A return to Stars Hollow...!!

Guys, an exciting event is coming soon; a long-overdue, highly anticipated and actually rather panic-inducing reunion of sorts. This is something that will change our lives in the best way possible, but also has the power to destroy our childhood and teenage hopes and dreams in just ninety minutes. 

I am talking, of course, about the recently (finally) announced Gilmore Girls revival.

Netflix – that life-saving site we all love and thank daily for coming into our lives – will be taking up the monstrous miraculous mantle of all things Gilmore. All things Stars Hollow. All things Luke and Lorelai. All things Paris. All things THAT MAKE US SO MUCH MORE HAPPIER.

There were whispers all around about this when the cast reunited for ATX Television Festival in the US earlier this year – my heart almost exploded seeing the red carpet photos, watching the on-stage chatter videos and reading the stars’ tweets – but for a while it was denied and pushed down, then eventually the dream faded away. And then just as we’d got to the final stage of grief, acceptance that this dream may never come true, IT HAPPENED.

Netflix closed this beautiful deal with Warner Bros., declaring it a “limited-series revival” which will be penned by series creator Amy Sherman-Palladino and exec producer Daniel Palladino. This is magical – Amy S-P was, of course, the angel who brought Stars Hollow and its quirky inhabitants into our lives so many moons ago (2000), so this revival is in the best hands. There was major controversy when Amy was ousted by WB back in 2006/7 when they got going with Gilmore Girls season 7, and apparently Amy never ever sat down and watched that season – the one she didn’t write – although she was told certain things that had been done to her characters and plots by friends and colleagues.

So maybe now her taking control of the revival – my new favourite word by the way, perfectly used here as it’s like the ghost of the Gilmore family is being brought back to life – will give her the chance to correct errors and see that her story ends the way it was always intended. Or maybe she just wants to continue the tales and see where they go. I reckon she’ll have all the ideas firmly in place; they say she had endings planned out for each character when she started the show. I hope that’s true.

There has been speculation as to whether all the original cast members will feature in the reboot.

So far Lorelai (Lauren Graham), Emily (Kelly Bishop), Rory (Alexis Bledel) and Luke (Scott Patterson) are confirmed. But what about Miss Patty (Liz Torres)? Jess (Milo Ventimiglia)? Logan (Matt Czuchry, who has had his hands full with The Good Wife)? And Dean (who is now Sam Winchester, with a brother called Dean, in Supernatural)?! KIRK?! (Sean Gunn, who I saw appear in Guardians of the Galaxy and I almost fell out of my seat with excitement) WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO KIRK?????!!!!

Sadly, of course, Richard Gilmore (Edward Hermann) will not be involved, as he passed away not too long ago. I just hope they handle that well in these episodes. And that Emily Gilmore is okay.

Another fun fact to emerge after the initial news of this broke (and social media went into a total frenzy, much like a Stars Hollow town meeting without Lorelai’s snacks and Luke getting angry), is that each episode in this tiny series will be ninety minutes long, and every one will take place at a different time of year, in a different season. Oh my gosh, can you imagine?

We get to revisit Stars Hollow in the autumn; I feel that was the season that always belonged to ‘Gilmore Girls’. No other show was so perfectly decorated with fallen leaves, red trees and steaming cups. Mind you, they did winter pretty darn perfectly, too. Lorelai’s love of snow was legendary – I would always get the happiest shivers whenever she leaned out the window, smiled knowingly and said “I smell snow”. Maybe all seasons should belong to Stars Hollow? 

The Top 3 Snow Moments.

1. When Max’s car broke down in the town square, and she looked up to thank the snow. Max may have been a bad decision as a whole, but that moment was lovely.
2. When Lorelai was punching, pummelling and swiping at the snow that had settled in her front garden, on her tree and thus fallen onto her car, shouting that her love affair with this weather was well and truly dead and buried. 
3. The ice rink. Holy heck, Luke made Lorelai an ice rink. Need I say more? I think for many that was the moment when Luke became Lorelai’s perfect man. For me, I decided he was when he raised an eyebrow at her and poured her the fifth cup of coffee in the first five minutes of the first episode of the first season. 

