Luke & Kiefer Sutherland Are Friends In 'GG'

Amy Sherman-Palladino and Dan Palladino brought their A-game to Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life when it came to pop culture references, which should surprise no one. But the duo went a little farther than one might expect with that sort of gag in the new revival series, making a character fans would never suspect have a major celebrity connection. That's right, in "Summer" we find out that Luke Danes and actor Kiefer Sutherland are friends — and more than that, they're fishing buddies. That's a pretty big deal for Luke.

Like Lorelai when she heard the news, many fans were shocked upon hearing of Luke's celeb connection. Why are they friends? How could Luke hold this information out on us for so long? Does he even know Lorelai? You'd think that after years of being together, Luke would understand how much Lorelai loves a good pop culture tidbit and would have found a moment before the scene in the revival to casually mention, "By the way, I'm going on a fishing trip with Jack Bauer so Cesar's watching the diner. Catch ya later!" The whole thing is deeply disconcerting.

Lorelai gets this piece of new information when she tries to pin Luke down to form a guest list for their upcoming wedding. Luke's trying to get out of the whole planning thing by claiming he's needed at the diner, though Lorelai tells him the diner needs him so little that "it's in its underwear blasting Bob Seger." She wants him to focus on the guest list, and so far, all Luke has on his half of the list is his sister Liz and her husband T.J., a Cousin Billy who doesn't actually seem to exist but somehow booked his flight anyway, and Uncle Brago — not even Cesar can come because Luke is refusing to shut down Luke's.

When Lorelai passionately reminds Luke of the importance of the day, saying, "Luke it is your big day. The biggest day of your life. You have officially peaked. There is nowhere to go from here but down. Now, knowing that nothing lies ahead but corns and death, is there anyone else in the entire world you would like to come to your wedding?," the gruff diner owner decides there's at least "one guy" he could invite, an "old buddy."

This old buddy, of course, happens to be the one-and-only Kiefer Sutherland, not just a random guy with a name "spelled the same as the real Kiefer Sutherland." According to Luke, "we did a baseball camp together years ago. We both stunk. We bonded. We still go fishing." Basically, Luke just has a casual friendship with the star of 24. As one does.

Both Lorelais have the best (and incredibly similar) reactions to the news, starting with imitations of Sutherland (Alexis Bledel really needs to work on her impression game) and ending with the notion that someone needs to get kicked off their table at the wedding so that Lorelai and Rory can sit near the actor. Pretty understandable, if you ask me.

I sincerely wonder what Luke and Sutherland talk about. Or do they just sit quietly and fish together? Ugh, if only Netflix would hook fans up with a Gilmore Girls wedding party episode. Fingers crossed, y'all, because I need to see Lorelai and Sutherland interact.

Images: Netflix, Giphy (3)