And Just Like That: Let The Games Begin
Season 3, Episode 4: testing the integrity of Carrie’s new hip, family game night, Weapons (the movie and also Wyatt’s)
I have to state a couple things for the record:
First, with five minutes remaining in this episode, I got so mad I shouted SHUT UP! Fuck you, dude! at the TV, which woke up Sandy (my dog). She thought I was having a mental break and also that we were going outside. So I paused the episode and took her out and just stared at the night sky for a few minutes while she peed and sniffed around. As I looked to the sky for answers or an asteroid to take us all out as punishment for allowing this abomination of a show to go on… I hoped that when I went back inside and finished the show Carrie would finally break up with Aidan. I should have just stayed outside and kept waiting for the asteroid.
Secondly, the moment Harry handed Pop Pop’s iPad to Rock and said it wasn’t working and there were a million tabs open, I typed: oh shit, there is going to be so much p*rn on that iPad. I just want you to know that I called it half an hour before it was proved to be true.
Directly from my show notes:
Harry’s dad is here, ready to commit some hate crimes and f*ck the neighbor in apartment 10F after he invites her to dinner without Charlotte or Harry’s permission.
Aidan and Carrie sneak away to have s€x. Aidan set a coitus cut-off alarm on his phone because he told the boys he was “going for a swim.” Your hair is completely dry, you idiot. Men are the worst liars. The worst. Come up with a realistic lie at least! He’s going to walk out of that guest house bone-dry and Wyatt is going to blow his brains out because it’s so obvious that Aidan and Carrie just fucked ten feet away from them.
This show is now in the horror genre and the soundtrack to this episode needs to be replaced with the score to the Weapons trailer (a movie that seems too scary for me, but I am dying to see. Allegedly, the script was so good that Jordan Peele fired his entire team after they lost the bidding war to produce the movie). What Carrie endured in this episode is scarier than maybe even Weapons will be.
This episode is titled “Apples to Apples” and for some reason when I read that before I clicked on the episode I thought “dust to dust.” Probably because that’s exactly what Aidan should have been treated like. But more on that later, I’m going to go in order from least to most irritating plot lines.
Miranda
Miranda is house-sitting for Carrie and is woken up with a start when the cat jumps on her while she’s sleeping. I know this feeling. Sandy has started punching me in the boobs. Don’t ask me how she’s capable of this. If I’m on the ground playing with her or petting her she will occasionally get so excited she sits up and paw-stabs me right in the tit. We’ve been making her sleep in the hallway between our bedrooms and she’s been very good about it. But every once in a while she will sneak into my room around 5 AM and jump up on my bed. She knows when she does this I’ll tell her to go back to her bed, so she has learned to do it so silently and delicately that it doesn’t even wake me up anymore. She’s so smart I can’t even be mad at her about the tit-punch thing.
Miranda gets her big break with Joy and asks her over to Carrie’s house. Miranda doesn’t have a great track record of good behavior when it comes to being around people she’s attracted to at Carrie’s place of residence (see: Che in the kitchen in Season 1).
Then Miranda accidentally says c*nt instead of country on live TV and it becomes a meme. She’s horrified, but as a baby lesbian she should be proud. It’s kind of an iconic move. And nothing viral is remembered more than an hour after it happens these days.
When her plans with Joy start to get dicey, Miranda spirals that maybe Joy is mad about the c*nt meme. But Brits love to say c*nt! Aussies do too. In fact, when I was last in Oz I couldn’t believe how much they said it. But the weird thing was when I said fuck they were like whoa whoa whoa, keep it down, no need to be vulgar.
Carrie’s suggestion to Miranda about the Joy situation is so AI-coded. She tells Miranda to have Joy bring all her friends over to Carrie’s place (a stranger’s house with no furniture and just a bed) to drink wine (Miranda is sober?).
This is the most chatGPT-ass idea I’ve ever heard. And I know that because I ask chatGPT crazy shit on a daily basis. I’d rather nudes get leaked than anyone see my conversation history with chatGPT. For example, I’ll ask it for advice about dating and relationship stuff. And too often chatGPT hallucinates and is like Yes babe! You’re really slaying, mama! You should say (insert most delusional embarrassing thing you’ve ever heard). And then I reply: actually I don’t like that, that’ll make me look crazy. And chatGPT is like You’re so right, queen! You’ve never been wrong! How about you (insert even crazier thing). And then I either give up or do the less insane option.
As I predicted, the Brits have a good old laugh at the c*nt thing and Joy doesn’t care either. We learn that Joy was only acting weird because she does that when she realizes she’s attracted to someone.
So Miranda and Joy make out (YAY), which hilariously shows up on Carrie’s security camera app. I love when that happens.
