As ‘Sex and the City’ Hits Netflix, Here Are the Episodes That Never Would Have Aired Today
Sex and the City has been a trailblazing staple of the small screen since it first debuted in 2008 on HBO, but that doesn’t mean all of it holds up upon modern review. There is some serious debate right now as to whether Gen Z viewers who might discover the show anew — now that it’s streaming in full on Netflix — will enjoy what the show has to offer the way millennials and Gen X-ers did when it was still on air.
The show follows four single women — Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker), Samantha Jones (Kim Cattrall), Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon), and Charlotte York (Kristin Davis) — living in Manhattan, partying, and having lots of sex. For those who grew up on HBO’s oft-compared female-centered follow-up Girls, this might not seem so revolutionary, but at the time, it was.
That being said, though the show was progressive in many areas at the time, a lot has changed in two decades and several SATC episodes wouldn’t exactly be copacetic if the show was new to today. So there may be some merit to the debate about whether teens and twentysomethings will get the same thrills as Sex and the City‘s original audience.
Case in point: These five episodes probably wouldn’t have been made in today’s social climate.
“No Ifs, Ands or Butts” (Season 3, Episode 5)
When Samantha dated Chivon (Asio Highsmith) — a successful Black man — the racial stereotypes (namely, the outfits and slang used by Samantha) in this episode were not only cliché but downright untrue.
And to top that, the show characterized his sister as the “angry Black woman” in the club as she gets into a physical altercation with Samantha.
“Boy, Girl, Boy, Girl” (Season 3, Episode 4)
In this cringeworthy episode, Carrie dates a man who’s bisexual (Eddie Cahill) and can’t quite wrap her head around the fact that someone can be attracted to both men and women.
“I’m not even sure bisexuality exists. I think it’s just a layover on the way to Gay Town,” she says to her friends. She ultimately can’t handle his sexuality and breaks up with him by ditching him at a party.
“Ring a Ding Ding” (Season 4, Episode 16)
When Aiden (John Corbett) moves out, Carrie is practically bankrupt. She’s mismanaged her finances so badly that a bank won’t give her a loan to buy back her apartment. “I’ve spent $40,000 on shoes and I have no place to live?! I will literally be the old woman who lived in her shoes,” she gripes.
Then, Carrie runs to Mr. Big (Chris Noth) for help and he cuts her a check to float her. The plotline of this otherwise independent and successful woman having to lean on her rich ex for financial salvation isn’t exactly a sterling moment for the show, even if she does tear it up later.
“Running With Scissors” (Season 3, Episode 11)
Mr. Big’s wife, Natasha (Bridget Moynahan), comes home early and catches Carrie in her underwear running from their apartment, which confirms she’s having an affair with Big.
Natasha trips on the steps while chasing Carrie and starts bleeding from her mouth. This age-old cheating trope is overused in the series, and does the wife have to be the one who’s physically “hurt” in the scene? Come on.
The series of events is lazy, and in the current women’s movement happening in society today, it perpetuates the “women hurt women” dynamic.
“One” (Season 6, Episode 12)
Carrie doesn’t have caller ID, which is a very ’90s problem to have, so when Russian artist Aleksandr Petrovsky (Mikhail Baryshnikov) calls she doesn’t know it’s him… and she doesn’t even attempt to find out who’s calling because she can’t “understand” his accent, insisting it must be a “wrong number.”
Her dismissiveness over a caller with an accent is very oof upon review.
Sex and the City (1998) where to stream
