The Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life – Spring

By starrymag | December 16, 2016

By: Taylor Gates

 

Emily (Kelly Bishop) and Lorelai (Lauren Graham) sit in the therapist’s office in awkward silence. Finally, Lorelai offers a blanket apology for everything she has done wrong. This, however, doesn’t please Emily at all. The therapist, Claudia (Kerry Butler), says that anything is allowed in therapy short of physical confrontation. Emily and Lorelai get into a fight about who is “winning” therapy despite Claudia’s constant insistence that she’s not keeping score. Lorelai is thrilled when Claudia announces time has run out, therefore ending the insufferable silence. Emily tells Lorelai to return next Tuesday at 10:30am, pulling the grieving widow card to guilt her into it.

 

Lorelai, Rory (Alexis Bledel) and Luke (Scott Patterson) go to Star Hollow’s International Food Festival. Both Rory and Luke are going to have to cut out early though as Rory has a plane to catch and Luke needs to get back to the diner.

 

Taylor (Michael Winters) is upset at the lack of participation—only 15 out of the 195 countries showed up. He demands that Kirk (Sean Gunn) make the booths expand to offer more cuisines.

 

Rory goes to hang out with Lane (Keiko Agena) at her booth. Mrs. Kim (Emily Kuroda) introduces her new Korean choir, which still has a lot of room for improvement. Rory gets a call from Sandee Martin (Julia Goldani Telles) from website SandeeSays. She asks if Rory received the gift basket she sent over and pushes her to join her team. Rory says she’s too busy to the devote the time at the moment, but Sandee says she will continue hassling her until she hears a yes.

 

Lorelai convinces Luke to bid on a basket since they shared one early in their relationship. Cassie, the maker of the basket, is not too thrilled by Lorelai’s purchasing of it. Kirk is upset when he spies the man from the Vietnam booth roasting a pig. Luke gently breaks it to him that every time he has been eating bacon, he has been eating pig.

 

Rory meets with Naomi (Alex Kingston) about her book. Naomi decides instead of a biography she wants to make it a children’s book about a whale and a rabbit so they can deal with archetypes and not revealing facts about herself. Rory has lunch with Logan (Matt Czuchry), complaining about the difficult, perpetually drunk Naomi. Plus, her meeting with Conde Nast also got pushed again. Logan’s father Mitchum (Gregg Henry) joins them at the table. He tells Rory that he can make a meeting with Conde Nast stick if she wants him to pull some strings. She declines the offer, shaken up by the fact he saw her and Logan together. Logan admits that this restaurant is a family holding but tells her to relax—he thinks she and Logan are just friends. Mitchum also mentions Odette, the French heiress Logan is engaged to.

 

At the town meeting, Taylor announces that Stars Hollow tried to hold a gay pride parade; however, there aren’t enough gays in their town and no neighboring places would lend them anyone. A movie is being shot in Woodbury and all the A-list actors are staying there. All the B-list actors are staying at the Dragonfly, which is bad news considering their tax base is receding. They need the rich, high-end celebrities spending money in their town. Michel (Yanic Truesdale) is also upset at the B-listers. He tells Lorelai the Dragonfly has peaked—their rooms may be pretty, but people value a spa, a gym and mini fridges over that. They also have no room to grow.

 

Liz and T.J. call Luke, informing him they accidentally joined a vegetable cult for the next six million years.

 

Lorelai wakes up in the middle of a night from a strange dream about the real Paul Anka. She calls Rory and tells her about the B-list actor dilemma and the fact nobody changes their name anymore. She admits that’s she’s really worked up about the fact Michel is likely leaving.

 

Lorelai and Emily’s next therapy session starts out awkwardly. There’s a brief interlude where the two of them laugh and sing together, but it quickly reverts back to tension when Emily brings up Lorelai’s teenage pregnancy and the fact she only came back into their lives when she needed money. She also mentions that she hides her relationships, smarts off in front of guests and takes forever to return phone calls. Emily also brings up the nasty letter Lorelai wrote her on her birthday, which Lorelai swears she didn’t compose. However, time is up before the issue can be resolved.

