Jess’ Handwriting

LORELAI: I know. Look how hard he worked on that sign and everything. Look at the handwriting, it’s so precise, so determined. It’s focused-Luke.

RORY: That’s Jess’ handwriting.

LORELAI: Really? How do you know Jess’ writing?

RORY: Oh, well, I lent him a book and he wrote some stuff in it.

Lorelai’s examination of Jess’ handwriting is a sign of how much more careful, focused, and determined Jess really is, deep down. That boy has hidden depths. Is it possible that it was Jess who convinced Luke to put a new special on the board – and if so, was it a tease for Rory, knowing that she usually orders French toast?

Lorelai also discovers that Rory can recognise Jess’ handwriting, and that’s because he wrote in her book – “vandalised it”, as Lorelai says. Rory is careful to say that she “lent” her book to Jess, not that he took it without asking, the very first moment he met her.

Note that the sign next to the chalkboard is for the Howland Mercantile Co., a reminder of Jess writing in the margins of Rory’s copy of Howl and Other Poems.

Surprisingly, Lorelai doesn’t seem to be able to tell Luke’s handwriting from Jess’, even though Luke writes on the chalkboard all the time. Unless Jess and Luke have the same handwriting?

The Specials at Luke’s Diner

LORELAI: Luke’s special omelette. That is brand new.

RORY: A new special? His four-slice French toast has been up there since I was born!

An obvious exaggeration. Luke’s Diner didn’t exist when Rory was born, and Rory didn’t live in Stars Hollow until she was two. It shows just how much Rory dislikes change – in “Like Mother, Like Daughter”, Rory bewails being forced out of her cosy little rut at Chilton to make friends.

French toast seems to be Rory’s go-to breakfast at Luke’s Diner, apparently because it is always on the specials board.

Geneva Convention

LORELAI: You know, you’re bound by the rules of the Geneva Convention, Mother, just like everyone else.

The Geneva Conventions are treaties and protocols that establish international legal standards for humanitarian treatment during war. The singular Geneva Convention refers to the agreements of 1949, negotiated in the aftermath of World War II. Lorelai melodramatically compares her being asked to wait for a meal to someone being tortured during wartime.

Antique Car

RORY: When did he get that antique car anyhow?

EMILY: A couple of horrible weeks ago.

It’s now around the middle of April, so Richard bought his antique car at the beginning of the month. It seems that Richard has gone through several hobbies since he retired earlier in the year – even though Emily urged him to try new things, she doesn’t seem that thrilled with any of his choices.

In real life, Edward Hermann, who played Richard, was a car enthusiast and did restore antique cars as a hobby.

(Technically it’s possible that this is the same Friday the previous episode ended on, but it doesn’t seem likely, because that finished with a big community feast at the diner. Lorelai and Rory shouldn’t be so hungry if they’d eaten only an hour earlier).

No Eating at Friday Night Dinner

The episode begins with Rory and Lorelai sitting at the table with Emily, but unable to begin eating because Richard is not there yet. Emily says that she will never start dinner without Richard unless he’s out of town or seriously ill, but in fact there’s been a few episodes where Emily has started dinner without Richard because he’s been busy or on the phone. And in “Hammers and Veils”, she rushes them to start dinner without Richard because he has an early flight the next day.

What makes it even more unbelievable is that Emily has allowed the cook/maid to serve the meal, and there is actually roast beef and vegetables sitting right on the table in front of them, getting cold. Apparently Emily will serve a meal without Richard, but won’t start eating until he arrives. Emily’s annoyance with Richard’s tardiness is soon weaponised to make everyone else miserable.

“You’re officially a part of this town now”

RORY: You facilitated it, you made it happen, so I guess that means that you’re officially a part of our town now.

JESS: Hey, wait a minute.

Having pestered, nagged, and occasionally dragged Jess into helping Luke by working at the diner, just as she gave him a scolding and inspired him to fix Luke’s toaster, Rory now tells him that he is a part of the town. As well as helping Luke, it feels as if Rory was also trying to rehabilitate Jess, or improve his reputation. Jess seems slightly alarmed by this, and rejects the idea that he’s part of Stars Hollow – he’s always seen himself as “on the road”, a freewheeling drifter who’s just on his way through.

