Lorelai’s Graduation
Day
Season 2, Episode 21
Original airing: May
14, 2002
My Rating: 67
The Good:
I really enjoyed the way the stories tied together in this
episode. The set up for Lorelai’s graduation led very naturally in to some
sweet moments with Lorelai’s parents. And it fed perfectly in to Rory missing a
big event in Lorelai’s life and opening up the conversation about Jess.
I adored the scene at the Gilmore manor when Rory invited
Emily and Richard to the ceremony. It was very impressive to see her balance
her mother’s wishes against her grandparents’ feelings. I like how calmly and
nicely she lays out the idea that Emily and Richard should only attend if they
genuinely want to see Lorelai graduation and will be bringing a spirit of
goodwill with them. She doesn’t accuse anyone of being spiteful on purpose, but
makes it clear that they will not be welcome if they can’t be happy for
Lorelai. I especially love how Rory shuts down Emily’s small bit of temper when
Emily asks why Lorelai didn’t invite them herself. It’s because Lorelai would
expect her parents to act exactly how they are acting when they first hear the
news. Now they have some time to get their heads on straight and at least
attempt to enjoy the event.
Of course, even when they do arrive they are initially more
concerned with propriety than anything else. Emily must have the perfect
recording of the ceremony and Richard can’t help but complain about the commencement
speaker. But it’s all wiped away when Lorelai steps on stage. The sudden
emotion in Emily and Richard’s faces is fantastic. They both look like they’ve
been hit by a truck as they realize they are proud of their daughter. And I absolutely
love that Lorelai sees them from the stage. She gets to spend one perfect
moment basking in their adoration of her accomplishment.
After the ceremony, the good feelings continue with Lorelai
asking for a picture with her parents. I love that their photo taken as a
family is done with Lorelai’s disposable camera and not one of Emily’s fancy
cameras brought by her cameraman. It’s down to earth, simple, and very Lorelai.
Meanwhile, Rory’s divergent storyline with Jess is
practically perfection. The show does a great job of making her arrival in New
York and ability to find Jess quite believable. He name drops Washington Square
Park which is much smaller than Central Park. Being able to wander up to his
bench worked really well. I like that they can’t seem to really talk about what
happened or what’s going on back in Stars Hollow. Jess can barely even say Luke’s
name. They’re time together is sweet and based on mutual interests, not
rehashing an accident neither could control. The sparks and smiles are
extremely strong as it feels like they’ve been separated for weeks.
But my favorite part was after Rory got back on the bus.
Jess waits until the last moment to ask her the big question – why did she come
to find him? It felt completely in character for him to take this risk after
she was safely distanced from him. All they have is eye contact and their
voices and their able to put themselves out there just a little bit. Their
goodbyes are incredibly sweet and painful.
The reconnection of the stories didn’t work quite as well as
other things in this episode (See The Bad). But I did like the second half of
the final scene. I thought this was a great way for Rory to finally admit that
she likes Jess. She’s in full on denial now which should be interesting for
future scenes involving Dean. And it made sense for Lorelai to forgive Rory
missing her graduation. Rory is obviously distraught about disappointing
Lorelai and her confusing feelings for two boys at the same time. Lorelai is
able to forgive her and see things much more clearly now. I was really proud of
Lorelai for stepping in and trying to tell Rory it’s ok to be confused at this
point. She’s not a bad person for liking two guys; it’s really going to come
down to how she handles it. And Lorelai even implies that if this means the end
of Rory’s relationship with Dean that would be okay as well. That’s a pretty
powerful concept, especially coming from Dean’s biggest supporter.
In the background, I liked that Lane is continuing to
practice her drumming and I liked that we had a small scene showing that Lorelai
and Luke are still on the outs. I don’t want these things to be forgotten by
the show.
The Bad:
While I really liked the second half of the final scene, I thought
the first half was flubbed. It was fine for Rory to focus on missing the
graduation and try to avoid talking about Jess, but it went on rather
excessively long for me. And it felt like it was supposed to be funny with the
manner that she delivered an on-going list of self-punishments. But that all
fell quite flat for me. I think this could have been shortened a great deal and
it would have been a better lead in to the meat of the scene (See The Good).
I was also not a huge fan of Paris’ rant. While she’s a
generally fun character, I thought her involvement in this particular scene was
distracting. Rory is making the decision to skip school and go to New York in
this moment and instead of paying attention to that, I’m listening to Paris
complain about her math teacher.
But those are relatively minor complaints. The really bad
part of this episode was the mini subplot of Lorelai trying to fit in with the
other graduates. Liza and Zak were completely random characters and extremely
annoying. Again, I think this is intended to be funny, but it’s not. They’re
rude to each other and hateful about everything Emily is doing. They don’t come
across as nice people and I don’t understand why Lorelai is supposed to be
concerned with what they think of her. This was an irritating and confusing
part of the episode.
Favorite Moment:
My favorite moment was Jess and Rory finally saying goodbye
at the bus station. It was extremely bittersweet.
The Bottom Line:
This was a pretty solid episode with some great development
of Lorelai’s character and the Rory and Jess romance storyline. It had some failed
humor, but the preponderance of strong moments at the end really lifted the
whole thing up.
