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Gilmore Girls: The Complete Second Season

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2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

The second season of "Gilmore Girls" is when a lot of things did not happen to Lorelai Gilmore. It started with Lorelai not marrying Max ("Red Light on the Wedding Night") and ended with her not marrying Christopher ("I Can't Get Started"), but Sookie got married so at least there was some progress in that area, although the duo's plan to open an inn together hits a major roadblock ("The Ins and Outs of Inns"). Of course, the most important thing that did not happen to Lorelai was that she manages to really notice Luke despite the fact he is pretty much there in front of her every morning at the diner. Clearly the creators of "Gilmore Girls" remember what happened to "Moonlighting" once Dave and Maddie stopped bantering and started kissing and other things, so the agenda is to put off the inevitable for as long as possible. So even if it is obvious to everyone else in Stars Hollow (to wit, Emily), does not mean that Lorelai has a clue.

As for Rory, her junior year at Chilton has its ups and downs. and not just because of Paris. The ups would be "The Road Trip to Harvard" and making her society debut ("Presenting Lorelai Gilmore"), while the downside would be the rift between her and her grandfather because of Dean ("Sadie, Sadie") and the problems with Dean because of Jess ("There's the Rub" and "A-Tisket, A-Tasket"). If anything, the common denominator is to make sure that none of the Gilmore women are happy, which means Rory is mad at Lorelai for blaming Jess for the accident ("Help Wanted," Lorelai is mad at Emily for arranging their going to a spa together ("There's the Rub") and Emily is mad at Richard for quitting his job without consulting here ("The Bracebridge Dinner"). What? You thought Emily was going to be mad at Rory? Are you kidding? Have you not been watching this show?

For me the fascinating part is watching the yang of Lorelai and Emily's relationship compared to the yin of the Lorelai and Rory dynamic. For me some of the most memorable moments from season two are when Emily orders Richard to make up with Rory because if their granddaughter ever gets married she to know about it (Lorelai did not tell her parents about her engagement to Max) and the look on her parent's face with Lorelai gets her business school diploma ("Lorelai's Graduation Day"). But then a good rule of thumb is anytime we see a chink in Emily's armor it is a moment that will be hard to forget. I am still trying to make up my mind as to whether or not Lorelai has an even more strained relationship with her father than her mother, given his visit to her place of work ("Richard in Stars Hollow") and her visit to his new office ("Help Wanted"). I am certainly leaning in that direction, but it is still open to debate.

But overall the two emotional highpoints of the second season finding Lorelai giving and then receiving as good as she gets. The giving happens in "Teach Me Tonight" when a totally distraught Lorelai goes after Luke because of the car accident where Rory gets hurt (slightly hurt, but hurt is hurt, and there is a cast on her arm, mister), creating a serious rift in their relationship. The receiving is two episodes later in "Lorelai's Graduation Day" when Rory misses the big event and offers the most high speed combined heartfelt apology and verbal self-flagellation in television history (I agree with her, I think she had a stroke or something).

My strong affection for high-speed dialogue can be traced from "Gilmore Girls" back to "Moonlight" and beyond to "The Thing From Another World" and any movie starring Groucho Marx. Equally as strong is my enjoyment of gratuitous pop culture references, especially as manifested in "The Simpsons" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." So to have a series that combines both of these elements and provides deleted scenes on the DVD is one of those absolute joys you hear so much about (although my wife is tired of me explaining all of the references, allusions, and impromptu name dropping). Then again, while I knew from the start that Carole King was singing the show's theme song "Where You Lead" with her daughter Louis Goffin, I only recently figure out they had re-recorded the song with some of the lines changed to better fit the show (No, I do not fast forward through the title sequence; I always listen to the song).

I am also pleased to see that the "Gilmore Girls" is being seen around the world, although I have to wonder how the pop culture references translate into out cultures (I have no doubt people can speak real fast in any language). But you can see "Gilmore Girls" now from Argentina (the current season is on the Warner Channel Thursdays at 21:00 with past seasons shown weekdays at 11:30 and 16:30) to the United Kingdom (Sundays at 18:00 on Nickeloden U.K.). It is nice to think that Stars Hollow's madonna and child have gone international.

This was such a great season for Gilmore Girls... But this isnt a review I noticed the page for this item is seriously lacking in the information department so here is what I know.



