‘And Just Like That …’ Recap, Episodes 1 and 2: Big Love

Season 1, Episodes 1 and 2: ‘Hello It’s Me’ and ‘Little Black Dress’

Ding dong, Big is dead. That is sad, but not for the obvious reason.

Make no mistake, a wide swath of longtime “Sex and the City” fans have longed for the day that John James Preston, a.k.a. Mr. Big (Chris Noth) would be out of the picture. After many seasons of bad guy behavior, the fact that he and Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) ended up together at the end of the original series left a significant portion of fans dismayed. That Carrie took him back after he left her at the altar in the first movie sequel, and that she compromised herself to fit his marital ideal in the second, did little to assuage disappointment.

Then “And Just Like That …,” the 10-part HBO Max follow-up series to “Sex and the City,” was announced, and rumors quickly swirled that Big was going to be killed off. By the end of the premiere episode, which dropped Thursday with Episode 2, the deed was already done.

As much as I wanted him gone, I wasn’t rooting for that. I had hoped that after years of heartache and accommodation forced upon her by this man she simultaneously won over and settled for, Carrie would instead finally realize she had always deserved better, and she would walk her sky-high stilettos out the door. She didn’t, and that’s the sad part.

Indeed, the premiere episode of “And Just Like That …” leads us to believe (at least for now) that Big had been tamed at long last — that he and Carrie were sincerely happy and had found their soft landing in love. And maybe they had. He and Carrie share a dreamy-eyed slow dance in the kitchen while searing salmon (Carrie cooks now?), and it looks like the picture-perfect marriage a 30-something Charlotte York (Kristin Davis) might have painted. They’re comfortable and committed, but they still have that spark. Who could hope for more?

And so, the series chose to have it both ways. Allowing that development to stand, however briefly, allows us to witness Carrie’s apparent success — all hail the conquering hero! But allowing it to stand much longer might have served as a perpetual reminder of what made their relationship so controversial: Carrie’s constant self-debasement through the better part of six seasons and two movies, as she convinced herself that if she only worked hard enough, waited long enough and acquiesced enough, she could change Big. It was that persistent delusion that frustrated so many fans for so long. And centering that narrative today might have sent a toxic and somewhat unconvincing message.

So in a tear-jerking scene in which Carrie inexplicably doesn’t call 911 upon finding her husband nearly dead on their bathroom floor, the two share frantic kisses and hugs before Big finally leaves her for good.

But more on that later.

When Episode 1 opens, we find a trio of familiar faces — Carrie, Charlotte York Goldenblatt and Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon) — living in a vaguely idealized, maskless, carefree-ish post-pandemic New York.

Of course there’s a glaring absence: Samantha Jones, played in previous installments by Kim Cattrall, who left the franchise amid a very public feud with Parker. The series gets right to addressing the missing “fourth musketeer,” in a way that may vaguely allude to the apparent real-life drama. A rift between Carrie and Samantha has emerged. In Carrie’s words, she fired Samantha as her publicist, and then Samantha fired Carrie, along with Charlotte and Miranda, as friends.

At first pass, this seems like a grave overreaction on Samantha’s part. She crossed an ocean and won’t answer texts just because her pride was bruised? Maybe. Or maybe she was just sick of third-wheeling with her boring married friends and needed to move on, and the overseas job thing is just a pretext. We’ll never know.

What we do know, however, is that in some respect, the story mirrors reality. Much of what has been reported about the relationships among the series’s core four actors is hearsay and speculation. But we know that there was friction between Cattrall and her castmates and that Cattrall, like Samantha, removed herself.

Regardless of the reasons for Samantha’s departure, it is relatable. As decades pass, some friendships wither, and this plot point is a reminder that, like romantic relationships, sometimes friendships aren’t happily ever after.

With that out of the way, the episode moves at a rapid pace, making little room for subtlety or nuance when it comes to situating the characters in this new stage of life. Everyone is older. (In case the passing of time wasn’t obvious, you’ll be made aware of it by the many self-deprecating “old” jokes woven into the dialogue.) The women have gray hair, in various degrees and shades of dye. They’re not entirely comfortable with podcasts. They struggle with pronouns. They weren’t who they once were, and they’re not trying to be. Sort of. (As Charlotte, still a full brunette, argues: “Ruth Bader Ginsburg died her hair.”)

Carrie is still in the media game, but she has parlayed her success from print columns and books into a steady podcast gig and healthy Instagram following. It’s all a bit uncomfy to her, though, especially when her younger, “queer, nonbinary, Mexican-Irish diva” boss, Che Diaz (Sara Ramirez), tells her she needs to be more explicit on the show.

