S04.E11: It's Love, Actually

[Angelus82]

Also, I don't understand how Liza has so much empathy for Pauline. I get that she sees herself in Pauline's losing herself and that resonates with Liza. But I struggle to see that Liza could justify just up and leaving the girls the way Pauline did. Being a parent is not something you can just turn on and off. What stops Pauline from checking out again? 

[Palomar]

Pauline moving into Charles' house (even to the guest room) changes everything.  Charles is really no longer even single.  I can't see Liza continuing anything with Charles when there is a possibility of "the family" getting back together.  Something's got to give here!

[luna1122]

I am not sure it's been established that Pauline had no contact with the girls for a whole year. I mean, maybe she didn't, but I don't remember that point having been driven home. Sure, she left the house and let Charles have parental custody but maybe she still saw them and talked to them. That changes how I'd view her, for sure.

[Stuffy]

1 hour ago, luna1122 said:

I am not sure it's been established that Pauline had no contact with the girls for a whole year. I mean, maybe she didn't, but I don't remember that point having been driven home. Sure, she left the house and let Charles have parental custody but maybe she still saw them and talked to them. That changes how I'd view her, for sure.

During the first season, Charles told Liza the girls were having a hard time because they hadn't seen their mother for months. I don't think it was ever mentioned again. 

[dubbel zout]

I love Liza and Jay together. Too bad they won't last.

Richard is garbage. He forces his son onto Diana and then unilaterally decides they should live in another apartment? Ugh. Brava to Diana for kicking him out. Good riddance.

1 hour ago, Stuffy said:

During the first season, Charles told Liza the girls were having a hard time because they hadn't seen their mother for months. I don't think it was ever mentioned again. 

I don't think they thought through what to do about Charles and his wife, and this is the result. 

I can't believe we still haven't gotten a Maggie/Diana scene.

[rho]

On 8/30/2017 at 11:03 PM, rho said:

Pauline has been a prominent character in 4 episodes so far and she's basically just repeated variations of the same two lines:

1) "This book changed my life"
2) "I think Charles is going to let me move back in."

Quoting myself from last week because she said it again in this episode, practically verbatim. New game: Drink if this book changed Pauline's life?

6 hours ago, Angelus82 said:

Also, I don't understand how Liza has so much empathy for Pauline. I get that she sees herself in Pauline's losing herself and that resonates with Liza. But I struggle to see that Liza could justify just up and leaving the girls the way Pauline did. Being a parent is not something you can just turn on and off. What stops Pauline from checking out again? 

Same! Pauline is just like all the annoying moms Liza left back in Jersey. There has been nothing to show that Pauline is interesting or endearing in any way. I wonder if maybe Liza's judgment is lopsided, considering her entire job is spinning the story into something palatable. 

Honestly, I think I might be able to stomach it more easily if it was presented as fiction (read: heightened reality) and I never knew the author's back story. But that seems impossible considering her estranged husband owns the publishing house. Ugh, just all of it is so tiring. I can't ever see myself buying a book just to read about how one woman decided she was suddenly exhausted by her family. 

[holly4755]

one day I was sitting in B altman's dining place circa 1970 when a woman sat opposite of me, it was a site where you find a seat where ever kind of place, so I didn't think anything of it, and then she looked me in the eye and started telling me her story. she was a midwest housewife with a successful self employed husband and 4 young kids, She felt unfulfilled. One day she just packed up and left to find herself in NYC.  I had not said anything to her, I had no idea why she told me this story, but it was like she was asking for my approval. I was pretty young, so not sure why.  She asked if I thought she should go home. I asked her if she were happy.  I really did not want to say good or bad.  She ate for a while and said she thought they were all happy now, She finished eating and left.  never saw her again. 

who knew it would be a plot in a TV show I was watching. 

