Cozy Season Has Everyone Swooning Over Gilmore Girls' Jess Again. We're Here To Admit He's The Worst.

It's Stars Hollow season, which means we're all reliving the ups and downs of Rory Gilmore's love life. We love the real-life partners of the "Gilmore Girls" leading ladies, but they've got nothing on the fictional leading men who populated this series. Sure, Rory's high school boyfriend Dean might have had anger issues, and her college boyfriend Logan might have grated on us with his entitlement and thrill seeking. Both guys were far from perfect. But mostly we're just glad she didn't end up with Jess.

Jess is Rory's shortest relationship. The pair dates for just part of season three. Still, long after they break up — or rather, after Jess disappears with no conversation and no warning — this cretin in a leather jacket just won't go away. Maybe it's this popping in and out of Rory's life that has so many fans convinced this pair is endgame. Jess consistently appears at the top, or close to the top, of fan and critical rankings. Never mind, say the Jess defenders, that he was sullen, rude, and prone to lying. Never mind that he was erratic, or that his vulnerability always came out as meanness. After all, they say, Jess is the guy who convinced Rory to return to Yale. Her intellectual soulmate. The one person who could reach her when she was spiraling into a dark, alternate timeline.

But that's the whole problem with Jess. Sure, he has his good points, and we're not above giving someone permission to get back together with their ex. But to defend Jess — and to earnestly ship him with Rory — means saying never mind too many times.

There's admittedly something electric about Rory's connection with Jess. In season 2, he crashes into her tiny town full of references to Charles Bukowski and Björk. He longs to annotate her copy of Allen Ginsberg's "Howl." He challenges her in ways that her sheltered, small-town life previously hasn't.

But Jess lets Rory down in other ways. He's hostile to the things she loves, and peevish when asked to prioritize her, whether it's meeting her grandparents or going to prom. As the viewer, we're often granted insight into Jess's troubled internal world — the mother who doesn't want him at home, the absentee father who abruptly appears, his struggles at school, even his victimization by a swan. But Rory never sees any of this because Jess never opens up to her. Instead, she sees a boyfriend who is inexplicably hostile and withdrawn.

Most telling, Jess's most important moment, when he urges her to return to Yale, occurs late in the series, long after the pair have split up. Of course, on-again off-again relationships tend to do more harm than you realize. Still, for a few brief moments, he is the man Rory always deserved, and for a moment, it erases all that came before. But we never actually see Jess and Rory together as a great couple; instead, we're attached to the idea of what Rory and Jess could be at some point in the future. It's all just potential. The problem is that imagined future is all based on one quick flash — one truly great scene — after six seasons of letting her down. It's just too little and it's too late.