Everything Missing From And Just Like That

When it was announced that the ladies of Sex and the City would be returning to our screens, fans were so excited. Then season one of And Just Like That proved to be… pretty lackluster. And now it seems that even the second season won’t be able to recapture the magic of the original series. So why has the reboot been so unable to reproduce what we all loved so much about the original show? Each episode of Sex and the City explored a central theme, layered with silly jokes and a healthy dose of character development, all tied in a bow with Carrie’s voiceover. The show was almost mercilessly formulaic and definitely cheesy at times, but there was something comforting and profound about the show and its repeatable rhythms.

And Just Like That forgoes almost all of these aspects, trading the cringe puns for much worse jokes, the character development for trite, loud, and shallow statements that are years late, and Carrie’s voiceover for a podcast that ends up getting canceled. It feels like an entirely different show that just happens to have the same actors playing now completely unrelatable characters named Carrie, Charlotte, and Miranda. So we couldn’t help but wonder: Why is And Just Like That falling Just Like…flat? Here’s our Take on what made Sex and The City so special, why And Just Like That’s departure from the tried and true formula caused the show to lose its magic, and whether the franchise can be redeemed.

The Structural Problems

Sex and the City had a couple of structural problems that had to be remedied before it could be revived. First, Kim Cattrall was not interested in returning as Samantha (although she does have an upcoming scene in the show’s second season finale.) Second, the show has been criticized in the past for lacking strong roles for people of color. While the show’s creators have said that no one can replace Samantha, it seems they tried to tackle both the Samantha problem and the diversity problem at the same time. Before the show premiered, creator Michael Patrick King touted that there would be six new series regulars and half of them would be women of color. By introducing so many diverse side characters with their own fabulous qualities, perhaps King was thinking maybe, just maybe, the audience wouldn’t miss Samantha so much, especially if a character is taking up the mantle of bringing friends to the hottest spots to meet men.

It’s a nice attempt to create a fictional New York that is actually reflective of its real citizens (or, at least, the really rich ones…) and to give these talented actors of all backgrounds the showcase they deserve. However, this fractured identity makes for a show that’s chaotically all over the place and doesn’t stick the landing emotionally. By giving everyone these short amounts of screen time, no one has the potential to meaningfully develop – with writers giving lip service but not real service to any of the cast. And with storylines involving more plots about parents and children than romantic relationships, the show is giving less “Sex and the City” and more “Modern Family.” Even though the original show was so focused on Carrie, her boyfriends, and her friends that episodes could at times feel repetitive and cyclical, the tight focus allowed the characters space to experience real character growth.

The show also lets go of one of the most important aspects that made Sex and the City special: the core friendship. With Miranda in LA for a lot of season 2, and all of the women hanging out with new friends (and partners) instead of each other, And Just Like That breaks the formula of a central group of friends coming together around a unified theme, without offering anything nearly as compelling to fill the void. But even though we don’t get to see the magic of the original quad together, the fact that the show focuses on friendships between older women at all is important in its own way. Shows so often pretend that older women don’t make friends and have fun (or full-on pretend that they don’t even exist) – so the fact that the reboot is showcasing so many stories of older women is something to give it props for.

The Characters Aren’t Relatable Anymore

On Sex and the City, Carrie Bradshaw’s life was never exactly relatable, but she did have plenty of moments of financial wavering. And there were many other moments of strife, from Miranda’s mother’s death to Samantha’s cancer to Charlotte’s struggles with fertility. Now, Carrie and all of her friends are so uber-wealthy, all of their problems are merely mild annoyances (and are pretty much completely unrelatable to the show’s viewers.) The show itself attempts to make fun of this but it falls flat given that the writing never does anything to fix the problem.

One of Carrie’s biggest conflicts so far is not wanting to read podcast ad copy, which somehow tanks the entire podcast company. But that issue, like any of the other supposed conflicts, disappears into the ether, because Carrie is now well off enough that nothing really matters. She’s successful enough to have a new book coming out, and she has a new generation of people to fawn over her. Apparently, spending time with Carrie is better than making thousands of dollars. Of course, the book is about Mr. Big’s death and Carrie cries while reading it aloud, but this arc, like everything else, ends up feeling a little hollow, with Carrie faking COVID to get out of her book recording duties and even going on a huge shopping spree as a coping mechanism. And this replacement of actual analysis of the characters’ lives with mindless materialism is another huge problem with the show. Instead of giving us interesting commentary on how obstacles are affecting any of them and showing how experiences are changing them as people, everything is just papered over with consumerism and excess. While Carrie has never been a stranger to spending money, in Sex and the City we were actually shown that this retail therapy was her way of avoiding what she really needed to deal with and that spending was a means of overcoming her problems she would eventually have to face head-on.

And we see this blind-materialism-in-place-of-character-development in most of the other characters as well. In this season, Charlotte actually becomes angry at her child for selling a Chanel dress she can’t even fit into. And one of Seema’s biggest troubles is someone stealing her deeply expensive bag. And the only time Charlotte seems genuinely proud of her child Rock is when they get scouted to model by a Ralph Lauren employee. Without any conflicts that don’t involve the names of one percenter designers, the show is gliding along like it’s in sky-high Manolo Blahniks, and we as an audience are left wondering why we should even care.

Confusing Messages and Takeaways

Sex and the City showed us a romantic fantasy of New York City. But And Just Like That takes a more obnoxious tone, where it tries to wear its heart on its very loud sleeve. While this scene is meant to juxtapose “real issues” with Charlotte’s concern over being on a “MILF list”, the lack of subtlety in the show’s writing makes viewers feel like they’re being yelled at by someone that just hopped out of a time machine from 2012 instead being of presented with engaging ideas, or having interesting plot points that would actually delve into any of the above issues. And speaking of yelling, the show has a major arc about a nonbinary character, something that is unique and important, but that too is handled with a lack of grace. The show continually presents what it clearly thinks is progressive social commentary but refuses to engage with any of it in any real way, so it always falls flat.

And Just Like That also takes the cake with its number of totally confounding scenes, including but not limited to a slow-motion scene of moms lusting after a child, Carrie complaining about a masked audio producer’s body odor, Carrie’s ex-podcast producer having what appears to be an IBS attack and even Carrie receiving a dick pic while the one and only Gloria Steinem is speaking. Sex and the City certainly had its uncouth and bawdy moments, but And Just Like That’s the type of unfunny humor never really seems to actually serve the plot or lead to any sort of character growth and instead just comes across as yet another poorly done attempt to be #relatable.

Conclusion

With all the goodwill Sex and the City managed to engender throughout its long history, it’s only natural to want the best for And Just Like That. And it’s admittedly occasionally fun to see what Carrie and her friends are up to after all this time apart. But this show deviates so far from what made the original great, that it’s hard to find anything to root for. We all had high hopes that maybe the lacklusterness of season one was just the show finding its feet, but now that we’re halfway through season two it looks like maybe, unfortunately, the magic really isn’t coming back. But still, not all hope is lost! With Samantha set to make a cameo at the end of this season, things could be getting a much-needed shake-up going into season three. And Just Like That has worked so hard (for better and worse) to address the criticisms of Sex and the City, so maybe, just maybe, they’ll start listening to fans about how to fix this show before it goes off the air…