A season ago Bailey did damage to Charlie by taking Owen away from him. Now he causes more damage to him in a totally different way. Gus has an offer to sell the factory to a big company, Standard Furnishing, so Charlie is surprised. He feels that the new owners will impose their will and won't let him produce the designs he likes but Gus tells him that they'll let him do it, that they have more money than him to produce the designs he did. In a meeting with the owners of Standard, they say they want him on board, and when he asks about the designs, they say he'll have to show them to marketing and other division but that's just a formality. Later, Charlie tells this to Kirsten and she asks if he's sure about what the company wants for him to do, he answers that with marketing involved, they'd make him produce things that everybody likes and then, things that he hates. She suggests he could leave the company, so he says he would, but all his designs (done in the last months) belongs to Gus. She jokingly says he could buy it himself, and when he says he is thinking about it, she says it's huge, like millions. Charlie talks to Bailey about a 2 year plan with the bank, but his brother also thinks it's huge, the numbers are much more higher than all the expenses from Salinger's, all the money gained in the restaurant. He is hopeful for a big loan, but when he goes to the bank, the office man returns him to reality, he can't buy it, there's too much collateral and the premium money offered by the company can't be matched. So Charlie finally accepts reality, to work under the new owners, that way he'd be earning a lot of money and have more time to spend with his beloved wife and their future children. He tells Bailey this, that his furniture wishes are not the most important thing in life, and that he doesn't want to put the workers, the bank people, Kirsten and the siblings in risk. But Bailey, inspired by a business class he took in college, researches, calls some people and convinces Claudia and Julia to put their shares in the restaurant and the house to buy the factory for Charlie. The three call Charlie and Kirsten to lunch at Salinger's (Kirsten thought they would change family dinners for family lunch, and she prefers that given her uneasy lunch at work), and pushes them to accept despite Charlie's initial refusal. Kirsten is too surprised to say something and seems supportive but I know she was never convinced of this. Charlie says it's a big risk because if the factory goes under they would lose the restaurant, but Bailey says that they trust him and that the furniture business is growing but not the restaurant. Finally, Charlie accepts. Gus authorizes the sell to the Salingers and the two brothers are happy. Still, I didn't like this turn out. Once more Bailey meddles in Charlie's life in the wrong way. Charlie Salinger never wanted to be an owner, a business man. Like he said in the last episode to Kirsten and today to Bailey, he is a family man, he just loves his wife, their children (plus Owen, Diana) and designing. And I think he's aware that Kirsten, for being pregnant, she'll need him so he realized that buying was a bad idea. Also, looking in the past seasons, he was happy doing carpentry jobs, painting, even bartending and managing Salinger's and of course, when he had the Seattle chance. In Brother's Keeper, he was willing to work for Cromwell Company, designing and producing his furniture and that's basically the same job the possible new owners of the factory were offering him today. So that's why he was going to take it, he was really happy with the Seattle offer and today wanted to accept the same. But now, the idea of being an owner and spending all his time in the factory, it's totally against himself. He never wanted that for his life. But Bailey still has the same disease Oliver diagnosed, he wants to help or interfere even when he's not needed. He pushed Charlie to buy to satisfy his needs more than Charlie's, the future will prove this. Also, he and the sisters don't know that Kirsten is pregnant so they don't know that Charlie now has to be there for his wife. And surely they don't even know how delicate is the illness she suffers, Bipolar II Disorder, given that they thought only about the factory, designs but not in her.
As for Julia's storyline: Adam has some arguments with a college teacher because he thinks he has to be free in writing and he can't learn what/how he wants in college. He proves that the teacher doesn't know too much given he didn't recognize an old piece from a great writer Beckett. Julia tries to reason with him, they're in college to learn but he thinks she'd be turning into a "drone". He also tells her that she has been so scared to publish her book only because a couple of persons didn't like it, that she can't approve her writing if someone qualified doesn't approve it too. For all this themes, and confused about about the way CFA teaches, Adam leaves. Julia goes to his dorm after the discussions, and finds out that he's gone. The next tenant tells her that Adam left a message for her, which says he went to visit some friends in a commune in Mexico, to figure stuff out (the soundtrack of that scene was great). About Adam, his decision explains why he didn't want to be enrolled at CFA in 6x12, he wasn't fully convinced, he just liked a few classes. Julia surely now regrets choosing this guy over Justin two episodes ago. Still, this is a reason to feel sorry for her. It's like she never could find a good guy during the entire series. Justin and Griffin were the best, but the relationships couldn't last much without big problems. For Julia all the relationships had disappointing times, bad endings. By the way, Neve Campbell was one of the cast members who didn't want to renew contract for a seventh season as a regular, just as a guest because she wanted to pursue a film career (and the series took too much time for her) and felt like Scott Wolf, that the show by season 6 had fulfilled the purpose, that their characters recovered from their parents death. Well, all the bad relationships Julia had in 6 seasons prove that she never recovered from her mother's absence. Miscarriage, violent and possesive relationship, a failed "marriage", changes of proffession and college each year, all this proved that Julia didn't have a satisfactory finished arc. That's why she needed a seventh season, she was 21 but with enough experience to straighten up her life. As for the time work, it's truth that the writers demanded a lot from her. In season 6, Claudia, Kirsten and Owen didn't have much screen time as Julia or Bailey (Charlie's time was correct). Anyway, if the writers idea for a season 7, even with Julia as recurrent, would have survived, she surely would have had a much better ending story.
Bailey, besides the other part, is smitten into a college business and marketing class, thanks to Holly, who helps him regain interest in college. It's good that he finds his proffession, highly linked to managing the restaurant, but like I said, he was wrong by pushing to buy the factory. Claudia deals in two fronts: Victor is acting secretly and is mad, so Claudia pushes him to tell the truth. He says that he has a daughter and the mother, his ex girlfriend, doesn't let him see her. This was unexpected, and interesting in some ways. Anyway this is the second time that Victor considers quitting as Owen's nanny, so this might not be a good sign, probably he won't last long, especially if he has a daughter to take care of. Claudia also is jealous when Todd travels to NYC and spend time with an old flame, a model girl who liked him, but at the end he returns with flowers to reconcile (this was a little funny part). Owen had barely two scenes today, I guess he still feels alone. Kirsten too, had just two scenes, she deserved more screen time, she is a wonderful character, and in some episodes of this season, like this one, appears too little (I wonder if Paula Devicq complained about it). So a good solution would have been that Kirsten and Owen could spend time together, he needs his adoptive mother and she has been lonely lately with Charlie working so much in the factory.
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