Footnotes to the TV series
ZACK: Dude, Lawrence Welk cranked louder than this.
Lawrence Welk (1903-1992), accordion player, bandleader, and host of The Lawrence Welk Show on TV from 1951 to 1982. His style of music became known as champagne music, that is, light and bubbly. He had numerous hits, the most popular being “Calcutta”, which went to #1. For many years, he was a byword for “lame old people music”.
The song that Lane’s band is rehearsing at band practice. Zack (very quietly) sings the song’s opening lyrics:
London calling to the faraway towns
Now war is declared and battle come down
London calling to the underworld
Come out of the cupboard, you boys and girls
“London Calling” is a 1979 song by English punk band The Clash, previously discussed. It is the title track from the band’s third album, a double album, written by Joe Strummer and Mick Jones. The song’s title comes from the BBC’s World Service station identification, “This is London calling …”, used during World War II, especially in broadcasts to occupied countries. The lyrics reflect the band’s concerns with world events, such as nuclear disaster, flooding, police brutality, and casual drug use. The song ends with the Morse code signal for S-O-S, to reiterate the sense of urgency.
The song went to #11 in the UK, becoming their highest-charting single to that point. It didn’t chart in the US, but was the first song by The Clash to chart outside the UK, reaching the Top 20 in Ireland and Top 30 in Australia and New Zealand. The song is regarded by many critics as the band’s finest, and it is consistently rated as one of the greatest rock songs of all time.
This episode is the first time we see Lane’s bandmates, Zack and Brian.
Zack is the lead guitarist and vocalist for the group, shown almost immediately to be a typical frontman, good looking and confident. He later becomes Lane’s boyfriend, then husband. Zack is played by Todd Lowe, who at this stage had had small roles in a few films, such as Where the Heart Is, and The Princess Diaries, and appeared in two episodes of Walker, Texas Ranger (once as a character named Zack!). Amy Sherman-Palladino used him again later in Bunheads, and he became best known for his role on vampire drama True Blood.
Brian is the bassist for the group, a little awkward and nerdy. He is played by John Carbrera, who is a friend of Sean Gunn who plays Kirk on Gilmore Girls; they attended the same theatre school in Chicago. At this stage Carbrera had had a few minor roles in TV shows such as CSI and NCIS. The previous year, he had won an award for his work in theatre. Recently, he has increasingly concentrated on screenwriting.
There have already been characters with these names on Gilmore Girls – Zach was Lorelai’s classmate at community college in Season 2, and Brian was one of the waiters at the Independence Inn in Season 1.
[Shane rushes over to Jess at the counter]
LORELAI: That girl’s a freak.
[Jess and Shane start kissing]
Lorelai says that Shane is a “freak” because she kisses her boyfriend in public – something Rory does all the time, and something Lorelai did when she was a teenager! It’s a pretty terrible thing to say about a teenager who is literally right there.
Even though Lorelai doesn’t want Rory to go out with Jess, for some reason she seems miffed that Jess has chosen somebody else, and snipes about Shane (she should be grateful Shane is making Jess unavailable). She may be trying to send Rory the message that only a “freak” would go out with Jess.
LANE: We practice for two hours, I’m home in time to watch reruns of Johnny Yune’s talk show on Korean television with my mom, who thinks I hooked up with you guys – which I did, so I’m not even lying.
Johnny Yune, born Yoon Jong-seung (1936-2020), Korean-American actor, singer, and comedian. He began performing stand up in 1964, and got his big break appearing on The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson in 1979. He was one of the show’s most frequent comedy guests. He is best known for playing the lead role in the 1980s comedy films, They Call Me Bruce, and They Still Call Me Bruce.
From 1989-90, he hosted The Johnny Yune Show, the first Americanised talk show in Korea The show was a hit, but after only a year, Yune decided to leave due to limited freedom of the media.
Mrs Kim is watching reruns of his talk show on KBS America, the local platform for Korean Broadcasting System, South Korea’s national broadcaster.
LANE: Hello Stars Hollow, are you ready to rock?
LORELAI: Let me guess, band practice tonight?
