Lorelai Gilmore Is The Embodiment Of 'Brat Summer'
Stars Hollow might call to mind the auburn and golden shades of fall foliage, but Lorelai Gilmore? That gal is the electric lime green of Brat Summer. Because Lorelai Gilmore IS brat.
When Charli XCX released her new album Brat on June 7, fans immediately swapped Taylor Swift, Barbie, and the Summer of Girlhood for the leather jacket-clad, lime green edge of Brat Summer. Brat Summer is all about going with the flow, and going buck wild — whether you're hanging out with your best friends at a party, living your Euro Summer dreams, or watching Glen Powell Twisters edits. (Hey, we don't judge). And if there's one fictional character I know for a FACT would be all over Brat Summer, it's Gilmore Girls' Lorelai.
Lorelai Gilmore Would Feel Empowered By Charli XCX & Brat Summer
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When you think about it, Brat Summer and Lorelai Gilmore have quite a lot in common: being effortlessly cool, bringing life to every room they walk in, and embracing life's all around edginess. Just like the Powerpuff Girls are made of sugar, spice, and everything nice, Lorelai is fun, spunk, and just a dash of rebellion — the perfect recipe for a Brat gal!
Lorelai in 2024 would love the live-with-abandon mindset Brat Summer offers us, especially since she already doesn't care what other people think about her. And the album would just serve as another excuse to wear those colorful, bold outfits she loves. I mean, how brat-coded is it to wear jorts and cowboy boots to your daughter's first day of prep school?
Lor's the girl all her exes always come back to, who looks better than anyone in the room without even trying, and who everyone wants to be friends with, mess and all. It's almost too obvious that Lorelai embodies all the rule-breaking, girlypop energy that comes with this trend, whether she's laughing because she has the worst seats at a concert or bugging Luke for another cup of coffee.
But Brat Summer isn't just joking about "bumpin' that" and a shade of lime green we're sure Emily would loathe.
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Charli XCX takes this party girl energy and envelopes it in thirty-something angst that's desperate to uplift women (she worked it out on the remix!!!) and break generational cycles ("Apple" isn't just a cute TikTok dance, y'all!!!), despite whatever cards she's been dealt. And that's Lorelai Gilmore to a tee.
Lorelai always encourages Rory to befriend the girls around her, constantly builds Sookie up, and vehemently rejects the her mother's choices. Sure, there's plenty of mess in the middle of all this, but what's a party girl to do? Even when Christopher disappoints her (again), Emily critiques her (again), or there's a literal fire at the Independence Inn, Lorelai powers through with a smile on her face. Because dancing through life, especially when it's hard, is Brat. And Lorelai is the ULTIMATE Brat Girl.
What is Brat Summer?
Brat Summer, inspired by Charli XCX's Brat album, is about embracing life in all its fun, heartbreaking, chaotic glory. The "Boom Clap" singer explains in an Instagrampost that her newest release is "my most pure, my most charli, my most brat."
"At the end of the day," Charli continues, "that’s exactly what brat is all about: me, my flaws, my f—ck ups, my ego all rolled into one."
Brat quickly entered the zeitgeist thanks to a nationwide desire to cut loose (not to mention those viral "Apple" TikTok dances), and the movement has even reached the White House. After Charli XCX tweeted Vice President Kamala Harris, who's now running for President, "IS brat" (a tweet currently at 53.9M views), the official Kamala HQ accounts made an Instagram post and changed their X header to match the style of the Brat cover.
TikTok users are editing Vice President Harris' viral "coconut tree" speech overtop of the album, and this kind of personalized, wild spontaneity is what sets Brat apart.
"You're just like that girl who's a little messy and likes to party and does some dumb things sometimes," Charli says in a TikTok video. "Who feels herself but then maybe has a breakdown but kind of parties through it, is very honest, very blunt. A little bit volatile. Like, does dumb things. But it’s brat. You’re brat. That’s brat."
It's an all-encompassing, vibey identity that respects the gravity of what it means to live in 2024 — while having the perfect amount of irreverence for everything else.
What does Brat Summer mean to you? Let us know in the comments and on Facebook!
Lead image via Warner Bros. Television