[Snarklepuss]

On 9/7/2017 at 2:29 AM, HunterHunted said:

Shut up Jay's mom who needed to get knee surgery. I grew up in Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh's main industries are health care/medicine, biotechnology, robotics, higher education, and banking. It has a top 20 medical school and the hospitals associated with the school are also in the top 20 in the US. Additionally, most of the highest ranked best known hospitals in the US aren't in New York. The Mayo Clinic is in Rochester Minnesota. The Cleveland Clinic is in Cleveland Ohio. Johns Hopkins is in Baltimore Maryland. M.D. Anderson is in Houston Texas. 

I'm just irritated because this is one of those dumb New York is amazing everywhere else is a one road cow town jokes that Darren Star loves. They never made much sense during Sex and the City. They make even less sense now because Darren seems to think that any place that isn't New York is Mayberry or the town from Deliverance. 

ITA, especially because US News ranks a hospital in Washington, PA outside of Pittsburgh as the #3 hospital in the country for knee replacement!

That said, it did rank a NYC hospital as #1 for general orthopedic surgery.  But the point is, they should have at least checked it out before just assuming that NY would be the best.  But that's IMO typical for Darren Star.  His is an outdated NY attitude.  A lot of his attitudes remind me of New Yorkers 20-30 years ago.  Similar attitudes can be found in old "Seinfeld" episodes and ancient "New Yorker" magazine covers.

[HunterHunted]

18 hours ago, dubbel zout said:

Authors don't always have logical or tangible reasons for jumping ship. Sometimes they just want a change. 

I actually think that Empirical thwarting Moore's announcement that he was Aubry Alexis who had written "Me, Myself, and O" played a significant part in why Moore jumped ship. He wants the recognition and accolades. I think Rivington exploited that resentment even if they too would never had let him come forward.

14 hours ago, Angelus82 said:

Also, I don't understand how Liza has so much empathy for Pauline. I get that she sees herself in Pauline's losing herself and that resonates with Liza. But I struggle to see that Liza could justify just up and leaving the girls the way Pauline did. Being a parent is not something you can just turn on and off. What stops Pauline from checking out again? 

I think Liza connects with Pauline's sublimation of herself and Pauline's self direction. Had David not upended Liza's life, Liza would probably still be in Paramus. Pauline didn't have an extrenal action by Charles motivating her to change her life. Pauline looked up one day and realized that this isn't what she wanted or thought her life to be. Both Pauline and Liza put their dreams and career ambitions on hold for marriage and motherhood, but Pauline didn't need to wait until Charles ruined their life for her to pursue her goals. I think Pauline inspires Liza to wonder what might have been if she, Liza, had the willpower to start getting back into publishing 5 or 10 years ago. 

Edited September 9, 2017 by HunterHunted

[Snarklepuss]

Well, my love for the show's handling of the Charles/Liza plot was short lived.  I think they're veering into shark jumping territory now with all the unbelievable plot twists.  Just in this thread alone we have collectively uncovered several "I'm not buying it" out of the blue head scratchers such as:

1. Charles' out-of-proportion protestations to love Liza, which seemed to come out of the blue.
2. Liza's out-of-proportion admission to being "in love with" Charles which also came out of the blue.
3. The show's complete amnesia about Liza's divorce not really being final, unless they're saving that for some kind of bombshell at some point.
4. Charles' wife seems contrived and one dimensional, more like a plot device than a real person.
5. Liza hitting it off so well with a one dimensional, contrived plot device that happens to be the WIFE of the man she's supposedly in LOVE with.  Not buying THAT one either!
6. The fact that a book supposedly about a middle aged housewife taking a "break" from her marriage and family to "find herself" being a smash with millennials is a real stretch that I don't buy either!  At the very least Kelsey would have thought it would be more appropriate to Empirical.  Her getting upset when Charles wanted to take it back to Empirical seemed ridiculous and unbelievable.
7. The fact that Charles would be OK with letting his wife have potential power over him when he's trying to move in on Liza is ridiculous too, especially given the force of his protestations of love for Liza.  The whole thing doesn't add up unless he's that desperate to generate money for the company.  But at what cost?  This is his EX after all.  But I guess Charles doesn't understand the concept of not pooping where you eat.  Maybe he has boundary issues?
8. The fact that Pauline would be so deluded as to think she could spin leaving her kids into some kind of wonderful spiritual journey to find herself instead of the abandonment that it was and everyone else just accepting that because of her book being marketable is just sickening if you ask me.
9. The fact that Charles is OK with his ex just walzing back into his and his kids' lives and the kids not being depicted realistically as confused and perhaps upset about their relationship with her.  It's just not realistic nor believable.  And you don't even have to have kids to realize that!  I think Charles is sort of whoring himself out to Pauline to make a buck.  The company has been unable to generate enough good book deals so he is selling himself out to his ex to get one, I guess.  Unless her manipulation is really working.  Of course they want the audience to think that because they're screwing with us to keep us tuned in.  Only they're going overboard with it, IMO and alienating us instead!