Lane was given permission by Sophie to use the music store to practice drumming two evenings a week, on Wednesdays and Fridays at 6 pm (evenings when she knew her mother would be out doing church activities). Lane is now really pushing that generous offer by finding a band that needs a drummer and letting them use Sophie’s music store as a free rehearsal space! It sounds like a pretty awful way to repay Sophie, but maybe Lane already fixed this up with Sophie offscreen. I hope so.
You may be wondering whether this episode starts on a Wednesday evening – it can’t be Friday, because Lorelai and Rory are having dinner at the diner, instead of heading off to Hartford for Friday Night Dinner with Richard and Emily. It appears to be a Saturday, oddly enough, so perhaps Lane also got Sophie to agree to a third evening of band practice per week. How Sophie would have agreed to all these changes to the orginal agreement, I don’t know.
This scene shows how happy Lane is to finally be in a band and playing music, she is absolutely radiating joy as she bounces into the diner and starts eating Rory’s dinner. Lane isn’t making any effort to keep her activities a secret, and even though Stars Hollow is super gossipy, she doesn’t seem worried about Mrs Kim finding out. Maybe that’s how confident she feels now she’s actually living her dream.
LORELAI: Now, this last one’s a little more gory. I’m out hunting … And my gun backfires and my whole face spins around a bunch of times and winds up in the back of my head like Daffy Duck.
Daffy Duck, animated cartoon character created for Leon Schlesinger Productions by animators Tex Avery and Bob Clampett. He first appeared in the short film Porky’s Duck Hunt in 1937, and is a staple character in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoon series. He is an assertive, combative figure whose lisp never stops him from putting forward his strong opinions.
A common gag is for Daffy to get shot in the face (quite often accidentally by himself), and his face spins around so that his bill ends up behind his head.
LORELAI: So, I think I’m in touch with the other side …
RORY: With Republicans?
The Republican Party in the US, founded in 1854 by anti-slavery activists, with an elephant as its symbol, for reasons nobody seems sure about. It shifted towards the right in the early twentieth century and is now a socially conservative party, tending to favour free market economics. It supports lower taxes, gun rights, restrictions on immigration, restrictions on abortion, restrictions on unions, and increased military spending. Since the 1850s it has been the main political rival to the Democratic Party, so when Lorelai says she is in touch with “the other side” (meaning the supernatural realm), Rory asks whether she means the other side of politics. Lorelai and Rory are Democrat supporters.
DARREN: [on answering machine] I just wanted to let you know that I just finished going over Rory’s records here, and no shock, they’re perfect. Rory, you are tailor-made for Harvard. They’re lucky to have you. As far as I’m concerned, you should pack your bags. I’m gonna tell all this to the people in admissions and I’ll give your headmaster a call as well, so take care and we’ll talk again.
There is no way that the alumnus who interviewed a prospective student would tell them to “pack their bags” – there are many, many excellent students who aren’t accepted into Harvard, nobody can guarantee anyone a spot, unless something very corrupt is going on. This goes right up there with Headmaster Charleston telling Rory she deserves to go to Harvard, just after she’s discovered breaking into his office, no less.
However, this is a way to neatly tie up the episode and let the viewers know that Rory will almost certainly be accepted into Harvard, and all her application anxieties are at an end. Although Rory has work for the newspaper to complete, and Lorelai needs to do tasks for the inn, they elect to spend their Sunday hanging out together instead, as if aware that their time together is running short, and therefore more precious.
JACKSON: I have this collection of antique farming tools that my dad passed down to me.
SOOKIE: Pre-Revolutionary War. They’re kind of valuable.
JACKSON: And I’ve got no place to put them. I’ve been looking for the right space.
LORELAI: In Rory’s room?
Sookie and Jackson continue being ridiculously annoying since their marriage. Now Jackson asks Lorelai if he can store his valuable collection of antique farming tools in Rory’s room when she goes away to college, as he has nowhere to put them. Oh really? So where are they now? Because wherever they are, that’s a place he has to put them.
The idea that when a teenager goes away to college their bedroom is now “free space” is ludicrous. Rory will still need to come home, she will need somewhere to sleep, study, and put her things away for at least a few years. And even if Lorelai did decide to use Rory’s room for something else, why on earth would she want to display someone else’s old tools in it?
I think this is meant to be a sad or bittersweet moment when Lorelai realises with a pang that Rory will soon be gone, but it ends up being stupid and irritating instead.
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 