The Man, the Myth, the Viagra

Episode eight of season two of “Sex and the City”

You’re probably wondering why I’m not starting from season one episode one, that is because I waned to make sure I talk about popular and widely liked episodes. This makes it exciting for you guys to revisit these great episodes. I found Screen Rants “10 Best Episodes of Sex and the City, Ranked” here: https://screenrant.com/best-episodes-sex-city-satc-ranked/

Overview of episode

I would firstly like to talk about the ICONIC theme/intro for the show. Let me just say, before doing this deep of an analyst of the show, I never noticed how the intro entirely focuses on Carrie Bradshaw. I mean I know she is the main character, but the three other starring women who complete the show are nowhere to be found in the intro, which is astonishing to me. I guess it goes perfectly with my sentiment that Carrie is a pretty self-centered character– don’t kill me, I love Carrie! just something I picked up from religiously watching this crazy, fun show.

Okay, on to the content of this specific episode. It starts off with Carrie and Big on a fancy romantic dinner, at this dinner he proceeds to call her his girlfriend to one of his friends and she is understandably surprised. Then it transitions to Miranda on a date but totally opposite scenario than Carrie and Big’s. She is at this vulgar comedy show, where the comic is a completely unfunny douche-bag– but hey, at least she is into her date, until she finds out he is MARRIED. Then, we get the scene where all the ladies meet up for brunch to hear about Big and Carrie’s perfect dinner but Miranda puts a dark cloud over Carrie’s rosy details because she is upset with her love life. From there on in the episode Miranda is having doubts about this new guy named Steve she has met, although he is great she can’t deal with another bad relationship. She then sees Big comes through for Carrie and gets the push to give Steve- a guy who has been so sweet to Miranda- a chance after all.

I couldn’t help but wonder…

Carrie’s column question is: are we willing to believe anything to date? This question is brought up because Charlotte would bring up stories she heard from second hand sources. These stories consisted of a man leaving his wife for a woman and they having a happy ending etc… total bullshit right? Well the three other girls believe so, knowing Charlotte is the naïve romantic they start laughing at her and proceed to tell her that those are urban legends to make women feel good about the situationships they are in.

I can’t help but to agree with Carrie, Miranda, and Samantha on this one. we have all been in a situation with a guy who is shady but we try to justify their actions by believing we can change them because we’ve heard of other women who have done it. This is why I love this show, because the themes of each episode are relatable still to this day! I have been both a Miranda and a Carrie in the context of this episode, being very pessimistic about love when going on a few bad dates, but also optimistic sometimes to a fault about a few good ones. I can even empathize with Charlotte for being naïve due to her hopeless romantic characteristics, because I am begrudgingly one myself. Honestly, as we see through each character, relationships can be confusing and can cause us to overthink and make assumptions about EVERYTHING.

“If they are not married, they’re gay, or burned from a marriage, or just aliens”

Miranda Hobbs

My rating of The Man, the Myth, the Viagra

I would rate this episode a 7.5 of 10. I mostly liked this episode but I do feel like it is lacking in a few areas. The things I liked: Miranda meets Steve for the first time this episode and if you know the show this is a very important plot point in the series overall, plus I just enjoy Steve thoroughly. Another bonus of this episode is that there isn’t much of a Charlotte side-plot which is fine with me because I usually find her plots in the earlier seasons quite boring and repetitive. My dislikes would have to be the way they just shoehorned in Samantha’s plot of her seeing and older rich guy to just close it out by her being disgusted by the sight of is literal old ass, I found that to be lazy writing. I felt they just wanted to make fun of the dynamics of younger/older consensual relationships and it came off kind of judgmental and ageist. Also, any episode where Carrie is giving Big the benefit of the doubt because he does the bare minimum is annoying to me because I believe Big to be a gaslighter. I know some of my fellow fans may ship them 100 percent but I just don’t feel he is a good man, but I can’t deny they are made for eachother.

Those are my thoughts and rating of the episode, thank you for reading!