In Its Final Season, The Millennials Of ‘Younger’ Have Finally Grown Up

Younger, a show about age and deceit and the sexy world of book publishing, has reached its seventh and final season — and has somewhat reluctantly, decided to grow up.

There’s a scene in the final season where the board is discussing the name of Millennial Publishing, the company the majority of the Younger characters work at. As fans would know, over time the young upstart vertical of the more traditional Empirical Publishing eventually took over the entire company, rebranding as a fun, adaptive, youth-based publisher — who published fun youth books about sex and feminism and being young.

It was crucial to the central premise of the show — how would Liza, a forty-something year old woman, get away with pretending to be a 25-year-old working for a youth based publishing house? What hi-jinks might ensue? But that premise is now seven years old — and it’s not just Liza who is noticeably older now.

“Millennial. It’s already dated — it’s like you named your company ‘Boomer Print'”, says one of the old men of the board. The name of the publishing house which once signified being fresh and young and new, now dated the publishing house horribly. They point out that millennials are in their thirties, have children, are the bosses themselves.

“Who gives a shit about millennials anymore” says another greybearded board member.

When the show started, Sutton Foster’s Liza was lying about her age in order to be a marketing assistant, and Hillary Duff’s Kelsey was a young publishing assistant — now they’re the bosses of the company, and their struggles and problems and identities are almost unrecognisable from the ones they suffered seven years ago.

“Lauren’s turning 30, and I’m next” points out Kelsey. “Millennials, we’re not the young kids on the block anymore — I’m not sure what defines me anymore.”

It’s a tale that is very recognisable to a lot of older millennials.

Younger‘s final season leans into this idea of millennials **finally** growing up, and the joy and confusion that follows.

Even one of the show’s most mercurial, unknowable characters isn’t immune to this. Lauren Heller, played by Molly Bernard, is a fabulous and frankly iconic publicist and free-loving pansexual, who is usually used as an avatar of millennial chaos. Her plots are often comedic, and a hyperbolised idea of what a millennial in New York’s life might be like — outrageous sex and dating plots, ridiculous parties and absurd outfits, and of course the millennial ideal of passionate work ethic somehow balanced by equally committed partying.

And in the final season, she turns thirty — which in typical Lauren style is an outrageous event — but it’s still indicative that the final season of Younger is grappling with being older (or at least not in your twenties).

Talking to Molly Bernard in the lead up to season 7’s release, I asked what she believed Younger has been trying to say about age all along.

“Great question. Really a great question,” she muses, gassing me up in a way that feels very Lauren of her.  “I think it’s important to look back on what the show was doing when it started because none of us could have anticipated that it would go on for seven seasons. So, the show is about ageism — and that has never changed. I think what has changed is that age became less important and Liza’s journey towards accepting what she wants in life and having the confidence, not to lie about it, not to hide it, I think is really, really important. And I think it was about her finding herself.”

It’s an interesting thing about Younger — for a show that was founded on ideas of ageing and ageism, it’s never been histrionic about the idea of growing old, or about glorifying youth. It’s always been pretty fair in its depictions and criticisms of both. Liza has always lived between the two worlds, after all.

“She was, as far as we know when we met her seven years ago, her only identity was her daughter had just gone to college and she was a stay at home mom. So she got to have a career and I think put simply the show is about strong female relationships and it doesn’t matter the age of your friends, it’s about the connection of who you’re drawn to and who you support and how you support them.”

The premise of Younger is definitely outrageous — having a forty year old woman cosplay a young millennial, rote learning millennial signifiers from 2015 like One Direction members and learning who Lena Dunham is, is very funny. But it’s also based in a very real atmosphere of ageism that women struggle against. When you think about it like that, it’s not so far-fetched what Liza does, and if more people could pass as a 25-year-old, they might even try to replicate her scam.

“I love seeing those women take charge of their careers and fight for… they’re in a very patriarchal system and they are in a very patriarchal publishing house, so I think fighting for what’s theirs and the work they’ve put into it is also a big theme of this season,” agrees Molly Bernard.

I ask her if Younger has changed her attitude to ageism, especially as someone who works in the notoriously ageist showbiz industry.

“Oh my gosh, yes,” she tells me immediately. “I mean also when I booked Younger, when I got this job I was 25, I was fresh out of graduate school, I had just graduated… and I didn’t really have any plans after that and then I was suddenly on this show. Now I’m 33, so I have been on this show from my mid twenties until my early thirties. And yes, it has totally both made me aware of how ageist just the world that we live in is.”

“And also it’s funny too, some of my favourite actors they’re ageing so well. You know Kathryn Hahn is probably my favourite American actress … and she’s thriving right now and she’s not young and glamorous, she’s not in her twenties, yet she has a whole body of work under her belt and she’s graceful and quirky and weird and fearless. And like Catherine Keener… some of my favourite performers have nothing to do with age. And that’s something that’s just very personally for me as an actress, that’s something that I look forward to is kind of growing into my stages as I age. I think that was a lot less interesting when I was in my twenties. I think the life that I lived, the life that I lived into has helped me become more interesting 33 year old.”

And as season 7 of Younger rolls out — from what I’ve seen at least — this is the attitude the show is bringing with it. It’s a celebration of the seven ridiculous years that the show’s had on air, and a chance to celebrate the characters and all things they’ve achieved.

Liza Miller taught us that age doesn’t have to limit us, but the latest season of Younger has shown that we can celebrate becoming older.

Younger season 7 is streaming on Stan.

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Patrick Lenton is the Editor of Junkee. He tweets @patricklenton.