We're Back! And So Is Bonkers Stars Hollow Chit-Chat. We Missed It So Much

We watch Episode 132: "The Long Morrow"

Hi there! Before we dive in to SEASON 7 (so long, Palladinos!!!! SEE YA) we just want to say a quick hello to all of our new subscribers, and a thank you to all of you who have been reading us for literal years. We cannot believe we are in the final season of this beloved and problematic show. As always, our episode recaps will be free, but you can show your support for our work (largely a labor of love) by becoming a paid subscriber.

And if you’re looking for more ways to support us and/or broadcast your love for our critical analysis of nominally feminist early-oughts pop culture, please watch this space, as in the next few weeks we will be rolling out the first official GILMORE WOMEN MERCH store. This is as exciting as it sounds. We promise. STAY TUNED.

Also: If you just can’t get enough pop culture analysis with a feminist bent and nostalgic flair, Megan just launched a new newsletter combining her reproductive health policy reporting (yikes!) with pop culture commentary (yay!) — if you sign up for any paid tier here, you’ll get access to her five-part essay series, She Was an American Gurl, which covers And Just Like That, Britney Spears’ memoir, Yellowjackets, the Bachelor Franchise, and the Y2K anticapitalism of Josie and the Pussycats. In the words of Julia Fox, it is a masterpiece if she does say so herself. A lot of you have already joined up, and Burbank Industries thanks you for your continued support.

Without further ado, Season 7. Unto the breach!

xoxo

Maggie and Megan

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Welcome to Gilmore Women: Two journalists discuss everything that’s wrong with every episode of Gilmore Girls & why we still love it

We stand in awe of Melissa McCarthy’s upper body strength.

Previously, on Gilmore Girls…

Megan: Get ready for a terrible time!

Maggie: Woohoo!

The recap shows Rory asking Mitchum why he is taking Logan away from her?

Maggie: “Taking him away from me?” Please.

Megan: Her whole personality is having a boyfriend!

Maggie: She was gonna dump him and then he jumped off of a cliff.

The recap continues…with Lorelai showing up at Christopher’s door after Luke won’t immediately elope with her. “I just don’t want to be alone.”

Maggie: Honestly go to Sookie's house! You don't want to be alone? Go to Sookie's house. You don't have to go sleep with your idiot ex.

Megan: All valid points.

The episode begins with Rory waking up in her/Logan’s apartment. She is clearly disheveled, as is the apartment, because of the rager going away party she threw him the night before. She crawls out of bed and finds a giant box with a bow.

Maggie: Remember how Logan paid for Rory's rent for a year? Like she's his freaking mistress?? This is not where Rory Gilmore should live in her senior year in college.

Rory opens the box.

Megan: It's a rocket.

Maggie: It's the rocket!

Cut to Christopher’s bedroom where Lorelai is trying to sneak out of bed and convince Christopher to go back to sleep. She is clearly uncomfortable.

Megan: Meanwhile.... making bad decisions. Ew!

Lorelai says she has to get home to Paul Anka. Christopher tries to talk her out of it. And Lorelai firmly tells him "No." And leaves. After she closes the door behind her, she grimaces.

Maggie: Okay, she's obviously regretting it already, so why do they get together????

Megan: It's really confusing. That's like not the face you make when you're like, well now I need to marry this person.

The credits roll. Reminding us of the good old seasons.

Maggie: Ugh. Bring back old Rory!

Megan: I miss this era of the show. We're really at the low point. I don't like Richard's mustache. I just want to get that on record.

When Lorelai returns home, Babette jumps up from her couch, surprised. She tells Lorelai that she's not a sleepwalker, and that she came over to feed Paul Anka when she heard him yodeling, and that she started a load of intimates in her washer and generally gives a good old-fashioned rambling Babette monologue. At the end she says she knows about the fight and that Luke hasn't called. She says she heard because a woman with a huge mouth was seeing how many devil dogs she could fit in it behind Doose's market and someone involved overheard Luke and Lorelai fighting.... it gets weird!

Megan: This is so deranged.

Maggie: It is. But I also think this is why this season is kind of good, is that they just let the townspeople be weird again, they just let them talk.

