[7.2/10] Look, if you’re going to bring a long lost daughter and babymama out of the woodwork, you could do a lot worse than Sherilyn Fenn. She’s a talented actress, she and Scott Patterson have a good dynamic together, and she fits into this world well.
She does, however, make me suspect that somewhere out there, Max had a baby with Lara Flynn Boyle, because apparently anytime Lorelai loves someone, he ends up having knocked up one of the ladies from Twin Peaks. Also, Jess’s father figures have suspiciously similar tastes in women.
That silliness aside, I still have major issues with the choice to embark on this storyline, but I appreciate a decent amount how the show goes about it here, at least when it comes to Luke’s interactions with Anna. There’s the sense that Chris’s effort to make good for his years of absentee dad-ism for Rory inspired Luke a bit to do the same, and I appreciate that sort emotional traffic, where events in one part of the show affect those in another part, almost through osmosis.
And I appreciate both Luke and Anna’s behavior here. Luke is the kind of guy we’d expect him to be here. He tells Anna that he doesn’t want to intrude on the lives that she and April have built for themselves, but that he wants to contribute however he can. And then, after he sees this amazing little life that his offspring has led in his absence, he wants to be a part of it, in however small a way he can. He feels a responsibility, both morally but also more spiritually, to this little girl who has his nose. As much as Luke’s behavior in some of this storyline doesn’t feel true to the character, that absolutely does.
“The Perfect Dress” also goes a long way toward helping explain how this could happen, You still have to handwave a decent amount of what we know about Rachel’s past with Luke, but the notion of the Luke of 13 years ago hating kids, and Anna not wanting to involve him considering they’d already broken up, makes a good amount of sense. It’s a little convenient that they never wanted for anything or even considered letting him know, but it’s at least a plausible story as to how all of this went down. And Anna herself is perfectly reasonable, telling Luke that he doesn’t owe them anything but is welcome to contribute if he likes, and welcoming his desire to have contract with his daughter so long as April herself is okay with it.
The only thing that doesn’t make sense about it is how Luke still hasn’t said word one to Lorelai about it. Again, I get what the show is going for here, with things going so well in Lorelai’s life, with Rory’s return and the wedding planning finally getting on track. But this is so big. It’s not like Luke, the honorable guy we all know, to keep something like this under his hat for this long and with so many opportunities to say something. And it’s a particularly big deal when he’s made offers to help financially support Anna and April which directly affects Lorelai.
I’m also not especially on board with the notion that Lorelai has some sixth sense for the fact that something’s amiss. You can just write it off as Lorelai’s usual neurosis, but it comes off as though the show’s positing that she can just psychically intuit that something will go wrong with all this wedding stuff because things are too perfect. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had that same sense at times, and hey, the palling around between Lorelai and Sookie is light and enjoyable (if a bit sexist at times), but every time the show uses the wedding stuff to suggest Lorelai has some preternatural sense for a problem, or as an excuse to draw out Luke not sharing this important news with his fiancee, it makes me cringe and groan.
I did (mostly) enjoy the Rory stuff here. I’m slowly reverting to my distaste for Logan, with his semi-stalker behavior. Rory herself is not exactly ready to just have a direct conversation about what’s bothering her, but at the same time she has reason to be upset and could totally need some cool down time before addressing the problem. Logan bursting out with the “I love you” at the end there is a good beat, because to Lorelai’s point, I believe him and his story, but it’s also the exact wrong time and wrong way to say it, and the way it flusters and disrupts Rory leads to the funny scene with the Yale psychologist that results in tears and tissues and an endless stream of babble from poor Rory that makes her sound like a crazy person.
The side stuff in this one is good too. Paris as the hard-nose editor of the Yale Daily News is a comic treat as usual. And Mrs. Kim dealing with her daughters’ grumpiness (that makes Lane seem very much like a proto-Mrs. Kim herself), but drinking liquor with her and saying “you’ve mourned your grief and now we move on” is an outstanding moment that reaffirms Mrs. Kim as one of my unexpectedly favorite characters on the series. She is hardnosed herself, but ultimately cares about her daughter, and watching her melt, just a little bit, and accede to her daughter’s way of things, is heartening as all get out.
Overall, there’s still a fundamental problem with the whole April thing that threatens to torpedo a major portion of the show, but until that torpedo explodes, I’m still enjoying the ride.
(Also, Lorelai’s wedding dress was ugly. It had to be said!)
