Thoughts on Younger’s Season Four Finale and the Future of Liza’s Relationships
From the moment I saw Josh (Nico Tortorella) say “I kind of need you, Liza” in the promo for Younger‘s season four finale, I guessed things were far from over between him and Liza (Sutton Foster). Boy was I right.
Let’s backup for a second. For all those on #TeamCharles, I get that this season was always supposed to be about Charles (Peter Hermann) and Liza. The time had finally come for the two of them to explore the possibility of a romantic relationship. However, the writers kind of half-assed this when it came to execution. We got an arc that slowly, but steadily, showed Liza and Charles’s relationship progressing. Episode 4 x11, directly before the finale, ended with Liza declaring her love for Charles as she cried on Jay’s shoulder. But in the last episode, there was no Liza-Charles movement whatsoever; everything essentially came to a halt. It really felt like the writers undid, and flat-out ignored, everything that occurred this past season up until that point.
With that being said, as someone who is hardcore #TeamJosh, I still really enjoyed the season four finale. For the reasons listed above, the shift to my favorite side of the love triangle seemed to come out of nowhere. But did I complain when I finally got an episode that featured Josh and Liza in the same room for more than a brief moment? Absolutely not! I’ve missed seeing the two of them share screen time. I honestly think the lack of their togetherness, and my yearning for it, is partly why this season made me ship Josh and Liza even more than I already did.
In order to talk about why I’m not giving up hope for a Josh and Liza reconciliation, we must talk about what actually happened in the finale. The episode starts with Josh realizing, after visiting Claire in Ireland, that he didn’t want to do a long distance relationship with her anymore. The easiest way for her to get a green card, since she already had a work visa, would be for them to get married. Josh calls Liza and begs her to come be a part of the festivities. So we see her travel to Ireland to be the best woman at her ex-boyfriend’s wedding. Then Liza learns she was only meant to validate the wedding to Claire’s family, and eventually homeland security. Naturally, Josh gets Claire to persuade Liza into lying for them. Her argument? Liza owes Josh for all the lying she’s done and for involving him in her charade from the beginning.
After a bit of back and forth, Liza comes through in the clutch, lying to all of Claire’s friends and family at the rehearsal dinner. Later that night, a very tipsy Josh shows up at Liza’s room. After kissing her he says, “it’s always been [her].” When she reminds him she can’t give him the life he wants, he delivers a swoon-worthy line only the way Nico Tortorella can: “The life that I want is any life with you.” Alcohol is just a truth serum, right?
The only thing they did, aside from kiss, was sleep together, spooning. The next morning, much to Liza’s dismay, he went through with the wedding, telling her beforehand, “I keep coming back to you, even when I know I should move on…. and I need to put a ring between us.”
That’s a lot of Josh-Liza to take in for one episode, especially considering the two of them weren’t speaking for the first few episodes of season four. While it seems Josh’s Irish wedding might be the end of his romantic relationship with Liza, I don’t think it will be. At all.
Let’s be real. This is still Josh we’re talking about. Does anyone think his marriage will actually last longer than the honeymoon? I think being a Mr & Mrs is all it’s going to take for Josh to realize you shouldn’t marry someone just for a green card, or to get over the ex-girlfriend you were nearly engaged to. Nico said it best in a clip TV Land played right after the episode aired: “Josh needs therapy way more than he needs a wife.”
On the other hand, Liza now realizes she’s not over Josh like she thought. While she’ll always support him, and want nothing but the best for him, there is still part of her that loves him unconditionally…beyond friends. And that epiphany means she’s not quite ready to make up her mind about who she wants to be with.
So where does this leave Liza and her messy-but-oh-so-perfect love triangle in season five? I don’t know. But I know what I personally want to happen (#TeamJosh forever and I wrote about why here) and this renewed hope in the Josh-Liza relationship makes me more excited than ever for Younger to come back in 2018.
