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In ‘Say Goodnight, Gracie‘, Jess’ father, Jimmy, stops by Luke’s Diner. Of course, Jess doesn’t know who he is. But Luke does. Luke calls Jimmy a loser and says Jess doesn’t miss him. He recounts that Jimmy had left Liz when he was supposed to be out buying diapers. So why is Jimmy there, why then, what good can come of it, when Jess has so many issues already?
Now, I realize that Luke has Jess’ best interests at heart. He’s only worried that Jimmy could make things worse. But was it his decision to make? Should Luke instead be supportive, in the hopes that seeing Jimmy will actually help Jess get over some issues in his past?
Jess thought so, of course. After Jimmy confronted him later, and they shared some awkward silence, Jess confronts Luke saying he had a right to know he was there, to prepare him. Luke says he didn’t have to do that. In the end, this fight erupts into something larger – about Jess and rules in general, particularly around school – and it ends up with Luke asking Jess to leave. Which you would perhaps be surprised to hear, after how concerned Luke has been this whole episode about Jess’ future.
At the very end of the episode, Jess and Rory are on the bus. He’s leaving; she doesn’t know it. In the end, is Jess leaving because Luke kicked him out? Because he failed out of school? Because he’s confused about Jimmy? Why?
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277 days ago
This was actually Luke at his best (defending himself against Jess) and worst (threatening Jimmy with violence). I’ve never seen Luke so hurt that after all he had done for Jess that Jess would still show such contempt for him.
Luke did NOT tell Jess he had to leave at first. He gave him another choice – to quit work, to take school seriously, and to graduate.
And all of this has to be taken in context. Jess came back at the end of Season 2 with a promise to do better, after deliberately stealing (from Taylor, Babette, the school), fighting, and doing nothing in school. He promised to do better.
And now he has lied to Luke to work at Walmart, lied about his car, failed in school, not graduating, and after a fight with Dean, made no attempt to do penance for it, leaving Luke to pay for it.
Luke made a bad decision not to tell Jess about Jimmy, and his threats against Jimmy are completely inappropriate. But Jess used the moment as another sign of his “oppression” with no regard to what Luke had done for him. He pushed it to far.
And Luke was, in the end, right. Jess had to go.
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277 days ago
I agree with what Marie has said. I think that the heated exchange between Luke and Jess at the end was well acted and very telling.
I think Luke was right in not telling Jess, Jess was going through a lot and didn’t need a nothing distraction. I don’t understand why Luke should have to prepare him for Jimmy’s visit. Given what we are to assume is his usual behavior patterns, he’s a bailer, so Luke didnt really think he would even stick around to say anything to Jess. Overall, I felt Luke was right in his decision to not tell Jess about Jimmy and then to tell Jess to leave.
And Jess, I don’t think Jess was sincere when he agreed to get his life together at the end of season 2. I think he knew that would be the quickest way back into Luke’s good grace and letting him stay and be closer to Rory. That being said, he had ulterior motives in his agreement. He never fully intended to fulfill his end of the bargain so he had to go. Jess left because Luke told him to and he couldn’t stay and face having to tell Rory he had messed things up so badly. Nevertheless, with everything going South in Stars Hollow, I think he felt it would be the perfect time to connect with Jimmy.
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277 days ago
Jess leaves because, at this point in the show, he’s a rebellious little coward. He’s angry at the world, and this includes Luke, his mom, and everyone at school for trying to help him. He’s so lost in self pity that he can’t even accept their help to get back on his feet. His dad offers him a way out of his current situation where he won’t have to face everyone he has disappointed, and he jumps at the chance.
Which, of course, shows that Luke was right to think that seeing Jimmy could only derail Jess’ course even further – that’s exactly what happens. If Jimmy hadn’t shown up, Jess wouldn’t have been able to find him, and it would have been a lot harder for Jess to quit school and leave Luke’s if he didn’t have somewhere he thought he could go.
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277 days ago
While I loved the acting of Scott and Milo in this episode, the plotline stinks of ASP over-manipulation and ranks as one of my least favorite in the entire series. Since GG was going to be picked up for a fourth season, Rory needed a clean-slate boyfriend-wise to open up opportunity once she got to Yale as there would be no real place for Jess. Even more telling ASP felt she had a character worth spinning out in Jess so he had to leave Stars Hollow to open up a new plotline. Everything else is just overblown detail to make that happen. Jess could have easily passed a high school equivalency test while working but that possibility was never considered. The idea of sticking him in snoozers of high school classes [as established by Rory's and Lane's past experiences] never made sense to me. The only part of the episode that made sense was Luke finally after all these years getting a chance to confront Jimmy and tell him off for screwing up Liz. I also thought in the Rory/Jess final bus scene that Rory kind of knew Jess was leaving and it would be pointless to try to stop him.
