Questions Abound in the Latest Episode of ‘And Just Like That…’
Is Virginia really for lovers? Do careers ever have happy endings? Can women have it all? These questions and more arise in Thursday night's episode.
Photo: HBO Max EntertainmentTV
Warning: spoilers for season 3, episode 3 of And Just Like That…
Some And Just Like That… episodes ask questions, while others strive to answer them. Just kidding, this show rarely provides answers, let alone satisfactory ones. But, with that in mind, the third episode of the season—”Carrie GoLightly”—is full of questions. Some questions I asked because I was genuinely confounded: Why is Anthony opening a horny bakery and why is Kathy, Aidan’s ex-wife, begging Carrie to source off-market Adderall for her son? And Carrie slips in some rhetorical questions. While driving down Virginia State Highway 201, she wistfully asks Seema, “Remember Maps?” Yes. We remember maps. She also self-deprecatingly asks Seema, “Who goes out of state for a casual lunch?!” The answer to that is Carrie, of course.
This week, New York City’s preeminent sex and relationships writer (who is currently working on—gasp!—fiction!) is invited to a literary luncheon in Williamsburg. No, not the hipster enclave across the East River, but the Civil War reenactment town in Virginia. (Another question I asked myself at one point: Is the Virginia tourism board getting a kickback from this episode?) Much to my dismay—and despite Carrie’s penchant for large floppy hats—we were not treated to Carrie wearing a tricorn. Alas. She attends this luncheon mostly to attend another lunch the next day with Aidan, her boyfriend, who previously asked that they not really be in touch for five calendar years. He also did not drive the one hour and six minutes (I used a map!) to attend the Williamsburg luncheon with his girlfriend. Perhaps Carrie should have donned a clown wig instead.
On this southern jaunt with Carrie is Seema, who just learned her 90-year-old business partner, Elliot, is retiring and is promoting a smarmy-looking man named Ryan instead of her. Hurt and insulted, she cashes in some PTO to reflect on what she actually wants from her career. Bravely eating fried chicken in bed wearing silk pajamas, Carrie and Seema discuss Seema’s options. Does she stick it out as number two in the company for longer? Does she strike out on her own? Would that be naive this late in her career? I found the conversation notably touching. The discussion also avoided the show’s signature quips and puns, which let Seema access a level of vulnerability we don’t often get with her. Plus, it’s the sort of glass-ceiling issue that actually plagues aging working women—more so than deciding between being flown out to SXSW or Google’s Palo Alto campus (a brief dilemma Carrie faced at the beginning of the episode).