Charlotte
Her whole plot line this episode centers around a visit from Harry’s father. Very few of you will appreciate this, but they call Harry’s dad “Pop Pop” which is the same thing the grandkids on Arrested Development call George Senior. Of course, I immediately thought of the classic “I have pop pop in the attic” scene.
Pop Pop just narrowly avoids saying the f-slur when commenting that boy ballet dancers used to have boyfriends. It comes out that Lilly’s boyfriend is Poly. I thought it was hilarious that Pop Pop, although clearly homophobic, relates to his non-binary grand-them, Rock, more than anyone else in the family and asks Rock to translate for him what the fuck poly means.
Seema
Continuity issue: did you notice in the background… her name IS on the wall? Last episode she kept saying my name should be on the wall. But it already is? Poust and Patel, the giant sign in the lobby reads. I’m confused. None of the writers consulted anyone in real estate about whether her name would come off the wall or the AI that is writing these scenes thought they were talking about medieval fiefdom and not current-day business practices.
Seema and Ryan square off. You can’t make me hate Ryan. He really wants her to work for him. And why shouldn’t she? I want to see her ride Adam the landscaper, not fight with Ryan. He says she has to evacuate her office in a week if she isn’t going to work for him.
Seema immediately tries to violate the (I assume) non-compete clause in her contract by trying to poach the receptionist for her new real estate venture. Seema references Jerry Maguire, the Gen Z receptionist says never heard of it, and Seema tells her it’s science fiction. Now that was written by a human!
LTW
I think she needs to see a neurologist. She’s not just talking in her sleep, she’s having rich-woman night terrors.
When she hears her editor is a man she immediately creates an HR no-no by saying they shouldn’t use a male editor for a documentary about women. If roles were reversed and a man said that they can’t use a female editor for a documentary about a man, they would be FIRED on the spot. But the editor is terribly hot, so I’m sure more HR violations are on the way.
Homer
Aidan’s (queer?) son Homer seems genuinely happy to see and love Carrie. How have we (the audience) NEVER up until this moment realized that she seems to have (when?) formed a real bond with Homer? Wyatt barely says hi to Carrie – he’s too busy looking for somewhere to plant a pipe bomb.
Since Carrie lost her luggage, Homer says Carrie can wear some of his clothes. Homer is saying that because he wants to trade clothes with Carrie. He can’t wait to get his hands on that little pink dress.
As a reminder, Carrie’s luggage was left behind in the towed away rental car and she has literally just the clothes on her back. Homer is like: Girl, let’s go shopping! I heard you got a big inheritance, mama. Let’s go try on shoes, queen! (Maybe Homer is chatGPT?)
Homer suggests Carrie pick up some things at “Daisy’s Dress Shop” because that’s his favorite place to try on women’s clothing. Homer even offers to take her. It’s less than six minutes into this episode and Homer has already shown more kindness to Carrie than Aidan has in the last two seasons combined. I fucking love Homer.
Aidan Is The Worst
Aidan continued to prove in this episode that his relationship with Carrie is just a long con for revenge. He ultimately wants to put her through hell to get back at her for her original sins from SATC. But the joke's kind of on him. I think he probably thought that she would have run screaming from the farm after day 1. He got into this relationship too quickly and has been trying to sabotage it since season 2.
You know what men do: most of them are too cowardly to break things off themselves so instead they try to make you so miserable that you break up with them instead. But Carrie called his bluff. She somehow withstood Weapons-levels of horror and still didn’t break up with him by the end.
In an effort to avoid this being painfully long (pathetic to admit, but I typed 15 pages of notes on this episode) I will list the revenge-theory evidence here because there is A LOT of it:
Aidan made Carrie do a semi-walk-of-shame. She is forced to wear her cute, but now two-day-old outfit and expensive heels to trot past the chickens to find Aidan the morning after she arrived sans luggage.
She makes self-deprecating mentions to her lack of deodorant and needing a latte while Aidan obliviously (or intentionally) is blabbing on about home improvement projects. Why are they doing work on the house when he could have gotten up early and tried to LOCATE HER SUITCASE? Or at least gone to Walmart and gotten her some essentials? This isn’t just weaponized incompetence, it's deliberately leaving her out to dry.
Aidan suggests she use his deodorant in the meantime. Couldn’t hurt, he says, implying she smells.
Without talking to Carrie about it, Aidan announces his oldest son, Tate, is coming home NEXT WEDNESDAY and Aidan wants Carrie to stick around for it. So he goes from “can’t see you for 5 years” to “surprise! Stay here until NEXT WEDNESDAY.” What day is it now? How long is he assuming she stay for? MAY I REMIND YOU THAT SHE DOESN'T HAVE ANY OF HER THINGS? He makes an assumption that she couldn’t possibly have any other plans or something to get back to in New York.
