Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life Reaction

For better or worse, A Year in the Life is the television event of 2016 I was most looking forward to. That doesn't mean that I expected it to be the best thing I'd watch in 2016 or even the program I hyped up the most. It's simply the program that I wanted to see the most. Overall, I'm pleased with it.

I love Gilmore Girls, but I'm not blind about it. For seven seasons, it was a very inconsistent show. Over the years people forget that or choose to ignore the inconsistency. They do that because the good far outweighs the bad. I love the characters, the dialogue, the relationships, and the town shenanigans. I love those things so much that I overlook the frustrating times when the characters or plot does something stupid just to keep a story line or complication going (ahem, April).

So, yeah, before I get into some of the things that bothered me about A Year in the Life, I wanted to go through my notes about all the things I loved about it that made me happy I watched it.

WINTER
-Hello townspeople I haven't seen in a decade. You don't need to do much. Just remind me that you are still around.
-"Ooober". It's nice to know that Kirk is still up to his crazy schemes.
-The town got a pig for Kirk and Lulu to stop them from having kids. That sound's about right.
-Paul Anka is still around!
-Pete. It got old as a running gag in later installments, but when he was getting the Anne-treatment (Her?) during his visit, I thought it was quite funny.
-Michel came out. The series always talked around it. It was refreshing to see it out in the open now.
-The giant Richard portrait. It's a funny sight gag with a nice payoff at the end of Fall when Emily finally gets a proper sized portrait.
-The flashback to Richard's funeral. Be it Emily's smile when Lorelei says she's going to stay a little longer even though Rory has to go or the mortifying moment when Lorelei tells her Richard story, everything with that flashback was solid (I kind of wish it couldn've been the starting point for the mini-series).
-Paris. She is the best! The place her character is in is perfect and Liza Weil is never better than when she's rapid-firing Amy Sherman-Palladino* dialogue. Paris is arguably the best character ASP has created (certainly of the supporting roles) and seeing her at all makes the whole mini-series worth it.
(hereby known as "ASP")
-Taylor delivering a Luke-esque rant about why Luke doesn't give out his Wifi password. It was both entertaining and a nice bonding moment between the two adversaries.
-Emily wearing jeans. It was short-lived and shocking.
SPRING
-Lorelei and Emily in therapy together. Just because it's broad and predictable doesn't mean it isn't a lot of fun to watch. I love the mention of her "scorebook".
-We see Mr. Kim and in the most fitting way: only a glimpse and without dialogue. That's a great meta-joke about one of the series' great mysteries.
-The Gay Pride Parade. Another meta-joke after the original series took flack for the lack of gay characters and occasional unfortunate dialogue. It's good to see ASP have some good humor about that criticism.
-Really, it was just fun to be in the middle of another town meeting.
-Kirk's second short film premieres. I'd like to see a full cut of that.
-Rory and Paris's return to Chilton. By that, I mean Paris's return. Her speech to the class and bathroom triad were both fantastic. Her power-play in the headmaster's office and the support group needed after her presentation too. I don't think anyone would've minded having Paris in all four episodes.
-Mae Whitman! It was a nothing cameo, but I just like seeing Mae Whitman.
SUMMER
-April doesn't overstay her welcome, but we get a wealth of information about her that allows us to fill in the blanks however we want.
-The secret bar. I'm a sucker for the particularly loony Stars Hollow things and this fits the bill.
-Stars Hollow: The Musical. It went on way too long, but I like the general joke of it. It's an awful play and Lorelei is the only one who sees that. Also, it builds to Sutton Foster's final song later that was quite lovely. This is the kind of C-story that would be very welcome in the middle of a 22-episode season.
-Jess shows up for some sage advice. When this many actors want to come back to a show a decade later when they already have other jobs, that says something.
FALL
-Wild: Book or Movie?. A great running gag, especially when Jess asks it independently later on.
-Speaking of that. More Jess. I don't know what all the actors' schedules were, but I'm glad to see Milo showing up for a few scenes like that.
-Lorelei's call to Emily. That's a great moment. Excellent work by both actresses. It's hard to act and react that well over a phone call.
-"Bullshit": Despite the content freedom that Netflix allows, I'm glad that they saved all the real swearing for Emily at the D.A.R. interview. I have some slight questions about the decision to have Emily turn on her old life like that, but this is a fine and hilarious way to do it.
-Keifer Sutherland. I'm of two minds about this. It's irritating to introduce Keifer Sutherland as Luke's friend without actually getting him to cameo, but it is a fun way for ASP to play with our expectations. And, within the scene, it was good for several jokes.
-Sookie returns. I can't fault Melissa McCarthy for having a busy schedule. There was never going to be a comfortable way to write around her absence. The one scene we did get her with was excellent. Lorelei and Sookie's relationship has always been vital, especially at times when Luke and Rory can't be her sounding board. Michel stepped up nicely the rest of the time, but it was a different vibe.
-Luke and Lorelei's wedding. The single biggest black mark on the original series is the lack of a Luke and Lorelei wedding. That was inexcusable. It doesn't make sense for the characters at all that they wouldn't be married after a decade of being together without incident, but I'm glad we got to see the wedding. It was wonderfully shot and it's nice that Kirk got to do something very right with the decorations.
-Emily's new life. It was well setup in the four installments and it's nice to see her happy again.
-The last four words. Given how the other 5 hours and 59 minutes were as a response to the seven season that came before them, that is the right way to end it. ASP wanted to tell a full-circle story, it turns out, and that's how you do it. Now, if another mini-series gets announced, I won't be as happy with the ending. It's stupid as a cliffhanger, but as the end that ASP was always building to, "Mom" "Yeah?" "I'm pregnant" is fitting.

