Gilmore Girls creator Amy Sherman-Palladino reveals she would want to address the series' biggest character failure in a potential second revival.
SUMMARY
Lane Kim's ending in Gilmore Girls was the show's biggest mistake, depriving her of her dreams and independence. The 2016 revival, A Year in the Life, failed to address or correct Lane's disappointing fate. Creator Amy Sherman-Palladino acknowledges the mistake and would like to fix Lane's story if there is another revival.
Seventeen years after the original Gilmore Girls ended, creator Amy Sherman-Palladino has acknowledged she would want to fix the show's biggest character mistake if another revival came to fruition.
Gilmore Girls follows the lives of Lorelai (Lauren Graham) and Rory Gilmore (Alexis Bledel), a close-in-age mother-daughter duo living in the fictional small town of Stars Hollow, Connecticut. Gilmore Girls ran for seven seasons from 2000 until 2007 and experienced a boost in popularity during the rise of the streaming era in the mid-2010s.
This newfound love for the show led to a limited revival on Netflix in 2016 titled Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life. The four-part miniseries takes place almost a decade after the finale of the original series, catching viewers up on the titular Gilmores' lives along with their friends in family.
While A Year in the Life was chock-full with nostalgic callbacks and some heartwarming moments, it also doubled-down on some questionable choices for certain characters. A Year in the Life also failed drastically to even address (let alone remedy) some of the original series' mistakes, including the biggest of them all.
Why Lane Kim Was Gilmore Girls' Biggest Mistake
Though the series made its fair share of missteps, Gilmore Girls' biggest mistake was Lane Kim's ending. Played by Keiko Agena and based on Sherman-Palladino's real-life best friend and Gilmore Girls co-producer, Helen Pai, Lane is Rory's best friend from the very beginning of the show.
Lane is introduced as a rebellious music-lover who goes to great lengths to hide her true self from her strict and traditional mother, Mrs. Kim, with the character proving to be a beloved fan-favorite.
As the show goes on, Lane begins secretly pursuing her dreams of becoming a rock star by forming a band called Hep Alien. She develops a sweet relationship with her bandmate Dave (Adam Brody), who is inspired by Pai's real-life husband with the same name. Dave is Lane's first true love and seems to really understand her, providing a more stable romance to counter Rory's love triangle with Dean and Jess.
The young couple tries to carry out a long-distance relationship when Dave moves to California for college, but it fizzles out. After Mrs. Kim kicks her out of the house, Lane proceeds to move in with her other bandmate, Zack. Despite her aversion to his womanizing ways, she develops feelings for Zack and they eventually get married, proving to be one of Gilmore Girls' most divisively-received storylines.
Lane ends up getting pregnant with twins after having sex for the very first time on her honeymoon with Zack in Gilmore Girls season 6. Instead of letting her become a rockstar and have the opportunity to leave Stars Hollow like she always dreamed, Gilmore Girls made Lane a mother of two with an incompetent partner at the age of 22.
While this ending might have been fine for another character, after years of fighting for the chance to be herself and finally finding freedom from her suffocating home life, Lane's fate felt like a slap in the face to both the character and the devoted viewers.
Showrunner and creator Amy Sherman-Palladino exited Gilmore Girls after season 6. Writer and producer David S. Rosenthal replaced Palladino as showrunner for season 7.
What's worse, A Year in the Life didn't take the opportunity to fix this mistake. In the revival, Lane and Zack are still a couple living in Stars Hollow. Lane ended up with a fate she didn't deserve, and her character arc remains Gilmore Girls' biggest disappointment. Knowing Lane's disappointing fate is one of the harshest realities of rewatching Gilmore Girls, and it's a shame that Amy Sherman-Palladino's return in the 2016 revival didn't result in amending this major shortcoming of the original series.
Amy Sherman-Palladino Knows Lane Kim's Story Needs Fixing
Fortunately, Sherman-Palladino is well aware of how badly Gilmore Girls dropped the ball with Lane. When asked about potential changes she'd hypothetically make in new episodes of Gilmore Girls, the creator confessed that she remains unsatisfied with Lane's ending (via Rolling Stone). Sherman-Palladino confessed, "I really never liked the way Lane’s life shook out...
I would have liked to have spent more time on her." The fact that the creator herself agrees that Lane's ultimate fate was a mistake and wants to fix it is reassuring. It looks like remedying Lane's story would be a top priority in another Gilmore Girls revival.
Lane Kim (Keiko Agena) on Gilmore Girls.
One way that another Gilmore Girls revival could fix Lane's story is by finally giving her the music career the show forced her to abandon. When she got pregnant and had twins near the end of the original series, Lane set aside her rockstar pursuits.
A Year in the Life had the opportunity to put Lane back on this career path, but that never happened. However, if the second revival took place another ten or so years after the first, her kids would be all grown up by then. As a probable empty-nester, Lane would have more freedom to pursue her own passions again.
While she could still chase her shelved dreams and stay with Zack, another revival would also give Gilmore Girls the chance to finally do right by Lane by splitting up her and Zack. The couple never felt like they really belonged together and Zack always seemed to be holding her back.
While it would be great if they maintained an amicable co-parenting relationship, there's no reason for the show to keep them together, especially if their kids are adults by that point.
Splitting up Lane and Zack would also give Gilmore Girls an excuse to bring Dave back and have Lane end up with her true soulmate. Of course, Lane's story in the potential revival shouldn't completely revolve around a former romantic relationship reborn.
As long as the main focus is on Lane rediscovering her passion for music and pursuing her dreams again, then reuniting her with Dave would be the cherry on top of her proper ending. She deserves true love and a fulfilling career.
Will Another Gilmore Girls Revival Actually Happen?
Kelly Bishop, Lauren Graham, and Alexis Bledel as Emily, Lorelai, and Rory at the cematary in Gilmore Girls A Year In The Life
There are no concrete plans at the moment, but Sherman-Palladino is on board for more Gilmore Girls as long as the timing is right. She told Us Weekly in 2022 that the possibility of another remake is "absolutely not off the table" but that "the stars just haven’t aligned yet."
Lauren Graham, who plays Lorelai, has also expressed interest in continuing the series, but echoes the sentiment that it would have to feel warranted.
Amy Sherman-Palladino has her next show all lined up, which could be bad news for anyone holding out hope for another Gilmore Girls installment.
Unfortunately, if another revival does eventually pan out, it probably won't be coming anytime soon. Sherman-Palladino and her husband and creative collaborator, Dan Palladino, already have another TV show called Étoile in the works, which received a two-season order from Prime Video after their success with The Marvelous Mrs.
Maisel's five seasons. With the creator preoccupied for the time being, the return of Gilmore Girls may not be entirely out of the question, but it'll most likely have to wait for now.
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