They are having breakfast and Carrie finally says more assertively: Hey, I’m in your teenager’s clothes and your man-deodorant, can I please go to a Target and get myself some things? Girls need their things!
Aidan puts her on an ATV to go into town and find some clothes. An ATV?! She just had her hip replaced in Season 1, she can’t afford to break another!
Before driving off on the ATV that will surely flip over and paralyze her, Carrie asks, “Can you kiss me?” She has to ASK him to kiss her while she’s sitting on an ATV in his son’s clothes before she rides off to find some basic supplies. He says “don’t run me over” because he knows that’s what he deserves.
Aidan asks her later to spend time getting to know the boys better, specifically Wyatt. But he has no plan for how she should do that. Aidan says I don’t know they can keep working on the house and you can hang out with them and play a game. Wyatt is basically on the FBI watch list and that’s the best you could come up with – for Carrie to just wing it with him?
Carrie has to wear a prairie woman dress in the Virginia heat to fish with the boys as their first forced-bonding activity. The amount of ticks and mosquitoes biting up her legs right now... Wyatt says he hates fishing. This is another trap Aidan set. He told Carrie to fish with the boys, but I’d bet ya a thousand bucks he knew that Wyatt would have a meltdown because Aidan already knew Wyatt hates fishing.
They go do some virtual reality zombie-killing game at the Mall. Wyatt accidentally bonks Carrie in the head and she steps out of the game. She hardly complains and Aidan says, “you don’t have to make him feel bad.” She wasn't though?? She kept saying she was fine? He is setting her up for failure and it’s diabolical.
Carrie confronts Aidan about the Adderall situation during Tate’s birthday. Aidan’s lighting the candles for the cake and you can see in his eyes that he thinks for a moment about throwing a match at the wood beams of that house and burning everyone alive inside it. Carrie says she feels awful about it. Then Aidan has the nerve to SCOLD Carrie for bringing it up, even though she was put in an incredibly unfair position. I would have gotten my ass back on that ATV and ridden the entire way back to NYC and never looked back.
After everyone leaves family game/annihilation night and it’s just Carrie and Aidan reeling from the aftermath, he abandons her again and says he need to go for a swim. He hasn’t thought FOR ONE SECOND how any of this has affected her. It’s all about him. He’s going to go swim in the farm-sewage runoff pond and I beg – I BEG – Carrie, for the love of god, stop f*cking that man or take antibiotics now, girl I’m telling you this is about to be the worst UTI of your life.
And there’s more in the final scene, but that’s coming.
Somehow, despite all of these humiliation rituals (called that too last week, if you’ve been following along), our delusional queen stayed.
More Hell On Earth/Farm
During breakfast, Wyatt shoots a look across the table at Carrie like he’s going to cut her arms and legs off in her sleep that night. Chilling.
Aidan is constantly trying to keep Wyatt off screens. He says without his supervision, Wyatt would be on the couch back on the Switch. Honestly, that sounds like the safest thing he could be doing, I’m more worried that he’s going to go assassinate someone. A bit later Wyatt is playing a toddler-style game on his phone and Aidan snatches it away. That’s why he’s going to shoot up a school. Let him stare at a screen for a bit to relax, God.
Later, Carrie and Aidan sneak away to have sex in the guest house. She still doesn’t have any of her own deodorant, or skin care products, or MEDICATIONS (bitches need their pills, OK?), or anything. Carrie’s going to get a raging UTI from this (see above).
Family Game Night
I have to ask this – I don’t think it’s ever been explained. Does Kathy (Aidan’s ex wife) or anyone in that family know that Carrie and Aidan kissed in Abu Dhabi in the second SATC movie? Kathy seems oblivious. She certainly wouldn’t act so warm to Carrie if she knew.
But – I wonder if this will circle back around later – Tate looks at Carrie and talks at her like he knows (the oldest child always knows).
Kathy says to Tate about his birthday when they all arrive: “You still have to celebrate with us because WE made you, right?” and then high-fives Aidan. Tate, Carrie, and Bob (see below) are visibly trying to hold down vomit.
Kathy’s boyfriend Bob is there too. One big happy family on the brink of annihilation (and this time I’m suggesting it’s Aidan that’s going to snap, not Wyatt). As another “outsider” Bob the boyfriend tries to bond with Carrie while Tate is opening presents. “They are a tight knit group,” he says with the kind of tension to imply that there is something deeply wrong with this family. I like how they are setting this up. It’s like the call is coming from inside the house. This is GET OUT but with divorced white people. Bob admits/tries to warn Carrie that it took him four years with Kathy to feel “pretty normal” around the family and then chugs his drink.
