Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life is stuck in suspended animation

I recently finished watching the Gilmore Girls sequel for the third time, and I realised the core problem for me wasn’t the story itself. It was that the characters didn’t seem to have changed enough during the ten-year gap.

They felt frozen in time, as if they had all stood perfectly still after the original series ended.

When I watch a sequel set ten years later, I don’t just want to know what happened. I want to feel those missing ten years in the characters.

Ironically, Emily was the only character who truly felt as though she’d lived through those missing ten years. Everyone else seemed to pick up almost exactly where they’d left off.

Even small changes would’ve made a difference. Take Lorelai, for example. I get that she’s always struggled with commitment in the past, but it seemed that Luke was the exception.

When they were engaged the first time around in season 6, it seemed like she was truly committed to him.
She wanted the June wedding, and it genuinely felt as though Luke was the exception to her fear of commitment.

So in the ten-year gap I genuinely think they would be married by now. The possibility of kids could’ve added something special, but even if they didn’t have kids, I think there are plenty of ways that Lorelai’s avoidance of difficult conversations could’ve still added intrigue and relatability to the story.

Rory also felt oddly untouched by time. I don’t mind characters struggling in their thirties, a lot of people do. Me included. What surprised me was that she often seemed to be facing many of the same emotional and professional hurdles she had at the end of the original series.

I always imagined Rory would’ve found different ways to keep writing, even if traditional journalism wasn’t working out. Maybe with some lesser-known publications. Or even a blog of her own could’ve worked, and showcased her writing voice, and what she was passionate about.

With Emily’s storyline, I believed her grief and exhaustion. It rang true to me. Because I’ve experienced grief myself after losing my mum last year, I found myself curious to see whether Emily’s perspective would resonate differently with me now.

I was surprised that I understood the exhaustion of life, and going through the motions. The normal routine doesn’t work anymore. In fact, it kind of constricts us. Then there’s a need or longing for something to change for the better. Just something, anything, even if it’s a small detail.

So much of Emily’s identity revolved around being Richard’s wife and her role within the D.A.R. A lot of the things she did were out of love for Richard, and once that world of business and status disappeared along with him, she seemed hollow, almost running on auto-pilot.

I will say though, to those of you who have only watched the sequel once, I would suggest trying to watch it a second time around.

I’ve found that sometimes with a series I’ve loved and then later on disagreed or got frustrated with how it progressed, it takes a while to accept that this is the story the writers wanted to tell.

So even if it’s several years later, try watching it again with a different viewpoint.

For me, I decided to focus more on Lorelai’s perspective on my second rewatch, and then on my third rewatch I focused on Emily’s progression.

And from a storytelling perspective it is interesting trying to figure out what the characters would be feeling, or what’s stopping them from taking a leap.

One of the positives is that most of the characters still feel like the characters. There wasn’t a moment where I thought, “Oh, that’s just an actor saying lines.” I still believed that they were genuine.

I’m sure you’ve guessed by now that I think Emily’s storyline was the best thing to come out of the sequel. I wouldn’t change a thing about it.

I would, however, change quite a lot about the other characters’ storylines 😅 But that’s a topic for another post.

I’ve always enjoyed asking “What if?” and imagining the different directions a story could have taken. I could ramble on for hours…

I’d love to know what your thoughts are on Gilmore Girls A Year in the Life, do you agree or disagree? What changes would you have liked? Feel free to leave a comment below. And as always, let’s keep the discussion friendly and respectful.