Daniel Radcliffe and Helena Bonham Carter in the Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to HogwartsPhoto: Nick Wall/HBO Max
1. The crushes of yesteryear
The most significant new information divulged in the special involves cast crushes. Watson reveals she had a massive crush on the actor who played her character’s primary antagonist, Draco Malfoy, feelings that developed after she saw Tom Felton draw a girl with a backward baseball cap on a skateboard as his vision of God. Not that anything happened between them (Watson’s direct quote: “Nothing ever, ever, ever, ever, ever happened,”) as Felton was almost four years older than her, which, in teen years, is practically a lifetime. But their declaration of how deep the bond still runs is a highlight.
Another utterly adorable moment has Helena Bonham Carter bring the note Radcliffe wrote her at the end of the final film. She has him read aloud, on camera, how he, at 18, wished he was a decade older so he could have been “in like a shot” with her. Aww.
Neo and Trinity would like you to stay through the very end, please.Image: Warner Bros.
Fans know to stay put through the credits on a Marvel movie, but maybe not on a Matrix movie. However, they definitely should when it comes to The Matrix Resurrections, which is now in theaters and streaming on HBO Max.
Resurrections is the long-awaited sequel to the original Matrix trilogy (The Matrix, The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolutions) which brings back Keanu Reeves as Neo and Carrie-Anne Moss as Trinity. Both characters died in Revolutions, or so we thought—but co-writer and director Lana Wachowski explores what happened next in her new film.
And after all of The Matrix Resurrections’ action and drama, there’s the credits. If you’re like most people, you probably stopped the film there. But Wachowski has a cheeky little surprise at the end and here’s what happened.
If you’ve seen the movie, you know that in this new version of the Matrix, created by the machines to house Neo and Trinity after Revolutions, Thomas Anderson created a hugely successful franchise of games called… The Matrix. And now the company’s owner, Warner Bros., wants him to make a fourth game. Something he said he’d never do. All of which mirrors, exactly, what Lana Wachowski went through with The Matrix films.
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After the credits, we revisit a scene that happens early in the film, and we see that Anderson’s braintrust is still trying to break down what a fourth Matrix should be. Now, whether or not this is still actually happening in the Matrix of the movie—since at the end, Neo and Trinity are no longer under the control of the Analyst (Neil Patrick Harris)—we don’t know. Maybe it is maybe it isn’t. But either way, one of the employees mentions that “Movies are dead. Games are dead. Narrative? Dead.” They believe media is nothing but a series of neural triggers. And the answer? Cat videos. “What we need is a series of videos that we call The Catrix.” He sits back with dumb confidence.
Like The Matrix Resurrections itself, the scene is a joke that works on a few levels. The basic one being the idea is so incredibly stupid, therefore it’s funny. However you have to think the scene is also probably Wachowski commenting on both her general disdain for modern, mainstream entertainment and maybe even previous ideas people have pitched her on doing a fourth Matrix. Ideas that are so stupid and random, they might as well have been the Cat-rix. Hopefully no one specifically ever pitched The Matrix with cats, but if you sub in cats for “Any Random Popular Thing,” it becomes more clear.
Anyway, it’s a fun little addition to the film and, in case you missed it, there it is. The Matrix Resurrections is now playing.
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The WarnerMedia-owned platform HBO Max packs a lot in its two-minute 2022 preview reel, introducing a number of lower-profile Warner Bros. films making their debut on HBO Max in 2022, marking a shift back towards theatrical releases for mainstream movies. It also offers brief glimpses of all of the other originals coming to the platform next year, including season four of Westworld and the new Game of Thrones spinoff House of the Dragon.
Throughout 2021, Warner Bros. experimented with releasing its big-budget films both in theaters and on HBO Max for a month after its release. Wonder Woman 1984, Godzilla vs. Kong, Dune, and The Matrix were just some of the noteworthy films that the platform debuted on both the big screen and the streaming service simultaneously.
Warner Bros. said it would return to theatrical releases in 2022, and it looks like it’s following through on its promise. The entertainment giant names six “Warner Bros. Streaming Exclusives” coming only to HBO Max next year in a post on its pressroom: House Party, Father of the Bride, Kimi, The Fallout, Scoob: Holiday Haunt, and Moonshot. The films won’t be shown in theaters, and will likely serve as appetizers for bigger releases. WarnerBros. previously said it would bring 10 straight-to-streaming flicks, which could potentially leave room for four more unnamed movies.
Warner Bros. films that do hit theaters in 2022, however, will be shown exclusively in cinemas for a period of at least 45 days.
A 30-year-old female tech executive alleges she was sexually assaulted by Sex and the Cityactor Chris Noth while working as a hostess and lounge singer at the Midtown Manhattan restaurant Da Marino in 2010. She was 18 at the time and Noth was 55.
On Thursday, The Hollywood Reporter published two separate accounts of women accusing Noth of sexual assault. One claims she was assaulted at his apartment in West Hollywood in 2004 and the other at his Greenwich Village home in 2015. Both women, Zoe and Lily, told THR that Noth raped them from behind while facing a mirror. (Noth called the allegations “categorically false.”)
The latest victim to speak out is a friend I met at acting school who first told me of her assault the day after it took place in 2010. She has been grappling with the traumatic incident ever since she found herself alone with Noth in a dark office many years ago. In the wake of The Hollywood Reporter article, she came forward with her story on Thursday and provided an account of her assault that she says was written in October of 2020. Her name has been changed to protect her identity.
