This week ABC Family's quaint dramedy Bunheads aired what may well be its series finale, if the show doesn't get renewed for a second season. In case you don't know, Bunheads is the latest brainchild of Amy Sherman Palladino, the spiritual sequel to her breakout hit Gilmore Girls.
Borrowing the small town setting, cutesy mannerisms, fast-paced pop culture dialogue, and several of the actors from Palladino's prior show, the parallels to Gilmore Girls are overwhelmingly inescapable. And yet, Bunheads manages to carve out its own slab of granite.
Before we go further, I have to admit I'm furious at the show for not being gay. There are so many unambiguous hints for each of the girls that they could be gay, for them not to address this by the finale is a downright tragedy. Don't they realize this may well have been their last chance?
If they were planning on making us wait 5 seasons for Melanie and Ginny to date, like they made us wait for Luke and Lorelai, it was quite a miscalculation on their part. Having a couple of gay characters could have been just the injection of relevant vitality needed to lift Bunheads up from its nostalgia-wrought cradle and into this decade. Teenagers, many of whom were probably too young to even care much for Gilmore Girls when it was on, aren't going to tune in for something that feels like it should have aired ten years ago.
And yet, as much as I want to yell and scream and condemn the show for its hubris, I just can't. Because it's such a goddamn good show! I eat up every minute of it, it's fabulous. It's unflinchingly idiosyncratic, with a loose appreciation for plot and absolutely gorgeous dance numbers.
Most surprising it actually presents what seems like a calm, calculated improvement on the Gilmore Girls gameplan: replacing the 'vanilla' predictability of Rory & Lorelai with a much more varied and volatile ensemble. 18 episodes can't wash away 7 glorious seasons of GG, but if Bunheads were to continue and maintain quality, it will easily outshine Gilmore Girls in a couple of years.
Given more seasons, this program could very easily rise up among my all-time favorite TV shows. I'll always resent it if they don't explore the overwhelming homosexual potential in these characters, but even so, I can't argue with results... and Bunheads is just so fantastically entertaining. Amazing characters, hilarious storylines, and a light, airy mood that resonates with easy warmth. It has a bit of magic that is impossible to describe, but easy to experience.
Unfortunately, Bunheads hasn't been doing great in the ratings. If the gods are good, it'll run for another five years. But I hope the Bunheads crew has made their peace, because the gods are rarely good.
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