Comfort Classic: Gilmore Girls

COMFORT CLASSIC

Gilmore Girls

Amazon

A gentle guide to getting older and wiser, which Moya Lothian-McLean returns to again and again

On the face of it, a coming-of-age story about a mother and daughter who live in a quirky Connecticut town and speak at the pace of an Aaron Sorkin script doesn’t sound that comforting. But that would be to judge Gilmore Girls, the cult comedy-drama created by Amy Sherman-Palladino too quickly.

Hitting screens in 2000, the show ran for seven seasons, its crossgenerational popularity such that it was revived for a four-part Netflix mini-series in 2016, nearly 10 years after the last episode aired.

There’s no secret about why the show is so beloved; sinking into the world of Gilmore Girls is like sipping on your first hot chocolate of autumn or swaddling yourself in a thick duffle coat.

At the centre of its appeal are Lorelei and Rory Gilmore, a mother and daughter navigating the world. When we meet them, both have a lot of growing up to do; Lorelei is a formerly teen mother who has a fraught relationship with her wealthy, old-money parents. Rory is literally a teenager. Often, their relationship is more like siblings than parent and child.

Which is part of what makes Gilmore