Megan: It's very goofy.

Lorelai tells Babette she really needs to get going. Babette says: "Oh I'm just waitin for my panties to dry." After a beat, she looks at Lorelai and says. "Oh, I'll just pick them up later! And don't worry, sweetheart. He'll call. They always do."

Megan: Yeah. Okay. See, that is what I like about this season.

Rory walks into the Yale newsroom wearing a white strappy dress, where Paris is apparently launching an SAT prep course. She is interviewing potential clients, a mother and daughter, in true Paris fashion. She's trying to convince the mother that her daughter will work at Dunkin’ Donuts if she doesn't get help from her. "She's either lazy or stupid," is a thing she actually says.

Megan: I always wear my backless dress to the newsroom...

Maggie: And look at Paris's outfit. A brown sweater vest over a polka dot blouse with puffy sleeves?

Megan: I like Rory's dress, but it's just like not how I would dress to go to the newsroom. First of all, you'd get cold.

Paris assumes Rory is going to be mad that she's using the offices, but she tells Paris she’s just there to "back up her files" again. Rory is only there because she is clearly bored and doesn’t know what else to do now that Logan has left.

Maggie: Oh, you have nothing to do because you have nothing else in your life?!

Megan: Whose fault is that?

Paris tells Rory some hard truths, namely that Logan and Rory didn't agree to any specifics during this time about whether they were together or not, or seeing other people, or even make plans for when they would see each other, which is not a great start to long-distance. "Logan is not that bright. You need to spell it out for him. He's got to know where the red lines are, or he's gonna leap right over them and into bed with multiple British floozies."

Megan: Paris has a point!

Lorelai leaves her house and Luke is there. He wants to talk. She says she doesn't have time and that there's "nothing left to say."

Maggie: Is she wearing a navy blue shirt and a black skirt?

Megan: I was just having the same observation.

Lorelai says again that there's nothing left to discuss.

Maggie: Yeah, because you slept with Christopher!!! OK. Maybe it's a denim skirt?

Megan: Yeah, I'm confused by her whole outfit.

Maggie: I'm still not over that Luke never would have said no in that scenario when she gives him the ultimatum! It's just terrible.

Cut to the Dragonfly, where Michel and Sookie are arm wrestling in the kitchen. Sookie is letting Michel win, and then comes back to easily beat him as Lorelai walks in. Sookie sings Queen's "We are the Champions" at him, and begins telling Lorelai why she's such a great arm wrestler. "It's all those years of whisking!"

Megan: But at least we get to watch them arm wrestle!

Maggie: Melissa McCarthy truly letting her talents shine.

Megan: I do feel this season has better continuity with how the character relationships are earlier in the series.

Maggie: Yeah. And like giving the secondary characters time to be quirky and weird and talk. Where last season was just getting weighed down by how plot-driven and dramatic the love stories and the April story all were. Also Sookie is right, it's true that cooking requires a lot of forearm strength!

Megan: That's true. I bet she has a lot of upper body strength. I wouldn't want to arm wrestle her. Look how she just picked up that pineapple!

Sookie finally notices that Lorelai is not into the arm wrestling conversation. Lorelai tells Sookie that she and Luke broke up. Sookie tries to convince her it was just a fight and they'll get back together. "He'll come back, he'll be back. Luke wants to marry you. I know he does."

Maggie: Me too! But he didn't.

Sookie tells Lorelai, "I get it. You're mad. You deserve to be mad. Luke's been a real jerk, frankly. Being mad at him makes all the sense in the world. And if you're so mad that you need to believe you guys are over, I get that."

Megan: I love that they actually are processing this together!

Except, oops, Lorelai tells Sookie that she slept with Christopher last night.

Maggie: And that she's honest with Sookie!

Sookie says Luke never has to know and that they can still get back together, but Lorelai explains that she simply can't wait for Luke any more if he wasn't willing to give her more than a separate life, "and that's all he could give me. If I'm gonna be with Luke, I wanna be with Luke, and he didn't get it. And I waited. I mean God, I waited."

Megan: This is true.

Maggie: Yeah, I wouldn't want to marry the Luke of last season either.