Then Bob lets the Adderall ruse slip. Aidan doesn’t want Wyatt to take Adderall (which he so obviously, desperately needs). There it is. Kathy went behind Aidan’s back to get the Adderall because Aidan is a very controlling, no-screen time, no-medication freak.
When they start family game night (apples to apples) they seem to be one of those hyper-competitive board game families. I have to admit, we Osinskis have been known to throw down over Catch Phrase and the early 2000’s pop culture Trivial Pursuit, but I think I can safely say we aren’t operating on Shaw-levels of insanity.
Bob has recused himself from family game night, obviously having learned that games in this family are a trap, and is getting wasted by himself.
Wyatt goes nuclear when Carrie’s card gets picked over his, but no one seems to be listening. It’s not about Carrie. He’s an outsider in his own family. None of you ever pick mine, he says. I’m no child psychologist, but this isn’t about the game. It’s their own fault for putting Wyatt in an environment where he has to compete for their attention and affection. Aidan tries to force him keep playing.
I can’t believe I’m saying this… but I’m on Wyatt’s side. Aidan is trying to fix him (unmedicated) in a screenless, weird way. Aidan and Kathy have a tense argument about Adderall in front of everyone. Bob is astral projecting to a tropical island and Carrie is wishing she never said that thing about Big being a big mistake. It was this look, right here where you could see Carrie slowly wake up as she got a front-row seat to Aidan’s parenting style.
She had a nice, calm, child-free life with Big in a beautiful apartment. And now she’s in Virginia, in fundamentalist-LDS garb, being forced to play in game night, and watching the family scream at each other.
At the height of the arguing, Wyatt walks up to the window with some kind of farm tool and shatters it. Carrie covers her mouth in shock as Aidan chases after Wyatt.
Later that night, Carrie retreats to the guest house and Aidan comes to find her after his sewage swim. She says “Maybe you guys needed some space.” Um yeah, bitch. They need about three atmospheric levels of space away from you. Get out of there!
Aidan finally starts an apology, but doesn’t say he’s sorry for putting her in a bad position or sorry for losing his shit in front of her or sorry for not taking her to target so she can get some things for herself. He says:
“I never should have asked you to stay”
Damn.
To her credit, Carrie handles it well. “Then, why did you?”
It wasn’t because he wanted her there or because he loved her and was dying to see her. He admits he only asked her to stay with them because he felt guilty. (This is the moment where I lost it and took Sandy out and sadly did not get hit by an asteroid)
“Well I owe you an apology too,” she says…
And finally breaks up with him!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just kidding, she makes excuses for him and says it’s OK.
THEY HAVE COMPLETELY LOST ME.
Aidan tearfully asks if she’s breaking up with him. Because that’s what she should do. That’s what he probably hopes she’ll do. But she says no and takes this moment to do the insane thing I forgot she was planning to do all along: she presents him with a key to her house.
Did you notice, as she puts it in his hand, Aidan opens his mouth to say something, but doesn’t? But Carrie doesn’t give him the chance to say anything as she blabs on about how she’ll still wait for him while he deals with his mess of a family.
She makes her needs ever so small, so microscopic, that she says, “Use the key when you can. But don’t use it out of guilt.”
My god, this man deserves to feel guilty! JESUS CHRIST.
I do not believe that the same Carrie Bradhsaw that we watched for 6.5 seasons and two movies of SATC would have witnessed the family breakdown we just saw and would not have run screaming from the house.
This is horseshit.
Carrie flies economy on the way home (another plot hole) and, through her inner-narration of the YA novel she’s writing in her head, she seems to admit that things aren’t quite right.
I hate watching her put herself through this because I know how this ends. It puts a pit in my stomach because I’ve been where she’s been. I’ve made the excuses, I’ve given second and third chances, I’ve tried to ignore when my intuition is screaming FIRE FIRE FIRE and I’m just standing there with a limp hose not helping.
Here’s something I’ve done a couple times and I hope Carrie stumbles on this one way or another. When I got divorced, I made a deal with the universe: from now on, if something is bad for me then take it away. I don’t care if it hurts or if it’s inconvenient or if I don’t like it. Take it out of my life. And it works every. single. time. I’ve said out loud – even very recently in fact – please, just give me an undeniable sign.
And I am telling you that the sign ALWAYS shows up within a day or two and it’s never a sign you can ignore. I don’t want to watch her go through this because I have lived it. It’ll sting, but it’ll be the right thing for her. For now, we wait with dread to find out how the universe is going to drag her kicking and screaming away from the horrors of Aidan and his family.
(Tyler and Sandy when they are reunited after camp)
(can’t keep a bad bitch down ;)
This is the kind of weird ass furniture I bet Aidan used to make.
(no comment.)