[Snarklepuss]

On 9/7/2017 at 8:10 AM, Ailianna said:

I've never seen Sex and the City, but I do know a lot of New Yorkers really feel that way.  I once lived on 129th street, and none of my friends would visit because they said I lived in "fucking Canada".  I'm not sure why if she's like that she would live in Pittsburgh, but there are a lot of people, both who grew up in Manhattan and who moved there to be living in Manhattan, who think NYC is the best of the best of everything.  Definitely not true of everyone, but I thought Jay was both mocking his mom a little for feeling that way, and the show was acknowledging that part of NYC psyche.

Do you know how the Dakota apartment building on 72nd Street got its name?  Way back when it was built in 1884 there wasn't much there yet.  It stood out like a huge house on a wide open plain way uptown outside the "outer limits" of the city proper.  Someone started calling the building the Dakota because it was so far out in the middle of "nowhere", LOL.  So the attitude goes waaaay back in NYC!

[Snarklepuss]

5 hours ago, holly4755 said:

one day I was sitting in B altman's dining place circa 1970 when a woman sat opposite of me, it was a site where you find a seat where ever kind of place, so I didn't think anything of it, and then she looked me in the eye and started telling me her story. she was a midwest housewife with a successful self employed husband and 4 young kids, She felt unfulfilled. One day she just packed up and left to find herself in NYC.  I had not said anything to her, I had no idea why she told me this story, but it was like she was asking for my approval. I was pretty young, so not sure why.  She asked if I thought she should go home. I asked her if she were happy.  I really did not want to say good or bad.  She ate for a while and said she thought they were all happy now, She finished eating and left.  never saw her again. 

who knew it would be a plot in a TV show I was watching. 

Wow, you just brought me back 47 years - Back at that time my mom used to take me to an eye doctor around the corner from B. Altman's.  When we went there we always ate at the restaurant in the store.  What a blast from the past!  And what a story to hear!  I have to confess I've heard a similar tale or two myself in my time, mostly when sitting at lunch counters back when single people did that and started up conversations with nice young people that happened to sit next to them.

[Bort]

10 hours ago, Snarklepuss said:

Liza hitting it off so well with a one dimensional, contrived plot device that happens to be the WIFE of the man she's supposedly in LOVE with.  Not buying THAT one either!

I don't necessarily think we're supposed to buy that. Liza does her job, which includes hand-holding the client, but I've never once thought that she's "hit it off" with Pauline. Most of the time, Liza looks like she'd rather swim in sewage than hang out with her.

[dubbel zout]

Liza really liked Pauline until she found out she was Charles's wife, and now she reluctantly still likes Pauline. She certainly relates to her desire to have a life beyond being a wife and mother, and Pauline's book obviously connected with her.

In this semi-triangle of Liza/Charles/Pauline, I think Charles comes off the worst. Make a decision, dude. He needs to either divorce Pauline or make a real effort to repair the marriage. This passive crap has to stop.

Edited September 9, 2017 by dubbel zout

[voiceover]

On 9/8/2017 at 4:40 AM, dubbel zout said:

Authors don't always have logical or tangible reasons for jumping ship. Sometimes they just want a change. 

Sure.  I get that.  But -- again! -- this felt like a big enough plot point to warrant more than just shocked expressions.  Charles could've said that to Liza.

