"And Just Like That": Carrie's return has elitism, bisexuals, d*cks, musems, marital spats, s'mores, and shoes. Lots of shoes.

Link to the n*de dudes

I never watched the original S*ex and the City series when it first aired on HBO (1998-2004), although I knew about Mr. Big (Chris Noth), for obvious reasons.  Who wants to watch four super-entitled New York-centric ladies having lunch? The only episode I watched featured Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) investigating bisexuals for her newspaper column.  

Her conclusion: they are all gay, and fooling themselves.  Bisexuals don't exist. 

So much for bi representation. 

Researching this review, I discovered that Carrie has a stereotypic gay best friend with the incredible name Stanford Blatch (why, was Bruce Van Swishington taken?).  

Having never watched the original, I've never been interested in the 2021-25 sequel, And Just Like That (presumably the title means that 20 years have passed "just like that"). But I've seen n*de guys parading around on occasion, and the plot synopses mention several LGBTQ characters.  We'll see if the portrayals are cringy.

I'll identify the five main ladies by their careers.  From left to right, Filmmaker Lisa, Art Dealer Charlotte, Columnist Carrie, Realtor Seema, Lawyer Miranda. 

Episode 3.5, "Under the Table," has three main plot threads.

The Charlotte/Lisa Plot:

Scene 1: The Guggenheim.  I love that museum.  Wait -- they didn't visit, they're just walking past. Art Dealer Charlotte's boyfriend Harry (Evan Handler) reveals that he has been diagnosed with prostate cancer, but they found it early, so he has a 98% chance of full recovery. 

In other news, they're going glamping (glamor camping) with the kids at Governors Island this weekend.

Scene 2:  Nuclear family breakfast in a huge, super-elegant kitchen. Filmmaker Lisa won't be back from filming her documentary until late Friday, so she tells her husband, Herbert Wexley (wow, what unrealistic entitled name), to take their children to Governors Island for glamping with Charlotte and her boyfriend. 

Husband is played by Chris Jackson

Wait -- this is the first he's heard of it. "No, I've told you several times." "No you haven't."

 

"Sorry, I can't do it.  I have a photo shoot for my campaign."  He has to pretend to be a "regular guy," eat one of those...um...frankfurter sausage things...and ride on the...you know, the poor people train...the subway.  

"You can do the 'regular guy' shoot on Monday, " Filmmaker Lisa commands. "This weekend we're going glamping with the Goldblatts."

Scene 3: Art Dealer Charlotte is trying to cook, but she's too distracted.  Her friend Anthony (Mario Cantone) asks if she's ok. 

Her children, a girl and a nonbinary person, ask if they can skip glamping.  "No, you're going" It's important because her boyfriend has prostate cancer, but he doesn't want them knowing that.

Scene 4: Governors Island (no apostrophe), just south of Manhattan, with views of the skyline.   The nonbinary child notes that there's a spa and go-karts. 

Art Dealer Charlotte's boyfriend complains about the mosquitos. 

 Filmmaker Lisa bursts in, and her husband criticizes her for being late. "Well, four hours ago, I was in Atlanta."  Then they bicker because one of them told the other to buy chocolate to make s'mores.  This couple is on the outs.

Scene 5: A tent big enough for three beds and a living room set. The boyfriend and the kids are lounging around, playing on their cell phones, when Art Dealer Charlotte bursts in and complains that they should be doing outdoor activities. They refuse. My parents used to say that on family vacations.  "You shouldn't be lounging around the cabin reading comic books.  Go enjoy the outdoors."  How does one "enjoy" the outdoors?  It's a place you go through on the way to enjoying things.

Meanwhile, Filmmaker Lisa and her husband bicker. She takes a photo of him and their kids.  When he looks at it, he accidentally scrolls to the last one she took: a selfie with her editor Marion (Mehcad Brooks).

"Are you having an affair with Michael B. Handsome?  Talk about getting your chocolate in Atlanta!"

"No, it's just a work crush."

He continues to growl, so Lisa stomps off, and runs into Charlotte at the pier.  They complain about their partners, and decide to ditch them and take a spa day. 

Cut to the spa. Close up of ladies in bikinis.  They're really pushing the heterosexual male gaze. 

Carrie/Miranda and Seema after the break

The Carrie/Miranda Plot:

Scene 1: Columnist Carrie seems to be plotting a romance novel in her head and gazing out the window when her hunky downstairs neighbor  (Jonathan Cake, left), who has been away on a trip, returns.  Next comes a montage of Carrie's feet in a variety of flashy shoes as she clatters around her vast, nearly empty apartment. Who wears stiletto heels on hardwood floors?   

Cake d*ck on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

Meanwhile, the hunky guy downstairs can't sleep (bare back only).  He bangs on her door to complain. 

The exterior is different, but Carrie lives at a real address, 8 Gramercy Park West, right off Park Avenue and 20th Street. When I was in grad school, I lived on East 14th, about five blocks away.

Scene 2: Four of the ladies have lunch. Lawyer Miranda has a problem similar to Carrie's: her neighbor in her illegal airbnb blasts rock music all night. No one notices that it's the opposite problem.

