrassing to watch.

[shron17]

32 minutes ago, Taryn74 said:

For me the worst was in the Revival when she was trying to flirt with the park ranger so she could go on the trail or whatever it was.  I was like, honey, please, stop.  Just, stop.  It was embarrassing to watch.

I hated that scene so much--really didn't need to see a gratuitous and longer than necessary scene with Lauren and Peter Krause.

[MatildaMoody]

For me,  the one Lorelai moment that crystallized everything for me was the Wedding Bell Blues episode. The woman who made Rory pack a bag with extra clothing for their short trip to Yale with the grandparents, couldn't bother to tell Luke that he should bring his suit rather than wear in on the car ride? What really irked me about that was how flippant she and Rory were about the whole thing knowing exactly how Emily and Richard (who had already made their disapproval of Luke known) would treat Luke. She set him up to be alienated and the subject of Emily's snobbery from the beginning and she and Rory just thought it was funny that Luke didn't know to bring extra clothes to hang out with her snooty parents and their snooty friends. 

So, now here is Luke who already feels like an outsider, being blindsided by Christopher and Lorelai's confession that she had spent a night getting wasted with Chris because his dad died. Of course Luke was going to freak out when Chris plays the father card and tries to claim Rory and Lorelai as his family to which Luke is an interloper. It was horrible for Emily to set Luke up to be humiliated like that, but Lorelai enabled all of that behavior by leaving Luke to feel like an outsider from the very beginning. That stuck with me long after they got back together and got engaged.

I always thought that Luke deserved better than Lorelai. So much so that I actually agreed with TJ (of all people) when he said there is always drama with Lorelai and they were both better off not getting back together (this was after Richard's second heart attack and Luke was running errands for Emily). I mean Liz and TJ were horrible people, but they were at least perceptive about certain things, like how Liz was worried that Luke would end up alone like their dad. 

 

Anyway, as much as I loved the charm that Lauren Graham brought to the Lorelai character, Wedding Bell Blues, and her ultimatum/temper tantrum/marry me or we are done in a later season soured me on the character. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoyed the show long after both of those incidents, but both always made me roll my eyes at how awful Lorelai could be when it came to people who weren't named Lorelai Gilmore. 

 

ETA: I also hated the way Lorelai and Sookie treated Michel after his dog died. It made no sense after all of the support and comfort they provided to Babbette in Cinnamon's Wake.

Edited August 14, 2017 by MatildaMoody

[junienmomo]

8 hours ago, MatildaMoody said:

So, now here is Luke who already feels like an outsider, being blindsided by Christopher and Lorelai's confession that she had spent a night getting wasted with Chris because his dad died. Of course Luke was going to freak out when Chris plays the father card and tries to claim Rory and Lorelai as his family to which Luke is an interloper. It was horrible for Emily to set Luke up to be humiliated like that, but Lorelai enabled all of that behavior by leaving Luke to feel like an outsider from the very beginning. That stuck with me long after they got back together and got engaged.

Much later it struck me that Lorelai was quite serious when, in her Doose's "take me back" plea, she claimed she could be a good girlfriend.  I believe that she recognized that she'd been a bad girlfriend, and ASP intended this. There were so many episodes in early S5 that had me thinking "That is not the way an adult who wants to be in a relationship would behave."

[Chadya07]

Sooo.... reading this thread clarifies the feelings I have about these fake people on a tv show. I cannot stand most people on this show honestly and sometimes as I am watching it I feel like I am punishing myself because it’s just ridiculous. But I can’t seem to look away. 

Lorelai is my least favorite because she treats everyone like crap and does not mother her child. Honestly though I may hate her because she reminds me of myself in some ways. I also ran away from home at 16 and like Lorelai it caused me to be completely stunted to that age for pretty much the rest of my life. I cant seem to grow up. Because of that the world seems to revolve around me cause that’s immaturity. And she’s super immature. So am I. I though can see it and she can’t seem to at all. She thinks she’s the best person in the world.  

Shes also my mom. Using her daughter as a confidante and sounding board which I can tell you is extremely stressful and often leads to some extreme acting out as the child feels unheard and like they are not cared for. They often say they are best friends but I think Rory is hers but she doesn’t often act like Rory’s. Her problems get swept under the rug quite often in favor of Lauralais almost endless dramas. An example is when they had the car accident and laurelai kept shouting my daughter my daughter my daughter  and wouldn’t even listen to Rory. In fact she rarely hears Rory’s wants or needs like when she freaked out about gpa bringing her to Yale (which laurelai seriously needed to shut up about) Good thing she has Lane. So Rory is also me. These ladies are all my character flaws ina  tv show. Which is why I get so irritated and depressed while I watch it. 

Im only on season three and I don’t know how much longer I can watch them relive my life but with more privilege and things magically working out and stuff.  

Also I really like curmudgeon Luke and Jess. And the genesis of Paris and Rory’s friendship. I like the grumpiest people. 

Edited January 12, 2018 by Chadya07

[stan4]

On 1/18/2017 at 8:53 AM, Taryn74 said:

 

 

What an interesting observation!  It never would have occurred to ME to take a hostess gift when being invited to dinner at someone's house, but that's kinda the point LOL.  I'm certainly not familiar with the customs of "that world" and neither was Rory.  Lorelai would have been if she had paid more attention as a young teen, rather than just rebelling against everything her parents stood for.  Interesting.

I don't know about it really being of "that" world.

In MY world, you don't go to someone's home, ESPECIALLY THE FIRST TIME, without a host/hostess gift.  And I ain't no Huntzberger.

 

What's funny is how after Rory left to live with her grandparents, she really did get an education on how to run the social events, etc.

Edited January 28, 2018 by stan4

[stan4]

On 3/27/2017 at 3:24 PM, deaja said:

 

Back to Gigi though, Lorelai could have made her point much more effectively if she had spared Chris her complete hyperbole. Gigi acted like a spoiled three year old. Lorelai described her as practically Rosemary's Baby.

To be fair, my son was 3, my daughter IS 3, I've spent a lot of time recently around kids who are 3, and I've never seen a single one of them (many of whom are ridiculously spoiled just given the area I live in) act like GG did in that episode.  She was pure insanity.

[stan4]

On 1/18/2017 at 12:30 PM, Eyes High said:

Very good point. However, your point highlights the weirdness of Shira informing Logan in front of Rory that she was unsuitable. Someone as versed in proper manners and etiquette as Shira would have known that, as you said, the proper thing to do is to voice concerns privately if at all, and certainly not in front of Rory herself on a social occasion. Good manners are as important as proper etiquette when it comes to proper social behaviour, and manners are all about making others feel at ease and comfortable in one's presence, a simple rule Shira flagrantly violated.

Moreover, if Shira were really up on her game, she wouldn't say anything at all to Logan or to Rory about Rory's suitability but politely ease Rory out of Logan's life,

Yeah, but remember...SHE didn't bring it up.  The grandfather did.  She ran off to smoke from the stress and really her only contribution to the conversation was to explain *why* the grandfather was being so hostile (and she was trying to frame it nicely).