[7.5/10] A lot to enjoy in this one. I appreciate the parallelism of Rory having her first bad date (though the show has to retcon that a bit) at the same time Luke and Lorelai are having their not-date.
It gives us an interesting chance to see Rory in an unfamiliar situation, having to navigate the actual dating world rather than just having flippy-haired boys drift into her life. The fact that she has to awkwardly navigate the asking-out process, make bad small talk, and live to survive the process is a nice look for her. I especially like that when presented with Lorelai’s “you have to hunt a lot” philosophy and Luke’s “you go with your gut” perspective, she tries each way and comes up empty on both. Her attempt to ask out the laundry guy is a neat affirmation of her little journey here, and I like that it doesn’t work out, but gently so. There’s a true-to-life, or at least approximation of it, quality here, that works.
And hey, I actually like the Luke-Lorelai business here. There’s some nice dramatic irony about them complaining about dating when, whether they know it or not, they’re very much on a date at that moment. The way they describe things they want without realizing they have it in one another is nice, and their back-and-forth repartee over Casablanca is as cute as always.
I also enjoyed the other main story, about Lorelai trying to distance herself from her mother so much that she doesn’t even want to use her decorator despite really liking her. It’s an interesting fault line between mother and daughter, and their conversation on the phone about not being able to talk to this person or that person, and the way the designer is caught in the middle, is quite interesting and amusing.
The town nonsense isn’t all that great here, with Babette’s bulbs and Lane’s emergency pizza run, and roommate standoffs, but the bread and butter of the episode is quite good.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParent2017-10-25T03:18:39Z
[7.5/10] A lot to enjoy in this one. I appreciate the parallelism of Rory having her first bad date (though the show has to retcon that a bit) at the same time Luke and Lorelai are having their not-date.
It gives us an interesting chance to see Rory in an unfamiliar situation, having to navigate the actual dating world rather than just having flippy-haired boys drift into her life. The fact that she has to awkwardly navigate the asking-out process, make bad small talk, and live to survive the process is a nice look for her. I especially like that when presented with Lorelai’s “you have to hunt a lot” philosophy and Luke’s “you go with your gut” perspective, she tries each way and comes up empty on both. Her attempt to ask out the laundry guy is a neat affirmation of her little journey here, and I like that it doesn’t work out, but gently so. There’s a true-to-life, or at least approximation of it, quality here, that works.
And hey, I actually like the Luke-Lorelai business here. There’s some nice dramatic irony about them complaining about dating when, whether they know it or not, they’re very much on a date at that moment. The way they describe things they want without realizing they have it in one another is nice, and their back-and-forth repartee over Casablanca is as cute as always.
I also enjoyed the other main story, about Lorelai trying to distance herself from her mother so much that she doesn’t even want to use her decorator despite really liking her. It’s an interesting fault line between mother and daughter, and their conversation on the phone about not being able to talk to this person or that person, and the way the designer is caught in the middle, is quite interesting and amusing.
The town nonsense isn’t all that great here, with Babette’s bulbs and Lane’s emergency pizza run, and roommate standoffs, but the bread and butter of the episode is quite good.