How Much Stars Hollow Has Changed Since Gilmore Girls Originally Ended

It's been nearly 10 years since the series finale of Gilmore Girls aired in May 2007, and fans all around the world have been hankering for more of their favorite fast-talking, coffee-drinking mother-daughter duo. Then, this November, Netflix offered up a return ticket to Stars Hollow with Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life. We all cozied up on the couch with our Thanksgiving leftovers to tune in and see what our favorite Gilmore girl or quirky Stars Hollow townsperson has been up to. Though nearly every original character returns for the revival, they aren't all the same as we remember them. After all, 10 years is a long time! There are new relationships, career changes, and a whole lot of self-discovery. Read below to see what your favorite character has been up to.

Lorelai Gilmore
Netflix

Lorelai Gilmore

Lorelai has always lived a fun and exciting life, complete with a rollercoaster of ups and downs. Now, nearly a decade later, she finally seems to be happy and settled. She and Luke are living together, the Dragonfly is pretty successful, and her relationship with Rory is solid. However, things aren't always as they seem. After the death of her father, Lorelai agrees to go to therapy with her mother. But, even after Emily stops going, Lorelai continues to attend sessions. Somewhere along the way, she feels as though something in her life is lacking.

Spontaneously, she packs a bag and leaves town to hike the Pacific Crest Trail, à la Cheryl Strayed in Wild. Due to a lost permit, she doesn't actually get to hike. But, a quick glance at a few mountains is all the clarity she needs. She rushes home, asks Luke to marry her, and the two FINALLY get hitched! She also asks her mom to use the money left to Luke (see below) to expand The Dragonfly Inn. Emily agrees on the condition that Lorelai and Luke visit her two weeks every summer and once during Christmas, bringing us full circle to their first arrangement of Friday dinners to pay Chilton's tuition. Looks like there's hope for that mother-daughter relationship after all!

Rory Gilmore
Netflix

Rory Gilmore

Once the girl who always had a plan and an annoying habit of succeeding, Rory is now almost completely unhinged. After an impressive article in the New Yorker, Rory continues to work as a freelance journalist. She's hired by eccentric author, Naomi Shropshire, to work on a book proposal, but is ultimately fired. After that, she struggles to get a job. Employers brush her off, and she squanders opportunities that she deems beneath her, including a teaching position at Chilton and a writing gig at online publication, SandeeSays. Professionally, things are bad, but personally, things are worse.

She gives up her apartment in Brooklyn to, essentially, couch-surf around the globe. This, conveniently, allows her to visit London at the drop of a hat. What's in London you ask? Not her boyfriend, Pete, as you would think. I mean Patrick, I mean PAUL (at least I remembered his name at the end of the day, unlike Rory most of the time). In reality, she travels across the pond to visit Logan, her ex-almost fiancé with whom she's having an affair. In an attempt to get her life back on track, Rory breaks things off with Logan, moves back home, takes a job as the editor of the Stars Hollow Gazette, and even decides to write a memoir. However, all of her progress may be derailed because she finds out that SHE'S PREGNANT! After hearing those last four words, we're demanding that Netflix create a revival to the revival.

Emily Gilmore
Netflix

Emily Gilmore

After the tragic passing of her husband, Richard, Emily is forced to adjust to living life alone. At first, she obviously has a hard time of letting go; after all, she and Richard had been married for 50 years. However, slowly but surely, she takes steps to deal with her grief and move on. She attends therapy with Lorelai (finally!), but that's short lived. Instead, she sleeps late, wears jeans, and even quits the DAR in an incredibly diva-like fashion. She eventually sells her home and moves to Nantucket.

Luke Danes
Netflix

Luke Danes

Good ol' Luke! At the end of the original series run, Luke and Lorelai's relationship seemed to be headed in the right direction but ultimately hung in the balance. Luckily, fans were able to let out a sigh of relief when they saw that Luke has been living happily with Lorelai for the past 10 years! He has become such a part of the Gilmore clan that Richard even wrote him into the will before he passed away.

Luke was given a substantial amount of money that was meant to franchise Luke's diner, as Richard had aggressively decided he should do back in season five. Although he looks at various potential properties, Luke decides that branching out just isn't in his future. Also not in his future: more children. Though the thought briefly crosses his mind, he shuts it down completely after visiting a surrogacy agency (run by our favorite Type A personality, Paris Geller). In the end, the only thing that Luke truly needs is Lorelai, and the two finally tie the knot!

Dean Forester
Netflix

Dean Forester

While in town visiting his parents, Dean bumps into Rory at, where else, but Doose's Market. As the two quickly catch up, we learn that Dean has remarried and currently lives in Scranton with his three (soon to be four!) kids. Despite all of the baggage between him and Rory, it's nice to see Dean finally get his happy ending.

