The Inevitable ‘Downfall’ of Rory Gilmore

The Gilmore Girls re-watch is an annual ritual. However, many find Rory Gilmore, one of the main protagonists, quite infuriating and say the show becomes unwatchable after she leaves high school. So why is it that Rory goes from becoming everyone's favourite to everyone's most hated character? In short, what really leads to Rory Gilmore's academic ‘downfall’ and does she deserve the hate or are viewers being too harsh?

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Throughout Rory's entire life, until she leaves high school, she's been put on a pedestal, by her mother, her grandparents, and her entire hometown of Stars Hollow. When she moves to the prestigious prep school, Chilton, she still continues to succeed and becomes one of their best students, despite having arrived significantly later than her other classmates. Rory has practically been worshipped by an entire town for over sixteen years. This means that when she is faced with challenges, rejection and criticism she finds it incredibly difficult to deal with.

At the beginning of season four Rory has now left high school and enters her first year at Yale where things start to deteriorate. Rory has to drop a class and feels like a failure because she couldn't handle the same workload as her grandfather when he studied there. Later, her internship with Mitchum Huntzberger ends in disaster when he tells her that she doesn't have what it takes to become a successful journalist. This is a key turning point for Rory. As she has been idealised for so long and has very little experience with handling rejection, this feedback hurts Rory deeply. In mere seconds, her lifelong dream has been shattered by one of the top men in the business. Rory's self image collapsing leading her to act impulsively and out of character. For example, stealing a boat and getting arrested. Mitchum’s lack of faith in Rory causes her to question her ability to succeed in the future and rather than persevering and bouncing back, she bolts.

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With journalism seemingly off the cards, Rory drops out of college, something we never thought we would see from her! Following this decision, she fights with her mom about it and decides to stay with her grandparents, Richard and Emily Gilmore, instead. Through her grandmother she volunteers at the Daughters of the American Revolution, planning events which she is good at but it doesn't challenge her. Eventually, Richard realises that this is not the same girl with the drive, motivation, determination for her future career and love for learning, who he used to know. He realises that in fact he and Emily haven't put in any effort to convince Rory to go back to school or to help her eradicate this sense of aimlessness she is struggling with.

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Overall, Rory does make some morally wrong decisions and I think that while some of her actions were entirely inexcusable - having an affair, stealing a boat, making fun of people's weight, and her refusal to recognise the extent of her privilege - Rory does represent the many difficulties of navigating being a teenager and young adult. There are going to be mistakes, minor ones and perhaps major ones, that you may deeply regret. But that's life and that's growth. Rory is hated for her flaws because she has gone from the perfect kid, to a not-so-perfect young woman. Furthermore, the fact that she is the main protagonist makes us critique her more harshly. However, these flaws make her character more realistic. A flawed character is a realistic character, and flawed characters drive plot! I do believe Rory deserves some level of sympathy. Considering the massive amounts of pressure the girl was under it's no surprise that she burned out academically. Also, she had been a strict rule follower her entire life and she was bound to rebel in some way at one point. Do we really think that the show would have lasted as long as it did if she had stayed an A grade, goody-two-shoes the entire time? Personally, I don’t think so.