[FuzzyCerts]

Take that GG from Matt Roush

Something seriously unfunny is happening on two of TV's most notable hourlong comedies, Desperate Housewives and Gilmore Girls. Not that either show is beyond rescue, but I fear it's going to take a while this season to extricate some heretofore favorite characters from the miserable corners they were painted into last season. Most infamously, Lorelai Gilmore (still, against the odds, effervescently played by Lauren Graham) is mired in an unpleasant situation that makes her overextended estrangement from daughter Rory a while back look like a walk in the park. Last season ended on a dreadful thumb-nosing note by departing series creator Amy Sherman-Palladino as Lorelai walked away from fiancé Luke after making an impulsive (some might say irrational) ultimatum, and then ended up in her former flame (and Rory's father) Christopher's bed. No good can come from this. In Tuesday's opener, Lorelai tells everyone who'll listen, "It's over." If only it were. Not Lorelai and Luke, but the series itself, which in this latest contrivance to keep the couple apart is only taxing our patience. Which isn't to say there aren't many delightful moments in the episode. This is Gilmore Girls and Stars Hollow, after all. Paris and Babette each go on flights of hilarious shtick, and while I'm not entirely a Logan fan, his romantic parting gesture to Rory almost redeems the hour. (Don't try to figure it out, or go to the effort to Google the episode title. Just let it impress and surprise you the way it does Rory.) But Lorelai couldn't be more maddening, even though there is still so much charm and humor in her character (especially with Rory) that you can't help wanting to give her the benefit of the doubt. Still, her refusal to go to Luke even after he suffers a calamity during the episode is just about unforgivable. I've never been much of a fan of "jump the shark" talk, finding it much too easy a way to condemn the inevitable missteps almost every series makes during the long run, but Gilmore Girls has been making a pretty good argument for it ever since Luke's surprise daughter April was introduced. (Actually, April is many ways a pretty cool kid, and the better narrative choice would have been for her, Lorelai and April's mother Anna to bond, leaving Luke comically frustrated with all these women bustling around in his life. Instead, a panicked Luke kept the situation a secret for too long, Anna turned a cold shoulder to Lorelai, and things went south fast.)