By Beth Nugent, Third Year, Film and Television
Whether it’s to obsess over the outfits, wish Luke’s diner was in your town, fight to the death over team Logan or Jess, or to raise your eyebrows at how Loreali was slightly too invested in Dean, Gilmore Girls (2000-2007) keeps you coming back every autumn with the same, if not more, enthusiasm than you had during your first watch.
For those who don’t know, Gilmore Girls revolves around a mother and a daughter as they go through life, each with their own individual challenges, love interests and triumphs. It ran for seven seasons, with a four part limited Netflix revival in 2016 (Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life), and still people (me) are yearning for more, so what makes this show so rewatchable?
There isn’t just one reason why this show has high levels of repeat viewers, but a large one could be that Gilmore Girls shows us a simpler life and one that we as a generation yearn for. As much as we love sending our friends tiktoks and binge watching shows on Netflix, there’s a part of us that looks at Stars Hollow and wishes that was us. These characters live in a world where most of their friends are a short walk away and their town thrives off community. There are frivolous town events that everyone shows up to and town hall meetings that display a time where people wanted to connect with their neighbours, even if it’s through arguing about planning permission. We can pretend that social media makes it easier for us to keep in touch with friends but Gilmore Girls shows us that nothing beats a tangible connection with meaningful quality time.
The setting of Stars Hollow is charming in itself, a sleepy town that goes through the changing seasons so clearly that it’s hard to imagine why anyone wouldn’t want to live in a place with snowy winters, leafy autumns and sunny summers. Situational TV shows have the benefit of allowing the viewer to become emotionally attached to the environment it’s set in, as well as the core characters, and through repetition of the same space the viewer feels like they’ve been there and that they’ve walked the streets alongside the characters. By using settings to attach the viewer to the show, rather than just the characters, it creates that nostalgic feeling we get once we revisit a show we’re so fond of. Showrunners and producers do this purposefully so that these iconic and recognisable places are cemented in your brain and woven in with feelings of warmth and joy. Stars Hollow is a perfect example of this - each episode is filled with wide shots of the town, exterior shots of the shop windows and often aerial shots highlighting the beauty of the entire town. By doing this we are clued into the routine the characters have in certain locations and become very familiar with the layout of the town. With all this information of the physical location of the town, our brains are tricked into believing that we’ve been there, making it all the more sweet when we return.
One of the more refreshing elements of the show is its commitment to giving the female characters space to feel their emotions in a way that feels real and authentic, without a hint of mockery, and it makes the show all the more relatable. Whilst admittedly most of us aren’t having observatories named after us, the majority of us know what it’s like to fight with our mother or to have our heart broken. The show gives space to the aftermath of these events that are usually downplayed as frivolous or ‘girlie’ in mainstream media and brings them to the centre of the story. It’s because of this dedication to writing the female experience in a way that never diminishes its importance, that makes women and girls all over feel seen and validated in a way that few other shows can do. Across its seven seasons we delve into complex female relationships, the central one being mother and daughter, but female friends also play a large part in progressing the plot line. Paris (played by Liza Weil) and Rory (played by Alexis Bledel), Lorelai (played by Lauren Graham) and Sookie (played by Melissa McCarthy), Lane (played by Keiko Agena) and Rory - these women are at the forefront, and yes they do make mistakes and sometimes their characters are truly unbelievable, but it’s a comfort to enter a world where formative relationships are explored with deep care and understanding.
Georgia Marsh
For all its feminism, it would be a disservice to the show to dismiss the love interests that have captured the hearts of many. In a world filled with movies and books showing love through death defying acts and supernatural barriers, it’s extremely comforting to be given mundane love stories that are closer to what we see and experience in real life. While there are endless valid reasons to hate on Rory’s boyfriends *cough cough* Dean *cough cough*, all Gilmore Girls fans can take a moment to appreciate that whilst there is only one man for Rory (Jess *cough cough*), each boyfriend taught her valuable lessons and helped her grow from a shy teenager to a complex and daring young woman. In between the fists being thrown between men demanding that they are Rory’s soulmate, it’s always nice to watch and see Lorelai get the love she deserves with Luke (played by Scott Patterson). It’s a quiet kind of love that helps the overall atmosphere of the show and gives a solid relationship to root for.
But whatever the reason, even if it’s just to hear Jess yell at Rory ‘Why did you drop out of Yale!’, rewatching the show is a cornerstone of many peoples colder month experience and with rumours of a revival sparking there’s no time like the present to remind yourselves of all that went down in Stars Hollow.
Featured Image: IMDB / Gilmore Girls
How many times have you watched Gilmore Girls?
