Samantha Jones Will Return (Via Text Message) To The Second Season Of “And Just Like That”
Despite being the kind of show that, at times, likely had more than one person joking, “And just like that, I grabbed the remote and watched an old episode of Beachfront Bargain Hunt on HGTV instead,” HBO went ahead and renewed And Just Like That… for a second season. With that brings the return of all your favorites: Carrie, Charlotte, Miranda. Okay, not all your favorites, because Kim Cattrall, aka Samantha Jones, still wants nothing to do with any of this. Still, Sex and the City writer and director Michael Patrick King decided to include Samantha in AJLT by making Carrie text with her here and there. Well, Samantha In Text Form is back!
Sarah Jessica Parker has said that she would not be okay with Kim Cattrall making an appearance on AJLT. MPK has said much of the same. AJLT established Samantha’s absence by explaining that friends come and go, and Samantha went and got herself a one-way ticket to London after Carrie drops her as a publicist.
So we only heard from Samantha in texts including when Carrie happened to text her after telling a story from the days of old, about a helpful Samantha yanking Carrie’s diaphragm out (season 2, episode 6). Variety decided to ask MPK about the future of text-based Samantha in the upcoming second season, and he let it be known that she’ll still very much be around. Just, you know, isolated to a phone screen. via Variety:
A key question about Season 2 of And Just Like That: Will Carrie and Samantha still be texting?
“Yes!” answered a gleeful Michael Patrick King, the showrunner of the HBO Max series.
King and his writers’ room have only recently embarked on working on the second season of the Sex and the City revival. During an interview at his office on the Warner Bros. lot, though he was hesitant to share much about Season 2, King was happy to answer that question definitively. After all, the texting back-and-forth was the show’s inventive way of keeping Samantha on the show after Kim Cattrall has said she no longer wants to play Samantha.
MPK didn’t add any additional details. But the first time around, it seemed like Carrie and Samantha were on friendly-ish terms, text-wise, so one might assume they’ll keep that energy up for the second season. Then again, there’s a chance it will go in the opposite direction. Since AJLT came out, Kim has managed to publicly shit all over the show, the direction of the characters, and once again reminded us all that she absolutely doesn’t want to be associated with it. And SJP responded to Kim’s hate by firing off some of her own, like accusing Kim of not knowing when to shut up, and implying that Kim is SJP’s only bully. I don’t think anyone will be surprised if in season two, Carrie gives her phone a confused look before saying, “Huh? Who is texting me from a London area code? Ah, it must have been that awful spammer I blocked over the summer.”
Pic: HBO