Review Roundup: 'And Just Like That' Gets Lukewarm Response
23 years after Carrie, Charlotte, Miranda, and Samantha first premiered on HBO, the first two episodes of "And Just Like That" landed on HBO Max today. No doubt it will be well watched in the LGBTQ+ community, but what do the early reviews say about the Samantha-less remake? Kim Cattrall has famously refused to appear in the sequel, leading some to speculate it's because of a rift between Cattrall and Sarah Jessica Parker.
There is a big reveal in the first episode about the fate of Mr. Big (Chris Noth), whom Carrie married at the end of the series, the Daily Mail said.
"The first and second episodes are packed with glamour, sass, many nods to political correctness and sensitivity — however we soon see Carrie left as widower... At the end of Episode One, Mr Big is seen riding on his [Peloton] exercise bike before he dies from a heart attack and is found by a sobbing Carrie."
The early reviews are out, and they are lukewarm. In Variety Daniel D'Addario writes: "There's always been more to 'Sex and the City' than escapism, but the 45-minute episodes of 'And Just Like That' gradually come to feel like installments of a drama with some jokes..." He goes on to point out that Cattrall is very much missed. "It's worth noting that without the typically game and shrewd Cattrall to introduce conversations, issues of the flesh remain largely theoretical for the show's three leads — which makes "And Just Like That" a missed opportunity to address issues of physical satisfaction for characters in a new season of life."
As for the introduction of a more diverse cast of new characters, D'Addario offered measured criticism: "And their complications are, in the first four episodes, explored unproductively; four new characters, all women of color, seem to exist, first, as sounding boards or reactive forces, to refine and reframe the racial politics of the leads, and of their show."
In Entertainment Weekly, Darren Franich admitted to being "a little weird about Sex and the City. It's like I need to defend the franchise while I throw it out the window," acknowledging the original has not "aged well." "'Sex and the City' was edgy in a dreary period for mainstream culture, back when an onscreen female orgasm earned an NC-17 from the patriarchy. The past ages poorly, which is why we bury corpses we don't burn."
"I've seen four episodes, and the fourth one strains less to include the new supporting cast; people stop talking about ISSUES and start talking about their issues..."
"Look. If you're asking 'Is this show just about giving white ladies nonwhite friends?' the answer isn't 'No.' In the vintage 'Sex and the City' episode formula, the women got together to talk about their lives, split into (usually) romantic subplots, then reunited to laugh over their troubles. 'And Just Like That' isn't as obviously structured — the 40-plus-minute episodes could all use an edit — but you can spot the same dynamic, with these new acquaintances filling the plotspace boyfriends used to occupy..."
"I wish the jokes were better ..." he concludes. "Still, there's a lightness here that improves from the movies' general thud... An image I didn't realize I needed to see in 2021: Carrie Bradshaw, cigarette in hand, the city that once was hers passing by outside her window. 'And Just Like That' tries too hard to bring its cultural brand into a new era, but it reclaims a core humanity lacking in the previous franchise extensions."
Inkoo Kang in the Washington Post was harsher: "This year has been a bummer, and so is the sequel series. The zippy, intimate, charmingly featherlight landmark HBO series of yore has been replaced by yet another bloated streaming-service grief-com, the latest piece of intellectual property back in zombie form to generate headlines, pique nostalgia and ultimately disappoint us."
Kang also laments the loss of Cattrall. "With its floozy-flaneuse presumably living large in London, 'And Just Like That ...' leans into 'Sex and the City's' least interesting mode... Detracting even more from the show's innate sense of fun is its many mea culpas for the criticisms the show has received since its departure from the air nearly 20 years ago. If 'Sex and the City' once drove the culture, it's playing catch-up now."
Kang continued, praising the show's premise, but finding it just dated. "It's admirable, I suppose, to reposition Carrie and company as White women who've recently realized they've still gotta do the work to earn the progressive bona fides they'd taken for granted as sexually liberated career women of the late 1990s and early 2000s. But boy, is watching their White feminist fumbles dull."
Robyn Bahr in The Hollywood Reporter was more measured, noting the differences with the original. "When the sequel series was originally announced, I found the title change a little more than eye-rollingly bumptious, but now I understand it. These are two completely separate shows that just happen to share a continued narrative. One was a sexy romantic comedy. This new one is a meditative grief drama. Even Douglas Cuomo's infamously plinky cocktail lounge-evoking musical theme has been excised."
But Bahr generally likes the re-imagining. "But just because 'SATC' was fun and 'AJLT' is somber doesn't mean the tempo shift is a mistake. Spending time with Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker), Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon) and Charlotte York-Goldenblatt (Kristin Davis) still feels akin to covering myself in a warm, time-worn blanket (even if I acutely miss the funky spunk brought by Kim Cattrall, whose #slutgoals Samantha Jones was the beating clitoris of the original series). I embrace the brooding and pensiveness of a series about three women in their mid-50s pinpointing the ways in which their lives have agonizingly changed or agonizingly remained static as they've aged."
In IndieWire, Ben Travers opens with: "'And Just Like That...' is quite a thing to behold." But that's not necessarily a good thing. "It's not good, per se, but it offers plenty to talk about and has moments, big and small, that resonate... Fans of the original series will feel the familiar pull, drawing you back into the vortex of high fashion, budding romance, and devout friendships, while non-fans will be given ample fuel from this very well-off, very self-absorbed trio to power their hate-watching."
"'And Just Like That...' appears to be on a mission to quiet any alarm bells associated with the show's past. Some topics fit right in with the series' longstanding ethos, like normalizing the choice not to have kids or the pros/cons of romantic couples devolving into roommates, and no version of 'Sex and the City' will ever apologize for its overt materialism... But the new episodes also make room for people of color and characters identifying as LGBTQ...
"For all its heavy-handed flaws and self-indulgent tendencies, the new series shows an earnest devotion to grow along with its audience, whether that's by inviting fresh faces to their dinner tables or acknowledging that no one (not even Carrie) stays the same forever. Maybe we don't need a new 'Sex and the City' series right now, but boy do we have one — and just like that, I'll be watching again."
But at The Independent, Adam White gives "AJLT" four stars out of five. "This 10-episode revival isn't just shocking because of what happens in it — claims by showrunner Michael Patrick King that no one gets killed off prove to be a total lie — but because it knows its main characters are older, whiter and completely out of step. It is a brave, unexpected and ultimately rewarding move..."
"As the new show continues, though, it becomes clear that 'And Just Like That...' has very different things on its mind than the Samantha-sized hole in the ensemble... " King said.
He concluded: "'And Just Like That...' doesn't feel like cloying nostalgia-bait, or a sad rehashing of the past. It's so good, in fact, that Kim Cattrall must be kicking herself."