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277 days ago
I think Jess left primarily because Luke told him to go and that Luke was wrong to hide Jimmy from him. I also felt that he’d have gone to New York again if Jimmy hadn’t shown up (as he did when he was sent off by Luke in the second season) rather than not going.
I think Jess always had a right to know who his father was and that this was actually an example of how Luke sucked as a parent. I think this was deliberately on the heels of Luke not believing the truth about who started the fight; Luke again fails at truth over Jimmy not realising that you need to give kids that sort of trust for them to give it to you.
I disagree with earlier posters about Jess’ promise to Luke about getting his life together at the end of season two. I think he did mean it and was quite shocked to be told he couldn’t graduate. I feel that Jess failed to put the minimum amount of effort in, but that was a misjudgment on his part (and, yes, he shouldn’t have been aiming at minimum) – as he tells Rory before it happens that he’s “got it covered” (or some similar phrase) meaning he wasn’t doing so much work to affect school (and was wrong). And, as an aside, it’s interesting that people feel that he had to leave – that Stars Hollow wasn’t the sort of place where he (or anyone else?) would be able to change; perhaps because it is so unchanging itself and that’s much of its charm.
I feel that season three contains a lot of bad stuff for Jess – things that go wrong for him but the kick-off event is not his (eg. deviled eggs, the swan attack, Dean starting the fight). I always felt this was an excellent comparison with season two. That in two, Jess does a lot of (all of?) the kick-off stuff himself (bidding on the basket, doing the police tape, turning up at Rory’s with food) and comes out of it OK (whilst Taylor, Dean and Dean again struggle). This is reversed, in part, I think, to show that Jess struggles as much or more with bad karma than those other characters (plus that the karma came back and got him). Luke kicking him out is just another bad event that he doesn’t deal with well (ie. he leaves instead of trying to sort stuff with Luke).
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277 days ago
I think Jess was a mess due to the emotional issues that came from not having a Dad. He was a little bad-ass brat of a kid who was angry at the world.
He had a lot of issues to work through, which he took out on both Luke and Rory a lot. Between Rory not sleeping with him, Luke kicking him out, and his Dad showing up, Jess just had a mini-crisis – I think.
Whether his Dad found him that way or not, Jess would have connected with his Dad. He would have gone to find him anyway, had he not shown up. I believe that.
As for Luke, he was just trying to protect Jess. I think he should have told him that his Dad showed up, just to be honest. However, Luke knew that Jess would leave with him. He knew that if Jess knew his Dad came, he would want to leave with him.
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277 days ago
It’s interesting to take different looks at Jess depending on one’s point of view, but a lot of this has to be put in context.
It’s very difficult to say over and over again that Jess was a victim of Dean starting a fight that led to his downfall. It’s not quite the full story. Jess picked that fight for months and months of antagonizing Dean and Dean resisted, showing incredible restraint at what is truly obnoxious behavior and taunting on Jess’ part. As I have tried to say before, Dean hitting Jess at the party was not fair and is probably rationalized, but if we go back to look at the scene, what pushes Dean over the edge is the feeling that Jess hurt Rory in some way. And Jess could have walked away — as Dean did over and over, when Rory asked him to stop. The bigger issue of course is that it falls to Luke to clean it up on Jess’ behalf, when he sees Dean taking responsibility for his mistake and Jess continuing to cause chaos with no concern about who is hurt.
I’m not sure, as mcityrk says, that this is so over-the-top for the character. Jess is explosive and offensive from the moment that he arrives. And I think as others have said in response to Amy Sherman Palladino’s exit, it is very fitting with her very defiant behavior.
I do not know how hard the graduation test is in the U.S., but Jess would presumably have to study for it, and if it did not cover only literature and rock, he might not pass that without school. Luke feels deeply betrayed on this point, and again, does not suddenly cut him off. He tries to come up with a solution to Jess’ failure but it’s Jess who will have none of it.
Luke seems shocked that Jess left in the next episode. For him, it seems that he had conditions for him staying and expected Jess not to leave Rory, at least.
Jess’ rapproachment with Luke in Season 4 seems to show that Jess knew he was wrong. That reconciliation is one of the most touching point of the series.