Megan: Yeah plot-wise they are actually picking up the pieces. There are a lot of choices they make that I don't like, but it feels so much more connected to the history of the show than season six.

Maggie: I love that Sookie is doing the friend thing, too where someone you know breaks up and you're definitely like, I’ll support you, but I also know you're gonna get back together.

Cut to Luke's Diner, where Luke is big mad and taking it out on Caesar and his customers.

Megan: I do like that the other characters acknowledge what an asshole he's being.

Luke leaves the diner to confront Taylor, who is installing a red light camera at the intersection outside, "to catch scofflaws"!

Maggie: I think Taylor's favorite word is "scofflaws".

Megan: It is a really good word. And you know what? I actually like this subplot because it is in many ways a subtle critique of this type of policing.

Luke says taking pictures of people just for driving is an "invasion of privacy" and probably is "not even legal!" Kirk says "spoken like a man with something to hide!"

Maggie: Yes, this is the rhetoric!

Megan: Yeah, it's a really good metaphor, very prescient.

Maggie: Megan, can I ask you a dumb question?

Megan: Yeah.

Maggie: The episode where Lorelai wakes up in Christopher's bed and Gigi is there and walks in? When was that?

Megan: That was the last episode.

Maggie: So it was this same experience of her waking up in bed with him at the beginning of this episode?

Megan: Yes.

Maggie: OK, I was like remembering that and thinking like, wait did they spend the night another time and then it just seemed like a completely different scene than the way this one opened! Very weird.

Cut back to the Dragonfly Inn, where Rory walks in to find Lorelai at the front desk. She begins unloading on her about how terribly hard the goodbye with Logan has been and how mean Paris was to her, "kicking me when I was down."

Maggie: Or she was just right?

Rory says she can't talk about Logan because it's only been seven hours, and can you imagine when it's been...? "No, I don't even want to talk about it."

Maggie: Why do you miss him? He's so lame!

Rory asks Lorelai what's going on with her. Lorelai also doesn't want to discuss her situation, but tells Rory she and Luke split up but she doesn't want to talk about it any more. Rory tries to insist, then they decide they can find some other activity to do together that doesn't involve talking. They decide on sports. They ask Michel for advice about sports. He suggests racquetball.

Megan: I actually think Alexis Bledel's acting is better.

Maggie: Out from under the thumb of the Palladinos!

Megan: Yeah, it's not that much better, but it's better enough.

Maggie: She's more Rory!

They try to talk smack and fail miserably. "I mean, my balls. They're gonna bounce like way further than your balls."

Maggie: I do think they should get into a sport like racquetball. You don't have to be super sporty to do the racket sports.

Logan lands at Heathrow and calls Rory immediately. He says he tried her first at the apartment but there was no answer.

Maggie: The apartment I'm paying for for you to live in!

Megan: Like a kept woman.

Logan asks if Rory got his gift. Rory thanks him and awkwardly says "of course I got it! I loved it!" Cut to the racquetball court that Lorelai and Rory have apparently found and reserved. They are not playing, but sitting on the floor discussing the rocket gift from Logan. They try to come up with reasons he could have given her a rocket as a goodbye gift.

Maggie: I can't believe they even own workout clothes? This was before athleisure was cool.

Megan: I bet they bought them.

Maggie: Oh yeah, I guess Rory did claim she went to the gym at Martha's Vineyard with Logan.

Megan: Oh yeah that's true.

Unable to come up with any promising theories about Logan's rocket gift, Rory and Lorelai decide to try to play racquetball, and on the first hit, the ball ricochets directly back to hit Lorelai in the eye. Cut to their house where they try and fail to find something in the freezer to put on her blackening eye.

Megan: Rory seems like a different person from her weird party girl arc.

Maggie: I think it's just like having them both be single is just much more entertaining.

Megan: Yeah, it's much more entertaining.

Rory leaves to go to Doose's and get some frozen steak or peas or eye patches (Lorelai's suggestion). Luke's Diner clears out because everyone wants to be present for Taylor's unveiling of the red light camera. He tells a customer to "get lost."

Megan: He's so mean.

