Cigarettes on the rooftop at twelve p.m. Cosmopolitans with the girls at five, and a dizzy cab ride split four ways on the way home. There are so many chic and relatable moments in “Sex in the City” that many young women have placed on their vision boards. One aspect of the 2000s sensation I think should be viewed strictly as a cautionary tale is Carrie Bradshaw’s atrocious love life.
It’s not as if she had the best options, Mr.Big, Aidan, Berger, and Alexander Petrovsky were all deeply troubled and if I had the time in this article I’d dive into that further but I digress. While Carrie’s bachelors were not great, she should’ve known better. In season one episode eleven we celebrate Carrie’s 30th birthday, a fully grown adult. However her actions and problem solving skills resemble those of a nineteen year old girl. Love makes you stupid, but not that stupid, and I’d go as far to say that Carrie was never ‘in love’ with any of these men.
Starting with the greatest villain in television history, Mr.Big. Described in the pilot episode as one of the most powerful men in New York we see just how powerful he is with the seemingly supernatural hold he had on Carrie. Carrie, for whatever reason, was so sure that Big was supposed to be the one, but on the basis of what? Big has always made it clear that he wasn’t looking for anything serious, even going as far to only take her to the same hole in the wall restaurant every time they went out because he didn’t want to be seen with her in places that he actually frequented. Their banter was stale and repetitive, their problems were always the same (seriously, how many times does a man have to move across the ocean without telling you, for you to get the hint??)
Carrie was not in love with Big, she wasn’t even in love with the idea of Big, Carrie was addicted. All it takes to get addicted to anything is one really great night, for Carrie that night occurred in the Pilot. Unable to get a cab in the middle of the night in New York, here comes Mr.Big in a limo ready to sweep her off her feet. From then on she was hooked. Chasing that rush she’d felt on the first night. Everytime Big lets her down, she quickly gets back up because she feels that she can get them back to that night. They could have it all if only Big would put in the work, but he didn’t, he never did. Still she stayed, waiting, and hoping, that she would feel that euphoric sensation she felt, on the very first night.
Aidan Shaw, the one that got away, came back, got away again, and…came back again. He was too sweet for his own good, I will say I do think that Carrie tried her best with Aidan, after all she quit smoking for him! Unfortunately Carrie’s best is the average person’s bare minimum, and after two months together she was having withdrawals, not from cigarettes, but from Mr.Big. Noticing a pattern? Aidan made Carrie into a better person, and even loved her when she wasn’t, still it wasn’t enough, because Carrie wasn’t looking for a man, she was looking for a fix. Aidan’s character exists to prove to the audience that Carrie is incapable of committing. All those times Carrie sat at the brunch table with Miranda, Samantha and Charlotte, describing her ideal relationship; it resembles her and Aidan’s relationship perfectly. But it’s not enough, nothing and nobody is enough for Carrie.
Introduced in the fifth season, Jack Beger takes the cake as the world’s worst boyfriend. You’d think that title would go to Mr.Big I’m sure, but he’s never acknowledged him and Carrie’s relationship as anything more than casual so… Berger is a loser. In fact that’s how he introduces himself to Carrie, and yet she dates him anyway? Carrie really only dated Berger because all of her friends were in relationships and Big was occupied elsewhere. When someone is unable to have access to the thing they are addicted to, they may, instead of quitting, find the closest thing. Big was cold and dismissive with his actions, and Berger was cold and dismissive with his words. She was too much for him, not in the same self destructive way she was for Big and Aidan, in fact for once she wasn’t the problem.
Berger and Carrie didn’t work because he saw her as competition instead of a companion. When Carries gives the smallest critique about his new book he flips out, when she buys him a red Prada shirt he flips out, because to him these things are not gestures they’re power moves. He takes the book critiques so hard because he knows that Carrie is the better writer and translates that in his brain to mean she thinks she’s better than him, same thing with the shirt, he’s upset that she bought it because he knows he couldn’t have afforded it. The reason Berger left is because he felt too emasculated, there was nothing that he brought to the table that Carrie didn’t already have two of.
Alexander Petrovsky was honestly Carrie’s best match, which is why they didn’t work together. Everytime Carrie had a problem and brought it up to him, he quickly found a solution, it was all too simple. She was bored, she never had to fight him on anything. He was much more wealthy than any other man he dated and was willing to share that with her. A key to his penthouse, and extravagant gifts, she even gets to meet his family, a first for any of her relationships! He did have his flaws of course, most days he was too occupied with work to spend time with Carrie, and thought his grand gestures could make up for it, even so, he always communicated with her and never downplayed her emotions.
The final two episodes of the original series are so infuriating because for a second, when Big chases after Carrie before she leaves for Paris with Alexander, her monologue before she leaves has so much passion behind it for a moment you think she means what she’s saying. Until you remember who she is, Big follows her to Paris and puts on the act that he can’t live without her, where this was suddenly coming from after 90 episodes of saying the complete opposite I’m not sure. Not even an hour after she ends things with Alexander, she’s with Big. What’s that they say about addiction being a cycle?
All in all, Carrie’s inability to attain or maintain a healthy relationship is nobody’s fault but her own. Or maybe it’s the fault of the writers? Hate her or love her, her consistently inconsistent lifestyle always made for good TV, she certainly made her mark on pop culture, her love life used as horror stories during slumber parties across America!