Just like Lucky Strike abandoning Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce in Mad Men: the loss of their biggest account was, rightfully, a sl arc.  And for a publishing house that is floundering, this should've warranted at least one soul-searching session, even if the answer was always "It's not you it's me" -- or, if Darren wanted to continue the fine tradition of stealing from himself, "Sometimes he's just not into you".

But, just like Liza's lack of divorce, I guess the showrunners just didn't think we'd notice.  Or care.

@dubbel zout! I see this week you were back to watching in real time ?

Edited September 9, 2017 by voiceover

[voiceover]

13 hours ago, HunterHunted said:

I actually think that Empirical thwarting Moore's announcement that he was Aubry Alexis who had written "Me, Myself, and O" played a significant part in why Moore jumped ship. He wants the recognition and accolades. I think Rivington exploited that resentment even if they too would never had let him come forward.

Here's another line in a conversation in a scene this show should have had!

[dubbel zout]

1 hour ago, voiceover said:

@dubbel zout! I see this week you were back to watching in real time ?

LOL. I watched this ep on my DVR. Yay!

I'm fine with the amount of Empirical/Millennial business we see. I'm still mad Charles promised Liza a raise and then reneged on it. That's a fast way to push someone out. Liza wouldn't (probably because she probably feels too much loyalty toward Charles [and because the plot demands she stays]), but with how Kelsey is feeling underappreciated, I can see her walking. It was really bad management to hire Zane without giving her a head's up.

Speaking of Zane, I loved how Kelsey put him in his place at the lunch with Moore's agent. (There can never be enough Michael Irie.) He deserved that—his plan was so unthought-out. He thought he could dazzle Kelsey with a smile (admittedly, it's a killer smile) and she'd go along with him. At least she had the sense to do some due diligence. 

[Snarklepuss]

3 hours ago, dubbel zout said:

In this semi-triangle of Liza/Charles/Pauline, I think Charles comes off the worst. Make a decision, dude. He needs to either divorce Pauline or make a real effort to repair the marriage. This passive crap has to stop.

I think Charles is going to try to convince Liza that he's only humoring Pauline because of the book and that he has zero intentions of getting back with her.  But if so he's leading Pauline on and will have to deal with her anger when she finds out.  Plus he's turning Liza off in the process.  How could she trust him and his ardent protestations of love when all evidence points to the contrary?  And after leading on Pauline?  She may actually pass on him......for now.  Until next season when she weakens and he finds a way to get her back.

It's the old time honored formula.  Guy gets girl, guy loses girl, guy gets girl back.

[Bort]

48 minutes ago, dubbel zout said:

Speaking of Zane, I loved how Kelsey put him in his place at the lunch with Moore's agent. (There can never be enough Michael Irie.) He deserved that—his plan was so unthought-out. He thought he could dazzle Kelsey with a smile (admittedly, it's a killer smile) and she'd go along with him. At least she had the sense to do some due diligence. 

Only because Liza told her to do some homework. Kelsey was thisclose to taking Zane up on his deal if it hadn't been for Liza.

[dubbel zout]

She listened to Liza, that's the important part for me.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Inside the episode:

Outtakes:

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I totally understand why Kelsey was upset with Charles for wanting to move Pauline's book from Millennial to Empirical. It sucks that she and Liza have done so much work to build their imprint, bring in authors, network to get press, etc. and he wants to take a book that Liza has done all of the work for. Liza, on the other hand, showed her maturity when she said that it would be good for the company. I mean, obviously she was upset too when Charles and Diana brought it up, but she wasn't taking it personally as Kelsey was. It seems like Charles has already made up his mind, as evidenced by his remark that he was just doing them the courtesy of including them in the conversation.

Liza also showed her maturity when she advised Kelsey not to make any hasty decisions (like jumping ship to join Zane, a guy who almost got her fired due to his unscrupulous actions) in the heat of the moment. Bonus points for telling Kelsey to check with Redmond to see if Zane's claims about LL Moore's contract were true.

