“And Just Like That…” creator and showrunner Michael Patrick King is defending his choice to conclude the “Sex and the City” revival collection with a decidedly unglamorous plot level involving literal poop.
Thursday’s collection finale episode, “Party of One,” discovered Carrie Bradshaw (performed by Sarah Jessica Parker) celebrating Thanksgiving on the residence of her longtime pal, Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon).
The night culminates with Charlotte’s boss, Mark Kasabian (Victor Garber), and Miranda scrambling to take care of an overflowing bathroom {that a} lactose-intolerant dinner visitor had clogged. The cringe issue of the scene was amped up considerably given simply how, um, true to life the prop turds appeared.
In an interview with Selection revealed Thursday, King mentioned he and the present’s inventive group noticed the scene as a reminder to viewers that “we cannot take ourselves too seriously.”
Craig Blankenhorn/HBO Max
“For the gorgeousness of Carrie’s pink, sparkly top and tulle skirt — that’s the high — the low is a toilet filled up with shit. Because guess what? Being single, there’s a lot of shit, and relationships are a lot of shit,” he defined. “It’s the comedy, with the drama, with the romance, with the fairy tale. I guess it’s a response to the fairy tale.”
King elaborated additional in a chat with Deadline, noting that the scene had a “symbolic” intention as properly. As for the poop itself, it was made from silicone and required solely a single take.
“This was a manifestation of how shit backs up and you have to deal with it. And also, we’ve always done high-low on the show,” he mentioned. “We’ve always done couture and comedy… It was the symbolic version of having to deal with a lot of doo doo in relationships, and it backs up if you don’t.”
Nonetheless, spotlighting excrement within the closing episode of a collection that’s turn out to be synonymous with cutting-edge style and New York luxurious caught many followers off guard.
“Why am I saying farewell to some of my favorite TV characters of all time and seeing a toilet overflow on my screen?” one particular person wrote on X.
Added one other: “Should change it to ‘And just like Crap.’”
Craig Blankenhorn/HBO Max
Critics had been equally unimpressed.
“The crescendo of the evening involved a toilet overflowing with lots and lots of poo. Could this have really been the intended finale to the entire franchise?” The Guardian wrote.
IndieWire felt equally, noting: “There are less than seven minutes between our last ever glimpse of Carrie Bradshaw, dancing down her palatial hallway in thousands of dollars of head-to-toe pink, and a gurgling geyser of feces spewing straight up into our collectively horrified faces.”
For others, nonetheless, the scene was indicative of the general reception to “And Just Like That…,” which debuted on HBO Max in 2021 to main fanfare however by no means captured the cultural zeitgeist like “Sex and the City.”
HBO Max’s unceremonious Aug. 1 announcement that the collection would conclude on the finish of its third season got here as a shock to many, prompting hypothesis that the streaming platform canceled it regardless of King and Parker’s claims that it was a inventive choice.
