Carrie Bradshaw continues to infuriate
I’ve been *hate* binge-watching the Sex And The City multiverse for years now. You might wonder why would I self-inflict that harm and if I’m passive-suicidal. However, truth be told, it wasn’t always the case. I was in school when I first watched SATC and most of it was lost on me. Most American TV would be lost on those who went to a Catholic school and didn’t know over 10 boys, in pre-Facebook age.
The O.C. was a rage growing up in the mid-00s in India. While SATC was popular, the age group I identified with and the lifestyle we had, somehow two didn’t work together. Instead, SATC for me felt like something I didn’t understand because of my age and to a large extent, the coolness factor.
At least, the O.C. actually had something to look forward to with characters in the same age group as me, but SATC has always been a little far gone. Even if I make an adjustment to see the coolness of those characters when I’m in my 30s now, I still think drinking a sugary cocktail and writing to pay through your luxury goods is a little tiring, than cool, but sure I’ll give Carrie that.
We don’t have to be the same people if we obsessively write about our respective dating histories, men, and others in between. Was this super cool in the ’90s outside of TV and New York? Maybe.
I’ve gone through school, college, more college and jobs and men; yet, I do not understand the reasoning behind making Carrie the goddamn star of the show. She can’t get her shit together, she’s constantly making faces and eyes at everyone (from random acquaintances to tightest friends to servers at Valentine’s Day when she’s well in her 50s) whenever someone doesn’t make her feel comfortable (which happens fairly frequently).
You’d imagine this would collapse with the end of season 4 or so but no. One whole series with 6 seasons, 2 movies and 2 seasons of a sequel series later, she’s still making faces and feeling uncomfortable. Never mind that in the last reprisal, she goes as far as fraternizing with one of her closest mate’s ex and invites them to dinner, after they poke fun at her friend’s relationship and sexuality (AJLT S2, The Last Supper, Part I). Carrie has to carry the show on her nimble shoulders, poor gal.
Another thing that is fairly exhausting is her love life. I do understand previously that the series was called ‘Sex and the City’ but at a time when the sequel is called ‘And Just Like That…’, she doesn’t really have to illustrate that she can ‘just like that’ her way out of every possible situation without looking through the consequences of her actions.
Between watching Carrie when I was in school, to now watching Carrie when I’m pre-menopausal (it’s happening a little too soon), I don’t get how she’s constantly putting herself through terrible dating/marital mishaps. In AJLT S2, she’s back with Aidan after grieving the demise of her husband.
The season went from her attempting to calendarize her hook-up schedule with a colleague and claiming she innocently sent an email around Valentine’s Day to her ex who’s now her partner but he’s committed to raising his kids into teens till they can be together forever. WHAT? Girl, catch a break, please.
Aidan giving Carrie a timeline of 5 years to reunite with her sounds familiar. We’ve heard this trope in real life and media alike, where either parents or couples take a consensual separation break to test the waters and see if they can find their way back when the timing is better. Nothing about this is clever, inspiring, or bait-offering to the people involved whether they be viewers or participants. I also don’t understand how is Carrie chill about this.
This isn’t very Sex and the City of her, but I suppose everyone’s conservative in the series, even though they are trying their darndest best to appear radically woke and aware of the world that’s changed around them. Miranda’s shed her anger and confidence for re-negotiating her gender identity and Charlotte’s more sex-positive than ever, so maybe Carrie is trying ‘Poo Bani Parvati’ for herself. Who knows?
After repeatedly showing up in each other’s lives for years, when Carrie and Aidan finally found a way back (or so it seemed), Aidan’s paternal instinct kicked in. I wouldn’t falter the writer, given the number of times he’s shown to be taking video calls from his son and his ex-wife shows up in their relationship to remind Carrie that their kids are not her writing fodder (understood ma’am, would you like a glass of sparkling water on your way out?).
The trope makes a lot of sense from Aidan’s perspective of doing the right thing and holding the moral high ground, but what in the train wreck mind did Carrie decide to sleep with him one last time and see him on his way out?
Again, this makes a lot of sense with Aidan trying to be the conscientious being between the two, but it’s Carrie’s goody little two-shoes act that gets me riled. She’s never been ‘I’ll do it for you’ for Aidan and that she’s donning the persona in her widow era, whether out of loneliness or the best orgasms doesn’t sit well with me. The woman who won’t do anything for anyone was willing to travel to keep up with her new relationship.
Another one of those classic Carrie’s ‘What on Earth?’ Are you doing moments that rattled me more than this one, is when she admits to Miranda about realizing that picking Big was a mistake. In the light of her reconciliation with Aidan, post Big’s demise, she wonders out loud if that was a bad decision on her part.
Girl, did you ever stop to think that while you were chilling and subjecting Big to your shindigs and being hella toxic with one another? You didn’t stop to think about Aidan for a hot minute, did you? I don’t see how Carrie in her right mind (and with a straight face) can say what she said to Miranda about Mr. Big. But hey, if you’re Carrie you’re excused cause you have the main character energy in everyone’s life, and now apparently death too.
Between SATC 2 film and the AJLT S2, Carrie not only had a whole change of heart but also decided that it’s okay to diss a man whom she wrote a whole book about upon his demise.
I’ll be real, if there’s a character I despise more than Carrie then that’s Mr Big because I am very well aware that if the roles were reversed, he’d have said the same and probably worse about him picking the wrong person (ergo Carrie) and running in the arms of his beloved from the past.
This makes me wonder if AJLT is actually a superior form of the SATC universe; the one where everyone finally embraces that they are all hella toxic and idiotic and that they all need to find god and touch grass, in either order.
Also, let the kids fornicate. Let Brady and Rose experience the momentary joy of realizing that their parents need help and so what if they bone in process?
As for AJLT, if you’re like me and by that I mean you’ve binged all of SATC far more times than you’re willing to admit, then take the plunge. Else, the UI/UX of streaming it legally in India is probably more pissing off than the series alone.
