Where is MA's column??????? Are we going to have one this week????? What time is it usually up???????

Rory's outburst in Mr. Medina's classroom was great. And remember that she started the episode freaking out because she was behind everyone, but at the end she seemed more secure?

What I oppose and which is my main point is the putting people in boxes. It sucks...and I wish we could just all be fans of the show and put the shipper business and angst to the side.

Question: Someone posted on the last thread about sides for a new character, described as a handsome and inteliigent TA. I think they used those adjectives. If it is just a TA that they wanted, why make him handsome and intelligent?

Question: Someone posted on the last thread about sides for a new character, described as a handsome and inteliigent TA. I think they used those adjectives. If it is just a TA that they wanted, why make him handsome and intelligent?

Question: Someone posted on the last thread about sides for a new character, described as a handsome and inteliigent TA. I think they used those adjectives. If it is just a TA that they wanted, why make him handsome and intelligent?

Caf....can you explain the difference between a JJ and Team LL.....i always thought that meant you were a JJ???

Uh, now I’ll really bore you, but sure.

I added that to my signature around or after Partings. It was a response to the Luke-blame/Lorelai-blame arguments that were going on at the time.

I think they do belong together but I started by watching the show and caring about each character separately, not “shipping” them.

I never particularly cared when/if they would get together, until they did. (Though I totally respect viewers who picked up on the anvils and were more impatient.)

When it happened, it felt right, although that was reportedly forced on ASP by the WB. Whatever, it worked – as an ignorant viewer, it felt natural to me. (I was also ignorant enough to take Chris leaving Lorelai for pregnant Sherryas the writers’ choice not an actor availability problem.)

I've also got a romantic streak so, sure, I enjoyed season 5 – but what really hooked me came later. That was the prospect of moving on to the next stage in their lives. Because shows rarely have the opportunity to do that, most don’t last long enough.

Well, GG had the opportunity but not the guts. This show worked best back when ASP let the characters lead and didn’t interfere with the natural storylines.

I remember Rory’s yacht theft winning a place in TVGal’s “wouldn’t buy it if you paid me” awards list. The romantic in me loves the scene of Rory and Logan running hand in hand down the dock, out towards Moby Dick’s sea – but I still don’t think Rory really would have committed a felony. Perhaps a different excape or lesser offence. This is where it started to get silly. It feels like the writers lost faith in their characters and instead wheeled in the soap opera ‘wham-bam’ stuff. A real artist creates characters, creates a world – and lets them develop naturally.

I do think Luke and Lorelai belong together, and that story would have been more interesting than the endless roadblocks that they will have to overcome for however many seasons are left. It’s spinning wheels, stuck in the same place.

I also find it implausible for Lorelai to try to follow Emily’s path – and if she is, they should explore that better. But whatever.

Quite separately, I dislike Chris and always have – it has nothing to do with LL. I agree with Ciaobella that “He stands for everything I despise in the male gender.” But for anyone who wanted to see LL together, trying to post seriously about Christopher around here is a lost cause.

Worse, each Christopher appearance reminds me of Rory’s issues – her reactions could go so many ways, all of them interesting and well worth exploring (with or without parallels to Logan – there are ‘some daddy issues there’, as DP said. Also some obvious ‘mommy issues’. )

Instead, the show has degenerated into a romantic triangle – into basically a romance-based show, for both girls. I don’t see that as Rory’s primary storyline at this stage of her life.

Structurally, breaking up LL destroyed some key foundations of the show – the diner scenes, the banter, the lead-ins to other scenes (eg, the breastfeeding scene, the rabbi/Andrew/Taylor teaser in Devilled Eggs – somehow they worked so much better with LL than similar recent scenes).

So. I wanted to see them together to see that next stage in both characters’ lives. But I also have every respect for real shippers who, coming from a rather different place than myself, were misled by the show and the showrunner’s public statements. So I usually don’t bother to differentiate.

I don’t ship or watch to see who will end up together. I got interested by a different kind of show here and wish they had gone the whole nine yards to create a complete opus. Instead, they panicked and turned to scoring as many own goals as needed to filibuster the rest of their run. Unfortunately, that’s also sucking the charm, the joy, and the original human interest out of the show.

In what way? It's not like Richard has had this "job" for long and depends on it for his livelihood or self-esteem. Is the fact that a mere TA takes over for him negates his importance? I just don't see why the TA has to be charming, handsome and intelligent. Is Richard that frightened of losing this position?

I don't think it has to do with this position particularly. It is like Paris said way back in Not As Cute As Pushkin. The younger kids are competition. So, just like Paris was unhappy about Rory's little Chilton guest and what she represented, Richard will be unhappy to see that he isn't indispensable. That is hard for a workaholic to accept. I think TA is just a symbol of the replacements in all parts of Richard's work life. I hope for Emily's sake that he adjusts to retirement better than he did last time. (But I'm not counting on it. He likes to put on his suit and go to the office.)