Ugh, I knew that Richard was manipulative when he finangled his way into moving in with Diana way back in the previous season, but dude. He lied to Diana about his wife kicking Ethan out, sprung his 20 something son moving in with them as a surprise, and then suggested that they get a bigger apartment together. This is the guy who couldn't even afford his own place and was sleeping in his office so I'm assuming what he really meant was that Diana should foot the bill for this new two bedroom apartment. He is THE WORST.

I'm so glad that Diana had the self esteem to call him on his shit and kick him out, even though it hurt. I was so annoyed that he was still continuing to try to manipulate her with that "we're so good together - look how much you've grown!" bullshit. He is so gross. She DOES deserve better. Her only mistake was leaving him alone in her apartment to pack. I wouldn't trust that guy not to try doing something shady while she was at the awards dinner.

Heh, and I loved that after she left the apartment, she put on that huge fluffy red necklace. What's a Diana outfit without a statement necklace?

Speaking of which, I get that the Pubbies are short for publication, but every time I saw "pubbies" written in the background, I kept reading it in my head as "pubies" as in pubic hair.

On 9/6/2017 at 7:41 PM, bilgistic said:

Since Empirical was able to bring on Zane/bring back Edward L.L. Moore, maybe they can finally hire an assistant for Diana and let Liza be an associate editor full time--and be paid for it. Grrrr.

Not only did Charles hire Zane, but he is an EXECUTIVE editor (not an associate editor, not a regular editor). I'm sure that this will just be another excuse why they can't hire a new assistant for Diana ("Money's tight now that we're paying another editor's salary so there's no money left in the budget for another assistant!").  Please don't have Diana hire Clare as her new intern/assistant! I'm totally fine with Clare leaving and staying gone.

On 9/7/2017 at 5:33 PM, MissEwa said:

Oh, I get the logistics - although I assume that she went to an imprint connected to him on purpose - but I'm still baffled that Liza heard the pitch and thought 'yeah, 20-somethings will eat. this. up." and that Kelsey agreed. Liza maybe, because she is actually 41, but I feel like there's no way Kelsey (even if she liked the writing) wouldn't have just palmed it off to Empirical in the first place.

A lot of 20-somethings read Eat, Pray, Love which was about a 30 something woman who was unhappy in her marriage, got a divorce, and then left to find herself so there are definitely readers who will buy/read books that are about people who aren't the same age as them, especially if they're about self discovery (see also: Wild by Cheryl Strayed which was a huge hit, despite the fact that not everyone who read it had lost their mothers and ended up doing heroin before deciding to hike a thousand miles). Kelsey is astute enough to know that the chick lit/memoir genre is lucrative if the author's journey to figure out who she is comes across as relatable. On top of that, I think she trusts Liza's judgment. And, as Kelsey pointed out, she wants Millennial to expand beyond novelty books like the labradoodle book.

Heh, of course Redmond recognized Zane's ass! I also got a kick out of seeing the Katiebot.

I loved the dresses at the awards dinner. Diana's was the most eye catching because of the color, but I also loved Liza's black and white polka dot dress and Kelsey's light ballgown. They all looked so beautiful in those scenes. The silvery eye shadow they put in Hillary reminded me of her 90s days. I think Sutton looks great with her hair up too.

Poor Jay. First he realizes that Liza is in love with Upchuck and then she calls him NICE while she's crying on his shoulder.

Edited September 13, 2017 by ElectricBoogaloo

[MissEwa]

10 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

A lot of 20-somethings read Eat, Pray, Love which was about a 30 something woman who was unhappy in her marriage, got a divorce, and then left to find herself so there are definitely readers who will buy/read books that are about people who aren't the same age as them, especially if they're about self discovery (see also: Wild by Cheryl Strayed which was a huge hit, despite the fact that not everyone who read it had lost their mothers and ended up doing heroin before deciding to hike a thousand miles). Kelsey is astute enough to know that the chick lit/memoir genre is lucrative if the author's journey to figure out who she is comes across as relatable. On top of that, I think she trusts Liza's judgment. And, as Kelsey pointed out, she wants Millennial to expand beyond novelty books like the labradoodle book.

