Younger Season 6 Episode 7 Review: Friends with Benefits
Carissa Pavlica
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Will that revelation from Charles help or hurt his relationship with Liza?
On Younger Season 6 Episode 7, Liza discovered an unfinished and unpublished manuscript among the items Charles had delivered to the office after his country place got sold.
Kelsey's hope that it might be the winning option for Mercury to publish after their merger opens an entirely new avenue about Charles that we never knew.
It was never going to be easy for Kelsey to step into the publisher role with Charles working as an editor.
But in business, Kesley is her own worst enemy. As worried as she was about managing Charles, he was ready to hand her the reins. He didn't plan on making it easy for her.
Younger Review: An Inside Glob
So Kelsey started the new relationship unable to take control of her new editors.
It was made more difficult by her odd behavior. She was trying to delineate Mercury and Millennial, but her approach was all wrong.
She kept pushing back and wanted to win a battle that only she was fighting.
From the onset, she dismissed the titles Charles and Zane had cultivated as not sexy enough for their first book post-merger, considered stealing their hard-won work, and questioned what they brought to the table.
Kelsey: After looking over your current acquisitions, I feel that this book would be much better suited as a Millennial title.
Zane: You lost that book! You can't just poach it because you want it!
Kelsey: It's just a better fit for Millennial. A story about a young woman who may or may not be a killer? It's a real-life Gone Girl.
What I found the most vexing was that she told Zane while bantering over the coffee maker that she was going to evaluate their business to see what dead weight they brought along with them.
As Millennial and Mercury were battling tooth and nail for every book they signed, what did weight did Kelsey expect to find?
Kelsey ultimately revealed to Liza that she found it very difficult to look at Charles as anything other than an authority figure.
Since Liza and Charles have, more or less, found a routine in which they aren't hiding things from each other, Liza took Kelsey's thoughts directly to Charles.
Younger Review: Stiff Competition
Charles suggestion that Kelsey had to be strong so he could be a good editor was refreshing. He really is interested in pursuing the creative side of the business again and knows that without Kelsey's help, he won't succeed.
But he's not going to roll over and play dead so she can feel significant. He expects her to earn his trust as an editor.
While Charles is looking forward to a future quite far from the path he was taking when Liza entered the picture, she has begun questioning what I just referred to as their routine.
While they were "balling" out and about, running into her old friends did nothing for her self confidence. She still looks at her married life as restrictive and unexciting.
Liza doesn't want to revisit the type of arrangement she had with her husband and she's scared to death leaving Josh behind and plunging forward with Charles will make that happen.
Liza: My worlds are colliding, and it all feels strangely familiar.
Maggie: I get it! It's like you only had chocolate ice cream for 20 years and then you got divorced and tried all these new flavors -- pistachio, guava, cookies and cream -- and now it's like you're with chocolate chocolate chip.
Liza: But I like chocolate.
Maggie: Sure, better than vanilla.
Liza spends too much time worrying about the little things. Charles is in the midst of a life-altering period, too. He doesn't want to get stuck in a rut any more than Liza does.
But what Charles doesn't do is keep someone on the side just in case.
And that's what I think Liza is doing with Josh. It's not fair to either man, and Liza needs to pick a lane and stay in it.
Josh is growing up and moving on. He has a child. But he still loves Liza. We've always known that. She was the one that got away.
Without losing Liza, though, Josh wouldn't have his baby, and he now has a number one girl who will never leave.
Younger Review: Merger, She Wrote
The parallel of one last ride with Josh on his bike versus one last fling with Josh the man was very easy to spot. Riding that bike one last time left Liza a bit shaken.
They're growing farther apart as Josh focuses on fatherhood and Liza leans into Charles. It was ironic that Liza read the unpublished and unfinished manuscript and used it as a pivot to her and Josh.
Liza wasn't snooping when the book fell out of the boxes. She's an editor. The sound of rustling paper makes her ears tingle.
But as soon as she picked up those bound papers and saw the note on the cover, it was obvious that Charles had written it. There are a lot of layers to Charles, and Liza has only begun peeling them away.
Josh: Look, I know you're with him, but I'm glad we can still spend time together like this.
Liza: Yeah, me too. You know, I've been reading a book that reminds me of us.
Josh: Really? Tell me more.
Liza: It's about a younger man who has an affair with an older woman.
Josh: An affair? Huh. Sounds racy.
Liza: It actually is pretty sexy in parts.
Josh: Oh, I bet it is. So how does it end?
Liza: Well, that's the big question. The writer didn't finish the book.
Reading something undiscovered that so closely emulated her time with Josh was attractive to Liza. She finally found happiness when she left her husband, and a lot of that was because of her time with Josh.
Josh made Liza feel free again. He ignited passions she had forgotten. No matter his age, Liza was alive with Josh.
Now that she knows Charles played Josh's role earlier in his life, will that affect the way she feels with Charles?
Liza, the summer I turned 21 I had an affair with the wife of a famous author. She was beautiful but dissatisfied. She was always looking over her shoulder, and she thought that a fling with a younger man would make her feel young, too. And for a while, it was exciting for both of us. That's the part you read.
Charles
Charles was discussion his fling with an older woman and why he chose not to publish a story about her that could hurt a lot of people.
But it was hard not to notice how closely Liza's time with Josh mirrored Charles' affair.
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And when he said he understood that the woman was a bored, disappointed housewife who needed validation, you could tell it stung for Liza to hear that.
Is there any way she won't wonder if Charles thinks less of her for dating Josh? Liza took the younger route not because she needed validation as a sexual woman, but because she needed the weight of 20 years of being a housewife eradicated from her resume.
Falling into the arms of Josh was a bonus, and that had to be validating whether she wanted it to be or not.
Liza can't allow what was to effect what will be because she and Charles may be in an easy routine when it comes to being truthful and sharing their love in the open, but they're hardly falling into old patterns.
Being in a routine is comfortable. Getting stuck in hold habits drains your soul.
They proved they're letting old habits die heroically when they ran away from their baller life like two school children. As long as they have that kind of passion for each other, they'll never grow tired.
And passion is something Diana finally has with Enzo.
Diana likes to pretend that she's a little above Enzo and sometimes too good for him, but it's all an act. Diana's heart is like mush, and her icy exterior is only to protect it.
But Enzo never falters in his love for Diana. Proving he's in it for the long haul, Enzo seized the moment to shut down his family's negative notions about Diana and proposed right on the steps of a church in front of everyone he loves.
Diana is seeing her dreams come true.
There will have to be a big, Italian wedding and a reception hall filled to the brim with affection and entertainment. Oh what fun!
You don't think Diana will rethink her answer, do you?
What is next for Charles and Liza? Is she ready to leave Josh in the past, or will he continually be like a carrot dangling in front of her eyes?
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Carissa Pavlica is the managing editor and a staff writer and critic for TV Fanatic. She's a member of the Critic's Choice Association, enjoys mentoring writers, conversing with cats, and passionately discussing the nuances of television and film with anyone who will listen. Follow her on X and email her here at TV Fanatic.
