And Just Like That isn’t perfect but it feels weirdly nostalgic and comforting

The Sex and the City reboot isn’t perfect and it has seen honest sex talk be replaced by other things that are weirdly comforting. WARNING: Spoilers

WARNING: Spoilers

“We can’t just stay who we were, right?” Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon) asks in the opening scenes of And Just Like That, the sequel to the iconic Sex and the City TV series, which ran from 1998 until 2004. (The less said about the movies – particularly the godawful second one - the better.)

It becomes clear very quickly that our beloved Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Charlotte (Kristin Davis) and Miranda have most definitely not stayed the same (there’s no Samantha, for one). Instead, we see the trio navigating a vastly different landscape where honest sex talk has largely been replaced by a group managing unexpected grief, crumbling marriages, substance abuse and late middle age. Cheers!

Still, for those of us of a certain age, there remains something strangely comforting about watching Carrie, Miranda and Charlotte lunching like it’s 1999 and reminding its audience what it was like to gather weekly – pre-social media – in real time to watch a series that was groundbreaking for its sexual frankness and complex female friendships.

A scene from the new chapter in the Sex And The City series And Just Like That. Picture: HBO/Binge

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Add to that, the fact that ensemble comedies about women in their mid-50s are not exactly common on TV, feels at once revolutionary and annoying that there aren’t more.

There are issues, however. Like much of TV at the time, Sex and the City was also very straight (gay men appeared but lesbians were thin on the ground) and very, very white. The show’s creator Michael Patrick King has moved to redress the imbalance by introducing new characters of colour and a non-binary LGBTQ character, but it often feels awkward and token, merely added as excruciating “teachable moments” for the show’s three leads.

Another scene in the Sex And The City series And Just Like That. Picture: HBO/Binge

And let’s address the elephant in the room: And Just Like That also suffers from the loss of the “fourth musketeer”, Samantha, whose wisecracks and levity are glaringly absent (Kim Cattrall did not return after an alleged falling out with Sarah Jessica Parker).

Sarah Jessica Parker and Willie Garson are seen filming And Just Like That... Picture: Gotham/GC Images

There’s also the very real loss of Carrie’s BFF Stanford. Fan favourite Willie Garson died of pancreatic cancer midway through filming so watching him in the first few episodes is particularly heartbreaking.

Still, Sarah Jessica Parker shines. Her New York might be a little more beaten down post-Covid, but her fashion is still fabulous (“Hello lovers,” she greets her wondrous shoe closet) and she is the show’s heartbeat, bringing a new gravity to Carrie that we haven’t seen before.

It’s not perfect by a long shot, but stepping back into Carrie, Charlotte and Miranda’s world, for a moment feels both nostalgic and comforting. Might order a Cosmo.

Originally published as And Just Like That isn’t perfect but it feels weirdly nostalgic and comforting