The 22 episodes (976 mins) will be released in a 6 disc set with full frame (1.33:1) video, and English stereo audio (English, French, Spanish subtitles). The set also sports some interesting special features:

!Deleted Scenes
!International Success - a look at Gilmore Girls in various territories.
!A Film by Kirk
!Gilmore Goodies & Gossip: On-screen factiods appear during one episode
!Who Wants To Argue: A montage of season two's greatest fights

More proof that entertainment can be great even without a lot of heavy sexual overtones. Thanks, Warner Brothers. A brief episode guide:

01 Sadie, Sadie: Lorelai considers Max's wedding proposal.
02 Hammers and Veils: While Lorelai thinks about her wedding. Rory's extracurricular activities interfere with her romance with Dean.
03 Red Light on the Wedding Night: Sookie has a bachelorette party for Lorelai. Emily's stories make Lorelai think about what she really wants.
04 Road Trip to Harvard: Rory and Lorelai go on a road trip to Harvard University.
05 Nick & Nora/Sid& Nancy: Luke's teenaged nephew comes to live withhim.
06 Presenting Lorelai Gilmore: Emily asks Rory to make her debut at a Debutante Ball.
07 Like Mother, Like Daughter: Rory gets into an exclusive clique; Lorelai and Emily model matching outfits at a fashion show.
08 The Ins and Outs of Inns: Lorelai and Sookie decide to open their own inn.
09 Run Away, Little Boy: Rory is cast as Juliet in a class play and Dean is not happy about Tristin being selected to play Romeo.
10 The Bracebridge Dinner: When a blizzard causes a group to cancel for a historical dinner at the end, Lorelai invites friends to take their place.
11 Secrets and Loans: Lorelia doesn't have the money to treat her home for termits. Rory tells Emily, who offers a loan.
12 Richard in Stars Hollow: Richard tries to get used to retirement.
13 A-Tisket, A-Tasket: At a picnic basket auction, Jess outbids Dean for Rory's basket.
14 It Should've Been Lorelai: When Christopher shows up with a new girlfriend, Emily is upset that Lorelai and Christopher's relationship didn't work out.
15 Lost and Found: Rory loses the bracelet Dean made for her and accuses Jess. Luke wants more living space.
16 There's the Rub: Emily and Lorelai go to a spa.Rory is home alone.
17 Dead Uncles and Vegetables: Luke has to make funeral arrangements for his uncle.
18 Back in the Saddle: Richard decides to start a second career after helping Rory with a school project.
19 Teach Me Tonight: Rory helps Jess with his study, but they go for a drive and get into an accident.
20 Help Wanted: Lorelai volunteers to help Richard set up his consulting business. Lane decides to become a drummer.
21 Lorelai's Graduation: Richard and Emily show up for the ceremony, but Rory goes to New York with Jess.
22 I Can't Get Started: Christopher comes to town and decides to stay for Sookie's wedding. Lorelai finds out that he and his new girlfriend have broken up.

Ah, what to say about Gilmore Girls. Well I could gloat that this is "LIKE THE BEST SHOW EVER", but that would be childish. I could say it's changed my world, but then I'd be obsessive. I could, however, mention the way it puts a smile on my face whenever I watch it and luckily for me, that only sounds borderline crazy. Gilmore Girls is truly a magnificent show. It is smart, sophisticated, sweet, wholesome, crazy, and wildly entertaining. If you're not up to date with the Gilmore craze, it goes a little something like this. The show follows Lorelai Gilmore and her daughter Rory in their very small Connecticut town of Stars Hollow. The two are virtually insepearable and have an incredibly strong bond. Because Lorelai gave birth to Rory when she was only 16, they share a connection that leans more towards best friends than mother and daughter. They are both extremely witty, intelligent women who must survive the world one step at a time, all in the midst of their crazy town, where everyone knows each other- which makes keeping things private almost impossible. Season 2 introuduces bad-boy Jess, the nephew of Lorelai's secret love interest Luke, who takes a liking to Rory. Througout the season, Lorelai struggles between being with Max and Rory's father Christopher and the strained relationship with her parents. Meanwhile, Rory confronts her usual challenges at her private school, Chilton while facing the fear of life after high school. The season culminates in a lost love, a gained love and a few important relationships that could be changed forever. If you want something the whole family or just you can enjoy, laugh at, and love than Gilmore Girls Season 2 is perfect for you! The life of Rory and her mother are what will hook you, and their relationship with each other and their community of Stars Hollow is what will continuously pull you back. Leave it to Lorelai's introduction to show you the way to this wonderful DVD: "There are many paths in life. There's the 'Hey, you're cute- sure, I'll marry you after graduation and med school' and the 'Can you drive Susie to soccer today, 'cause I've got a pediure?' path. And then there's my path, where I found myself 16 and pregnant and I realized 'I have to get a job, I have to raise a kid and being me, I have to do it all by myself.' Not easy. But the thing with my path was, when I reached the end, I turned around and realized I'd ended up someplace really good."

