And Just Like That, Things Change
I just finished the first two episodes of And Just Like That, the Sex And The City reboot streaming on HBOMax. I absolutely loved seeing the girls navigating life in 2021 where podcasts, social media, and pronouns reign supreme. Nothing stays the same, most importantly our age.
I was scrolling through Twitter reading some of the reviews of the reboot. WTF are they doing? Where is the voiceover? I don’t like the Samantha storyline. Complain, complain, complain. Nothing stays the same folks. Didn’t we learn that from COVID? All those deaths, the lockdown!! Do we not remember that? Change is inevitable, no matter what. We change schools, we change careers, hell we change our looks every other week. Change happens. Time happens. Ageing happens…just like that!
The character of Samantha is missing and when people heard that Kim Cattrall wasn’t coming back for the reboot people said they were not going to watch. Loyal fans couldn’t imagine a revival, reboot, anything Sex And The City without Samantha — that’s understandable. What we loved about Samantha is that she was fierce, she was very open about her sex life. She had the best one liners ever, but let me ask you something; How many times have we’ve seen the Samantha character cloned on other shows? How many shows since SITC aired used and are using a voiceover, especially with their girlfriend ensembles? As a society we have progressed when it comes to talking about sex.
The character of Carrie spoke to her readers about relationships in her news column. And Just Like That, Carrie finds herself barely speaking up on a podcast where they’re openly talking about masturbation. Words like cisgender, nonbinary are spoken so quickly that you can see Carrie’s head spinning. This would be Samantha’s territory or would it? Admittedly, I had to go back and listen several times to understand because…things change. Do you see where I’m going?
Miranda thinks that Charlotte and Carrie are trying to keep up with the younger generation by coloring their hair and being on social media. Charlotte thinks that Miranda should go back to red instead of the gray, because the gray ages her. Miranda is aware that she’s older and she embraces it. However, when she starts her new class, she’s the oldest one there. When her professor arrives, she mistakes her for a student, but Miranda says she looks different because of the braids she’s wearing. The millennials cannot believe what they’re witnessing. Miranda tries to apologize, but she keeps digging herself in a bigger hole. I also must add that I love the added spice, color, and diversity of this cast.
Charlotte’s life is exactly how I imagined. Harry is still the loving dad. Her daughters Lily and Rose are beautiful. Lily is a pianist and appears to be the easy daughter, Rose is the rebel. I’m looking forward to their story.
I always say stick to your intuition. Carrie didn’t want to go to Lily’s recital she had other plans. Charlotte was insistent that Carrie be there. Carrie changed her plans and she sat and listened as Lily played beautifully. When Carrie arrived home Big was waiting for her…And Just Like That, he died.
Do you remember the call you received when someone you loved died? Did you ever witness someone having a heart-attack or a stroke? Did you ever walk to your car and notice that it was broken into or that your home was broken into? Have you ever received a health diagnosis that you weren’t prepared for? Things happen, life happens…just like that.
Samantha and Carrie not being friends anymore is a real thing. Friends fall out all the time. Co-workers fall out. Kim Cattrall and Sarah Jessica Parker fell out. Are not friends. It happens. The Today Show made a post about And Just Like That on their Instagram page. Here’s what I said:
Big’s funeral felt cold. I was expecting to see so many of the colorful characters we met over the years show up and be there for Carrie at Big’s funeral. There was the blonde that remembered how Big treated her in the past and another lady that had on an amazing outfit, but familiar faces there weren’t a lot, then I thought, would they actually attend Big’s funeral? Post COVID? Samantha sending those flowers were a beautiful gesture, but wouldn’t she call? Samantha would, Kim isn’t, not now anyway. Watching Willie Garson, that played Stanford sitting at Big’s funeral, how I cried. Here he was shooting scenes for the reboot and Willie Garson is dead. Stanford is gone.
I read reviews of people talking about how old the ladies looked and that really made me upset. People really expect people to stay the same. We age. No matter how much we inject, whiten, suck out, lift, and filter we cannot change our age. If we could go back in time, wouldn’t we? Wouldn’t we bring loved ones that died back to life? Wouldn’t we go back and make different life decisions? Like that college, like marrying too young, like being more decisive, like taking more chances. Like, like WE CAN’T GO BACK! AGEING HAPPENS FOLKS.
As a society we’re so fixated by age. We can’t wait to turn 16, then 18, let the countdown begin to 21, then 22, then it starts getting quiet. Many start freaking out at 25 — the quarter life crisis they call it. Look it up there are books on it! Many are depressed at 30. The pressures that we put on ourselves because of a number.
And Just Like That is about three ladies in their 50s learning, losing, adjusting, and living. Every single day there are hits, punches, hurdles, highs, and lows. There is beauty and there is pain. What are you going to do? Are you going to keep looking back on what was? Who hurt you? How things were simpler back then? How you wish you would’ve and should’ve? Or are you going to snap the hell out of it and live? Ok, you can play the music from back then, because we all know that it was better.