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277 days ago
Seemed like Jess did not graduate because of miscalculating the seriousness of his truancy, not because of failing grades from which he could not recover. If allowed to stay through year’s end he probably could have buckled down and done well enough to squeak through on the finals if he saw there was a chance to graduate [that clearly was his intent until the principal squashed that idea].
When that did not happen he would have had nothing to lose by taking one shot at the equivalency tests to satisfy Luke’s condition for him to stay. But that was not what the producers and writers wanted so that was never considered. [It is really tough for me to look at the storyline as presented and interpret it only by what is shown and said when there is such a sideshow going on with the producers of the content].
But I degress. For all his faults, I thought Jess got a raw deal on how he had to leave [like Max before him and Dean, Digger, and Chris after him] but that simply was the GG way. It was of course nice to see a “redeemed” Jess in later years, but that was as much a convienient short-term plotline device to refocus Rory than anything else. If Rory had not needed an attitude readjustment we would never have seen Jess again.
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277 days ago
I agree with most of what you said. First of all, the whole not graduating thing, and Jimmy appeareance to me always seemed so forced. Jess was a smart guy, yes, he had emotional issues but he was smart, and I agree with the idea that he really thought “he got it under control” and the surprised face when the principal said him he’s not graduating and the “22.8 mile” thing with Rory in the previous episode prove me right. He really wanted to graduate but he focused to much on work at Walmart.
After the fight with Luke, Jess leaves for many reasons: he disappointed Luke and he knows that he broke his promises and Luke is right(though if he stayed another day, Luke would have calmed down and tried to talk with Jess and help him), he disappointed Rory and he couldn’t do for her the one thing she asked ( taking her to the prom), he’s curious about his father and he wants to know him and now seems the “perfect time”.
I know that Jess had to leave the show (to do the spin-off that we never saw, and to leave Rory without boyfriend when she starts college) and I try to understand this leaving. Jess was a coward, he had that tough look but he was a shy boy (the fact that he never told Rory that he likes her-in season 2-and in season 3 seems very difficult for him to admit that “Dean was right”) so he was very insecure on his relationship with Rory. He knows he didn’t treat her right (and I think at this point he really loves her) and he hurt and disappointed her and it is for the best to leave. Also the fact that Dean will always be near Rory emphasized his insecurity that determined him to leave the town.
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276 days ago
I never really bought Jess leaving. I know they tried to write him off the show so he could star in his own spin off but I thought it seemed abrupt. I would have rather he stayed and we could have had some more Jess-Rory time. He liked her so much, I can’t beleive he would have left without telling her.
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276 days ago
One final question. If truancy was enough to keep Jess from graduating senior year, how did he pass from junior to senior year at SHHS when he missed the last 3-4 weeks of school and final exams when he had headed back to NY after the accident?? Just another maddening lack of logical continuity in the GG plotline!
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276 days ago
I hated this episode. It just didn’t really seem to make much sense that Jess would just leave all of a sudden. Yes he had some problems, but he seemed to be happy with Rory and, for a girl he wanted for so long, I don’t understand why he would leave her so abruptly. I think that it was bad writing and that they tried to just get rid of jess with any old plot that didn’t make much sense. I think also this idea of being told how he should have to live his life i.e go back to school probably caused him to want some freedom.
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276 days ago
I think mcityrk sums it up nicely in the end, or at least this is where we agree:
The only way to explain the logic of the show, if not to see it cynically as the producers/writers and what was convenient, is that this is how they themselves behave and see the world.
Jess leaving Stars Hollow under these circumstances is no more illogical than Lorelai leaving home (unless she had depression after the pregnancy). No matter how bad Emily and Richard were, they supported her and did not shun her. They probably would have supported HER to go through college as well while they took care of Rory.
And it’s no more illogical than Lorelai shunnng Rory when she goes back to her parents, or refusing to tell Christopher that she loved him for 15 years while she had no one, or to give him a chance at doing something other than a success while she was a maid, and so on and so on.
From one perspective, it seems that the Palladinos know this and are mocking — or making comedy — out of this defiant behavior, that many people engage in on one or two issues in life, but seems to be an epidemic among the Gimores and the Danes clans.
But then the way they left the series, it’s hard not to see it as the way they live life.
Remember, Amy is a woman who said you will have battles with your family until the grave. It’s not normal. Neither are these people, which is why it can be fun to laugh at them and be sad for them, rather than venerate them.
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