Maggie: Honestly, it is so weird that everyone is SO excited to watch a red light camera be installed. This is true Stars Hollow battyness!!

Miss Patty, Gypsy and Lulu are chatting at the red light camera site. Rory says hello and asks what's going on. Gypsy tells her "Big Brother is watching."

Megan: See! It's about the surveillance state.

Maggie: Mhm. Also do you remember those camisoles like Lulu is wearing? With the lace on the edge?

Megan: Yes, I had several of them.

Maggie: Me too. OK, seriously though. No one has ever ever gathered around to look at a traffic light camera!

Megan: No!

Taylor describes how the camera works, and Gypsy says "seems kind of intrusive to me!" Taylor says "Law-abiding citizens have nothing to worry about. Now we are going to have our ceremonial first law breaker played by Kirk! Kirk will drive my classic 1964 Ford Thunderbird down the street, through the red light and the auto-patrol PR 100 will capture him in all his law-breaking glory." Instead, the flashes of the camera blind Kirk and he swerves around the street, crashing right into Luke's Diner's front window.

Maggie: Oh! I forgot about this!

Megan: It's about how the surveillance state doesn't actually make us any safer, because of the unintended consequences.

Maggie: I forgot it crashed into Luke's! Oh my gosh. Luke's whole world, gone!

Back at the Gilmores’, Rory recounts this whole episode to Lorelai in a tone of somewhat disturbing GLEE.

Maggie: How could she think this would not affect Lorelai?

Back at the diner, Luke and Taylor are fighting about insurance.

Megan: That’s the car that Max Medina had.

Maggie: A T-bird?

Megan: Yeah, I think it’s a blue T-bird.

Maggie: Maybe it was just the one this show owned.

Megan: They should just keep it in the diner as a decoration. People can sit in it.

Maggie: Yeah.

Back at the Gilmores’, Rory is complaining about the rocket problem to Lorelai. She’s not even sure she and Logan are still together because “we hadn't had a chance to decide on anything.”

Maggie: In all these weeks that you knew he was leaving?

Megan: You can just talk about it. It's okay.

Maggie: Aughhhhh.

Lorelai suggests that Rory go visit Logan, because “you were supposed to go traveling in Asia together anyway. You don't have any plans for the summer, so go.”

Maggie: I hate that they just keep saying “Asia.”

Megan: Yeah, like what country? It's really frustrating.

Bedtime. Lorelai is spiraling in her room, removing everything that reminds her of Luke, which includes stripping the bed.

Maggie: I also feel like this would be very annoying for Lorelai to have Rory just sitting there complaining about her long-distance boyfriend troubles when Lorelai's going through something very devastating. Also, I like Lorelai’s PJ pants.

Megan: What book is she reading? I can't see. Oh my god I remember those shirts: long, long shirts that you wear with your low-rise jeans.

Maggie: Dress slash shirt. Too short to to really be a dress, too long for a normal shirt. Yes, Lorelai, your entire house reminds you of Luke because you remodeled your whole house with him so he could move in.

Christopher calls, charming as ever: “I'm just checking in. Had a really great time last night. Don't worry. This is not a booty call.”

Megan and Maggie: Ew!

Maggie: Very bad decision, Lorelai, that you know was bad.

Megan: Anyway, so now it's time to get married.

Now Rory’s here, and she has news: She knows how to use Google and deduced that the rocket is a reference to an episode of the Twilight Zone she and Logan once watched that was basically Gift of the Magi, but in space. It’s a romantic gesture after all, for anyone who cares! Rory cares, and, charmed by her own telling of this anecdote, decides she’s going to London, but wants to know if Lorelai will be OK alone.

Maggie: No, she's not.

Megan: Also just break up. You're young.

Maggie: Yeah, seriously. You're still literally in college. Just go date people, or not, just go to college!

Rory calls Logan to thank him for the confusing gift. She catches him at the office. Rory asks if he’s there on a dare, making us like her more. But Logan says no: “It's my first day, so I'm trying to make a good impression… New suit, new shoes, even brushed my hair.”

Maggie: Come ON, you always style your hair.

Rory says she wants to visit him. Logan responds by saying he bought her a ticket to fly to London… in DECEMBER.

