[S4E10] The Nanny And The Professor
At the end of the episode, Rory realizes that Fleming is the professor of her contemporary political fiction class. He saunters up to her and basically explains to the entire class how nepotism works:
[S4E10] The Nanny and the Professor
Lorelai splits her time between friend drama and Jason sex. Michel is flabbergasted to find Tobin at a Dragonfly Inn meeting and doesn't even try to hide his irritation. Not only is Tobin Davey's temporary nanny, he's also Sookie's shopping buddy. Unlike Michel, he's friendly, loves children, and eats pizzelles. I understand why these two don't get along. They're both nightmares but in totally opposite ways.
Sookie's new nanny turns out to be Michel's old rival, who has child-phobic Michel so paranoid he offers to play Mary Poppins to Sookie's new baby, Davey. Meanwhile, one of Rory's professors shows a penchant for women 40 years his junior...Paris Gellar.
Rory (Alexis Bledel) returns early from winter break and is surprised by the arrival of Paris (Liza Weil), whose clandestine personal affairs could endanger her future at the Yale Daily News. Elsewhere, Lorelai (Lauren Graham) learns more about Jason (Chris Eigeman) when she spends an unusual evening at his place; Michel (Yanic Truesdale) is jealous of Davey's nanny (guest star Bruce McCulloch) and offers to babysit the infant; and Lane (Keiko Agena) gets a job.
The nanny is Michel's old rival, who has child-phobic Michel so paranoid he offers to play Mary Poppins to baby Davey. The professor is a famed academic who's dating a woman of 40 years his junior: Paris.
In this episode, Rory learns that her old friend Paris is dating a professor, and it aptly describes some of the growing pains or just plain confusion that some college freshmen feel when they're not sure just how "adult" they actually are.
Tour guide from the Historical Society: Dorrie.Tropes: Accidental Misnaming: Michel somehow got the idea that Davy's name was Truman.
Ambiguous Disorder: Jason has trouble sleeping in the same bed as someone else, as well as in the same room as any distractions. The result is his guest room is a lot more luxurious than his own bedroom.
Bait-and-Switch: Asher Fleming mentions to Rory that they have an important person in common. She thinks he means Paris, but he means her grandfather.
Bizarre Taste in Food: Subverted with Lorelai and Rory and marzipan. They love sugar. Marzipan is basically made of sugar, yet they hate it.
Blatant Lies: Rory tells Lorelai that Paris and Jamie are doing fine. Lorelai immediately catches on that something is not right.
Rory tries to convince Emily that she swallowed her marzipan without opening her mouth. It doesn't work.
Call-Back: Lorelai asks Rory to remember Dean when considering how much of a right Paris has to fall for another man when Jamie is such a good boyfriend.
Captain Obvious: Rory points out that her mother is a pig for brushing crumbs under the sink. Lorelai asks if she only realized that now.
Child Hater: Michel claims he doesn't hate babies, but Lorelai retorts that babies hate him.
Dark Humor: Doyle compliments Rory on her merciless and dark-witted reviews.
Deathbringer the Adorable: Cyrus the really quiet Jack Russell terrier.
Distinction Without a Difference: When Lorelai doesn't want to tell her parents they're dating, Jason suggests just telling one of them.
Funny Background Event: Though it's technically foreground, Rory trying marzipan while Lorelai talks to her parents. A brief moment in the real background before Jason disappears when he's about to spit out his piece.
Gold Digger: Emily refers to Jason's date as this. Jason claims she's just a friend.
Gratuitous French: As mocked in the pre-intro segment, English is full of it.
Green-Eyed Monster: Lorelai learns that Jason took a woman who wasn't wearing underwear to a function for fibromyalgia whose name turns out to be Crystal.
Hypocritical Humor: Paris thinks Harrison Ford and Calista Flockhart are disgusting with their PDAs (or PDsA), unaware that Rory has seen her making out with her sixty-year-old professor.
Insistent Terminology: Lorelai didn't brush dirt under the sink, just crumbs.
It Is Dehumanising: Michel doesn't mean anything by it, but Lorelai reacts to him referring to the baby as "it". He doesn't really have the foreigner excuse, either, since French doesn't have a neuter grammatical gender.
Lampshade Hanging: Lorelai tells Rory that as a reporter she'll have to talk really fast. Rory asks if she means faster than she already talks.
Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Inverted. When one of the people on the tour thinks the Gilmores are hired actors playing the house's family, Richard angrily declares that they are not actors.
Seinfeldian Conversation: Lorelai takes issue with the plural of cul-de-sac being culs-de-sac, because why borrow French grammar with French loan-words, they are English words now.
Shout-Out: The episode title references Nanny and the Professor.
Lorelai's reference for how to pronounce French loanwords is Mariah Carey.
Harrison Ford and Calista Flockhart were at the resort Paris went to.
When Lorelai learns about Paris's escapades with a sixty-year-old man, she figures Woody Allen will hire her for his next movie.
Even if Asher Fleming loses his job and reputation, he'll always have Paris.
Martha Stewart did a piece about making a hat out of newspaper.
Doyle hates Time Magazine.
By the sound of it, Jason and Lorelai watched Hidalgo. Lorelai's main complaint was that none of the horses talked.
Jason keeps books like Wuthering Heights and Valley of the Dolls in his guest room.
The history tour mentions Stanford White in connection with the house.
Lorelai wants Emily to rate Jason's date on a scale from Catherine Zeta-Jones to Paris Hilton.
Apparently Fonzie used the bathroom as his business office.
Lorelai asks if Jason is Hugh Hefner.
Jason is only interested in spending time with Lorelai and Eartha Kitt.
Crystal thinks that Babe can really talk.
Take That!: Doyle says that if you want your work to be "perfectly all right", go to Harvard.
Jason thinks fibromyalgia is a boring disease.
According to Jason, talking to Crystal is like beating your head against a wall with spikes.
Too Much Information: Michel has had to wax.
Though she is already aware of the relationship, Rory does not want to hear Paris talk about her sixty-year-old boyfriend.
Dr. Huang looks over Chelsea Doe's body and thinks that it's possible that Tom Landricks had the mentality to kill. Huang suggests that he kept the head & fingers as souvenirs, and restrained Chelsea Doe in a way so she would fight back. The detectives discover that Chelsea Doe is a woman named Karen Stencil, who used to live at the Landricks during the same time Chelsea Doe was discovered. They talk to Karen's grandmother, who says that Karen used to be the Landricks' nanny; and she was told by Tom Landricks that Karen moved to Europe 2 years ago. She hasn't heard from her since. Elliot looks at a picture of Karen and recognizes the bracelet on her is the same one that Sally gave to Elliot as a present. 041b061a72