I am aware that people don't only read books about people their age or -- and this is obvious, right? I mean, The Hunger Games is huge despite the fact that teenagers don't regularly get sent into televised battles-to-the-death? -- people who've had the exact same experience as them. But I still don't think Pauline's book would ever have started at Millennial IRL. And part of that is that I don't think Kelsey would have wanted it, but even if she did, I think Charles and Diana - especially Diana, who is the *marketing* person - would have stepped in right away. Everything else aside, the last time I looked, women in their 30s - 50s are still, by far, the biggest buyers of adult fiction, and there's no way Empirical would risk alienating that segment of the market by having Millennial publish that book. I might be wrong but I feel like EPL and Wild were both marketed to that segment but crossed over into other demographics when they became hits. 

And I kind of buy that Kelsey wants to get the stink of the labradoodle book off her imprint, but at the same time everything else she's tried to publish over the past three seasons has been over-the-top Millennial... youtube stars and books based on twitter accounts and written by young NY socialites. When she has gone for Serious Books, they've been 900-page screeds on the state of the universe by pretty, photogenic hipsters like Colin.

Which... I mean, if Pauline is looking for accolades and a serious writing career, makes it puzzling that Pauline would *want* to be at Millennial (the Liza factor aside). I get that she would have approached them at that pitching thing as a round-about way of getting to Empirical, but not that she'd actually want her Very Important Book to be published by the Labradoodle imprint. 

Obviously this is just my opinion, and obviously Empirical is not run like any other publishing house actually is in the real world, but it's a thing I am irrationally annoyed about this week. Don't worry - next week it'll probably go back to being the whole Charles-Liza relationship, like it usually is. 

[dubbel zout]

I don't think Pauline's book is that out there for Millennial. Lots of imprints publish all sorts of books. I worked for one that published humor books and cookbooks, both of which were extremely successful. I'm not sure the general public really cares (or knows offhand) if a book is published by Knopf or Chronicle. Reviewers and other industry people might have some initial preconceived ideas, but Diana is smart enough to play that up in the marketing: "A brand-new direction for Millennial!" 

Charles is a jerk for taking Pauline's book away just because he thinks Empirical has a better track record with awards. The time to do that is before one of your imprints buys the book, not once it's clear the book will be a giant success. And then he springs Zane on Kelsey in a public place where she can't say anything without causing a scene. If I were Kelsey, I'd be thinking if it was worth staying at Millennial.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

7 hours ago, dubbel zout said:

I'm not sure the general public really cares (or knows offhand) if a book is published by Knopf or Chronicle. Reviewers and other industry people might have some initial preconceived ideas, but Diana is smart enough to play that up in the marketing: "A brand-new direction for Millennial!" 

Yes to all of this. As Charles mentioned, he thought that Pauline's book would have a better chance at winning literary awards if it was moved to the Empirical imprint, and I get that it could make a difference to industry people (similar to the way that HBO and Showtime shows are more likely to get Emmy nominations but CW shows are not).

But the reading public buys books for various reasons (prominent publicity push, good reviews, cover art, etc), none of which I've ever heard anyone say is because it came from a specific publisher or imprint. I know which ones tend to publish books I like but (1) I'm not going to buy a book just because it came from ABC publisher and (2) I'm not going to pass up a book just because it came from XYZ publisher. If it looks interesting, I'll read it regardless of who published it. 

As for Eat Pray Love being marketed to 30-50 year olds, I'm not privy to the publisher's marketing strategy for that book so I don't know who their original target audience was. All I know is that in 2006, while the book was still in hardback, I knew a bunch of 20-somethings who read that book and were obsessed with it. Several of them told me that's what inspired them to pack a bag and go travel. And they committed to it - they were gone by 2007. Many of them went to India but a lot of them just traveled the world, staying somewhere until they decided to head off somewhere else. Of course I was left wondering how they all paid for their months/years of wanderlust because I had student loans and bills to pay!

