For many people (myself included), autumn involves time-honored traditions: wearing sweaters in heat waves, piling the few leaves on the ground, and watching the sun set over the freeway. Among the most widespread fall experiences is turning on the TV to watch Gilmore Girls. 

The Grove recently held an event to celebrate the show’s 25th anniversary, and tickets quickly sold out. Its popularity, with the assistance of media like the Gilmore Guys podcast, has skyrocketed over the years. The stars, Alexis Bledel and Lauren Graham, even reunited to present at the 2025 Emmy Awards.  

The eponymous Gilmore girls are Lorelai, an inn manager, and Rory, her bookish teenage daughter. Their relationship is more sisterly than parental, as they’re only 16 years apart in age. The show’s seven seasons mostly follow everyday kerfuffles in the fictional town of Stars Hollow, Connecticut. 

Why do so many people, particularly teenagers, return to Gilmore Girls every fall? The obvious answer would involve the show’s plethora of warm colors, academic subplots, and coffee. Perhaps it’s the escapism that Stars Hollow offers at a stressful time of the year. 

But to argue that comfort is the only reason for the show’s perennial appeal would be to sell it short—another key factor is the writing. 

In each episode, characters exchange fast, reference-packed banter like their lives depend on it. The actors Lauren Graham (playing Lorelai) and Scott Patterson (playing her love interest Luke) both quit smoking to keep up with the dialogue. The episodes’ scripts were far longer than those of most other shows, making memorization a Herculean task for the actors. 

It’s this part of the show, along with the tradition of watching it with my mom, that initially made me come back for more. Even when its quality decreased, the dialogue and performances kept me hooked. 

Whether it was Lorelai’s tense relationship with her own mother or Rory’s friendship with the acerbic Paris, the interactions between characters were constantly engaging. The two main characters almost always supported one another—sometimes to a near-codependent degree, but still endearingly so.

Yet Gilmore Girls’ positive qualities aren’t the only reason people still watch it. Several of my classmates mentioned their frustration with Rory’s familiar trajectory over the series, as she became increasingly burned out. Others complained about Lorelai’s stubbornness and lack of communication with her loved ones. Yet none of them could stop watching. 

Perhaps no one is more aware of Gilmore Girls’ flaws than its fan-base. The show is filled with easily avoided arguments and dubious plot points, but because the characters were so compelling, seeing it through to the end became imperative. Exasperated affection toward the show is commonplace.  

Gilmore Girls is also pleasant to look at. Its visual language and set design showed autumn as an aestheticized ideal, where the air is brisk and the trees are russet. This clear seasonal distinction is a comforting thing to see in an era of rapid climate change. 

Ironically, it was filmed in Los Angeles. Fake leaves were painstakingly arranged in real trees to create an impression of New England’s fall foliage (Rory’s “study tree” in season 4 is a Californian coast live oak), to say nothing of the mashed potatoes used as snow. The show-runner Amy Sherman-Palladino leaned into the artifice to great effect.

Gilmore Girls’ writing, aesthetic, and ability to connect with (or frustrate) modern teens has made it one of the most lasting shows on television. Some may see it as saccharine or slow, but it’s these qualities that make it the equivalent of a warm cup of coffee for many stressed fans. The lyrics to the opening credits say it best: where the Gilmores lead, everyone follows.