I think it’s really heartbreaking knowing how much Rory probably wanted her father in her life. Granted, Lorelai gave her anything and everything she needed, but Rory always carried with her hopes of reconciliation and a need to reconnect with her father.
Now that I think about it, Rory’s never-ending hope that Chris would one day start acting like her father was probably why she never treated Max, Jason, or Luke as a father figure. Sure, she was close with some of her mother’s boyfriends, but she rarely every thought of them as anything more than friends or people to respect.
And it’s only really when Rory realized how toxic her father was to her and her mother’s life that she finally let go of this idealized version of him, and really showed some growth in my opinion. It was always easy for Rory and Lorelai to get into a fight because they were so close, but Rory realizing how problematic her father was truly showed that she understood her mother’s struggles with Chris and why it could never work. Rory finally accepted Chris as someone who was a part of her life by fate, never by choice, no matter how hard both of them tried, which makes you wonder even more how Rory handles her situation in “A Year in the Life.”