Despite the warnings from the Chilton Headmaster, Rory was shocked to receive her first ‘D’ on an English paper. In ‘The Deer Hunters‘, Rory must go from that ‘D’ to her first English test, a test worth 20% of her grade and with no make-ups.
Rory’s teacher, Max Medina, isn’t overly sympathetic about the ‘D’. Rory herself is shamed, especially by having Dean think she’s the “smart girl”, when she doesn’t feel like that any longer. She doesn’t even tell Lorelai about the grade – she has to learn it from Max at the parent-teacher conference (as he flirted with her). However, the worst of the trouble comes from Paris, who taunts Rory as she studies, saying “you’re going down.”
Now, I could understand it when Paris was mean to the ‘new girl’, not knowing if Rory would be her new competition as head of the class. But, after Rory received a bad grade, why would Paris continue to taunt her? Why does she want Rory gone from Chilton completely (as her actions would indicate)?
Of course, all of this ends in a meltdown when Rory ends up late for her test after being hit by a deer. Her meltdown is my favorite scene, especially how she reams out Paris for being so rude:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pA-NWlYFSz0]
In the end, Rory seems to take courage from her second failure, instead of the other way around. She’s determined, now, to see it through. I have to wonder if getting back at Paris is one of the reasons she’s determined. What do you think?
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I think that Paris really drives Rory. The rivalary between them is ongoing and I think that Paris is driven by Rory as well. My favorite part of the (and my daughters) is when Rory tells Tristan that her name is RORY.
This is my first comment on this website. My daughter got me hooked on Gilmore girls about 4 years ago. I have watched them multiple times, in fact, I go to sleep every night to GG. We were scheduled to go to New York in September to see guys and dolls featuring Lauren Graham but it was cancelled. I was HEARTBROKEN. It would probably been my only chance to see Lauren Graham in person.
I was always surprised that Rory oftentimes received grades that she did not expect [either better or worse than expected]. Most smart students so know how to game the system that this does not usually happen. As to Paris, she already knew she outclassed the rest of the sophmore class, was a bit bored by this, and relished the chance to find a challenge [any challenge] allowing her to channel her inner B#### and competitive nature to keep her interested and focused on where she wanted to go!! Rory was quietly competitive [to the point of passive/aggresive] and took great plesure in successfully retaliating against such nonsense!!
Paris ! Paris ! Never tired of her! Yet she’s unsecured, and her aggressiveness in general is the way she fights (it). Then comes Rory, the opposite character, threatening her in the ground she, till then, stood alone. The clash of the two opposite and strong personalities is inevitable as friendship that must come between them can be.
Paris saw Rory as a threat, so she lashed out at her. Anytime Paris saw someone as a threat she’d freak on them, but her bark was worse than her bite. It was great to watch the odd, yet colorful friendship that Rory and Paris forged over the years. In some ways, I think the Rory/Paris friendship was much stronger than the Rory/Lane friendship because as the seasons went on the Rory/Lane friendship became almost nonexistent.
Just another thought – the most DISTURBING thing about this episode comes from Lorelai, not Rory. Lorelai admits in this episode that she had been pushing Harvard on Rory “ever since she could crawl” and that she bought her Harvard clothes when she was four. Do we really think Rory – genius though she supposedly is – knew enough about colleges to make this kind of judgment?
This is a key scene that seems funny at the time but becomes dramatically unsettling in Season 3, when Lorelai learns how hard it is to get into Harvard but still pounces on her own daughter for even applying anywhere else and flies into a rage when she applies to Yale. It’s pretty clear why – Emily is right, she hates Richard and Emily that much. Sad.
The good news on this one is that Lorelai gets over it, not without some drama along the way.
I love Paris, no matter what she does. She needed some competition, just like she confessed in season 6 after Rory dropped out of Yale. By teasing and tauting Rory, I think she’s only assessing who seems to be her best rivalry.
My favourite scene is when Lorelai yells at the Headmaster and calls him Duce. The argument is great and all three characters involved in it are just awesome.
Hi Mac: Do you know them: http://www.youtube.com/results?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=gilmore%20girls%20paris&sa=N&tab=w1&um=1
I think the reason Paris continued to taunt Rory after her bad grade was because she was jealous of the attention Tristan was giving her.
I do think that Rory was determined to get back at Paris after her failures.