And Just Like That...: Diwali
January 6, 2022 11:10 AM - Season 1, Episode 6 - Subscribe

The continuing adventures of Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte, not Samantha, and their new friends.

To start anew, Carrie buys an ultra-modern, uptown apartment. Charlotte is bothered that Lily and Rose want to update their shared bedroom to reflect their individual tastes and ages. Nya, still struggling with infertility, asks Miranda to join her and her other grad students in renovating old apartment buildings into affordable housing. Seema invites Carrie to her family's Diwali celebration, a Hindu holiday of light triumphing over dark. To deflect her parents' constant pressure about getting married, Seema has been falsely claiming she is seeing a (fictional) doctor named Dennis. Carrie accompanies Anthony when he consults a plastic surgeon about a facelift, then considers having work done herself. Miranda continually fantasizes about Che. When she tells Charlotte about their sexual encounter, Charlotte questions Miranda's behavior. Carrie dislikes the new apartment and moves back to her old one where she feels happiest.
posted by BlahLaLa (10 comments total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
Charlotte having to deal with neither of her children being the same old fashioned girly girl she is, is just... *chef's kiss*

The friendship between Miranda and her professor is just... it's not inappropriate in an abusive way, but, like, still inappropriate? Like, ok, they wanted Miranda to have a black woman friend, but couldn't they have found a way to do that without the teacher/student dynamic adding a strange background?

And then in the "ridiculous fantasy wealth" column... that Carrie can just blithely buy an absurdly expensive high rise condo and then just as quickly sell it... like... Well, I suppose Big left her a massive fortune or something, because what podcaster can do that? Oh, and all this time she's been paying for not just her old apartment, and the new one with Big, but a storage unit too? In short - Carrie's income level and actual cash flow remain one of the great unexplained mysteries of this series(s).
posted by dnash at 6:31 PM on January 6, 2022 [8 favorites]


I think this was my favorite episode of the series so far...though I have to say my least favorite parts were the scenes without Carrie/Miranda/Charlotte. So the law professor's fertility issues at her dinner and afterward were kinda meh.

dnash I absolutely think all of Carrie's stability comes from Big's money, and that there was a lot of it. The old apartment was paid for (it's a condo or co-op) a million years ago, and she made a huge bundle on selling their apartment. And hey, the way NYC real estate works, she'll still probably make a profit by selling the new place. I'm more curious about where she stores her wardrobe because we all know the tiny closet in the old place doesn't hold enough for the likes of her. (Though I do truly appreciate that so many of her costumes this season incorporate parts of old costumes, just like a real person would have new stuff mixed in with the old. You can follow the wardrobe people on Insta to see closer looks if you want.)

Also sorry we haven't gotten a glimpse of Steve since Miranda cheated. Especially given that they've had cheating issues in the past, on his part. I'm very curious how they're going to handle that.
posted by BlahLaLa at 7:15 PM on January 6, 2022 [3 favorites]


Carrie's income level and actual cash flow remain one of the great unexplained mysteries of this series(s)

She was a famous columnist for a long-time (and author?) - her face was on buses in the show, IIRC. But - possibly like many in that role, she came from money? And - in "current times", she is not podcaster working out of a makeshift desk in her bedroom/home office - the produce out of a studio - and in today's times podcasters can make millions. (Blippi is now worth $40 million and is creating a little media empire) My other assumption is that she owned her old place outright.

But - that storage unit - wowza... so huge, barely used - and bigger than many NYC apartments.
posted by rozcakj at 5:23 AM on January 7, 2022 [1 favorite]


I would watch Sarita Choudhury watch paint dry.

I still hate Charlotte, she was the reason I didn't consistently watch the original series. And I don't know why I am watching this one...initially it was because of Sara Ramirez. Shows where my bread is buttered, I guess. Maybe we're just meant to see the three main characters as dinosaurs who don't know how to navigate the current social landscape?
posted by wellred at 8:07 AM on January 7, 2022 [1 favorite]


Steve Deserves Better
Say what you want about whether you’d fuck, marry, or kill him, but I love Steve. And I’m not alone. First of all, he is physically very attractive, and I’d argue that David Eigenberg, the actor who plays him, has aged quite well. Second of all, Steve is just good. He’s honest without being cruel, undyingly supportive of Miranda, and a five-foot-nine king. Despite Miranda’s snobbishness about his bartending aspirations when they first met, he came into his own and opened up a whole goddamn bar, which makes him a business owner (hot) and a guy who can make you a negroni (also hot but admittedly probably not what Miranda needs right now).

