He didn't want to involve his agent, but he didn't want to negotiate the contract himself either. He just wanted the purity of the art. Which I can understand and admire, but it was also contract work. And his unwillingness to see it for what it was, made the whole thing incredibly awkward for everybody.
In the end, his struggles seem to have lead to a lot of personal growth, and that's great, and he does seem to understand that he mostly created this problem himself, and could easily have prevented it by involving his agent. But I'm not so sure that he understands that this was never about friendship; he was hired to write an ending, had a profound artistic connection with the guy who hired him, and somehow he seemed to think that entitled him to a friendship rather than a business relationship. I'm not sure he understands that that was the core misunderstanding here, and that his belief in a friendship that was really a business relationship, made the business relationship really awkward and dysfunctional.
In the end, his struggles seem to have lead to a lot of personal growth, and that's great, and he does seem to understand that he mostly created this problem himself, and could easily have prevented it by involving his agent. But I'm not so sure that he understands that this was never about friendship; he was hired to write an ending, had a profound artistic connection with the guy who hired him, and somehow he seemed to think that entitled him to a friendship rather than a business relationship. I'm not sure he understands that that was the core misunderstanding here, and that his belief in a friendship that was really a business relationship, made the business relationship really awkward and dysfunctional.