Linksy Bits: And Just Like That, We Out.
We can't help but wonder, August rising tunes, and comfort food with chaos.
Welp. Carrie breaks up with Aidan, and HBO Max breaks up with Carrie.
On Friday afternoon, showrunner Michael Patrick King announced that this season will be the final season of And Just Like That, snubbing out the final cigarette of the long burning Sex and The City franchise.
After the announcement SJP gave us a lovely poem as tribute to Carrie, along with these thoughts:
“Carrie Bradshaw has dominated my professional heartbeat for 27 years. I think I have loved her most of all.
I know others have loved her just as I have. Been frustrated, condemned and rooted for her.
The symphony of all those emotions has been the greatest soundtrack and most consequential companion. Therefore the most sentimental and profound gratitude and lifetime of debt. To you all.”
It’s been well-documented that people seem to be hate-watching the show this season particularly. But at least they are watching, and kvetching. Maybe some of them will actually miss it, and be forced to face what an overindulgence in cringe-calling might portend.
Listen, this show did fail on some storylines (did Seema really have a two episode deodorant arc?), but I can’t help but continue to be vexed by people who are just waiting for these characters to hurry up and revert back to their 30-year old versions.
This was SUPPOSED to be a show about women in their 50’s!
The most anti-SATC thing would have been to keep them locked in time and personhood to their former selves. The whole series has always been about learning, fucking up, loving the wrong people, trying on new people and lives, buying shoes, and living loudly and proudly in the mess with your friends.
Do we really want Carrie sitting in that tiny apartment and writing her column again as if nothing has changed her? I don’t.
It feels to me that people have been afraid of losing these women who, while fictional, have meant so much as avatars of who we hope to see in ourselves (hence the ever present Are You a Charlotte or a Miranda vibe check.) In truth, my loves, people are afraid of losing themselves as they age. The answer to squelching this fear is not labeling everything that makes you uncomfortable as cringe, it’s recognizing the power in evolution and seizing freedom from the youthful gaze (a.k.a. not giving a fuck about what the kids say.)
And that’s why I was holding out hope for at least one more season, to get some of this right for the generations who can’t understand it now, but will, when they watch it again in a few years.
Alas, we have only two more episodes with our girls. How will they tie the bow on this?
+ Seema should have been given a very cool business story, about launching her own brand at this stage, and not about deodorant or Uber budget living. I like the neo-hippie gardener, but let’s hope she doesn’t give up smoking for him or his plant. Seema in the City spin off??
+ Miranda and Joy will likely make it more official, someone’s gotta move in with someone, that’s lesbian canon. I’d be more interested in following Brady down the chef lane than the teen mom lane, but ok.
+ Charlotte and Harry start swinging. Just kidding.
+ LTW will get a visit from Michelle Obama, I’d bet my Manolos on it (narrator: she did not, in fact, have any Manolos to bet).
+ And Carrie? Will she end up blissfully alone after a life spent seeking and wondering? Wouldn’t it be the ultimate The Real Journey Was The Friends We Met Along The Way moment if she did?
Stay tuned, two more weeks. Then all the think pieces. Then some space. Then a thoughtful and reflective rewatch. I don’t make the rules.
Here’s an AUGUST HAZE playlist because the one I made for you won’t link for some reason XO
"I took a deep breath and listened to the old brag of my heart: I am, I am, I am,"
» Wear the shorts, FREE THE FLAPS!
» Movies to be excited about and a cool little account to follow.
» Do we need to talk about FAFO parenting? Some of you didn’t have German mothers who threw you into the lake to teach you to swim and it shows.
» Japanese walking is better than just walking in the way that Japanese everything is better than anything.
» Comfort food with chaos in my new favorite food category: Miso Udon Carbonara With Spam
» You need your summer to last as long as possible? Freeze it: Sweet Corn Basil Ice Cream
Love it
Never watched SATC, started watching AJLT for the middle aged women - and yes, it quickly devolved into hate watching. Then I watched a few SATC eps and was surprised at what a good show it was. The writing and characters are so much better.
I see why O.G. fans felt totally betrayed by this version.