Plus, he’s a pretty damn good boyfriend. One of his most telling moments in the original series happens when Miranda, caught in a meltdown about the prospect of Steve moving in and being repelled by her messy habits, shatters a jar of store-bought marinara sauce on the floor. Steve hugs her, tells her he’s not going anywhere, and suggests they order pizza. He’s just as good-natured and calm navigating their accidental pregnancy (remember when he picked up Brady’s umbilical-cord stump while the cat was playing with it?) and subsequent co-parenting situation. Every time Miranda is spiraling into crisis mode, Steve swings in with an affable grin and a bad pun that somehow pulls her out. He was always the “safe” option, but that didn’t make him boring — it made him great.
posted by dnash at 2:58 PM on January 7, 2022 [6 favorites]


LOL I have the exact opposite reaction to Steve. Not that there's anything wrong with him as a person, but he was never going to be Miranda's "forever". Among the four of them, she was the one who "settled": she was too bogged down by compulsory coupledom in the early series (in spite of putting up some resistance to the notion of it), it was a pressure she had on herself that she didn't even seem aware of because of how loudly she protested it.

She's always been so much more dynamic, so earnest about her hustle not just at her job but in life, and Steve's always been placid, complacent, lackadaisical. He was never going to be able to keep up with her. I'm glad we're seeing how miserable it makes her in the long run.

And let's recall - Miranda only made peace with settling for Steve because she had a moment of clarity that caring for Steve's Maaaaa was meaningful. As moments of clarity go, that's a pretty profound one. Not gonna knock it. But it has nothing to do with Steve, or love, or romance, or couplehood, or marriage. It's a revelation about the necessity of connection, a revelation about accepting the unglamorous aspects of corporeal existence, or a revelation about mortality, or a revelation about what it means to be dependable when loved ones need you. Perhaps it's even a revelation to her that Steve is doing something decent by taking care of his Maaaa all the time, therefore there is something (something! at least this one thing!) she can admire in him.

It's even understandable to me that in the state of mind Miranda is in after all those long years of on-again-off-again, and it being the 90s/2000s, and the aforementioned buying into compulsory coupledom, finding ONE SINGLE THING she can admire about Steve would, of course, *seem* like reason enough to settle down with him. The deck was stacked, her frame of mind at the end of the series made it inevitable. But that shouldn't fool the rest of us. THIS was inevitable.
posted by MiraK at 5:00 PM on January 7, 2022 [6 favorites]


Also I may just be biased because despite being straight af I seem to have a massive crush on Sara Ramirez.
posted by MiraK at 5:09 PM on January 7, 2022 [1 favorite]


A bunch of Indian aunties comment on Carrie's Diwali outfit.

> Do you think Carrie’s outfit was cultural appropriation?
>Aunty Veena: Absolutely. Because what she had on was a lehenga, which she had modernized, so it was totally appropriate.
>
>Oh! Not “appropriate!” Appropriation!
>Aunty Veena: (Looks perplexed)
>Aunty Roma: I don’t think it was appropriation. She was going to a Diwali party; it was great.
>
>...
> How would you rate Carrie’s hair?
>Aunty Roma: One. Zero.
> Aunty Veena: Minus one.

posted by MiraK at 5:34 PM on January 7, 2022 [8 favorites]


I'm aware of, but not immersed in, the critiques of this new series. And I agree that there have been some major cringe moments. But overall for me, this is absolutely net positive. I am going through a hard time personally--my mom was recently diagnosed with cancer--and watching a light but, I believe, accurate depiction of grief has been a balm.

Watching these three women, and their newer friend additions, take care of each other over and over through all the crap life throws at us feels like such a relief, like the writers really understand the power of community to sustain us. The characters don't always get it right, or know exactly how to help--you can see Charlotte struggling to figure out just how to get Carrie to the bathroom, and then when it turns out she's strong because she's been preparing for just such a scenario, the preparation we all do in our quest to stay healthy for ourselves and our families--that's a really remarkable thing to see on TV. And their disagreements with each other come out of honest communication, too! Not from hiding or trying to manipulate. I love when Seema lays it out for Carrie and says: what you said hurt me, and this is why, and Carrie responds by (after some process) taking responsibility. This is how relationships should work.

So yeah, some of it is silly, but I need that silliness to leaven the heaviness that is all around me. We all do.
posted by CiaoMela at 9:46 AM on January 12, 2022 [4 favorites]


If Big left his ex a cool million, I can only imagine what he left Carrie.
posted by archimago at 9:26 AM on January 13, 2022


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