Luke worries that he and his uncle Louie were parallel to each other, but in fact it is Jess who is most like his great-uncle, Louie Danes. Both are unpopular in town, and considered to be rude, antisocial pains in the backside, given the cold shoulder by the good folk of Stars Hollow. Maybe like Louie, the town would soon turn forgiving should Jess actually die – a plot line Milo Ventimiglia urged upon the writers of Gilmore Girls, to no avail.

Of course, by roping Jess into helping out, Rory has ensured that she and Jess have spent most of the week (was it a week?) together, and working together respectably in public as well, so that everyone can see they are friends. Notice has exaggeratedly Rory addresses Jess as “friend” and “buddy” while she teases him, letting everyone know that she and Jess are just good friends.

What Dean thought about this volunteer work, we don’t know – he isn’t seen or mentioned in this episode. Since the Bid-on-a-Basket Festival, Dean only shows up in order to play the jealous boyfriend, never to just spend time with Rory or to help her out.

“Why did you put me through all that?”

TAYLOR: Why did you put me through all that hoohah at the town meeting if your vegetable business was just temporary?

TROUBADOUR #2: Actually, you put yourself through it, Taylor. You put yourself through it.

The vegetable stall sub-plot comes breezily to a close with Second Troubadour telling Taylor that he was only doing it on a very temporary basis, selling off all the excess produce from his garden in a few days to make a bit of extra money. How he managed to grow such a large amount of vegetables and fruit all at once is something of a headscratcher, although its superior quality is plausible, since home grown produce is nearly always better than that sold in supermarkets.

It seems that apart from making money, his motivation was to get revenge on Taylor for not allowing him to become a Town Troubadour in Stars Hollow. By setting up a rival fruit and vegetable business across the street from Doose’s Market, he took business away from Taylor and made him panic. And as he says, Taylor “put himself through it”, he knew enough of Taylor to understand how to push his buttons. Why he originally wanted to be a Troubadour in Stars Hollow remains a mystery.

The sub-plot of the bountiful spring harvest is to underscore the death of Louie Danes, who is “harvested” by the Reaper, and buried in the soil, part of the natural cycles of time and the earth.

Louie’s Wake

LUKE: What’s going on?

RORY: It’s kind of like a wake.

When Luke and Lorelei get back from the funeral, they find a wake for Louie in full swing at the diner. No matter how they felt about Louie while he was alive, we see how Stars Hollow comes together to honour the death of one of their own. He may have retired to Florida (and the town threw a party in celebration), but now the town reclaims him as a citizen.

In life Louie was a disgusting rude old man, in death he becomes a “colourful character” that his former victims can now view with humour and affection. More than anything, you can’t help think that people in Stars Hollow just can’t permit an opportunity for a party to slide by. These are the people who threw a wake for a cat, after all!

Notice how many fresh vegetables and salads there are at the wake – the temporary market stall in the park has been a major contributor to the celebration of Louie’s life.

The Stars Hollow Re-Enactors Come to Louie’s Funeral

LORELAI: It’s what your dad wanted.

LUKE: Yeah. Oh, I know Louie would’ve hated this.

LORELAI: That’s just a fringe benefit.

Despite their dislike of Louie Danes, the re-enactors do end up coming to his funeral. It’s not only a tribute to their former fellow member, William Danes, but what Louie is due as a returned war veteran. No matter his many flaws as a human being, he did serve his country, and has earned at least this modicum of respect.

“You are not your uncle”

LUKE: What Taylor said about me being like Louie, a loner, never being married and stuff. I mean, I am getting crankier as I get older, he’s not so far off.

LORELAI: You are not your uncle. I mean, would Louie ever build someone a chuppah, or help fix things around someone’s house without being asked, or make a special coffee cake with balloons for a girl’s sixteenth birthday?

The point of the episode is for Luke to begin questioning whether he is on the same path as Louie – a bit of a cranky loner, unmarried and childless, with only a lonely death ahead of him that will come as a welcome relief to those around him.

Lorelai, who has always been one of the first to criticise him for his loner tendencies, reassures Luke that he is not Louie. Unlike Louie, Luke has a kind heart, and has done many things to help Lorelai and Rory, as well as taking in Jess without asking for anything in return. I think it’s fair to say that Louie would never have bothered so much over an uncle’s funeral as Luke dutifully does for him, either.

Lorelai and Luke have this conversation in front of a wreath of spring flowers, Lorelai wearing a jacket with a pattern of deep red roses, symbolising love, and a pink tee-shirt under it. There’s something slightly romantic or even wedding-like about the look of the scene. It’s certainly not funereal.