Anyway, those two weather seasons were the best when it came to this show. Having said that, the summer was nicely covered with the summer fête shindig the super-keen Town Selectman Taylor invented (the song ‘those lazy hazy crazy days of summer’ will forever be going round and round my head after the first episode of series 3) and the Hay Bale Maze (Series 7). I’ll admit I don’t remember much of spring in the show, but maybe Amy S-P can make spring unforgettable in this revamp.

So yes, the seasons were always well-established. Miss Patty always had a dance event on, Sookie would whip up something seasonal in the kitchen with Jackson’s fresh veg, and Rory would be stressing out about whatever exams she was doing at that time of year.

My Requests for This Revival:

• No more empty cups. 
  OH MY LORDY this drove me crazy. I have all 7 series on DVD and let me tell you, not one episode featured the Gilmore ladies holding a takeaway coffee cup that actually contained any kind of fluid, coffee or otherwise. They’d be gesturing with the cups constantly – throwing them all around, up and down, shoving them in one another’s faces and taking very casual gulps whenever they remembered. Actually there were also times when they’d hand each other cups, like actual ceramic mugs, and they’d be empty. Sookie handed Michel an ‘Earl Grey tea’ in the episode Die Jerk series 4, and damn it you could see the bottom of the empty mug as he took it from her! Guys, this is shameful. At least put some tap water in the takeaway cups.
• Do Richard justice. 
  As I mentioned earlier, Edward Hermann died earlier this year of brain cancer. I remember finding this out on social media and actually instinctively crying. When asked what was up, I told my friends the devastating news and followed it with a tearful gulp and a wail of “but Emily demanded to go first!” (Forgiveness and Stuff, series 1)
  So yes, Amy S-P, I am sure you will do what’s best, but my gosh please give Richard Gilmore a good send-off.
• Jess Must Return.
  In one way or another – whether he is Rory’s official long-term boyfriend (finally), or just a presence in the background. He must be there. That story must reach its conclusion.
• Luke and Lorelai must be…Luke and Lorelai.
  These two are my original OTP, my #1 ship; they are perfect and have gone through so much together and apart, so they must be together now. C’mon, Amy. They kissed in the finale. I know you didn’t write that, Amy, but…they kissed. That was enough of a hint that the L&L train was starting up on the tracks again! Luke is the perfect father figure to Rory (not totally because he’s a good example to her or whatever, but because he loves her more than anything) and Lorelai is indescribably safe and secure with Luke.
• Christopher……meh.
  I could live without Christopher in this revival. He can swan in for maybe a couple of minutes, have minimal screen time just so we know what he’s up to now, but that’s it. He inhibits the girls.

Gilmore Girls is so special to me. Stars Hollow is my spiritual home. Lorelai is my idol (I may or may not be planning on naming my first born daughter Lorelai someday); I identify so much with Rory, I yearn for a rock like Luke, my first boyfriend was a little too much like Dean – and Logan is every guy I fancied for a long time after that break-up. Like the Gilmore ladies, I find such comfort in junk food and old movies. Carole King is my ultimate musical heroine, and she not only sings the theme song with her gorgeous daughter Louise Goffin, she also stars in series 3 as the owner of the music shop where Lane Kim finds her sound.

I can remember the sickening horror I felt the day they stopped showing Gilmore Girls on E4 – this day happened to be a Friday 13th – and the immense relief when my sister and I were given the box set for Christmas from our parents. When I went away to uni and felt immensely homesick in the first month, my mum texted and said “Hey Rory, stay at Yale! We’re all rooting for you back in Stars Hollow xx”.

I would always watch the show at uni in my student bedrooms when I needed a lift, or a boot up the butt – my sister and I would negotiate who got what series DVD at the beginning of each semester.

Bottom line here is, I just want this reboot-reunion-revamp-revival to be as perfect as possible. I want the questionable end of series 7 slightly corrected and perfectly filtered into episode 1 of this new series.

I’m sure Amy S-P won’t let us Gilmorites down.

At the ATX Festival, she said the following words: “There’s nothing in the works at the moment’ (lies!) ‘…if it ever happened, I promise we’d do it correctly”. We trust you, Amy. Also, we are eternally grateful to you for this!

Go team! Copper Boom!