What the fandom wants, the fandom doesn't always get

Nine years is a long time to pine for something. And once you're given the thing you've been pining for, it's impossible to not be disappointed in some way.

Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life is a case of fans getting what they asked for, if not what they wanted. At least not everything they wanted.

Obligatory spoiler warning.

I was one of those fans who went into Thanksgiving thinking, "I get to watch new Gilmore Girls episodes tonight!" Even my family was on board, happily willing to replace our traditional Thanksgiving weekend Lord of the Rings marathon with Gilmore Girls (the revival graciously gave us two—that I remember—LOTR references as consolation). Watching "Winter" for the first time was, to steal a word from Kevin Porter of the Gilmore Guys, transcendent. The first 15 minutes or so felt forced, but once I got over the jarring sense of being back in uncharted Gilmore territory, that feeling I had yearned for for so long settled in: I was back in Stars Hollow. Whatever discontent was in store, that hour of warm fuzzies would make it all worth it.

I was familiar enough with Amy Sherman-Palladino's writing style to expect some frustration to go along with the delight. ASP isn't one to give us cake without serving it with a side of prunes.

The revival has its beautiful moments, some of the best of the entire series. Everything involving Emily is flawless (and Lorelai, too, for the most part). Richard's death was handled beautifully. Some of my favorite Kirk moments ever happened in these new episodes, and my stance on Jess went from Team Still Harboring Resentment Toward Season 2/3 Jess but He's Probably Still Better than Logan to Team Jess Is Too Good for Rory—Stay Far Away and Marry Someone Decent Like Mandy Moore.

The revival also has its problems, the most unforgivable being time. The whole point of the revival is to finally see the ending ASP had envisioned, but with nine years between the season 7 finale and "Winter," the story ASP has been harboring all these years doesn't quite work. Everyone is in the exact place we left them in, which is irritating. The actors all look exactly the same and it would have worked fine to only jump forward a few years, but instead we're supposed to believe that Luke and Lorelai waited nine years to have the "fresh kid" conversation and to get married just so we could see it, that Rory would still be trying to figure out how to adult even though she's in her freakin' 30s. (Netflix's lack of episode length restrictions also stuck us with time-wasters like the Stars Hollow Musical and another dumb Life and Death Brigade escapade.)

But what I think fans wanted more than anything was this: closure. Thanks to Rory being the Absolute Worst and those infamous final four words (which were, to Alexi Bledel's credit, delivered perfectly), that is exactly what we didn't get.

From a writing standpoint, I love it. The best writing always has divisive characters, and Rory's journey works thematically. But as a fan, I just wanted things wrapped up in a semi-neat bow. In this post-GG revival world, I feel like I'm right back where I started.

Which was probably ASP's evil plan all along.