Recent claims of an excess of gamma rays from the Galactic center have grown in statistical significance over the last few years. In this talk, I’ll provide a (fairly optimistic) summary of the observational and phenomenological work relating to the Galactic center GeV excess. This will necessitate an up-to-date discussion of the claims in the literature, and will also include discussion of some particle physics models that can provide a basis for the signal. I’ll go on to discuss ideas for new techniques that might help push us toward a deeper understanding of the signal and its phenomenology.