Maggie: So this is May, right? Because he just graduated. And he's saying I'm not gonna see you until December, when she's on the east coast and he's in London. That's not actually a terrible flight. He's not that far away.

Megan: I think they should just break up.

Maggie: Yes, they should. She was gonna break up with him anyway, and then he fell off a cliff.

Jolted into an epiphany by the surveillance state’s incursion into the diner, Luke has changed his tune and is now ready to marry Lorelai. RIGHT. NOW. He shows up to Chez Gilmore to share the news and a complex travel itinerary.

Maggie: When she finally told him how she felt, she gave him zero time to process it after a year of letting him be a jerk and her just going on with it. Of course he's willing to just drop everything to be with her, he just wasn't ready to do that in the moment.

Megan: Well, and he also made all these plans before telling her, which feels kind of presumptuous. Just have a conversation! Talk to the person you're in a relationship with!

Lorelai responds by telling Luke she slept with Christopher, which is not the choice we would have made in this situation.

Megan: She could just have said yes. I mean, he has been a jerk. I wouldn't want to marry him either.

Maggie: But he's clearly not being a jerk now. He snapped out of it. She definitely didn't have to tell him.

Megan: No, you could just have kept that to yourself.

Maggie: Also, you really shouldn't have slept with Christopher. Let's be honest. You should have never slept with Christopher. And she’s done it several times on this show and always regretted it!

The episode ends.

Maggie: This is off to a terrible start.

Megan: Yeah. And yet. I think it's better than season six.

Maggie: Yes, definite bright spots compared to season six. I think I just already put season six out of my memory.

Megan: Good.

Maggie: It doesn't feel like canon.

Megan: No, I mean, this doesn't really either.

Maggie: Because I never rewatch it. I never really rewatch the last season.

Megan: But Sookie and Lorelai actually talk to each other about their lives.

Maggie: Yeah, and Rory and Lorelai's interactions felt more real and funny.

Megan: They're genuinely funny. And you're right that the townspeople get to be included more in the stories and are back to being silly and weird.

Maggie: I love that Sookie just sprained Michel's wrist.

Megan: Yeah. And Babette has her whole weird monologue.

Maggie: I cannot believe that this will go from this to Lorelai deciding to be with Christopher.

Megan: No, it doesn't make sense. I think what's funny about it is it's like both Rory and Lorelai are in relationships that they should not be in.

Maggie: Yes, yes. The whole Logan-Rory thing is so gross-feeling from this episode because it's like, OK, he told you he loves you with this rocket. He also is paying for your apartment but doesn't want to see you for the next six months???

Megan: I know. You know what it reminds me of? It reminds me of Richard Gere's character in Pretty Woman, who wants to basically have a transactional relationship with with his partners. That's exactly what it reminds me of.

Maggie: Yes! Like I want you to feel good and taken care of, and I'll buy your pretty things, give you a nice place to live, because you can't live in New Haven anywhere!

Megan: No one lives in New Haven!

Maggie: And I'm a multimillionaire and I'm not gonna fly to New York from London, which is like the easiest flight that they run like 500 times a day, even one time for the next six months? No, it's just so gross. And that she's so spun out about it? No, she should be feeling relief that he's gone. I feel like she would be feeling relief, because she didn't even like him! She was gonna break up with him! She was gonna dump him!

Megan: I know. So, they're both in relationships they should not be in. And it takes almost the entire season for them to actually break up, BUT they are going to eventually break up.

Maggie: And you can kind of see that from here.

Megan: Yeah.

Maggie: Ugh. Why did they ever have to throw this wrench into Luke and Lorelai? Just get rid of April Nardini. This is just not a good plot device. Why did we have to make Luke into a giant jerk? He was becoming a big softy. He was reading his therapy book. He was communicating and then they just stopped communicating. And maybe that's realistic, but it's not great TV. I don't like it.

Megan: Well, it would be realistic if it was earned, if it was at all contextualized in the storytelling, but it's not.

Maggie: Why did Lorelai all of the sudden become a meek wallflower? That's not her.

Megan: Who wears weird navy shirts with black skirts, doesn't wear any color anymore.