Charlotte is mostly still Charlotte, living a lovely life in a Park Avenue palace with her adoring husband and girls. While her oldest, Lily (Cathy Ang), who stuns the crowd at her piano recital with a virtuosic performance, seems to take after her mother in the pursuit of perfection, her youngest daughter, Rose (Alexa Swinton), is a punky skateboarder who won’t wear the floral Oscar de la Renta number her mom bought for her without an ironic T-shirt over top.

Finally, Miranda has ditched corporate law to pursue a master’s in human rights — an endeavor she proclaims she doesn’t need to be a “spicy redhead” for. If Miranda’s gray hair and fine lines aren’t enough to alienate her from her Gen Z classmates, the racially insensitive rambling she spills onto her Black professor, Nya Wallace (Karen Pittman), certainly solidifies it. Watching Miranda struggle to walk back comments about her professor’s braids is almost as uncomfortable as watching Big masturbate.

It has been well publicized that the franchise has made an effort to reckon with its original blinding whiteness, namely with the addition of new cast members of color. Reasonable people will disagree on whether or not the series is doing that successfully and sensitively. Still, Miranda’s word vomit scene suggests they’re at least being thoughtful about that process. Considering the original series is riddled with dated, problematic references, and that the second movie was slammed as, at worst, offensive, and at best, insensitive, the still largely white cast couldn’t burst into this series completely enlightened. Their learning curve is on display, particularly in Miranda’s cringey white savior moments with her incredibly patient professor, and that at least feels honest.

In all other regards, the first episode is largely lighthearted until the very end, when Big suddenly drops his phone, has a heart attack and dies. That flows into the mostly melancholy Episode 2.

Much as they did when Big no-showed his wedding to Carrie in the first movie, Carrie’s fiercely loyal friends, Miranda and Charlotte, are right by her side in this time of need, literally, sleeping next to her in shifts as she navigates her new role as a widow. Even Samantha makes a spectral appearance, sending a billowing coffin spray to the funeral.

The funeral itself is as austere as the man was, by Carrie’s design. Knowing Big would have hated a stodgy old funeral home, she throws a modern if somewhat unfeeling affair to commemorate Big’s passing — an event through which she does almost no crying. “But is that good?” Miranda wonders aloud.

Speaking of wondering aloud, let us all raise a glass to the cameo friend Susan Sharon (Molly Price) for taking a pause mid-memorial to ask the essential question: “Am I the only one that remembers what a [expletive] he was to her?” Amen.

The steeliness of it all is broken by Charlotte, who does the bulk of the crying, in part out of sadness for Carrie’s loss, and in part out of guilt. Charlotte reasons that had she not forced Carrie to go to Lily’s recital instead of heading out to the Hamptons with Big, Carrie would have been with Big when he had his heart attack, and he might have lived (assuming Carrie had remembered to call for an ambulance). Late in the episode, as Charlotte pushes this theory once again, Carrie relieves her of her pain, saying she isn’t mad at Charlotte but at herself for not switching off the people-pleaser inside her and leaving with Big, as she wanted to.

It would have been a great time for Susan Sharon to show up again and point out that Big still refused to go to events with Carrie and her friends, and that maybe, if he would have been a little more considerate, he might have come to the recital and not died alone.

In any case, that’s the worst of it for Charlotte, at least in these first two episodes. Her only other pressing concern is whether she can turn the cool documentarian and fellow P.T.O. mom Lisa Todd Wexley (Nicole Ari Parker) — her allotted friend or colleague of color for the series — into her new BFF.

Other characters are facing deeper issues. These early episodes hint at a possible drinking problem for Miranda, who sneaks wine into Lily’s recital, orders a midmorning Chablis at a dive bar and slams bourbon at the funeral before her speech.

Meanwhile, marriage is not so blissful for Anthony Marentino (Mario Cantone) and Stanford Blatch (Willie Garson) who bicker at every turn, even on a “good night,” only to be reminded by Big’s passing that they’re lucky to have each other. Given that Garson died in September as the new series was still filming, it remains to be seen how long that will remain true.

But of course it is Carrie whose world has been rocked the hardest. She is on her own again, asking herself, “What do I do now?”

Will she gallivant through Manhattan sipping cosmos and serial dating? I hope not. Most of us aren’t here for Carrie ‘n’ friends to relive their glory days. They’re in a more mature, wisened up place, and that feels right.

Still, despite her grief, it’s impossible not to feel a ripple of excitement that our single girl is back.