In an ideal world, “Gilmore Girls” fans would care just as much about Rory Gilmore’s (Alexis Bledel) career as they do about her love life. But most of them don’t.
Our evidence: The many fierce debates over the last decade about whether Rory should have ended up with Dean, Jess, or Logan. Or no one at all. And, frankly, it’s a lot more fun to discuss romantic entanglements than a fledgling — and often frustrating — writing career.
In Netflix’s “Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life” released on Friday, viewers finally saw how Rory’s story ends. Let’s break it down one by one.
Logan (Rory’s college boyfriend, played by Matt Czuchry)
Of all the scenarios we imagined for Rory, we never thought one would be “Embroiled in a torrid affair with Logan while she’s dating a sad sack named Paul and Logan’s engaged to a French heiress named Odette.”
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Yet that’s what happens starting in the very first episode. We learn Rory is dating a guy named Paul who is so forgettable that literally no one can remember meeting him — and Rory forgets him quite often too, even though he’s her boyfriend of two years (!). Mostly, she’s just too busy to break up with him.
And that’s because every time she’s in London, she stays with Logan, her troublemaking ex from Yale who also helped her discover a new world outside of her introverted shell. Even though they have a “when we’re together, we’re together, and when we’re not, we’re not” arrangement, it starts to fall apart. It didn’t work when they tried something similar at Yale, so why would it work now?
(Side note: We know that the revival jumped ahead eight years, but this affair with Logan seems wildly out of character for Rory — although considering she was fine dating Dean while he was still married to Lindsay, maybe not. Carry on.)
Even though Rory and Logan have great chemistry and they enjoy each other’s company, Rory puts her foot down when Logan’s fiancee, Odette, moves in with him. Rory is extremely offended when Logan suggests she stay at a hotel “like a geisha” when she’s in town, and breaks it off with him at the end of the third episode.
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“I realized I can’t call you anymore. Because she’s there,” Rory tells him. “So that’s it, we’re breaking up. Except we can’t break up because we’re nothing.” (Again, whose idea was this idiotic arrangement in the first place? We digress.)
In typical Logan fashion, he can’t let that be goodbye — he flies to Stars Hollow and enlists his college pals for one more giant Life and Death Brigade extravaganza. Rory and Logan sleep together one last time before they say farewell forever, and he goes back to London to marry Odette. Before he does, Logan tries to peer-pressure Rory into borrowing his family’s house in Maine (oh yeah, Logan is still absurdly wealthy) so she can finish writing her book.
“If you change your mind about the house…” Logan trails off after they kiss.
“I think your days of rescuing me are over,” Rory says.
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“You never really needed rescuing, Ace,” Logan says, a callback to her old pet name. “You know that.”
“I do now,” Rory sighs.
End scene. Really.
Jess (Rory’s second high school boyfriend, played by Milo Ventimiglia)
Ah, bookish bad-boy Jess. Many fans are Team Jess. Too bad Ventimiglia was busy filming “This is Us” and didn’t have more time to devote to the series. He and Bledel have a delightful rapport, even though they’re real-life exes.
Share this articleShareOr, maybe that’s why Jess and Rory only get a few scenes together. Either way, it’s a pivotal one, as he visits Rory at her new job as editor of the Stars Hollow Gazette, after she’s devastated when the job with Conde Nast doesn’t work out, and even got turned down from the SandeeSays website. “I could’ve been a contender,” she says wistfully, sipping whiskey around noon.
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But just like Jess convinced her to go back to Yale in the sixth season after she dropped out, he’s the one who points out what she should really be doing with her life. “You should write a book,” he says. Specifically, a book about her and Lorelai’s mother-daughter best friend relationship. Because what topic does she know better?
That’s pretty much their only interaction – except later on, when Luke asks if Jess still has feelings for Rory, and he says “no way.” But then we see him gazing lovingly at Rory through a window, so maybe there’s hope for them yet.
Dean (Rory’s first high school boyfriend, played by Jared Padalecki)
Many viewers re-watch “Gilmore Girls” and realize that Dean, as sweet as he seemed at first, was actually a Stage 5 clinger with a possessive streak. Then there was that whole “affair” situation when he was married.
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Anyway – it’s all ancient history! Rory bumps into Dean at the grocery store and they have a nice little reunion. She inquires about his wife (Jenny) and kids (there’s three and another one the way), and it turns out Dean got out of Stars Hollow and now lives in Scranton, Pa.
Rory ultimately tells him about her book idea – and asks if she can include him, because he was the best boyfriend ever, and if only he had come along when she was older and more mature. Naturally, Dean says yes. Then they have a cute moment with corn starch, a callback to when Dean kissed Rory in the market, and she was so startled that she ran away and accidentally shoplifted a box of corn starch.
Nope, she’s not a teacher, like some theorized. She stuck with journalism and is now a freelancer, with bylines in Slate and The Atlantic and even The New Yorker, with a Talk of the Town piece that no one can stop raving about. Still, she’s struggling to find a full-time job – a too-real scenario for all the journalism majors out there.
She has her heart set on Conde Nast, but her informational interview keeps getting bumped. Eventually when she does make it through the door (thanks to a phone call from Logan’s dad – that had to hurt her pride), she doesn’t really click with the editors. Then she has a terrible interview at SandeeSays, a website that sounds like a cross between Huffington Post and HelloGiggles, and it’s back to Square One.
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That’s when she heads back to Stars Hollow and winds up accepting a job as editor of the Stars Hollow Gazette, a position that pays no money. But if she doesn’t take the job, it’s going to shut down, and she can’t fathom letting a storied institution fade away. So she accepts the position and starts drinking in the middle of the day, because she’s mildly depressed and the only staff member who isn’t at least 70 years old.
That’s when Jess arrives with the idea of the book about her and Lorelai. Suddenly, Rory realizes it’s what she’s meant to do, and the words practically spill out as she writes the outline and first few chapters. All she needs is her mother’s blessing.
Unfortunately, Lorelai isn’t thrilled – she doesn’t really want her life story out there for the world when she’s worked so hard to protect it. They argue and stop speaking for awhile. Eventually, Lorelai comes around and says Rory can write the book. She trusts her. “If I don’t like it, I’ll just sue your ass,” she jokes. Rory excitedly accepts these terms, but not before Lorelai gives her some crucial advice about the book, tentatively titled “The Gilmore Girls.”
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“Just one note. Drop the ‘the,’” Lorelai tells her. “Just ‘Gilmore Girls.’ It’s cleaner.”
A clear homage to “The Social Network” (“Drop the ‘the.’ Just ‘Facebook.’ It’s cleaner.”), we can only assume Rory will have Mark Zuckerberg-levels of success, just in the publishing world. Considering her dream to be a writer, that’s a pretty great ending.
Plus, thanks to the bombshell final four words, we discover in the last seconds of the show that Rory’s pregnant. So, unless the creators and entire cast want to reunite again in another 10 years, we’ll be left with that fun cliffhanger forever.
Read more:
‘Gilmore Girls’ on Netflix: A refresher (and rating) on each season
As a teen, I saw myself in Rory. Now I strive to be like Lorelai.
‘Gilmore Girls’ revival: How a reboot goes from idea to reality
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