Totally agree with your posts. I've seen clips of Kelly Bishop on youtube and she is remarkably talented. I would rank her and Lauren as the most talented actors (male or female) on the show. When people say the show is most importantly about the mother-daughter relationship (more than the romance angle), i think it applies to Lorelai/Emily almost (almost) as much as Lorelai/Rory, but of course in a completely different way.
One thing i liked about the much-maligned season 7 was the way Emily's character broadened even further. I think we saw her at her most vulnerable during and after Richard's heart attack. She of course was in full Emily mode part of the time (such as at the hospital when she treated Luke like an errand boy), but we also caught glimpses of how scared she really was at the thought of life without her husband.
In earlier seasons we also saw rare glimpses of Emily's vulnerability and i agree completely that she loves Lorelai. Being Emily, she has her own way of showing it. Throughout the series, Emily had an inner conflict between needing Lorelai (and Rory) in her life on the one hand, and her natural tendency to be a hyper-critical control freak on the other hand. Periodically she would express her fear to Richard that they would "lose Lorelai" again. So, in that sense, Lorelai held the cards. What was Emily's way of keeping control? Money. And ASP nicely saw to it that Emily & Richard paid for Chilton & Yale.
There are moments when Emily makes me sick to my stomache. I hate when she refers to an eligible man for Lorelai as having "good breeding". But this is consistent with her upper crust outlook. And for all her shades of character, she was remarkably consistent. As wmushell pointed out in her post, even in the finale she was anxious for Lorelai to stay in her life. And her way of doing that, typically, was to badger her about upgrading the inn... and loaning Lorelai the money, natch. I loved the moment at the party when Lorelai understood and said they would discuss it at Friday night dinner. And the following moment when Emily told her not to wear jeans, and on and on. The few moments of peace between Emily and Lorelai are extra special because they are so rare.
Paris and Emily share a few things in common: both control freaks, both show the occasional vulnerable side, and both have voices that are so sharp they can shatter glass.
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