I am absolutely obsessed with Gilmore girls. I watch every new episode religiously (whilst taping it, so I can immediately watch the highlights again once it's over.) There is a sign posted on my bedroom door saying "Do not disturb between hours of 9-10 Wednesday nights (I have Global, not the WB) on pain of death." Yeah. So anyways, I think you get the extent of how much I love this show.
I have seen all of season two before, and let me tell you, it is definetly a great season. I am counting down the days till this release. I don't know the quality of this particular set, but I'm going to expect it to be the same as season one. The picture is good, clarity is good, and the packaging is SUPERB. There are six discs in total, with four episodes on each disc. The last disc contains two episodes and special features. I haven't watched the special features yet, but it looks to be much better than season one - a "Film by Kirk" is reason enough to buy the DVDs!
I have watched these episodes twice each at least, and I'm still eagerly awaiting the arrival of this DVD.

I have been expounding the merits of Gilmore Girls since its' very first season, and continue to do so today - five years later. Like most shows, it has had its' ups and downs over time. However, I can assure you that the first and second seasons of the show are particularly fabulous and highly recommended.

This show is for individuals who want to see Intelligent, Vibrant, Hilarious, and Heart-Wrenching television - all in one amazing package. The best place to start with this show is definitely Season One. Where you are first introduced to the characters and will fall in love with them.

The Second Season is a continuation of the trials, tribulations, love stories, and heartaches of mother and daughter, Lorelai and Rory Gilmore. The "Girls" are surrounded by the crazy town of Stars Hollow, the 'elder' Gilmores, and potential love interests. And, while the premise may sound saccharine or mundane, believe me, it is anything but! The writing infuses the show with the kind of wit, sarcasm, and emotion that other shows would kill for. And, often the plethora of emotions are captured in a single *scene*, let alone a single episode!

Lauren Graham is the rock of this show. She is absolutely astounding. I have never had a "favorite television actress" before her. Her dialogue delivery is bar-none the best on television, because she doesn't just get the words out at break-neck speed. She also infuses the words with the exact emotion they call for. This season shows the continuation of her engagment to Max (Scott Cohen), and the re-appearance of Christopher (David Sutcliffe), the father of her child.

Alexis Bledel is also great as Rory. In the second season she deals with confusion in her love life, as Jess (Milo Ventimiglia) comes to Stars Hollow and makes her doubt her feelings for sweet boyfriend Dean (Jared Padalecki). You also see her continuing struggles at the haughty Chilton Prep School.

The supporting cast is equally fantastic. Special mention goes to Kelly Bishop as Emily Gilmore - who in my mind is really the third "Gilmore Girl". Viewers familiar only with the first season will also get a more in-depth view of Luke (Scott Patterson), as he struggles to raise his nephew Jess. Other standouts include Melissa McCarthy (Sookie), and Keiko Agena (Lane).

This show has always been about the smaller moments in life. If you're waiting for car explosions, graphic sex, or foul language, then you're watching the wrong show. But, if you want to watch a show that will engage you, take you inside its' world, and make you care about the characters, then this is the show for you. And, let me also state that this is not just a show for women! There are guys out there who will find this show just as amusing.

So, if you were on the fence before, and wondered whether checking out this show was worth your time. Get off the fence, and jump right in. Trust me... this is definitely television worth watching.

Ok, let me just clear something up: Just because it is called "Gilmore GIRLS" does NOT mean that it only appeals to girls! I am proud to say I am a 17 year old red blooded male with dvds like Die Hard and 24 and The Matrix, yet I love this series!!
It it fast paced, witty, full of pop culture references and it has some of the strongest performances you will ever see. I bought Season 1 on an impulse, just wanting to see what everyone was raving about, and now that I'm hooked, I will buy this one as well.

So, my message is to all you guys out there.....WATCH IT, you might just be surprised, I know I was.

