Gilmore Girls is back...or is it?

So, last night was the first new epiosde of Gilmore Girls by the new production team since Amy Sherman-Palladino did a scorched-earth policy as she exited the show. (I don't blame her really but it does leave the new writers with a hell of a hill to climb to open the season).

For those of you who missed it or were living in a cave this summer and missed all the on-line buzz about it, here's what happened. Lorelai got tired of putting off the wedding to Luke, gave him an ultimatium to marry her right then and Luke said he wasn't ready. Lorelai went to her ex (and Rory's dad) and ended up spending the night with him. The final scene of the season was Lorelai waking up with Christopher and having a look on her face of--dear heavens, what have I done? (In a case of art mirroring life, this is exactly what fans of the show were thinking about ASP's decision to move the Luke/Lorelai storyline in this direction..but I digress).

Now, this plotline hasn't quite been the trainwreck that a lot of fans and critics would want you to believe. Yes, it's misguided and everything about it reeks of TV "we've got to invent reasons to keep the couple apart" but it's not the end of the world as we know it.

The whole thing is--the plots left the show at a crossroads and while I hope that ASP had a way to get out of this, we'll never know since she's taken her toys and gone home.

Instead, she leaves a new producer David S. Rosenthal in charge and we mark the beginning of a brand new era of Gilmore Girls. We got our first taste of it last night.

And the report card is a fairly solid C+. In a way, it's like Manny Cotto taking over Enterprise in season four--he was left with a messy cliffhanger and had to spend two episodes cleaning up the mess before he could get into his stories. And that is a lot of what this week's episode reminded me of--Rosenthal taking the pieces he's given that he has to work with and doing his best to make something out of them.

Of course, my big criticism last year of Gilmore Girls was that you could watch the first five minutes and skip to the last five minutes and not really miss anything. And that appears to still be valid here with big things happening in the first five minutes and then big things happening in the last five. But on a show like this, it's about a journey with the characters. And we got that here--Lorelai dealing with what she did, Rory trying to figure out Logan's message and the plot in Stars Hollow that leads Luke to a revelation and was about as subtle as a two by four upside the head. Oh look, Luke has a hard time dealing with ultimatiums and making quick decisions...I get that. But if not, here it is once more.

It all end with Luke realizing he's an idiot, coming to Lorelai and then getting his heart ripped out, stomped on with golf shoes and drug behind a truck for a few hundred miles. Of all the choices Lorelai could have made, sleeping with Christopher was the worst and may have doomed (for now) her relationship with Luke. So, I am guessing this season will be about picking up the pieces and the long distance relationship of Rory and Logan, which honestly felt more like an adult relationship than Luke and Lorelai did...

What was missing--well, we got no Emily and Richard who are always conspicious by their absence. And while the dialogue was good at some points, at others it felt like it was trying too hard to be witty, urban and Gilmore-Girl-like.

I'm not breaking up with the Girls yet, but I am still wavering in my loyalty to the show. I want it to get back to what it was but I'm wondering if that is possible. We'll see what happens in the coming weeks.