Jess Mariano
Netflix

Jess Mariano

With his new long locks and five o'clock shadow, Jess rolls into town on a rescue mission. First, he tries to save his mom and stepdad from a vegetable cult. (They were actually kicked out for being too odd. Weird, we know). Then, he finds a down-on-her-luck Rory and saves her by giving her the brilliant idea of writing a book — a memoir on her life with her mother. He would probably even publish it for her, since he's still working at the book press.

Apparently, he and Rory have stayed in touch, but haven't seen each other in nearly four years. But, what's four years to a man in love? With his single status and long, over-the-shoulder glances at Rory, we're keeping our fingers crossed for #TeamJess!

Logan Huntzberger
Netflix

Logan Huntzberger

After Rory turns down Logan’s marriage proposal in the seventh season, most people probably thought that we had seen the last of him. But in reality, it's quite the opposite. Logan has a thriving career in London and is engaged to a French heiress named Odette. His life is essentially picture perfect, except for one small thing: Rory.

Even though he is engaged to be married, and Rory is in a long-term relationship, the two have been having an open, no-strings-attached affair. She is even living with him in London before Odette comes to town! Sadly, Rory has once again become "the other woman." After a raging night out with the Life and Death brigade, he and Rory have one last tryst. She cuts ties with him, but we have our suspicions that Logan will forever be a part of Rory’s life. #BabyDaddy.

Paris Gellar
Netflix

Paris Gellar

Was there ever any doubt that Paris would become extremely successful after graduating Yale? After attending Harvard Medical School, Paris marries her Yale boyfriend, Doyle McMaster. They have a couple of kids, live in a five-story Manhattan townhouse, and are doing very well . . . until Doyle makes it big as a Hollywood screenwriter. (It's a fun nod to Danny Strong's career as Empire co-creator.) The two quickly grow apart and are now going through a divorce. But don't weep for Paris! She has a very successful surrogacy empire called Dynasty Makers to fall back on.

Lane Kim
Netflix

Lane Kim

When we last saw Lane, she had married her bandmate, Zach, and had given birth to twin boys, Kwan and Steve. Ten years later, she and Zach are still happily married and living in Stars Hollow. After years of trying to let her real identity shine bright, it's nice to see Lane get her happily ever after. The band, Hep Alien still gets together to jam every once in a while! Fun fact: Hep Alien is actually an anagram of Gilmore Girl creator Amy Sherman-Palladino's best friend, Helen Pai, who Lane's character is loosely based off of.

Michel Gerard
Netflix

Michel Gerard

Michel was always a grump, but finding love seems to have warmed his heart. Michel has married his partner of five years, Frederic, and the two are adopting a baby! However, his expanding family and growing listlessness have caused him to reevaluate his job at The Dragonfly. Looking for more responsibility and more money, Michel considers taking a job at the W Hotel in Manhattan, but we never get resolution on his future path.

Sookie St. James
Everett Collection

Sookie St. James

Michel wasn’t the only one that needed a change from The Dragonfly Inn. Our favorite bubbly, accident-prone co-owner and chef decided to take a sabbatical and fly the coop. Leaving the Inn, but taking Jackson and her three kids with her, Sookie took a 6-month-turned-much-longer job working at Blue Hill Farm with Dan Barber. In her absence, Lorelai hired numerous celebrity chefs to take her place, including a quickly fired Rachael Ray. Luckily, Sookie returns to the Inn just in time to design a cake for Lorelai's wedding.

Kirk Gleason
Netflix

Kirk Gleason

While Kirk may have finally found stability in his long-term relationship with girlfriend Lulu, his professional life is still all over the place. Stars Hollow's quirky jack-of-all-trades has many new ventures, including a ride-share service called Öööber (that’s totally different from Uber because you have to call his mom first), a new original film, and raising his pet pig, Petal. He takes on the job of decorating Luke and Lorelai's wedding and does such a superb job we think that he's finally found his true calling!

Christopher Hayden
Everett Collection

Christopher Hayden

Throughout the original series, Christopher continuously struggled with his family responsibilities. But after years of neglect and failed promises, he finally steps up to the plate. He pays Rory's Yale tuition, provided for her stepsister Gigi, and even tries to solidify his family by marrying Lorelai. While their relationship ends in divorce, he stays a friend to Lorelai and a father to Rory.

In the revival, presumably after discovering her pregnancy, Rory turns to her dad for advice. She wonders if he did the right thing by allowing Lorelai to raise her alone, and he assures her that everything worked out the way it was supposed to. Looks like he finally got good at giving fatherly advice! He currently works for his family's company, while his daughter, Gigi, lives in Paris with her mother, Sherry.

April Nardini
Everett Collection

April Nardini

Just because people grow up, doesn't mean that they grow wiser. This is especially true for Luke's daughter, April. Apparently, college taught her that lawyers are fascists and that it's OK to lie about meeting Noam Chomsky. Now 22, the recent MIT graduate has plans to spend the summer canvassing for marijuana legalization. During her return to Stars Hollow, she also asks her father to finance a study abroad trip to Germany. With her nose ring and constant insistence that she only watches broody, foreign films, April continues to be the absolute worst. It's comforting to know that some things never change.