Episode Report Card Al Lowe: A | 2 USERS: A+ YOU GRADE IT Sidekick In The Pants
By Al Lowe | Season 6 | Episode 19 | Aired on 04.17.2006
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Mrs. Kim accosts Lorelai when she turns over Lane's wedding dress, saying it is imperative that Lorelai bring a date to the wedding in Luke's absence -- Lane's grandmother is coming from Korea and would not find it proper for a single woman to attend unescorted. GMamaKim arrives, causing MamaKim to go immediately into subservient mode, not unlike Lane did with her for so many years. Lorelai plans Lane's bachelorette party (attended by the AWESOME Kyong), but it doesn't go that well. All their plans fall through, and they end up hanging out with Zach and his friends and have genuine fun. Lorelai's substitute wedding date, Michel, dumps her for Celine Dion, so she has to ask Christopher to go with her at the last minute. Lane has two really pretty, crazy weddings, followed by two looney receptions. Hep Alien reunites as a wedding band. Lorelai finds out about Rory meeting April and gets upset, which leads her to slam about 900 shots of tequila and give a drunken, embarrassing toast about her own non-wedding NOT happening on June 3rd. Rory and Chris escort her home, but Rory has to run to New York to be with Logan, who was hurt on his trip. Chris stays with her all night. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
Preparations for Lane's wedding are in full swing at MamaKim's. The kitchen is full of Korean cooks preparing kim chee. "Very good," says Mrs. Kim, having a taste from Aunt June's jar. "It's not too spicy." Aunt June nods: "I pack it very tightly. It strangles the spice." Heee. Mrs. Kim says it's perfect, and goes to open another window. Lane comes downstairs and is immediately surrounded by the excited relatives, all apparently adding their Korean two cents about all sorts of wedding-related things. "Back to work, all of you!" MamaKim shouts, pushing them back to the kitchen. "And she will have children at the proper time!" MamaKim insists that Lane go back upstairs (even though Lane is being suffocated by the kim chee odors)...
but, as Lane's going up, Lorelai comes in with the wedding dress bag over her arm. "Vera Wang calling!" says Lorelai, before hitting the kim chee wall. "Wow, you can almost see that smell." The dress bag is decidedly lighter than it was the last time we saw it, but Lane, who is halfway up the stairs, is clearly still worried. Mrs. Kim asks to see it, but is interrupted by the ringing phone and steps out for a moment. "Couldn't you have set it on fire?" Lane asks, while they wait for her mom to come back. "Dude," Lorelai answers, "there's not enough lighter fluid in the world." Lane cringes, saying she hopes Lorelai made a matching blindfold for Zach, so he won't have to actually see her in it. Lorelai tells her that, actually, she's going to look beautiful: "You have a very pretty face, and you have hands and feet! For some guys, the stuff in between is just annoying." Lane is not really comforted by this little joke about her wedding day. (Speaking of dresses, I'm not totally loving the one Lorelai is wearing, especially since I had just seen it elsewhere the day before. REEGe!)
MamaKim returns from her phone call, completely undone. I think we're supposed to assume she's just had a shock, but Emily Kuroda plays it so big, I think for a moment that Mrs. Kim has had a stroke or a bout of dementia, and wonder if this episode is about to get much more sad than I expected. She grips a table, asking Lorelai what she's doing there. Lorelai looks confused, and says again that she's brought the dress. "What dress?" Mrs. Kim asks, and Lane worriedly explains that it's her wedding dress. In her altered state, Mrs. Kim barely reacts when Lorelai removes the dress from the bag. Talk about altered -- it's completely different. Lane's face absolutely beams with glee. The dress is still conservative, but is quite sweet and pretty. Mrs. Kim says it's fine, and that she will see Lorelai and Luke at the wedding. Lorelai says, sadly, that Luke will not be able to make it, because he's out of town, but that she'll be there. That really bugs me -- that Luke isn't going to be there. I get that it's a set-up, but it's ridiculous, and I hate it. How long has Lane worked in his stinky diner? Wearing that same sweater day in and day out, pouring his coffee and serving his fries? He was there when Zach proposed, even. If Lane has any kind of father figure, he'd be it, and New Fake Secret Daughter or not, it's weird that he's not going to be there. I guess it doesn't matter to anyone else, either, because Mrs. Kim just kind of mumbles and goes back to the kitchen.
Lorelai and Lane quietly celebrate that they've gotten the dress past her mom. "She didn't yell," Lane says, in wonder. "It's got a waist, and she didn't yell!" Lorelai tells her not to question it, and to take the dress and hide it until she's walking down the aisle. "And even then," Lorelai says, "walk fast." Lane clutches the dress and carries it upstairs.