 

Rory gets into a heated argument with Naomi over the phone. Naomi doesn’t think Rory has the humor to write the book anymore. She shows Logan the SandeeSays website and while he agrees it’s a few pegs below The New York Times, their layout is catchy and they might want Rory to class it up a bit. Rory’s considering staying in London a few more days, but Logan tells her Odette is coming to town.

 

Lorelai and Luke go to the Black, White and Read movie theater. They, along with the rest of the audience, bring their own food (and in some cases grills) to enjoy during the film. Kirk premieres his second short film before the movie. Luke’s phone rings in the middle of it and Lorelai is shocked to see that Emily is calling him. She answers it for him and Emily says she wants Luke come join her for dinner next week. He and Lorelai agree to go together.

 

Lorelai tells pop-up chef Rachael Ray about her worries with Michel. She reveals that Michel has had her back since day one and now he is visiting New York, likely to find another hotel job. Rachael tells her that life has a way of working itself out. Lorelai thanks her for the advice and sammie before letting her go.

 

Luke and Lorelai arrive at Emily’s house. Emily is angry that Lorelai came along, as she only invited Luke. Rory joins them as well; she’s staying at Emily’s house because she’ll be going to a Chilton alumni event the next day. Emily pulls Luke into Richard’s old study alone. She demands that he get a will immediately. Richard also left him money in his will to grow Luke’s into a franchise. She’s going to set up a meeting between him and a realtor to look at new locations. Luke lets Lorelai know Emily’s plan, but she promises it’s not going to happen.

 

Rory meets up with Paris (Liza Weil) to give guest lectures at Chilton. They are greeted by headmaster Charleston (Dakin Matthews). Paris immediately starts grilling him about where the $100,000 she donated for school improvements has gone.

 

In therapy, Emily is irritated that Luke and Lorelai aren’t married. Though they’re been together for nine years, they’re more like roommates that permanent partners and one day someone is just going to up and leave. Tired of hearing Emily’s insults, Lorelai starts to storm out. But their time is up anyway, which makes things less dramatic.

 

Rory gives her lecture about how the most unexpected courses can change their lives the most. For example, music composition was one of the most challenging and rewarding experiences she’d ever had. Paris’ talk about the harsh realities of life wherein she quotes Stalin scares the students. Paris and Rory plan to get lunch, but their plans are derailed when Paris spies her childhood crush Tristan and sprints to the bathroom. Paris paces, saying that she’s feeling panicked, heartache and lonely. Tristan didn’t even look at her despite all her education and success. She opens her briefcase, revealing that it is empty. She thought people would think she was more important if she was carrying one. She tells Rory even her kids like the nanny over her. Her childhood nemesis Francie (Emily Bergl) comes in, leaving Paris paranoid that she and Rory are in cahoots against her again. Francie reminds Paris that she has law, medical, literature and dental degrees and doesn’t understand why she’s picking on her. Paris continues yelling at her and Francie rubs in the fact that she never got into Chilton’s secret society before leaving. Paris breaks down, saying how much she misses Doyle. Rory calms her down and Paris finally pulls herself together.

 

Rory talks to Headmaster Charleston, who invites her to get her master’s and be part of the faculty at Chilton in any department she chooses. Rory graciously declines the offer, as she doesn’t think teaching is in her future.

 

At Paris’ house, Paris flops on the couch, complaining about how she left her glasses upstairs. She can’t ask the nanny to get them, as asking her to climb stairs is how they lost the last nanny—that’s the price you pay when you have a five-story house and won’t put in an elevator in order to maintain its architectural integrity. Doyle (Danny Strong) joins them in the living room, talking about how great screenwriting is going for him. He’s now renting a loft in Tribeca. Paris is irritated that Doyle and Rory sometimes email each other. She freaks out when Doyle says the kids will have to eat at her house since she has no food. The nanny will have to take them out to eat, climb the stairs too many times and will eventually quit too. Rory offers to take the kids to gets some food. She takes them to eat hot dogs at the park. While there, she sees a Vine Sandee tagged her in saying that she’s waiting for Rory to agree to work for them. This prompts her to call Logan, asking if Mitchum would still be willing to put in a good work for her at Conde Nast. Logan promises he’ll do it.

 

Rory meets with GQ. They rave over her previous work and find her book proposal with Naomi interesting. They talk about some subjects they have openings in, including sports and a piece about lines and their psychology.