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParent2018-01-07T20:43:30Z
[7.2/10] Look, if you’re going to bring a long lost daughter and babymama out of the woodwork, you could do a lot worse than Sherilyn Fenn. She’s a talented actress, she and Scott Patterson have a good dynamic together, and she fits into this world well.
She does, however, make me suspect that somewhere out there, Max had a baby with Lara Flynn Boyle, because apparently anytime Lorelai loves someone, he ends up having knocked up one of the ladies from Twin Peaks. Also, Jess’s father figures have suspiciously similar tastes in women.
That silliness aside, I still have major issues with the choice to embark on this storyline, but I appreciate a decent amount how the show goes about it here, at least when it comes to Luke’s interactions with Anna. There’s the sense that Chris’s effort to make good for his years of absentee dad-ism for Rory inspired Luke a bit to do the same, and I appreciate that sort emotional traffic, where events in one part of the show affect those in another part, almost through osmosis.
And I appreciate both Luke and Anna’s behavior here. Luke is the kind of guy we’d expect him to be here. He tells Anna that he doesn’t want to intrude on the lives that she and April have built for themselves, but that he wants to contribute however he can. And then, after he sees this amazing little life that his offspring has led in his absence, he wants to be a part of it, in however small a way he can. He feels a responsibility, both morally but also more spiritually, to this little girl who has his nose. As much as Luke’s behavior in some of this storyline doesn’t feel true to the character, that absolutely does.
“The Perfect Dress” also goes a long way toward helping explain how this could happen, You still have to handwave a decent amount of what we know about Rachel’s past with Luke, but the notion of the Luke of 13 years ago hating kids, and Anna not wanting to involve him considering they’d already broken up, makes a good amount of sense. It’s a little convenient that they never wanted for anything or even considered letting him know, but it’s at least a plausible story as to how all of this went down. And Anna herself is perfectly reasonable, telling Luke that he doesn’t owe them anything but is welcome to contribute if he likes, and welcoming his desire to have contract with his daughter so long as April herself is okay with it.
The only thing that doesn’t make sense about it is how Luke still hasn’t said word one to Lorelai about it. Again, I get what the show is going for here, with things going so well in Lorelai’s life, with Rory’s return and the wedding planning finally getting on track. But this is so big. It’s not like Luke, the honorable guy we all know, to keep something like this under his hat for this long and with so many opportunities to say something. And it’s a particularly big deal when he’s made offers to help financially support Anna and April which directly affects Lorelai.
I’m also not especially on board with the notion that Lorelai has some sixth sense for the fact that something’s amiss. You can just write it off as Lorelai’s usual neurosis, but it comes off as though the show’s positing that she can just psychically intuit that something will go wrong with all this wedding stuff because things are too perfect. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had that same sense at times, and hey, the palling around between Lorelai and Sookie is light and enjoyable (if a bit sexist at times), but every time the show uses the wedding stuff to suggest Lorelai has some preternatural sense for a problem, or as an excuse to draw out Luke not sharing this important news with his fiancee, it makes me cringe and groan.
I did (mostly) enjoy the Rory stuff here. I’m slowly reverting to my distaste for Logan, with his semi-stalker behavior. Rory herself is not exactly ready to just have a direct conversation about what’s bothering her, but at the same time she has reason to be upset and could totally need some cool down time before addressing the problem. Logan bursting out with the “I love you” at the end there is a good beat, because to Lorelai’s point, I believe him and his story, but it’s also the exact wrong time and wrong way to say it, and the way it flusters and disrupts Rory leads to the funny scene with the Yale psychologist that results in tears and tissues and an endless stream of babble from poor Rory that makes her sound like a crazy person.
The side stuff in this one is good too. Paris as the hard-nose editor of the Yale Daily News is a comic treat as usual. And Mrs. Kim dealing with her daughters’ grumpiness (that makes Lane seem very much like a proto-Mrs. Kim herself), but drinking liquor with her and saying “you’ve mourned your grief and now we move on” is an outstanding moment that reaffirms Mrs. Kim as one of my unexpectedly favorite characters on the series. She is hardnosed herself, but ultimately cares about her daughter, and watching her melt, just a little bit, and accede to her daughter’s way of things, is heartening as all get out.
Overall, there’s still a fundamental problem with the whole April thing that threatens to torpedo a major portion of the show, but until that torpedo explodes, I’m still enjoying the ride.
(Also, Lorelai’s wedding dress was ugly. It had to be said!)