Michael Mitchell: Archive

In celebration of learning Netflix may renew Gilmore Girls for a limited run of four 90-minute movies, I thought I'd share my favorite scene.

Gilmore Girls is more than my favorite TV series. I think it's nearly as good as TV or film in general will ever get. It's easily the best example of maintaining the highest quality throughout a series that I have ever seen.

When I compare it to other shows, I can't help but marvel at all the usual ingredients that are missing. No vampires or zombies or superheroes. No explosions or gun fights. No rapes or murders. No need to investigate crimes or diagnose deadly illnesses. I can't even remember a single emergency situation. Rory is in a car wreck, but it's minor and not dramatized. Lorelai's inn burns down -- the one she worked at before starting her own -- but not a single spark is needed to communicate the catastrophe happened, just a phone call. Of course, there's nothing wrong with fantasy creatures or high-stakes drama, but Gilmore Girls doesn't feature them at all! There are not even any exaggerated, melodramatic moments, like in nighttime soaps. It's just "boring life" made interesting and entertaining.

Sure, it starts with a "slice-of-life" concept, like we're merely looking through a window at a mother and daughter who drink too much coffee, but the end product is highly stylized. To me, the most pathetic compliment anyone could pay Gilmore Girls is that it's "realistic." It is, but it's so much more than that, too. It makes Game Of Thrones look like The Wire. Just remember all three stories are fictional and it should be obvious what I mean. The above scene is a great example.

Lorelai needs Rory's help to determine if she's dating Luke. That's it. That's the scene. But the way the writers and actors and all involved "bring it to life" is so exquisitely detailed and brilliantly executed that the characters are more "real" than people we actually know, and the action, which is mostly dialogue, is infinitely more interesting than shit that actually happens.

It would take days for any expert creator or critic to fully analyze this scene in the full context of the series as a whole. That's how much is going on here. It takes place in three locations: inside, outside, and then back inside the diner, which is rare for TV. At the end, they even continue setting up Rory's reunion with Dean, which is not an aside, but rather a comparison. It's actually an example of one of the few Lorelai/Rory contrasts, rather than the many parallels, used throughout the series. Lorelai usually gets some indication her big moments are coming and Rory is usually blind-sided by them. Also, near the end, we get a quick and timely reminder that Luke is the most dependable person in Lorelai's hectic life, when he says, simply: "I'll get a broom." She breaks things and he fixes things. They've essentially been married without benefits for years.

This is not a short, concise, methodical scene used to dutifully build to Luke and Lorelai's climactic kiss, which is all it really had to do. It's pure revelry, guiltless indulgence, in a delightfully confusing moment for Lorelai, who has obviously had unrequited feelings for Luke since the pilot episode. It's a reward for viewers who have lived through it with her, who have watched it all develop and have enjoyed the journey as much as they know they'll enjoy the destination. And, best of all, the way the viewer feels is aptly parallel to how Lorelai has felt in her love-scattered brain ever since she learned "Luke can waltz." Confusion combined with unbearable anticipation is also the reason why, for once, she doesn't know how to act around him. She's so preoccupied with it that even her own daughter has trouble understanding her. "How on earth can you be frustrated with me right now?" Rory says. Hilarious.

To take something so simple and ordinary to the heights of entertainment is the greatest triumph a literary artist can achieve, and Gilmore Girls did it consistently for seven (yes, all seven) seasons.

Yeah, I always "have my superlatives ready" (required reference, paraphrasing Logan from Season 5, Episode 7: You Jump, I Jump, Jack) when gushing about Gilmore Girls, but the only way it could be better to me is if it weren't morally/politically neutral. The most important element of art is the perspective of the artist. However, unfortunately, that's an element missing from almost everything these days, especially from art in pop culture, so I don't hold it against this show. I'm an egoist and a capitalist, and this show could be altruist/socialist and I wouldn't care.

Gilmore Girls is the closest cinema has come to meeting the quality of classic literature and we're about to get six more hours of it. Copper boom. It means: "Hurry up."