Rory Skips School

Rory walks through Chilton’s front gates with Paris, Paris doing all the talking. As Paris heads to her locker, Rory looks around apprehensively, then walks back through the gates. She’s not only skipping school but also missing out on a meeting of the school paper which she told Lorelai she had after school, meaning she wouldn’t be at the graduation ceremony until 6 pm. This doesn’t seem like something a really keen journalist would do. Perhaps Rory hopes to make it back to school in time for the meeting.

Skipping school for no reason, especially at this crucial point of the school year, seems like something Chilton wouldn’t be very impressed about (let alone Paris). However, we never see Rory face any consequences for it. Perhaps she made up the work she missed, or Lorelai wrote the school a note or something to explain her absence.

Note that even while approaching the school with Paris, Rory is already looking away as if wishing she was somewhere else, or looking for an escape route.

Rory’s Fashion Advice

RORY: Take light layers. Wear your turquoise and tan dress that you just got that’s cool and it’ll look good without your gown on, and wear your turquoise vintagey sweater over it because it’ll look great with the dress and it’ll keep you warm if it’s cold in the auditorium.

LORELAI: You are a fashion genius.

RORY: Well, you’ve taught me everything I know.

Rory’s fashion advice to Lorelai is a callback to “Kiss and Tell” in Season 1, when a panicked Rory can’t decide what to wear for her first date with Dean until Lorelai picks out a top for her. Now it is Rory’s turn to help out her mother when she is too keyed up about graduating to select an outfit.

I’m not sure whether we’re meant to think Rory has become a full-blown fashion expert in the past 18 months, or just that either Gilmore girl is capable of getting the odd brain freeze, and needs the other to help out so they can get dressed. The shows seems to be leaning towards the former, because Rory was so stunned at the way her mother could instantly pick the right top.

Also note, Rory Gilmore’s fashion genius advice – wear layers, no headwear over curls. You got that for free.

Jess Phones Rory

Jess phones Rory out of the blue – conveniently it’s at a time that Lorelai is celebrating the end of her exams and too drunk to notice or care, so they are able to talk privately in Rory’s bedroom. And Lorelai is playing loud music in the living room, so there’s no chance of Lorelai overhearing their conversation. Jess has been extraordinarily lucky in the time he chose to phone up!

It’s now two weeks since Jess left Stars Hollow, and he makes contact with Rory, but neither of them know what to say to each other – and Jess soon says he needs to go when he learns that Lorelai is in the house with Rory. (He’s on a payphone on a pavement, so can’t really talk properly anyway). This intriguing yet unsatisfying phone conversation is what propels Rory into one of her rare, yet surprisingly regular, moments of madness.

Notice that when the phone rings, Lorelai jokes that if it’s Mick Jagger to blow a whistle and hang up. She’s earlier said she wanted to keep her children away from Mick Jagger, and suggests using a whistle to deter him – in other words, activating an anti-rape device designed to raise an alarm and gain people’s attention to your plight. Jess is definitely someone Lorelai wants kept away from her kid, and the suggestion of rape seems like a foreshadowing of later events.

Mick Jagger

RORY: Okay, here’s an interesting question for you – “Have you given any thought to how children will work into your future plans?”.

LORELAI: Oh, well, uh, they’re not gonna stand in my way, that’s for sure. I mean, I plan to have some, of course, but I’m just gonna knock ’em out and, uh, have Nanny catch ’em and care for ’em, make sure Mick Jagger doesn’t come anywhere near them and then just return them to me when they’re twenty-one.

Sir Michael “Mick” Jagger (born 1943), English singer, songwriter, actor, and film producer who has achieved international fame as lead vocalist and founding members of the Rolling Stones, previously mentioned. His songwriting partnership with Keith Richards is one of the most successful in history. Jagger’s career has spanned over six decades, and he is known for his distinctive voice and energetic live performances. He gained press notoriety for his romantic involvements which is why Lorelai says she’ll make Nanny keep him away from her (imaginary) children.

He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989 and in 2004 into the UK Music Hall of Fame with the other band members. As both a member of the Rolling Stones, and as a solo artist, he has reached #1 13 times, made the Top Ten 32 times, and the Top 40 70 times. He was knighted in 2003 for his services to popular music.

Of course, this casual attitude to children is the exact opposite of Lorelai’s real mothering style, which is deeply protective, and, if anything, rather too involved in her daughter’s life. Although even in a joke, she is concerned about shielding them from unwanted influences.

52 Girls

This 1979 song is playing while Lorelai celebrates her exams being over with margaritas. It’s by new wave band the B-52s, from their debut album The B-52’s.The kitschy lyrics and hook-laden harmonies helped give the band a fanbase, and they released several chart-topping singles. The album received mostly positive reviews from critics, who noted that it cleverly recycled early funk and Chicago blues into an eminently danceable party album. The album went to #59 in the US, was most popular in Australia at #7, and is regarded as one of the greatest albums of all time.

