Ever since And Just Like That premiered in 2021, a contingent of diehard Sex and the City fans have wondered what the hell happened to Miranda Hobbes. Between her messy break-up with her husband, Steve, her even messier situationship with stand-up comedian (I repeat: stand-up comedian) Che Diaz (Sara Ramirez), and that hasty, stereotypical alcoholism subplot, our girl just can’t seem to get a win on this show—even as other characters, like her dear friend Charlotte York, find new life.
This week, things don’t get any better. In fact, they get much, much worse when a bomb cyclone hits Manhattan. The frosty air quickly starts to feel like a metaphor, at least in Miranda’s life. It’s not just that she and Che finally break up, either (although, yes, thank God, they do). This week, she and Steve finally get into their first real fight since their split—and it turns into the kind of argument you can’t take back.
Not everyone is having a terrible time this week. The snow bomb grants Carrie an opportunity to break out a truly ridiculous puffer coat with an Anastasia-like silhouette as she heads to “Widow Con” to read an excerpt from her memoir. The real name of the event, hosted by her jilted former writing partner (played by SATC newcomer Rachel Dratch), is far less sexy—“Life After Death: A Women's Storytelling Event”—but Carrie’s reading there is a smash hit. Even better? Once the snow clears and summer sets in, she’ll officially be sharing a house with her friend Seema Patel in the Hamptons.
Kristin Davis, meanwhile, steals the episode once again this season as Charlotte embarks on an icy quest to find her teenage daughter, Lily, some condoms, so that she can safely lose her virginity. (With every bleated “Please!” at the man sweeping inside a closed-down pharmacy, Davis earns her paycheck all over again.) As outlandish as the condom request might seem to some, it pales in comparison to Lily’s (rejected) demand that her mother also reserve her a table at Nobu for a pre-coitus lunch date. This “Blake” kid better be worth it!
Unfortunately, the clouds have been looming over Miranda for a while now. She and Che have been picking at one another for weeks, while her son, Brady, has complained both at home and at therapy about the ways his parents tiptoe around one another at the house they still share. (As any New Yorker can tell you, it can sometimes take a while for cohabitating exes to find new apartments.)
Sarah Jessica Parker.
Craig Blankenhorn/MaxAnd yet, Miranda and Steve had never had it out until now—months after her affair. Miranda has been blaming herself for ages, saying things like (this week), “It must be nice to have a no-fault divorce. Mine’s an ‘all my fault’ divorce.” Most of the time, Steve has simply refused to look in her direction, but this week, he finally let loose when, in a low moment, Miranda pointed out to him that only her name is on their mortgage—a low blow, especially considering how much sweat equity we know he put into it when they first moved in during SATC.
“This is my house—my house,” Steve yells. “I made it—this kitchen, I built it! It was a shithole before I did everything.”
Then, things really get ugly. “You never wanted to come here to Brooklyn,” Steve tells his wife of decades. “You never wanted me. You never even wanted Brady. So why don’t you get a new place and get the fuck out of our lives?”
Of all the things Steve hurls out in the heat of the moment, throwing in the fact that Miranda considered an abortion when she first found out she was unexpectedly single and pregnant with Brady is an especially cruel move—which is probably why he immediately starts apologizing as Miranda starts sobbing. While Steve comforts her, a condom wrapper on the nightstand adds insult to injury.
Carrie relayed to Miranda that Steve said he’d never move on, but clearly that’s not true. Our newly liberated Miranda is now ready to draw up her divorce papers. Unfortunately, when she shares this news with Che, she finds out they’re breaking up, too—because of course they are!!!
“Two back-to-back break-ups,” Miranda says. “I’m killing it over here.”
Much like how it abruptly introduced several new, non-white characters, And Just Like That heaped several struggles on Miranda when it first began. Beyond her new drinking problem, the former law partner also suddenly lacked confidence when speaking to anyone non-white or below the age of 60. And, yes, the sequel series apparently wanted us to believe that Miranda would cheat out of boredom. This double break-up feels like the culmination of far too many embarrassments that Cynthia Nixon simply doesn’t deserve.
As a longtime Sex and the City fan who often wondered why Miranda telegraphed such queerness without actually being queer, part of me has always wanted to embrace chaos and root for her relationship with Che. Unfortunately, And Just Like That has made it impossible by giving her marriage with Steve short shrift. This is a relationship that’s been tested many times before; it’s withstood cancer, an unplanned pregnancy, an ailing live-in mother in law, religious differences, and, yes, a perilous move from Manhattan to Brooklyn. And it’s ending like this—really? For a New York fairytale of a show, this is all starting to feel far too close to how things work in reality.
Really, the messiness wouldn’t be such a problem if Che Diaz hadn’t been portrayed as such a monster from day one. Sometimes people stumble in and out of love, and not always gracefully—we’re all human! But the disrespect has been constant, even as Miranda moved to California to be with her new lover. This week’s crowning achievement in awful-ness would be when the comedian had the audacity to call Miranda their “mommy” while complaining about her on the phone with their mutual friend, Carrie.
First of all, um, yuck—and also, how old are we? Miranda once dumped Blair Underwood to be with Steve, and now we’re supposed to believe she’s dumped Steve for this?
If there’s one silver lining out there for Miranda (and all of us who love her) after this week’s episode, it’s that once you enter “back-to-back break-up” territory, there’s usually nowhere to go but up. With any luck, our favorite former power attorney will have her mojo back in no time. But more importantly: Seriously, who’s gonna get the house?