The first season of this wonderfully rich and vibrant show on The WB was a fine and solid debut. It set things in place that the show will take higher and with even better results. Such is season two for an example. With the addition of a new character, the junior year scored. Opening with "Sadie, Sadie" and "Hammers And Veils", the two part opener resolves the Lorelei/Max cliffhanger from season one. This was originally aired as a two hour premiere. A great opener. Rory's future educational life and Lorelei's empty nest syndrome is given a foreshadowing in "The Road Trip To Harvard". Luke's nephew, the broody and troublesome Jess, debuts in "Nick & Nora/Sid & Nancy", after he is sent to live with Luke. He doesn't like anyone...except Rory. He causes some minor mayhem in the delightful "The Inns And Outs Of Inns", before turning the town on it's ear when Rory gets hurt in "Teach Me Tonight". An ongoing story arc here also concerns Richard and Emily(Edward Herrmann, Kelly Bishop), when Richard goes through a career crisis that we first really learn about in "Presenting Lorelei Gilmore", and is further expanded on in "Help Wanted", and "Back In The Saddle Again". One of the best episodes here is the wintery delight of "The Bracebridge Dinner", where Lorelei and Sookie invite friends and family to the inn. "Lost And Found" is another highlight, as the season ends with a wedding and a broken heart in "I Can't Get Started". There are many more good things here, but too many to write. Like any TV show, every season is filled with some duds. The duds here are "Red Light On The Wedding Night", "There's The Rub", which has Lorelei and Emily going to a spa for a weekend, and "Secrets And Loans", among a few others. The show continues to be one of the most incredibly brilliant and sharpest shows on TV. The dialogue and banter continue to be second to none, and continues to make people wonder where the closet full of Emmy's this show should have won by now are at. The cast is one of the finest ensembles on TV. Lauren Graham continues to be one of the best leading ladies on TV. Her Lorelei is fleshed out and she carries the show with a magnetic presence that cannot be denied. She is a vision of beauty, and an actress of high caliber talent. The same can be said for Alexis Bledel, who continues to be one of the best representations of a young woman on TV. Same goes for Kelly Bishop, who is a fine and elegant actress in her portrayal. Much praise to the rest of the cast and the town's oddball collection of quirky citizens, which includes the likes of Luke, Lane, Miss Patty, Kirk, Taylor, Babbette, and Paris. A fine collection of supporting characters. The show continues to show a truly strong and healthy relationship between mother and daughter, and the nature of their relationship is a lot more common than some people think. Lorelei has proven herself to be a great mother and the proof is in all the good she has done for Rory, and what she has done herself and their lives and done so mostly on her own. Take a trip to Stars Hollow soon. You won't soon regret it.

Like many of you I approached "Gilmore Girls" with caution at first. It's a family-oriented WB borderline-soap with a decidedly girly reputation. That has not however stopped me from becoming addicted to one of the most falling-down funny, literate and psychologically complex shows on. It's appointment TV for me along with "The Sopranos", the late, lamented "Oz" and "Buffy" and "Curb Your Enthusiasm." Lauren Graham is a tough-minded, brilliantly comic marvel as Lorelai Gilmore, the renegade scion of a blue-blood Connecticut family who got pregnant at 16 and by sheer force of will created a great life for her daughter. That daughter, also named Lorelai by her mother "in a frenzy of pain medication," is nicknamed Rory and is played by the angelic Alexis Bledel. Rory in public high school has aspirations to Harvard, so Lorelai approaches her starchy, proud parents after years of estrangement. (They are played with marvelous humanity by old-pros Edward Herrmann and Kelly Bishop.) They gingerly begin to rebuild their relationship in order to realize Rory's possibly spectacular future.

They say that executive producer Amy Sherman-Palladino sounds exactly like the verbally agile Lorelai when she speaks. She has created an enchanted village for the Gilmores to live in called Stars Hollow. This is where the genius of the show kicks in. Instead of being sticky-sweet like a hundred other small town dwellers you've seen on TV, these people are benign but uncontrollably insane eccentrics who have created a little Utopia for individualists. (Just how does Kirk hold every job in town?) The point of "Gilmore Girls" is that rigid social conventionality does not necessarily go hand-in-hand with "family values." You can be a super-mon like Lorelai and still be a non-conformist. Lorelai is currently looking for the "whole stupid Dan Quayle, two dogs and a cat, matching running suits package" in a family, but she's not putting off living her life and raising her daughter in the meantime. (She will probably eventually get the whole package with the gruff but good-hearted Luke, the backwards-baseball cap-wearing diner owner who everyday feeds the cooking-challenged girls.)

In the second season, we meet Jess, Luke's troubled nephew from the big city who has been sent to Stars Hollow to clean up his act. Like a lot of fans, I am not that thrilled by the James-Dean-aping Jess, but he provokes an interesting reaction in Rory. Normally she is the sweetest and most level-headed of girls but when she lays eyes on Jess she reveals an unsuspected streak of attraction towards the irresponsible little punk. (Who resembles in character more than a little Rory's long-absent father.) It appears that Rory has her own rebellion issues to work out; like mother, like daughter in more ways than one. This is what I mean when I say this show is one of the most psychologically acute shows on TV. Lorelai is Wonder Woman but also shows a inability to commit to a relationship with a man. Rory is a preternaturally "good girl" with a hidden but similar independent side that both delights and alarms her mother. Richard and Emily, the grandparents, are hopelessly blinded by their own social class issues, but they desperately love their granddaughter (and reluctantly, her mother.) It's a family that's as realistically screwed up as yours is. If you get the "Gilmore Girls' DVD's you will have many, many hours of great viewing pleasure you can look forward to.

This show is amazing. No, it is not a reality series (Thank God). It also does not contain special effects, vulgarities, or explicit sexual content. However, it still manages to be one of the smartest, funniest, most sarcastic, and yet, ironically, the warmest shows on television. It has the quick banter of the 30s, but it still mangages to reference what's going on in pop culture right now. You must buy this DVD!