When “And Just Like That” premiered in 2021 with Carrie Bradshaw freshly widowed and needing a hip replacement at the tender age of 50, I knew deep down we were cooked.
“Sex and the City” is so embedded in my soul that the Aug. 2 news that its spinoff won’t return for a fourth season — meaning this universe is finally coming to a close after 27 years — felt like a Manolo stiletto heel to the heart.
But recently, the show has gone so far off the rails from its source material, making a mockery of these beloved characters as they slide (or hobble) into their twilight years, that I can’t even hate-watch an episode in one sitting.
The original “Sex and the City” series, flawed as it was with its lack of racial diversity and limited representation of queerness, was lauded for upending stereotypes about women: their goals, their sexual desires and their biological clocks. (Raise your hand if you first learned about squirting from Samantha Jones.)
It made getting older seem aspirational and powerful; Samantha (played by Kim Cattrall), the oldest and friskiest of the bunch, was 46 years old when the final season aired. It also didn’t shy away from emotional or fraught topics, sometimes making viewers cry almost as hard as we laughed.
“And Just Like That” does the opposite, most commonly eliciting groans and eyerolls. It leans into tropes about aging, rendering Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) and Miranda (Cynthia Nixon), in particular, basically unrecognizable while squandering the chance to unpack rich topics like grief and loss, how friendships shift and falter over time, and how sexuality evolves as you age.
It took me four tries to watch the second episode of the third and final season of “And Just Like That.” Yes, that’s the episode where Aidan (John Corbett) licks his hand — gag — to kick off an awkward phone sex session with Carrie. Millennial libidos may never recover.
It was the ick heard around the internet that became even more puzzling when Parker, star and producer of the series, told Howard Stern that she hadn’t seen the offending scene because she doesn’t watch the show. Ever. This admission made me feel better about not being able to get through it myself.
Sex, so integral to the original show that it was the first word in the title, is barely seen at all in “And Just Like That.” When it is, it’s used for shock value or to draw a cheap laugh, as with the masturbating puppeteer or when Miranda deflowered a nun.
That’s a glaring missed opportunity, according to Sally Chivers, a professor of gender and social justice and English literature at Trent University, and host of a podcast about aging called “Wrinkle Radio.”
“There’s this opportunity with the ‘Sex and the City’ spinoff to be aspirational and make people excited to get older,” Chivers said. It could have made strides for representation of the “messy and missing middle — the middle stage of life for women on TV, in novels, in stories — that just gets erased.”
Instead of showing these women’s depth and complexity as they navigate their mid-50s, they’re reduced to barely tolerable storylines that are neither inspiring, relatable nor entertaining. Real estate magnate Seema (Sarita Choudhury), billed as a sexy, single Samantha replacement after Cattrall declined to return, spent two full episodes of season 3 focused on her younger boyfriend’s preference for natural deodorant.
“There is a real thirst for a conversation about what it means to be in your late 50s and early 60s, which is that sort of pre-official retirement age when women are probably menopausal or post-menopausal,” said Chivers. “There’s an absence there. So it’s disappointing that ‘And Just Like That’ doesn’t fill that absence.”
Chiversl who has written two books on aging and representation in pop culture (“The Silvering Screen: Old Age and Disability in Cinema” and “From Old Woman to Older Women: Contemporary Culture and Women’s Narratives”), isn’t surprised that the show is fumbling. “There’s a pattern in broader Hollywood where men get sexier and more active, or at least get to stay the way they were, and women have had to fade away.”
Chivers pointed to some layered or constructive representations of older women in the messy middle, like “Grace and Frankie” and the “Matlock” remake starring Kathy Bates. But in “AJLT,” we’re left with Charlotte’s goofy vertigo, Carrie’s Tums habit and Miranda’s seeming full lobotomy.
It’s as if the writers just took one aspect of each character, such as Charlotte’s (Kristin Davis) over-the-top squealing reactions, and blew it up to the point of caricature. There’s no dignity in these women maturing at all.
This afflicts the men as well. In one season 3 scene, Charlotte’s husband, Harry (Evan Handler), wets himself in public because he can’t get his mid-life crisis-induced slim-fit jeans off fast enough. It’s a slapstick moment that could have been played for laughs if it had been executed by, say, Ross Geller on “Friends” circa 1999. But seeing Harry, our affable baldie who has always been comfortable exactly as he is, pee his pants in his mid-50s while Charlotte stays out late with her 20-something gallerina coworkers just felt sad. The joke became even less funny when, a couple of episodes later, his incontinence was revealed to be a symptom of his prostate cancer. Womp womp.
As well, some of the characters seem to be getting less progressive in their older years. Carrie was known for clutching her pearls from time to time in “SATC,” but she was a generally curious-minded sex columnist. Now, she often seems uncomfortable with Miranda’s later-in-life sexual awakening, visibly wincing when her friend passionately kissed her girlfriend hello in episode 7 and being so shocked to see her naked in episode 5 that she walked into a door frame trying to escape.
“It makes no sense because, as you age, there’s less that surprises you about bodies and about sex,” said Chivers. “Research shows, practice shows, logic shows that you just get less and less surprised because you’ve heard the stories, you’ve had the experiences and you’ve watched your own body change.”
I’ve asked myself if I’m uncomfortable with the show’s portrayal of aging because I’m getting older myself. I was in my late teens when the original series aired and, watching these glamorous ladies in their 30s, it felt like we were a century apart. Now that I’ve passed 40, their often depressing mid-life trajectories feel … close.
Of course, some people in their 50s do get hip replacements, have health scares and navigate dating after losing a spouse. But Chivers agreed that it’s “a little young for that kind of symbol of age. That’s an example of how there isn’t room for a middle ground.”
‘And Just Like That”‘s main failing is that it has lampooned every single character as they get older without balancing the indignities with humour, heart or authenticity. It feels more like a humiliation ritual than entertainment. And despite my deep affection for these characters and the cultural impact of the franchise, I’ve had enough punishment.
Until recently, I was firmly in the camp of fans who loathe “AJLT” but knew we would hate-watch 1,428 more seasons of it. Now, in the words of Carrie circa “SATC” season 4, complaining about planning her wedding to Aidan, it makes me want to take a big old nap. Let’s just pray they don’t attempt yet another resurrection by roping in Liza Minnelli for one more terrible spinoff movie.
It’s sad that the “Sex and the City” story is closing on such a tepid note, but all good and bad things must come to an end. Honestly, it’s a relief.
