Did Jess Mariano arrive in Stars Hollow on 9/11?
an interview with my partner about a way-too-plausible Gilmore Girls theory
My partner believes that Jess Mariano got off that bus in Stars Hollow the morning of September 11, 2001. I interviewed him about it.
Let's start by saying who you are.
I'm Jack McManus, I'm a New York City-based playwright, musician, Gilmore Girls fanatic, and 9/11 obsessive.
That seems about fair.
I would consider those my professional qualifications.
They are your professional qualifications, I co-sign that.
Thank you.
I want to hear about this theory.
It's not a theory in that we know that 9/11 happens in Gilmore Girls. We know this because in season 4, when Rory's first going to Yale, her guide mentions something about how we're living in a "post 9/11 world, so you need to keep your IDs on you." Which means post-9/11, which implies—
—that there has been 9/11.
—that 9/11 has happened. Exactly. We know for a fact that 9/11 happens in the world of Gilmore Girls. The question is when. At what point in the story of Gilmore Girls is September 11, 2001?
I'm forever morbidly fascinated with media around 9/11, just the way we have culturally portrayed it. The interesting thing with Gilmore Girls is that it's being made concurrent to this news happening. Obviously, the episode of Gilmore Girls that is set in September of 2001 was not made with 9/11 in mind, and that's what makes placing 9/11 in the narrative an interesting thought experiment to me.
What's the theory? Give me the meat and potatoes.
The key pieces of evidence we have to consider when we're talking about where in the story is September 11, 2001 is to briefly recount the end of season one and the beginning of season two. Gilmore Girls is set within the year that those seasons aired.
They talk about President Bush.
Yeah. Presumably, the episodes that begin airing at the beginning of season 2 would be early September, August of 2001. That's what gets it muddy, is that the season doesn't cleanly start in September because we start the season with the fallout of Lorelai and Max Medina's engagement.
There's some immediate stuff we have to get to before we jump a bit in time.
We're still spending some time in the summer of 2001. One of the key events that happens before this is Rory and Lorelai visit Harvard after Lorelai decides she doesn't want to marry Max Medina, and classes are going on.
Which means that Rory's not in school, but college students are in school, so it places us—
Presumably in late August. Now, you could argue that students in this class have a familiarity with each other that implies that they're more than a couple of weeks into classes. The one student has a line about how we can't get anywhere without bringing up moral relativism. You could imply this is summer school, but I think based off the way things are set up we're supposed to be early in the process of this college.
So then, we jump ahead a bit to the start of Chilton's school year. That, to me, is the real big question about when 9/11 happens. When in the year does Chilton's school year start? Is it late August? Is it early September? Before or after Labor Day? The show never gives us direct answers. Rory never goes, "Today is the first day of school, September 5th, 2001." Paris is never like, "You're correct. It is September 5th, 2001."
Because they didn't know 9/11 was going to happen.
They didn't know that I was going to be thinking about this 23 years later, which is really on them. This is something they should've known.
What we do know — we don't know exactly when the beginning of the school year starts, which is why I think there's a little bit of flexibility to what I'm about to say moving forward. But. We know that [Rory's school newspaper] the Franklin meets on Tuesdays. We know this. We know the newspaper club meets Tuesdays. And it is the beginning of the school year, which means we are somewhere in the late August, early September period. Which means, realistically, one of the Franklin newspaper club scenes is on 9/11, I think. It's *A* Tuesday in early September and we get two of them.
And that episode, that day within the story where Rory goes to work on the Franklin, is also the day Jess Mariano arrives in Stars Hollow.
So your theory is that Liz saw the effects of 9/11, was devastated, didn't know how to raise her kid, and sent him on a bus the day of 9/11 to Luke Danes to be safe from 9/11?
If I'm gonna be honest with you, based on the timeline of the episode, I think it's just coincidence that she shipped him off that morning. Now, that isn't to say — I do think, truth be told, if you look deep down, there is 9/11 subtext in Jess Mariano in the way that he talks about and his relationship with New York City. It's never an explicit part of the show, I don't even think it was an intentional part of the show. I think it's an unignorable part of his character.
That Jess was impacted by September 11th.
There is stuff there. You can't be a teenager from New York City who was kicked out the same day the Twin Towers fell and have a normal relationship with everything.
It is possible, with the shifting timelines of it all, that Jess shows up the Tuesday after 9/11. He could show up on the 18th. But I think it is more likely that Jess shows up the morning of September 11th, before it happens.
And they had no way to know! They didn't do it on purpose. Luke doesn't go, "Good morning, Jess—"
"—Happy 9/11!"
"—It's September 11th!"
But, yes. I believe Jess Mariano arrived in Stars Hollow either on or shortly after 9/11.
i find this theory utterly plausible, if you want my commentary. i hope you enjoy reading it as much as i enjoyed hearing it for the first time. we’re in the midst of a mid-spring Gilmore Girls rewatch and it’s nice to apply thought to the thing i’m a subject matter expert in again.
i, a newly-minted Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference semifinalist and not finalist or winner but it’s fine, have a weird new play up on New Play Exchange that’s kind of about The Newlywed Game and kind of about something else. check out Jack’s plays, too!
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