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Time is a flat circle, and it is Valentine’s Day on And Just Like That … I won’t complain too much about the AJLT space-time continuum, because this episode (written by Samantha Irby) offers quite the romance alongside one perfectly disastrous Miranda date. I can always get into that kind of balance. To be clear, the romance of which I speak is, sure, somewhat related to Carrie Bradshaw and the Very Important Visitor From Her Past, but it is mostly found between Charlotte and Harry, who are a perfect blend of ridiculous and loving, and I cherish them even if we have to get through one of the most overused storylines on television — Person Accidentally Eats Pot Brownies — to get there. Also, Drew Barrymore is here. This show is a fever dream from which we can never wake up. Embrace the madness!
Okay, friends, the rumors (and very intense marketing campaign) are true: Aidan Shaw returns. He not only answers Carrie’s “Hey stranger” email with a “What’s up?” (these two ex-fiancés haven’t seen each other in 13 years, but sure, “What’s up?” is cool) but also suggests they get dinner one night while he’s in town, and that night just so happens to be Valentine’s Day. Charlotte can barely contain herself when she hears the news. In her mind, that means either Aidan knows it is Valentine’s Day, which makes this a super-romantic date, or he doesn’t realize it’s Valentine’s Day, signaling that he is currently single because no man can retain the fact that February 14 is Valentine’s Day nor read a calendar unless they are in a relationship. The logic here feels flawed, but I appreciate the enthusiasm.
Carrie is nervous leading up to the big day, worried that too much time has passed or not enough time has passed, and she almost talks herself out of it. But our girl gets herself seated at that table, waiting for her one-time great love, owner of a perfect snuggle nook. And then a half-hour passes and he doesn’t show. But don’t fear — it’s just AJLT being a tease. Finally, Aidan texts, and it turns out Carrie’s at the wrong restaurant — he’s next door. I guess restaurants don’t have names anymore. Wild. They meet out on the sidewalk and take each other in. Aidan’s coat is so tight it makes his “come hug me” arm gesture so awkward and infantilizing, and I would like to erase it from my mind henceforth. Yet the moment they embrace, I’m immediately swept back up in Carrie and Aidan. Listen, friends, I will fully admit that whenever these two are in a good spot there’s like a magic spell that comes over me, much like with the couple themselves, and I only remember how great they could be together. The memories of each of them treating the other like shit at various times do not exist. I know this is bad, but I do not care. Carrie and Aidan have an undeniable spark. Carrie and Aidan are not a good match. Both things can be true!
Their dinner together feels easy and right, and it goes so well that Carrie invites Aidan back to her place to keep it going. When the cab pulls up and Aidan realizes Carrie still lives in the same apartment as she did when they were together, he can’t even bring himself to walk up the steps. There’s too much history up there. Aidan’s haunted by those memories of trying to renovate that place and the way it ended in disaster, memories of “the wall [he] couldn’t break through.” He tells Carrie he couldn’t believe how incredible the night had felt. It was as if they were back where they started, but he realizes that really, “this is where we ended.” He can’t go inside that place again. Carrie tries to reason with him — saying that things weren’t all bad, that there are good memories too — but it’s too much. “I guess time doesn’t heal everything, no matter how much you want it to,” she tells him, letting him go again. But just as Aidan turns his back to leave, he changes his mind: “Hey, fuck it. This is New York. They have hotels, right?” he says before pulling her in for a big, swoony makeout. See what I mean about ignoring all the bad stuff? Don’t tell me you’re not doing it too. That kiss was romantic as hell!
I’d be surprised if And Just Like That … saddles Carrie with a permanent love interest at this point in the game, so what are we doing here tossing Carrie and Aidan back into each other’s lives and beds? Aidan lives in Virginia and has kids; I don’t think he’s moving to NYC anytime soon. Will this just be an opportunity for these two to end things without hurting each other? Will it open the door to something more permanent in the future? Or will we all be duped one last time?
As swoony as that Carrie-Aidan kiss is (I won’t apologize!!), the real romance belongs to Charlotte and Harry (nope, I’m not apologizing for this either). Ahead of Valentine’s Day, Charlotte is spending her days tending to everyone else in her life. She’s killing herself dragging Rock around to meetings with modeling agencies and growing their Instagram following, only for Rock to turn around and say they aren’t interested in modeling anymore. Charlotte’s also assisting Lily with her “F the Boys” Valentine’s Day dinner with her new cool girlfriends since she and Blake broke up. “Assisting” here, of course, means vowing to be out of their gorgeously kept apartment for the duration of the party and taking all the abuse Lily hurls at her leading up to and during the event, which, again, is in Charlotte’s home. Charlotte’s children are monsters; what else is new? Speaking of monsters, Charlotte also procures Anthony a new Hot Fella to join him during a Valentine’s Day appearance on The Drew Barrymore Show (he sent her a Hot Fellas Breadbasket and she became an instant fan). The guy is a handsome Italian poet she comes across in a stationery store who, once in Hot Fellas uniform, reveals a monster-size dick that even gets Drew sweating on air. Charlotte finally gets to do something for herself when she and Harry head out for a Valentine’s dinner. Unfortunately, Charlotte scarfed down a brownie brought to the house by one of Lily’s new friends, and, as if you couldn’t see it coming from a mile away, it winds up being a pot brownie.
