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Gilmore Girls: The Complete Second Season
Season Two of WB's acclaimed series Gilmore Girls kicks off with Lorelai (Lauren Graham) accepting a marriage proposal from her daughter's teacher, Max (Scott Cohen) but curiously hesitant to share the news with anyone — and when Lorelai's mother, Emily finds out third-hand that her daughter's engaged, the just-starting-to-thaw walls of ice go back up between the two. Meanwhile, daughter Rory (Alexis Bleidel) finds herself torn between her boyfriend Dean (Jared Padalecki) and bad-boy Jess (Milo Ventimiglia), the new-in-town nephew of diner owner Luke (Scott Patterson), while still trying to survive the taunts of her arch-rival Paris (the hilariously high-strung Liza Weil) at Chilton Academy. There was a lot of action throughout the second season of this deservedly praised family dramedy, with the occasional somewhat-stand-alone episodes most notable — as in "The Road Trip to Harvard," with Lorelai and Rory touring the campus and "Like Mother, Like Daughter," where Rory attempts to make friends by infiltrating a campus sorority, the "Chilton Puffs" — and a number of intertwining subplots elegantly tying together from show to show. Luke, despite his jealousy over Lorelai's engagement to Max, gifts her with a handcrafted chuppa for use in her wedding; Lorelai and Sookie (Melissa McCarthy) decide that its time to start their own business; Lorelai discovers that there are still sparks between her and ex-husband Christopher (David Sutcliffe); Rory finds herself attracted to the previously loathed Tristan (Chad Michael Murray); Lorelai must battle with her own obsession with independence when she needs $15,000 for house repairs; everyone's romantic interests get tweaked when the town participates in the Stars Hollow picnic basket auction; Sookie and Jackson (Jackson Douglas) get married; Lane (Keiko Agena) secretly learns to play the drums, and Lorelai and Christopher almost get together again. Much of the appeal of Gilmore Girls is watching the complex, flawed and poignant interactions as the main characters develop — Lorelai, charming as she is, starts to reveal herself as hot-headed and a bit of a control freak in season two, while the more responsible Rory makes some very stupid choices where boys are concerned and Lorelai's steel-hearted mother, Emily (Kelly Bishop) reveals herself to be extremely vulnerable despite her frosty demeanor. Warner Home Video's DVD presentation continues the excellence of Season One — gorgeous full-frame transfers, excellent DD 5.1 audio and an attractive tome-like package. Along with the 22 episodes, the six-disc set includes a booklet, "Your Guide to Gilmore-isms," for folks flummoxed by the Gilmores' pop-culture references to the likes of Ida Morgenstern, Them!, and pop rocks; a number of deleted scenes scattered across the six discs; "A Film by Kirk,"(2 min.) the film Kirk premieres in the episode "Teach Me Tonight"; "Gilmore Goodies and Gossip," actually the episode "A-Tisket, A-Tasket" with pop-up factoids throughout; "International Success," ( 5 min.) on the show being dubbed into other languages, including the difficulty with the rapid rhythm of the dialogue and the numerous pop culture references; and "Who Wants to Argue" (1 min.), a montage of argument clips.
—Dawn Taylor