 Ok. That was 1000 words about what A Year in the Life got right. That's a lot of positives. So, now can I talk a little negative about it without being called a "sourpuss" or too critical? ...No? ...Well, I'm doing it anyway.

There's a lot about the episodes that I didn't like simply because the show was made for all the fans, not just me. I don't like Logan, nor do I care for the Life and Death Brigade. I just have to deal with that. Whatever.

My single biggest issue with A Year in the Life is that it was ASP writing her season 7, not a story set 10 years later. As a result, several stories got trapped in time for a decade. So, Lorelei's story is approached from the end: her and Luke getting married. What would cause a happy couple who originally planned to get married to put it off? Stasis. Something needs to kick them out of that stasis, so Lorelei gets wanderlust and goes "Wild" (that specific decision feels very out of character). This "adventure" makes her realize she wants to get married finally. Her whole story arc was reverse-engineered to end with a wedding. Same goes for Rory. ASP knew where she wanted Rory to end up: pregnant. To be full-circle, Logan makes sense as the father, but it's only notable that she's pregnant if he isn't in the picture. What if he's engaged to someone else that he's not going to leave? Ok, that means Rory is the girl on the side and so on and so fourth. I just don't like ASP's approach. I like character-driven stories rather than story-driven characters.

There's other aspects left over from the original series too. I think ASP's view of Rory is different than the audiences'. I just think Rory a screw-up, which is fine. ASP seems to think she's an exceptional talent who just hasn't found her place. In other words, A Year in the Life didn't "fix" anything from Gilmore Girls. It just maintained them.

Lastly, six hours was too much from a story perspective. In an ideal world without contracts and actor availability, I think A Year in the Life would've been significantly shorter. There was just too much filler. The musical, Life and Death Brigade, researching the story about lines, "Wild". Those all went on longer than needed. That's a Netflix problem though. It's been true about almost all of their series. I went into A Year in the Life ready for that.

In my ideal world, A Year in the Life would've had a lot more Sookie and even more Pairs. Jess would've been more of a casual presence (not just popping in for sage advice). Logan would've been a distant memory. Luke and Lorelei would've already been married since that would've made sense (flashback to it if needed). Rory would have a stable job already that we don't spend much time following, because that was always the least interesting part of her life. Richard's death could've provided plenty of drama between Emily, Rory, and Lorelei, but they would've been derived from a place the characters would be at in 2016, not 2006. That's just me though.

It was nice to be back for a few hours though, and that's all I really wanted.