Well-worn plot aside, Charlotte and Harry believing that Charlotte is having a stroke in the middle of the restaurant and being whisked away to the hospital gives us all another reminder of why their love is the best love. As they put Charlotte into the ambulance, the two of them yell about how much they love each other. “Don’t you leave me,” Harry cries out to her. Is it silly, especially since it’s obvious that Charlotte’s high out of her mind? Yes! But it is also endearingly sweet. They just love each other so much, guys!
Once the doctor clues them in to the fact that Charlotte won’t be dying today, she decides to do something with this not-so-near-death experience: She tells Harry that she’s getting lost in everyone else’s life and wants to figure out who she is again; She’s going to contact the gallery owner who offered her a job at LTW and Herbert’s anniversary party and see if the offer still stands. Harry seems surprised but onboard, mostly? Don’t let me down, Harry — this is a great little turn in Charlotte’s story.
Miranda also has an epiphany of sorts. For her first single Valentine’s Day in a long time, she wants to figure out who she’s sexually attracted to outside of “craving me some Che.” It’s not long before she finds a gorgeous woman in a great suit with an even better voice (another Younger alum joins this adventure — she’s played by Miriam Shor) performing a reading of Pride & Prejudice in the back of Books Are Magic and realizes she is all revved up. “I’m done with Dickens,” she declares.
Amelia Carsey (yes, Carrie points out that it is ridiculously close to Darcy) happens to be the voice behind the Jane Austen audiobooks Miranda used to run to, and she happens to be into Miranda, too. Miranda, looking fab, is encouraged when Amelia changes their plans last minute to dinner at her apartment, but that excitement dies a swift death upon entering her date’s place to find a dirty hellhole. She almost immediately steps into the cat’s litter box, Amelia is in sweats (Diana Trout would never), and she tells Miranda to pick something to order from Grubhub out of the binder of menus while she heads down to get her flannel sheets out of the laundry. It’s a far cry from the lusty romance Miranda had written for herself in her head. Surprisingly, Carrie offers up some sensible advice: Why doesn’t she just leave? It dawns on Miranda that the 35-year-old straight version of herself would’ve definitely stuck it out, but 56-year-old lesbian Miranda doesn’t have time for nonsense like this, and she bolts. “I may be different, but dating isn’t. It’s still a shitshow — a cat shitshow,” she complains to Carrie. Miranda’s first real test of the lesbian dating world might be a disaster for her, but it also seems to hint that single Miranda might be a great time, and that is quite a hopeful note for us to go out on.
• I hate to call out Nya because her story line in this episode was literally “Wants to make a chocolate souffle for her first Valentine’s Day without Andre / Buys a cookbook / Makes a chocolate souffle,” and that is … well, that’s nothing. It’s a shame that she is continually underused, but she also referred to her solo V-day as having a “me-vening,” and that is so lame that I’ll never forgive her. Nya! WE TRUSTED YOU.
• Cue up my weekly rant about what And Just Like That … has chosen to do with Seema. You don’t need every character in every episode! Wait until there is space for a real story line, I am begging! Otherwise we get these weird one-off scenes like the one here with Seema and Carrie in which Seema books them a massage on Valentine’s Day, but the place is only doing couples’ massages, and she goes on a “Single people have rights, too” rant. Listen, I agree with Seema that we celebrate couples way too much as a culture, and also, what spa wouldn’t let people just get a solo massage regardless of the date? But also, Seema, my dear, just get the massage in the same room as your friend. None of this makes sense. Why is this how we’re spending our time with Seema? Let Seema live! Or at least let Seema fuck.
• LTW’s Valentine’s Day storyline has to do with her eldest son’s handsy girlfriend, Baxter. She tries to set a trap to get evidence that Herbert Jr. and Baxter had sex in LTW and Herbert Sr.’s bed, which is honestly a wild sentence to write with any kind of seriousness. In the end, LTW and Herb come home to find their son and his girlfriend in LTW’s closet, where Baxter is doing an Instagram shoot with LTW’s designer bags. This is a sin much graver than sex in their bed. Again, I’m being serious!!
• Admittedly, I did laugh out loud when Herbert referred to LTW’s trap as not a booby trap but a booty trap. I’m disappointed in myself.
• Filed under “I guess this is a thing we’re doing now”: We get a quick scene and a half with Che, who, I guess, used to work at an animal clinic and winds up finding a stray dog, bringing it to said clinic, and getting their old job back. Sure? Also, why?
• Charlotte, from the back of the ambulance: “If I die, please let Carrie pick out what I’m buried in!”
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