On a related note, this article refers to books like Eat Pray Love as priv lit, which I think Pauline's book would fall under as well. 

Edited September 14, 2017 by ElectricBoogaloo
Missing a word

[MissEwa]

Yeah fair enough. It seems like an odd fit to me but I'm not an expert :) 

[Angeleyes]

When Kelsey had the victory at the lunch with Redmond I thought for sure she'd see the opportunity there to get Moore back for Empirical. She could have gone to Charles with what she learned at the lunch and together they could have negotiated Moore's return. She could have then leveraged that win for Marriage Vacation to stay at Millenial. Instead, it presumably gave Zayne the opportunity to go to Charles and say that He could bring Moore back if in turn Empirical hired him. He outsmarted Kelsey once again. 

As for Richard, we saw his manipulation constantly throughout the season. First, he knew just what to say and do to get Diana to agree that he move in with her. Then, when she objected to his son moving in and then over staying his welcome Richard used sex to get her to comply. He used to be her therapist so he knew which buttons to push. I'm glad she finally saw the light and kicked him out. I'm ready to see her with a great guy. 

[Bort]

1 hour ago, Angeleyes said:

He used to be her therapist so he knew which buttons to push.

Richard was never Diana's therapist, he had an office in the same building as her therapist. However, as a therapist himself, he probably was able to tell what buttons to push anyway.

[aradia22]

Yay, it's about time they got rid of Richard. But I hope they give Diana a new worthwhile love interest. He doesn't even have to do much like that doctor boyfriend. We can just know he's there... mostly offscreen. Not that I think a woman needs a man but Diana clearly wants a partner in her life and I think it sends the wrong message to say that a career driven woman like Diana can't have that. Also because Miriam Shor is beautiful and it's weird that everyone on this show acts like she's a shrewish hag who couldn't possibly get a boyfriend or husband who isn't taking advantage of her.

Also, I loved her posing on the red carpet and then quietly murmuring "stoop, please."

Kelsey looked like Cinderella. Why the ballgown?

Well, that ending was lame. I feel like they need to remind us of all the Liza/Charles moments because it makes no sense for them to love each other now with the buildup they've gotten this season.

[aradia22]

Quote

I can totally understand why Liza and Kelsey would be annoyed about Charles wanting to take Marriage Vacation back from Millenial, but I still can't understand how it ended up there in the first place - or how it's generating so much buzz with anyone under the age of... 40? How many 20-somethings really want to read about a bored UES publishing wife leaving her husband for a year? Or... doing anything, for that matter, unless it's biting and satirical? I'm and married and have kids and *I* find the concept completely dull.

I think millennials (not uniquely) love gossip and drama but if it's not about people their own age it needs to be about Beyonce or someone like that. But I can see this being a insider-y thing that the elite publishing world is buzzing about because it deals with one of their own and then all the publications buzz about it. So far we haven't heard anything about readers in the general public actually caring about the book. The closest they got to young people was The Cut which is still nymag. 

Quote

Had I not just watched 2 seasons of the Real Housewives of New York where half the cast lost their minds trying to snag the same underwhelming 50 year old bachelor, the idea that Jay would be an in demand commodity would have seemed ridiculous. But seriously Jay has a good job. He's well educated and well connected. He's never married and a decent guy. He should be beating women off with a stick.

Ha! Excellent point.

[aradia22]

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 I'm not sure the general public really cares (or knows offhand) if a book is published by Knopf or Chronicle.

I think it depends. I don't really have a sense of whether a book is published by Penguin or Dover. But reading romance you get a feel for the individual Harlequin series. And if I read from any other particular imprints or publishers regularly (rather than following authors) I'm sure I'd eventually start to see the differences between Harlequin and Zebra and Avon. I think the problem is how they've defined Millennial on the show. It would make sense if Millennial was a brand that only sold YA fiction or something like that. But they've pushed all kinds of different books so it doesn't make sense for them to have a consistent readership/audience. The person who buys an adult coloring book on tattoos won't necessarily buy the labradoodle book or the other stuff that I've forgotten about. They don't have a brand identity.