And Just Like That.. - Season 2, Episode 10

The Goldenblatt family rethinks being so agreeable about Charlotte's return to work

"The Last Supper Part One: Appetizer"
Original airdate: 8/17/2023

Episode summary: Charlotte celebrates a gallery sale by getting sloshed with her young co-workers. Lisa continues to cope with her implausible pregnancy. Aidan receives troubling news about his son Wyatt.

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Recap: Carrie and Aidan stroll the Coney Island Boardwalk, then meet up with Steve, who just bought a new beachy eatery that offers clams, hot dogs, and beer. Aidan gets an unexpected call from Wyatt, who complains that his mom is "being a real dick", and so Aidan hastily rushes off so that he can listen to his son's grievances in private. While that's happening, Steve chitchats with Carrie about how he always liked coming to Coney Island as a kid, and later as an adult stared despondently out at the ocean when he and Miranda were having their marital problems. A few seconds later, Aidan returns and fibs that everything with Wyatt is A-OK, and then Brady swings by the new eatery on his bicycle.

Raina returns to her Human Rights Watch job sooner than expected after taking only five weeks of maternity leave, and Miranda shares that she took off a whole twelve weeks after having Brady, then winces as she adds, "It felt like a hundred." [I personally can't imagine having either such brief lengths of time after birthing a live human, but OK.]

Over at the Kasabian Gallery, Charlotte is showing some strange looking art to Sam Smith when her boss suddenly informs her that Rock is on the line for an emergency call. Charlotte is visibly annoyed when the "emergency" turns out to be a notebook that Rock forgot at home and needs for one of their classes. Charlotte promptly calls Harry [who is, I was surprised to see, busy at work at his law firm], but he says he doesn't have time to fetch the notebook 'cause he's in the middle of a brief...then meekly capitulates when Charlotte sternly reminds him that he had agreed to pitch in with their kids' faux emergencies during her 'rejoining the workforce' discussion. 

The next day over brunch, Charlotte gushes to everyone about how Lisa's documentary has been picked up by PBS to air as a ten-part series. If she ever gets around to finishing it, that is. A few seconds later, Charlotte gets a call from Lily, and irritably chastises her for interrupting her "me time" on a Saturday and abruptly hangs up. After that, Lisa shares the exciting news to Carrie that she was the grand prize raffle winner at her kids' school's charity event, and as such will enjoy a Michelin chef-prepared dinner party for sixteen guests. Carrie squeals happily and says it'll be the perfect excuse to throw one last fête at her old apartment. Oh joy.

After brunch, Miranda tells Carrie she's soooo excited to be working at the UN this week. Carrie says she's never been there despite having lived in New York for so long...and speaking of places she'd never been, she and Aidan were in Coney Island the other day to check out Steve's new beach restaurant. She describes it as "magical", and breaks the news that she's also planning on seeing Che's new comedy set. Miranda decides she's A-OK with Carrie spending so much time with her exes and admits that, yeah, it is kinda weird that she hasn't yet gotten around to seeing Steve's new Coney Island eatery.

While shopping for glassware, Lisa tells Charlotte she's somehow pregnant and that she's really really not up to the task of taking care of a newborn and can only assume that she'll fail at motherhood and her career as a slow-moving documentarian. Charlotte half-heartedly assures her she can do this - but Lisa argues that a new baby is way too much to manage at her [well past child-bearing] age. She wonders aloud how in blazes this could have happened...and, yeah, I can't help but wonder the very same thing. 

"Can you believe I'm pregnant?"

"No, I find that impossible to believe."

Over at the vet clinic, Judy tells Che she really really wants to come to their upcoming comedy show, which...ugh, Judy! Ugh. A few seconds later, Dr. Fisher emerges from the back office to misgender Che...and while Che complains about how frequently he does that, Judy clucks sympathetically. 

Anthony and Guiseppe canoodle in bed after a vigorous romp - but when Guiseppe expresses a strong desire go at it again with him on top, Anthony makes it clear that he's never been the bottom and never will be the bottom because he's "not the woman" in any of his relationships. Guiseppe scrunches his face perplexedly and says he doesn't get why they can't reverse sexual positions every now and again, so Anthony explains that for him it's a generational mindset that stubbornly dictates which role each gay is permitted to play while going at it in the sack.

Seema and Ravi are in bed getting it on...and when they exchange I love yous, Seema suddenly looks startled at the depth of affection she's suddenly developed for the cantankerous movie director.

Carrie is packing up her apartment while Lisette hovers and insufferably gushes about how much she'd looooove to snatch up whatever fashion scraps Carrie sees fit to leave behind. A few seconds later, Seema arrives with takeout, snipes at Lisette for getting too good of a deal on the apartment, then barks at her to skedaddle so that she and Carrie can enjoy their lunch. Once Lisette is safely out of hearing range, Seema tells Carrie about her latest "disaster": exchanging 'I love yous' with Ravi during sex. Carrie urges her to not hold back and "run after love" if she's feelin' it - but Seema complains that love clouds her senses, like when she didn't object very hard the time Carrie sold her apartment to Lisette at well below market value, for example. 

After their UN meeting, Raina tells Miranda that she has to rush off, leaving her to enjoy some flirty banter with Joy, a delightful BBC producer. Miranda explains to Joy that she's just been covering Raina's maternity leave at Human Rights Watch, and Joy says that, based on what she saw during their UN meeting, she's very impressed with her lawyering. The two then amiably shake hands and go their separate ways. 