Maggie: That is the weirdest Lorelai outfit.

Megan: I mean, I think a big problem with it is just the season six is so bad that it sets up this season to just be a disaster.

Maggie: Yeah, it takes too much time to get out of it.

Megan: And so it's like they have to tie up all the stuff that started in season six, and I kind of wished that they had just kind of done that from the beginning. Like, OK, have Rory and Logan broken up by episode two.

Maggie: And they could've had Luke and Lorelai get married.

Megan: Yeah, or working through their stuff and just let the whole season be about something else. But instead it's like we have so many episodes that are dedicated to those particular plots.

Maggie: And I swear so much of it is still dictated by the fact that the Christopher actor and Matt Czuchry were signed on. They had long term contracts. I feel like that's probably more the reason that they're like, OK, we'll keep these people around.

Megan: That's probably true, because it doesn't serve the narrative at all for them to there.

Maggie: And it's so stupid because even in season one, we were like, go away, Christopher. Do people like him? He has no redeeming qualities.

Megan: He's a handsome person.

Maggie: So is Matt Czuchry. I get it.

Megan: But that's not enough to sustain my interest in the character.

Maggie: At least we're going bring back Marty, sort of.

Megan: And Rory does get friends.

Maggie: It's true. I'm looking forward to that.

Megan: They may not be the friends we want for her. But they are friends, so that's good. And I like the stuff with Paris being an SAT prep tyrant.

Maggie: Yeah, that was hilarious. It's a very good move for Paris Gellar.

Megan: So I feel like with this season, what makes it enjoyable is just the cute little interstitials with the characters' relationships and the town. And those are things that I really missed in season six, and it's nice to have them back. And that's why I think season seven is better than season six. But it's not because it's excellent storytelling.

Maggie: Yeah, and you're right that like the acting feels a little bit more natural again.

Megan: Yeah!

Maggie: And just being able to see Rory not always play against Logan is just much more refreshing and interesting.

Megan: Yeah, I don't know why it's better but when I started watching it, I was like, Oh, she seems more like early-seasons Rory than whoever was in the last season.

Maggie: I think it's because she's not just next to Logan. Her around Logan is so annoying and gross. She's so ditzy about around him. I like some of the settings. I like them sitting in the racquetball court and talking, and then in the empty living room. Some of that is the feelings from the early seasons of like, we're gonna put these two characters in like these weird situations.

Megan: It's cozy. It has the coziness of the early seasons, and also the dumb pointless plots. This episode is like Rory gets a present and is confused by it, and that's her entire plotline. And I feel like in the early seasons, there are a lot of plot lines like that and they're very enjoyable in their own way, just because it's not this high drama.

Maggie: Yeah. Early on, we were kind of like, oh, some of these plots are so lame and get rid of them and cut them down. And now I'm like, no, I think that's when the show's good.

Megan: No, now, I'm like no. I want more of the episodes where it's like: Rory goes golfing.

Maggie: We want more nothing happening. Like: Oh no! Rory has too many books in her backpack!

Megan: There was bad weather. So Rory had to stay at her grandparents' house.

Maggie: It's perfect! Rory has to do a Romeo and Juliet scene for school.

Megan: Yeah, there's so many that are like that. Rory goes on a college visit.

Maggie: Yes! Rory and Lorelai tailgate with the grandparents.

Megan: They watch a football game. Yeah, more of that.

Maggie: I want more of that.

Megan: Yeah, I think that's what makes it good. I mean, it's not like good good, but it just feels like a relief that the characters sound more like themselves and there is some continuity and it's not all just like high, depressing drama. That's what I want.

Maggie: I think there is a little more of that this season. Yeah. And I guess at the very least, the Lorelai and Christopher situation — it will finally take that away as an option.

Megan: In a way, I think that's why they did it. They push it through to its absolute conclusion to the point where it's like, okay, we can never bring this guy back, and in a way, I think they needed to do that.

Maggie: Yeah, kind of like with Dean.

Megan: Yeah, who we don't have to see anymore, thank god.

Maggie: Well, this is is off to a promising start.

Megan: Yes, doing great.

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