Die, Jerk
Rory is trying to get on the Yale Daily News. Sookie is a new mother who doesn't take maternity leave as Lorelai and Michel can come to her house for meetings. Mrs. Kim weirds Lane out by wanting to gift Dave a jug that she once told Lane was a marriage jug, but it turns out she only said that to make Lane stop crying. Luke and Nicole put their divorce on hold and are dating again.
Maid of the week: Cora.
Tropes
- Accidental Misnaming: When introduced to Jason, Rory forgets his Embarrassing Nickname Digger, and calls him Scooper.
- Actually Pretty Funny: After Lorelai tells Rory her review is too mean, Richard and Emily tells her the review was really funny, especially the part expressing regret that evolution caused man to stand on two legs because it led to this night.
- Backhanded Compliment: Doyle tells Rory her piece isn't good, but that it's definitely not for lack of trying.
- Blatant Lies: Lorelai claims she likes Nicole. Luke claims that Nicole likes Lorelai. He even adds that she likes her "fine". No one is convinced.
- Brutal Honesty:
- It is very emotionally exhausting for Rory to be this. She wants to recant her review of a ballet and apologize to the ballerina whose feelings were hurt by the review.
- Lorelai informs Luke that his new coffee pots look stupid.
- Calling Me a Logarithm: You better not try to "google" Emily.
- Can't Take Criticism: The ballerina who can't handle a negative review. She hopes Rory dies.
- Child Hater: Michel claims not to know how he feels about babies, never having been near one in his thirty-something years. After Bruce expresses her disapproval of baby language he calls all his friends and tells them to stop talking to their babies.
- Childhood Brain Damage: Bruce feels that talking baby language to Davey even once will stunt his development.
- Comically Missing the Point:
- Michel does this deliberately. When he learns Bruce's policy against baby talk, he calls all his friends with babies and tells them to stop talking to their babies. Not just baby talk, but in general.
- When she learns that her daughter thought the jug was a marriage jug, Mrs. Kim says they can make it a marriage jug, whatever that is.
- Continuity Nod: In the first couple of seasons it was occasionally mentioned that Rory went to Miss Patty's ballet school when she was younger. This episode she mentions it again when confronted by the ballerina.
- Digging Yourself Deeper: Confronted by a ballerina she has reviewed, Rory comes up with reason after reason not to be upset, such as "not many read the reviews anyway" and "most people don't even care about ballet".
- Dramatically Missing the Point: Lane thinks a regular jug that Mrs. Kim owns is a marriage jug and that she wants to send it to Dave to announce their nonexistent engagement, so technically Lane misses the point, although she thinks it's Mrs. Kim missing the point for thinking she and Dave are serious enough to consider marriage.
- Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Rory's coverage of the lacrosse match made Lorelai almost give a flying you-know-what about lacrosse.
- Grammar Nazi: Rory doesn't let being yelled at by an angry ballerina distract her from pointing out that an equivalence is different from a comparison.
- Literal-Minded: Mrs. Kim doesn't believe that Lane can't send Dave the jug, since she showed her how to use the bubble wrap.
- Malaproper:
- Lane sugests Rory kick her editor where the sun don't shine.
- Michel feels like Rosa Parks when banished to the porch. While Parks is, in a sense, famous for sitting, she was not banished to the front of that bus.
- One Drink Will Kill the Baby: Sookie doesn't drink while breastfeeding.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: It bothers Lorelai that there is no one she and Rory are supposed to be mad at at the moment.Lorelai: We're always mad at someone.
- Product Placement: According to Emily, Portofino is a good place for business dinners. The Mill on the River is apparently quite a romantic place.
- Rule of Three: Subverted by Doyle. When there's three of something, he always forgets the third one. He thinks it's a statistical thing.
- Running Gag: Rory comparing Sandra the ballerina to a hippo is the thing that really sticks with people.
- Shout-Out:
- One sneeze, and Michel is Rosa Parks having to sit on the porch during a business meeting.
- Rory takes Lorelai to a college production of The Nutcracker so she can write a review about it.
- Lorelai thinks it would make Vincent Gallo feel better about The Brown Bunny.
- Paris feels that the best way to respond to threats written on your door is going full Ariel Sharon.
- Paris feels that Rory pissing someone off is as unlikely as Dorothy pissing off the Tinman.
- Lorelai points out the irony in Al Capone going to prison for tax evasion.
- Rory claims that it's Avril Lavigne's world and we're just living in it.
- Getting harangued by an incensed ballerina is a Salvador Dalí kind of surreal, according to Rory.
- Rory pitches her idea for an interest piece about the ballerina as "8 Mile meets Fame".
- Rory reviews a production of Michael Row The Boat Ashore.
- Stalker without a Crush: Discussed. Rory thinks it's a bit stalkery of Lorelai to claim whoever is in Luke's life is in her life, but Lorelai backpedals to "we're a small, close-knit community".
- Stealth Insult:
- Doyle assures Rory that the badness of her writing is definitely not for lack of trying.
- Everything Lorelai says about the ballet she and Rory are watching.Lorelai: She recovered quickly.
- Take That!: Emily feels you can save yourself a trip to Atlantic City by dumping your trashcan on your porch and walking up and down it.
- Technologically Blind Elders:
- Richard is amazed that wireless internet works in his entire house.
- Emily thinks the whole "finding people in cyberspace" thing sounds absurd.
- Technophobia: Discussed at the dinner table. Rory does research on the internet when she can't get to the library. Lorelai argues that the internet is good for shopping, even though you miss out on the social aspect of shopping; but then she realizes that she rarely remembers to return clothes, and starts to doubt.
- Title Drop: An incensed ballerina writes "die, jerk!" on Rory's dorm room door. She also says it aloud when confronting Rory in the cafeteria.Sandra: Bye jerk! Die jerk!
- Verbal Backspace: Lorelai jokingly discusses peace in the Middle East with Davey, but when she realizes midwife Bruce is glaring at her she pretends she was talking to Sookie about work.
- Your Approval Fills Me with Shame: Dave gets upset at hearing that Mrs. Kim approves of him to the extent that she'd let him and Lane get married, a thing she specifically prohibited when she approved him taking her to prom. (She wasn't, but that's not the point.)
