I am really loving this season, I can't stop watching it....it's more emotion packed than normal, lots more Lorelai and Luke and Rory's imploding personality are keeping me hooked
The way Rory said "WHAT??" the minute Lorelai told her she bought a dog.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2018-01-06T19:56:16Z
[8.8/10] Whatever your other feelings about this episode,you have to give Gilmore Girls this -- it may have topped Parks and Recreation in the category of “Best Use of Madeleine Albright in a T.V. Show” which is no small feat. The recreation of the famous 4 A.M. birthday wake up call, with our former Secretary of State, gives us a slanted version of one of the show’s touchstones, in a way that shows the shadow of that broken connection is weighing on Rory’s mind while giving it an appropriately dream-like twist.
That’s the throughline for this episode. As in some prior Amy Sherman-Palladino-penned eps, this one doesn’t so much have an A-story and a B-story or so on, as it has a theme that everyone is ruminating on and orbiting around at once. Rory’s birthday is coming up, and that means different things to pretty much everyone in Rory’s life, including the birthday girl herself. The way each of them handles that is revealing of the characters, and features more great writing from ASP.
One of the benefits of having the boss writing the script is that the dialogue just pops. There’s absolutely cutting Emily lines like “Horrid people, why don’t they just show up the night before with a sleeping bag.” There’s funny character moments like Paris and Doyle’s well-rehearsed “I was sleeping with the editor” “Now I am!” bit. And there’s interactions like a meeting between Logan and Zach, or stately ladies laughing when Luke asks what the DAR is that are pitch perfect.
But often what strikes me about these signature episodes is how great the performances are even when there’s little-to-no dialogue. I think I’ve come to take Lauren Graham for granted on this show. She is so effortlessly good so much of the time, and so much a focus, that it’s easy to forget how talented she is and how much she carries the show. Both she and Kelly Bishop have the ability to vacillate seamlessly between flawless comedy and forceful but not overdone emotional moments. The look of touched joy on Lorelai’s face when she realizes that Rory called upset because she hadn’t RSVP’d to the birthday party, and the look of quiet pain on her face when she sees Rory’s birthday, and with it, Rory’s life, moving on without her, are each outstanding scenes that show of Graham’s incredible chops.
But everyone is on fire here (not literally, no need to worry Sookie). I appreciate that for the elder Gilmores, the initial concern about the big 2-1 is the prospect that Rory might be having sex. There’s ways in which Richard and Emily are very quaint and of their time, and this is one of them. It comes off pretty adorable if backward, with the invitation to the reverend and his speech about virtue vs. sweaters, Emily’s trying to hogtie Rory out of the poolhouse, and Richard ranting that he bought her a “sex house” “sex mattress” and “sex box springs. Hell, even Emily referring to Lane as “Rory’s Asian friend” is one of those small but significant details that shows how quietly backward the elder Gilmores can be, and that’s on full display here.
In the same vein, I enjoy how torn up Richard is about all this, how much he’s finally realized the depth of this issue, but in a way that’s still utterly patronizing to all involved. There’s something so true to the elder Gilmores’ “throw money at the problem” philosophy to Richard’s plan of either leveraging Rory’s trust fund to get to her to go back to Yale, or trying to bribe her with a car or townhouse. Lorelai is right to be steamed that only now does Richard accept that this is an issue and want to change course after he already facilitated this course, and she’s right that this sort of bribery would never work on someone like Rory.
But things only get better and more serious when Richard, Emily, and Lorelai more or less have it out in Richard’s office at the party. On the Lorelai front, there’s that moment of vindication for the audience where Richard says that everything went wrong when they went against her. (And I appreciate the added shading that prior moment gets with Emily noting it was Richard’s idea, which helps explicate things a bit.) But on the other hand, their conversation makes explicit the subtext of all this sex talk -- that they’re afraid about Rory being sexually active because they’re afraid it means she’ll turn out like Lorelai, and only then will they have “lost her.” It’s what Emily’s most worried about, and it drives her daughter away.
Then Richard makes it even worse, because while he seems to be somewhat worried Rory will turn out like her mother now that she’s sleeping with boys, he’s just as worried that she’ll turn out like Emily, however much he may try to back water from that. You can see the hurt and anger in Emily’s eyes when he calls planning parties and organizing social functions, which are her contributions to their lives, “meaningless” and “frivolous.” Richard is beside himself, feeling like he’s lost the granddaughter who’s the apple of his eye, but in his frustration and stupor, he may also lose his wife and his daughter, and that’s the sort of interwoven emotional threads that I appreciate when Sherman-Palladino is behind the pen.
And that doesn’t even touch on the outstanding Lorelai/Rory stuff here. The episode gets the longing, the regret, the wistfulness, and the awkwardness between them just right. There’s so much tradition and meaning wrapped up in Rory’s birthday for both of them, and the two simple shots of each awake, noticing the other’s absence at 4:03 A.M. on the big day, tells us all we need to know about how hard that is.
There’s also great scenes of each one’s beau trying to comfort them. The big Atlantic City plan is something Lorelai and Rory both feel loathe to be missing out on, and Logan and Luke each try their best to comfort them despite it. The way that each Gilmore Girl expresses the same sense of loss in the same way shows how close the two really are, even when they’re this far apart. It adds a layer of melancholy to every moment when they’re interacting with or considering the other, and the way that their initial slight thawing at the party leads to Rory being pulled away by her new life is softly devastating.
But then there’s Luke, who’s not nearly as showy as the other major characters in the show, but just as effective. He doesn’t make much out of giving Rory his mother’s necklace (pearls, appropriately), but it’s clear that the gesture means a lot to him. The same goes for him acquiescing to Lorelai’s mad scientist Halloween plan, something he’s very much against, but willing to do when he knows the woman he loves is in a bad place and needs it. He’s a good guy, and in an episode where Richard show’s the pitfalls of good intentions and poor understanding, Luke shows the benefits of acceptance, support, and love.
It’s a hell of an episode, and hopefully a sign that Season 6’s needle is pointing north once again.
(As a side note, I wish we had gotten more from Emily realizing that Lorelai is engaged and didn’t tell them. That was a big deal the last time it happened, and I was hoping we’d get more of an echo of that, or some aspect of Emily processing it, beyond just their quick exchange here. Also, I haven’t really had the opportunity to mention it elsewhere, but I’m pretty tired of the antics around Paul Anka the dog.)