Realtor Seema knows Carrie's complaining neighbor: a Famous Novelist who divides his time between New York and London. So Carrie has to live above him for six months.

"But he's completely unreasonable.  He wants me to...take off my shoes in the house!" Carrie's obsession with shoes was a running gag in the first series.  She changes shoes like 20 times a day.

"We could try to get him evicted, or we could kill him." Presumably they're joking, but with entitled fashionistas, you never know.

Scene 3: Lawyer Miranda is trying to work in her illegal airbnb, when the rock music starts.  She leaves a passive-aggressive note under the miscreant's door.

Cut to Columnist Carrie bringing the Famous Novelist a gift basket to smooth things over. He doesn't want to be smoothed, and has a gift for her: some unfashionable pink "nursing home slippers," har har.

To make matters worse, Carrie gets a heavy, clunky furniture shipment from boyfriend Aidan.  This further antagonized the Famous Novelist.

She calls Lawyer Miranda to complain, but her buddy ignores her to talk about her loud rock music problem.  The owner of the illegal airbnb won't do anything about it!

"Move in with me," Carrie suggests.  "I have a huge apartment with lots of spare rooms." How much is she paying in rent, $10,000 a month? 

"Nope, we wouldn't get along."

Miranda tries another passive-aggressive note.  The neighbor opens the door n*ked, wielding a meat cleaver.  "If you slide another note under my door, I will f*cking cut you to pieces!"

So it's move in with Carrie.

Scary Guy is played by Tom DiNardo, who doesn't look nearly as scary in real life.  A fitness trainer, he appeared as himself in the documentary "Winning Big" (2010), about female bodybuilders.  

Scene 4: Shortly after moving in with Carrie, Laywer Miranda has a date with her girlfriend, so she grabs one of Carrie's scarfs without asking and heads over for a smooch.  So Miranda has come out as bi?  Carrie must have changed her conclusion about the validity of the bisexxual identity. 

Problem: every time Lawyer Miranda tries to move in for some action, her girlfriend's dogs complain. I had that problem on a date once. Whenever I touched the guy, his dog started growling, and he refused to exile it to another room.

Cut to Columnist Carrie sleeping with a cat on her head (the cat is named Shoe, har har).  She goes out into the hall to find Lawyer Miranda walking around n*aked (full body shot).  She explains that she and the girlfriend had  a falling out.  But that doesn't explain why you're n*aked in a shared space.

 Scene 5: In the morning, Miranda eats Carrie's yogurt -- she thought it was "house yogurt."  And the last banana! 

The Seema Plot:

Scene 1: Realtor Seema is applying for a small business loan to start a new agency after the old one was "sold out from under her."  She just needs enough to buy an office in Tribeca, plus some new clothes, dinners, a limo and driver, the usual.  The loan officer is not impressed by her business plan.  More incredibly entitled people. What is this, "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous"? 

Scene 2: She has lunch with Columnist Carrie to complain about the loan officer's lack of compassion.  She just needed enough to cover basic living expenses for a few months. Who can survive in the City without a limo and driver?  How are they supposed to get around?

As Seema and Carrie return to the apartment, they see Lawyer Miranda working on her laptop, with papers spread out on the dining room table.  She's drinking the last bottle of Mexican Coke!  Carrie accidentally spills the coke onto the laptop -- then she uses her research papers to mop up the mess! Then Miranda swoops in to use Carrie's favorite scarf!   

Conclusion: Miranda moves out.

While the conflict is going on, Seena goes outside to smoke.  The teenage gardener, Jamie (Jackson Moresco-Baeza), criticizes her, but the adult  (Logan Marshall-Green) asks for a cigarette of his own.  They flirt.

Some time later, Carrie sees smoke coming from Famous Novelist's apartment.  She bursts in -- the pot on the stove has caught fire!  He hasn't noticed because he's facing the other way, wearing headphones.  And he can't smell smoke?

They try to smother the flame with a dishtowel, which catches fire -- but Carrie stomps it out with her stiletto heels.  Shoes saved the day!  

They go out to dinner.  When she returns to the apartment, Carrie takes off her shoes.  Getting a bit more accommodating. The end.

Beefcake: The grotesque guy, and the back of the Famous Novelist..  Meanwhile, there are bikini babes and ladies everywhere.

Bonus: Logan Marshall-Green's d*ck, on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends.

Heterosexism:   For a show about "s*x and the city," this episode was rather chaste. Two of the ladies flirt with guys, and two kiss their partners briefly.

LGBTQ Characters: The nonbinary child, the bisexual Miranda, and her friend who was hanging around at breakfast (not mentioned in this episode, but he's married to Stanton Blatch from the first series).

My Grade: The plot threads are not linked thematically, the elitism is super annoying, and the ladies are self-centered jerks with no attempt to understand their neighbors/partners.  Maybe the guy with cancer doesn't feel up to a 10 mile nature hike? But a lot of it resonated from my years in grad school in New York.  C.

See also: "Muscle & Fitness": Searching for the Kelvin cover, with Weatherford backside and Lesnar d*ck.  About the 1990s.

"Partner Track": High-power lawyer is passed over in favor of people with p* enises. Yes, we see a few.

"Broad City": This ain't your Daddy's "Seinfeld.