 

Emily has bailed on therapy telling Lorelai that even after six sessions she hasn’t changed at all. Claudia tells Lorelai that things like this happen all the time, inviting her to stay for the session since it is already paid for. Lorelai tells her about when she found out Richard was in the ICU—it was sudden and unreal. Richard was so angry about dying from a heart attack, as it wasn’t noble enough. His last words were yelling at the nurses to get away from him. Neither she nor Emily got that big goodbye moment. They switch gears and Claudia tells Lorelai that many people have long, lasting relationships without being married. However, maybe the only reason she doesn’t want to marry Luke is because she is insistent on not doing things like her mother.

 

Emily visits Luke’s with the realtor in order to look at possible franchise locations. Luke reluctantly has Caesar (Aris Alvarado) look after the restaurant while they search. The realtor suggests Caesar can run one of the franchises. The first place they tour is still open. Emily says that won’t be a problem—everything is negotiable and the owner is four months behind on payments. Plus, they illegally tapped their gas so the place is eventually going to explode and it’s going to need remodeling. In the car, Emily tells Luke they’re going to squeeze in one more property. Luke asks if she needs to get going to therapy with Lorelai, but she says they stopped that a week ago, smug at the fact that Lorelai never told him. When Luke gets home, he makes it a point to ask about therapy. Lorelai lies and said it was the same as always. Luke also keeps a secret, not telling her about restaurant hunting.

 

Rory drops by Paris’ house since she’s in the city. She offers to let the nanny relax to a bit while she watches the kids. Naomi’s lawyer calls her saying she’s planning to dissolve their contract—she is unhappy with her work and ideas and demand that she forfeits all rights to the whale and mouse idea. Rory immediately calls GQ saying she’s going to take a crack at the line idea. They don’t have any money to give her, but she agrees to do it on spec. Rory calls Lorelai to tell her the news. Lorelai offers to accompany her to New York while she writes her story.

 

Rory starts interviewing a pastry-lover who is always looking for the next big thing in line for the cro-dough-cake. However, she gets tired and falls asleep in the middle of it. Lorelai rejoins her with coffee and a bag of the sought-after cro-dough-cakes everyone is waiting for. An employee was taking out the trash and she chatted him up in order to get them. Lorelai also retrieves some hot dogs she manipulated a vendor to get. One of the girls in line (Mae Whitman) has to get to work sans a cro-dough-cake and Lorelai gives her an extra one of hers.

 

Rory interviews people waiting in line for high-end sneakers. Lorelai has gotten those too, as the girl she gave breakfast to works at the shoe store. The two head to a line outside a store for comic collectibles. Lorelai is uninterested and her feet hurt so she goes back to the hotel while Rory finishes up. When Rory gets back to the room, she is majorly panicking. She tells Lorelai she slept with one of the people in line—a guy dressed up like a Wookiee—after burgers and drinks. Rory freaks out since she’s just now having her first one-night stand at age 32. Lorelai assuages her by saying she has never had a one-night stand.

 

Rory freaks out. She has no job or apartment and her love life is a disaster. Lorelai says she’s being too hard on herself, but she tells Lorelai that every time she’s in London she stays with Logan even though he’s engaged. Paul doesn’t know, either. Rory feels like she’s blowing her life and career. Conde Nast knows she’s a failure so this is karma. She didn’t have her lucky outfit and thus doesn’t have confidence. Lorelai asks Rory to describe her lucky outfit and realizes it’s in her closet. She also says the outfit kind of washes her out. Lorelai gives Rory a pep talk, saying it was her turn for a few curveballs. She encourages her to call up SandeeSays. She’s still young; she’s got time to work for The Washington Post someday.

 

Sandee gives Rory a tour of the offices. They’re expanding fast and everyone works together at communal tables—there is no hierarchy. Rory’s interview with Sandee is cringe-worthy. She has brought no specific pitches or ideas to sell herself and Sandee is clearly disappointed. Sandee calls Rory once she has left, saying they are going a different direction for the job. Rory is livid noting that Sandee all but guarantee her a position she didn’t even want in a first place. They get into a petty screaming match which ends with Rory throwing all three of her phones away.

 

Rory wheels her suitcase into Lorelai’s house and announces she is moving home.