This is a callback to “The Deer Hunters”, when Lorelai wore a B-52s tee shirt to the parent-teacher meeting. She told Max Medina she wasn’t really a big fan, it was just something to wear because she spilled coffee on her blouse. Now we see she is enough of a fan to own this album, and to put it on when she’s in a celebratory party mood.

By the way, the song’s title doesn’t refer to a particular number of girls, but is a tribute to those women, both famous and obscure, who rocked the beehive hairdo, otherwise known as the B-52, or just “the 52” (and are therefore “52 girls”). It is this hairstyle that the band is named after.

School Pageant

RORY: I had a school thing once, and I wasn’t sure if Mom would want to go so I didn’t invite her. It was my kindergarten “Salute to Vegetables” pageant and I was broccoli and I did a tap dance with a guy that was playing beets and the entire number I was just thinking, “Mom’s not here” and it was my fault that she wasn’t there and, well, it was kind of a life lesson for me.

We already know that Rory studied ballet with Miss Patty when she was a little girl, but apparently she did tap dancing even in kindergarten! I’m guessing Miss Patty also taught tap to the kindergarten class. In A Year in the Life, Rory takes up tap dancing again as a way to relieve stress.

Rory’s little anecdote about the school pageant is actually one of the more plausible things we hear about her childhood. Most things make her seem either too old for her age or too young, but it’s perfectly believable that the thoughtful young child of a single, working mother who’s a maid at an inn would be hesitant at asking her mother to come to a school pageant.

Little Rory would know how hard Lorelai works and that there’s no other parent to fall back on if she’s unavailable. I can imagine her feeling that a school pageant isn’t important enough to pull Lorelai out of work for, yet missing her horribly when the moment arrives, and seeing all the other mothers there.

The fact that she blamed herself entirely for the situation shows that even as a young child, she was already placing herself as the responsible person in the relationship with her mother, and taking on the parental role.

Rory Invites Richard and Emily to Lorelai’s Graduation

RORY: As you know, Mom’s been going to business school at the community college out here for three years now … Actually, she’s graduating Thursday, and there’s going to be a ceremony and I think it would mean a lot to her if you guys were there.

Concerned that Lorelai is making a mistake by not inviting her parents to her graduation ceremony, Rory takes it upon herself to give them tickets herself on an after school visit for afternoon tea. She makes a very mature, calm and rational submission to them, and you can tell that her days on the debating team haven’t been wasted.

At the end, she addresses her grandparents as “Richard” and “Emily” when tea is served, to indicate both how objective she was trying to be, and that she was speaking to them as a friend and equal, not as a beloved granddaughter pleading with them for a favour.

She wishes them to attend Lorelai’s graduation ceremony because they want to, not because they feel manipulated into it, and I think Rory’s sincere attempt to make things right is the main reason Richard and Emily go to the graduation ceremony with such a good attitude.

Lorelai and Luke Meet at the Market

LORELAI: Hey Luke, do you think we could –

LUKE: I gotta get back.

After awkwardly running into each other at Doose’s Market, Lorelai attempts a reconciliation, but Luke evades her overture by saying he has to get back to work. He is not ready to forgive her yet, and it’s another sign to Lorelai that Jess being gone has not really solved any of her problems.

I’m not sure what Luke came into the market for, but he’s just left without buying anything, so whatever it was, he didn’t get it!

Note that Frosted Flakes breakfast cereal is shown in the background, which was so prominent in the scene where Lorelai discovers Jess will be moving to Stars Hollow.

Skeet Shooting

While all three walk through the town square, Dean explains his new hobby of skeet shooting to Rory and Lorelai. He has taken it up at the urging of his father, who is a big fan of the sport.

Skeet shooting, elsewhere known as clay pigeon shooting or clay target shooting, is using a shotgun to try to break clay targets mechanically flung into the air at high speed from a variety of angles.

The show keeps giving Dean more and more interests that couldn’t be less compatible with Rory. Monster trucks, robot battles, shooting … we get it now. He and Rory don’t belong together! The fact that Rory can’t wait to make fun of her own boyfriend for daring to have hobbies she doesn’t share seems like another red flag Dean should have paid attention to.

“My stupid conservative high school”

RORY: You’ve never been a part of an actual graduation ceremony.

LORELAI: I know. That’s because my stupid conservative high school wouldn’t let me be in the ceremony and nurse you at the same time.

We discover here that Lorelai did not graduate from her private high school. Although she jokes they wouldn’t let her graduate while nursing a baby, most likely she was actually asked to leave once her pregnancy became obvious. Her former classmate Mitzi said she hadn’t seen Lorelai since “her seventh month”, suggesting that she didn’t return to school after the summer vacation of 1984.