Later, Nya tells Miranda she just got an e-invite to Andre's new lady's baby shower, and sheepishly admits that she had sent him several congratulatory-themed emojis. When Miranda says that surely she's not seriously thinking of attending the shower, Nya remarks on how maybe she should be the kind of person who cuts off exes, e.g. the way she (Miranda) is always doing. As a crestfallen looking Miranda chews on that insult, Nya clicks on the baby shower registry, sees a luxury baby carriage on the list, and buys it in the hope that Andre's new baby mama will be tortured every time she's reminded that her man's ex-wife is a Columbia law professor with a lot of disposable income. Seems like an odd stretch, but OK.

"The best revenge is to be happy."

"That and overspending on a designer baby carriage for my ex's spawn."

Che is watching videos of their past stand-up performances, wincing at the one where they had long hair and made cringy jokes about the need to starve in order to be acceptably thin for a career in showbiz. 

After tossing and turning in bed, Lisa rails at Herbert for not getting a vasectomy when she had asked him to years ago, and Herbert unwisely retorts, "I thought it was just the hormones talking." He then wankingly tells her that she'll do an outstanding job mothering a new infant and assures her that he'll be more than happy to pitch in every once and awhile. Lisa reminds him that he's running for public office and wonders aloud what'll happen if he wins. Herbert mulls that over for a few seconds and asks if they should be having "the other discussion", and Lisa hugs him, says she's grateful that she has that option, but that she could never bring herself to have an abortion [even though the word abortion somehow doesn't directly make its way into the conversation] and that she really just needs to wrap her head around this new reality. 

Carrie summons Anthony to her apartment to inform him that Stanford is staying in Japan forever, and that he's decided to live out the rest of his life as Shinto monk. He also apparently passed along to Carrie all of the legal papers necessary to divorce Anthony and leave him the apartment and his belongings...and I'll go on record saying that I found this to be a supremely shitty way to bid a final adieu to the late, beloved Willie Garson.

Charlotte's young co-workers convince her to go out for a drink to celebrate the sale of a gallery's art piece to Sam Smith. 
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Carrie and Aidan are about to enter the comedy club where Che is performing when Miranda makes a surprise appearance. She explains that she doesn't want to be the type of person who cuts exes off, e.g. the way she treated poor Skipper back in the early days of Sex and the City. She adds that Che doesn't know that she's going to be in the audience...so, yeah, that'll be a real fun surprise.  

​Charlotte is getting increasingly drunk as she throws back shots with her young co-workers...and when her family keeps texting her, she gaily tosses her phone into a nearby margarita pitcher and continues drinking. Lol.

The hairless Toby arrives at the comedy club and gives Che a quick hey before they're summoned to the stage to deliver an unfunny set of jokes about Miranda, aka the confused married straight white woman with whom the sex took soooo long they soon became "confused about why I was fucking her". An appalled Miranda's all 'the fuckity fuck?!' and is eventually too disgusted to continue listening to the horrendous performance...and when she gets up and storms out of the club, Che notices, abruptly (yet mercifully) ends the set, and races out after her. Miranda whirls around, glares at them hatefully, and shrieks, "Not funny! Not funny!" and rhetorically wonders what kind of person makes tasteless jokes about an intimate relationship. When Che weakly points out that their comedy schtick is always cobbled together from the bad things that have happened in their life, Miranda makes it clear how deeply insulted she is that Che regards her as a bad thing. After she storms off, Toby emerges from the club and sympathetically listens to Che whine about being tired of always explaining themselves. Toby wankingly urges them to feel proud to own all of their feelings, then offers to tag along to wherever they are headed now.

"What do you get when you cross an insufferable non-binary comedian with an unhappily married alcoholic?"

"I don't think I like where this joke is headed."

A full-on drunk Charlotte eventually staggers home, where her waiting family stares at her in stunned bewilderment as they chide her for ignoring their repeated calls and texts. She slurringly explains that she tossed her phone into a margarita pitcher and has no idea what happened to either the pitcher or her phone, then reminds all of them that she was her own person long before she became a wife and mother. She rails at their need to "get it together!", then stumbles off to her bedroom and angrily slams the door - but then cooingly allows Mr. Burton to enter and sleep it off with her. Lol. 

While lounging in a hotel room, Carrie tells Aidan that soon she'll have their bedroom ready at the mansion, which she's already calling "our place". Aidan sheepishly admits that he feels bad about his past mistakes, including 1) pressuring her to "lock it down" back in Season 4 of Sex and the City, and 2) being such a dick lately about refusing to step foot into her apartment for fear he'd get mad at her all over again for doinking Big. A few seconds later, Kathy calls Aidan with the troubling news that Wyatt broke his collarbone after driving his (Aidan's) truck into a tree, and a panicked Aidan tells Carrie he's going to need to book a flight to Virginia asap.

Lisa wakes Herbert to tell him "something's not right" and that she's pretty sure she just suffered a miscarriage. 

As Carrie arrives at her empty mansion the next day, Miranda calls to let her know she's not comfortable coming to her dinner party, given that Che will be in attendance. Carrie's all 'tough shit' and insists she come...then goes on to condescendingly shame Miranda for not even knowing what's going on with Steve's latest venture, despite the life they once shared. Miranda somehow refrains from pointing out that none of this is, in any way, any of her damn business and meekly agrees to come to the dinner party. After that, a tearful Aidan calls to tell Carrie that Wyatt had gotten into a fight with Kathy, snuck out of the house and made his way to the farm, then had a few beers and drove the truck into a tree. He totalled the truck and broke a few bones, wailing incessantly about how he wanted to sleep at his dad's house. Aidan sobs, "I should have been there!" and Carrie coos that breaks eventually heal, but also concernedly voice-overs, "And just like that, for the first time I was worried."

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