This is the song that Sookie puts on for Jackson, because it’s one of his favourites, although she is not a fan.
“Bad Moon Rising” is a 1969 song written by John Fogerty, and performed by his band, Creedence Clearwater Revival, often known as CCR. Fogerty was inspired by scenes of a hurricane in the 1941 fantasy film, The Devil and Daniel Webster, and the apocalypse that Fogery claimed was going to be visited upon us.
It was the lead single from their Green River album, received glowing reviews, and went to #2 in the US and #1 in the UK, Ireland, New Zealand, and South Africa. It is considered one of the greatest rock songs of all time.
Lamb chops with Sicilian olives, rosemary, and garlic
Warm potato and chorizo salad (chorizo is a type of spicy Spanish pork sausage)
Cornbread (a quickbread made with cornmeal with origins in Native American cuisine)
Home made beef jerky (lean meat cut into strips and then dried)
Fried marshmallow pie (this only seems to exist as a Gilmore Girls-inspired recipe, suggesting Sookie invented it! It has been created as small hand-held pies with fried marshmallow filling inside flaky pastry, covered in glaze)
Note the specification of Sicilian olives, in line with the themes of the Mafia and betrayal in this episode, suggesting that Jackson feels really wounded.
RORY: I can’t believe I was her best friend. I feel awful. LORELAI: Look, I’ll tell you what. If you wanna make things right, just go back to school tomorrow and let her stab you.
It’s Friday Night Dinner, so why would Rory and Paris go to school the next day, Saturday?
Rory is surprised to discover that Paris considered her her best friend, which seems somewhat oblivious, considering that Paris already told Rory several times that she feels able to ask Rory for help in a way that she can’t with Louise and Madeline. Paris has made it fairly clear that she considers Rory her equal, and relies on her – Rory fulfils a role in her life that nobody else can.
I think Rory is meant to come across as sweet and humble here, but she actually seems too self-absorbed to understand how important she is to Paris.
RORY: I was trying to help you. PARIS: You were? You mean, in between betraying me and selling me out, you were trying to help me? Gee, you are quite the Renaissance woman, aren’t you?
Embodying a basic tenet of Renaissance humanism that humans are limitless in their capacity for development, the concept led to the notion that people should embrace all knowledge and develop their capacities as fully as possible. This is expressed in the term Renaissance man, often applied to the gifted people of that age who sought to develop their abilities in all areas of accomplishment: intellectual, artistic, social, physical, and spiritual.
Rory is therefore a Renaissance woman.
The thing that Paris finds most unforgiveable is that Rory told Francie about Jamie, but in fact Francie had already noticed for herself that Paris had a boyfriend and brought it up with Rory (no matter how implausibly Paris is wandering around her school with her college-aged boyfriend! Anything to keep Rory innocent).
It doesn’t seem like a coincidence that the James Bond film Die Another Day had come out the previous year, in 2002, directed by Lee Tamahori, and starring Pierce Brosnan as the title character.
It has a notable fencing scene in it [pictured], where James Bond has an unexpectedly aggressive fencing bout with the villain, Gustav Graves, played by Toby Stephens. The fencing instructor in the film is played by Madonna, one of Lorelei’s favourite celebrities (she also sings the film’s theme song). Less than a month after this movie’s release, UK fencing clubs saw an increase in the number of people interested in taking up the activity.
Die Another Day was a box-office smash, and the #6 film of 2002. It received reasonable reviews at the time, but is now considered one of the worst of the films in the series. It was heavily criticised by Pierce Brosnan.
The fencing instructor at Chilton is played by Teigh McDonough, whose background was in the Chicago theatre scene.
FRANCIE: Rory came to me and said she wanted to talk about some things . . . you know, policy, the prom, the senior gift, et cetera. So of course I said, “why don’t we talk about them at the student council meeting with Paris?” And she said she wanted to do this without Paris. She said Paris is just too wrapped up in that boyfriend of hers to care about any of this. I didn’t know what to do, so I went, and then I found these, and I’m just so upset. I mean, I would never intentionally do anything behind your back, Paris. And I promise, the next time Rory tries to get me to, I’m just gonna say, ‘Talk to the hand’, you know what I mean?
Talk to the hand, slang from the 1990s, a sarcastic way of saying the person doesn’t want to listen. More or less telling them to shut up. Often accompanied by holding the hand out with the palm towards the speaker, as if physically stopping the person from continuing.
Francie’s story about Rory is fanciful and accompanied by the most flimsy of evidence. Even if it were true, all she is claiming is that Rory spoke about the prom without involving Paris, which already happened at the supplementary meeting, and Paris wasn’t that bothered.
The fact that Paris falls for this farrago of lies tells us that Rory is more important to her than she has let on, and that she is far more insecure than she likes people to know. Also, plot drama!
SOOKIE: Oh wait! What’s that? It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s Super Jackson and his atomic pea tendrils!
Sookie sarcastically compares Jackson to the comic book superhero Superman. The television series Adventures of Superman, 1952-58, with George Reeves playing the title character, was introduced each episode with a crowd of people saying the lines, “Look! Up in the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s Superman!”.
Sookie and Jackson are still fighting over the produce he provides for the inn. Before they were dating, it seemed cute, as if fuelled by unresolved sexual tension. Now that they’re married, it seems stupid, as if their relationship hasn’t progressed, and more like workplace bullying.
RORY: Jess knows I’m friends with Dean, Dean knows I’m dating Jess, and they both seem fine with it … They do, I swear.
Lorelai is frankly disbelieving that Dean and Jess are “fine” with the situation. She has a far more realistic grasp of the situation than the naïve Rory!
DEAN: Rory and I are just friends, just like you and Rory were just friends. And hey, look how it turned out for you.
Dean is pretty much trolling Jess here, planning to make things as hard for him as he believes Jess made things hard for Dean when he was going out with Rory.
In the film, a grateful misty-eyed Farmer Hoggett says this line to the pig Babe after he has, against all odds, won a sheepdog trial, despite not being a dog. One of the most understated last lines in film history, it’s a dignified, restrained way for Lorelai to say Emily is doing very well indeed.
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 