25 incredible TV moms we love to watch

Lorelai Gilmore – Gilmore Girls

Perhaps the ultimate pop culture mother in the television canon, no list of TV moms would be complete without Lorelai Gilmore. Pretty, quirky, and fast-talking, Lorelai is the mother we all wish we were and the mother we wish we had.

A teen mom herself, Lorelai fled the confines of her wealthy Connecticut upbringing when baby Rory was just a tiny baby. She wound up in a shack behind a quaint B&B where she worked as a maid to feed her and her young daughter. Although this seems like an extreme reaction to a life that doesn’t look so bad from the outside, Lorelai was determined to give Rory a better, more accepting life — albeit poor — than she grew up experiencing.

Both mother and daughter landed in the small town of Stars Hollow, where they found the sense of love and community Lorelai couldn’t with her mother in their giant mansion. Maybe I’m romanticizing their situation a little more than I should because they lived a fun, simple life filled with coffee, weird neighbors, and lots and lots of takeout.

It’s also easy to romanticize Lorelai as a mother, but true fans will remember lots of times when she wasn’t so great. She was often judgmental and pushy and resented Rory’s relationship with Lorelai’s parents. This doesn’t exclude her for mother of the year. In fact, it’s sort of what makes her so inspirational.

Any mother who says they’ve never yelled at their kid or said things in anger is a liar. Lorelai, although she is an idealized version of the perfect mother, she’s often a pretty accurate portrait of motherhood fails.