“They were looking for a pretty hostess that could draw people to the restaurant and double as entertainment on nights where they had a pianist play Broadway show-tunes,” Ava explains about getting hired at Da Marino, located on 49th street off of Times Square. At 18, she had just graduated from an acting conservatory and desperately needed side jobs to supplement her acting career, so the chance to sing was appealing.
Ava says her job was to stand in front of the restaurant and convince passersby to go inside, the goal being to fill the restaurant with enough patrons so that she could perform. “The better I was as bait, the longer I got to sing,” she maintains.
When Noth came to Da Marino he was always intoxicated, claims Ava. “I cannot remember in detail how many times we spoke, but with great familiarity, one night he told my boss I would sing with him even though I hadn’t filled the restaurant yet.” They played characters in their song duets, and at his table, they talked about his career and her hometown of Toronto. “I love Canadian women,” she remembers him saying as he repeatedly pulled her onto his lap while groping her and “pressing me onto his erection.”
She says it confused her at the time because, on some level, it was exciting. She was getting the attention of Noth, whom she’d watched as the iconic character of Big on Sex and the City: “I remember how electrifying his hand, the hand I watched hold Carrie Bradshaw in Sex and the City, felt grabbing me.”
Sarah Jessica Parker and Chris Noth in And Just Like That…
HBO
At the end of her shift, around 1 a.m., Ava’s manager informed her that he’d pay her in the office, which was accessible by way of the kitchen. As she gathered her coat and envelope of cash, the lights shut off behind her. She remembers that Noth had made his way into the office. “He acted as if we had intentionally snuck off together clandestinely,” she recounts. Instead, she found him “sloppy,” “heavy,” and “strong.”
“At first, it felt as though I was the only person in the universe who could hear me saying no,” she shares. She says Noth began kissing her and pressed her body against a desk. After pulling down her tights to digitally penetrate her, he felt her tampon. “I was so hopeful that would be the end of it,” she remembers. Instead, Noth asked if she was at the end of her period and continued to grope her. She slid into an office chair to create more distance and pressed her arms and legs against his body, pushing him away. “My limbs hurt in the morning.”
“He wasn’t hearing ‘no,’ but he heard me when I said ‘not here’ and convinced him that I would meet him somewhere else,” she explains. The idea of relocating to his home inspired Noth to stop and gave her the opportunity to escape the office and his grasp. Noth told her he would send a car once he got to his apartment. After Noth left the restaurant, Ava went home without the intention of going. He texted her from his home, awaiting her and asking for her address, but she never replied.
“At first, it felt as though I was the only person in the universe who could hear me saying no.”
The following day, she called her parents, who had made friends with the owners and management of Da Marino when they’d visited New York. They listened to Ava’s story in disbelief, trying to make sense of a restaurant they believed would protect Ava like family. On a call with Ava, she says the owner rejected her claims about Noth: “They told me he [Noth] would never be interested in someone as insignificant as me. I never went back.” (Da Marino did not respond to requests for comment; the owner at the time, Pasquale Marino, passed away in 2015.)
“Ava is an open book, particularly among her close circle of friends, and this incident was no secret to us,” says James, her close friend she met at acting conservatory. Ava was confused at the time by what happened and chose to make light of it when explaining the incident with Noth to friends.
In a Facebook message observed by The Daily Beast from May 10, 2010, a friend from Toronto wrote to Ava, “I feel terrible about the thing you told us all and that that happened to you… I just want to say that what happened to you is neither funny nor a joke and I hope you realize that as well.”
When reached for comment, Noth’s publicist said that Noth “denies this as ever happening and has no idea who this woman is.”
Ava eventually left acting behind to start her own business in property technology and a family. Three years ago, at the height of #MeToo, she’d begun to come to terms with what happened to her in that dark office years ago. She wrote a Facebook post about the horrific episode, though didn’t name her assailant, and participated in anonymous email chains where survivors and advocates shared stories and compiled evidence against celebrity offenders. But she says “the fad passed, and the emails stopped.” Noth “was never the headline. His name was never in the lists.”
While watching the documentary Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Richon Netflix, Ava identified a moment that felt familiar. An Epstein victim described the look of the flight crew as she walked off his private jet—a knowing look that seemed to communicate how they knew of his crimes and they too were complicit. “I haven’t been able to shake the memory of how the kitchen staff looked at me as I emerged from the office with Chris Noth.”
Peloton has taken down its viral parody video of the Sex and the City sequel after two women came forward with sexual assault allegations against Chris Noth, the actor who portrays the character Mr. Big and appeared in the company’s video. Noth has denied the allegations and said the sexual encounters were consensual.
Peloton removed its “He’s Alive” video from its social media accounts and YouTube channel on the same day the Hollywood Reporter published a horrifying report about two women who claim they were raped by Noth in 2004 and 2015. The women, whose identities were not revealed, told the outlet that promotions of And Just Like That and media articles about the show had brought back “painful memories” of the purported incidents with Noth.
“[S]eeing that he was reprising his role in Sex and the City set off something in me,” one of the women accusing Noth told the outlet. “For so many years, I buried it.”
Gizmodo reached out to Peloton for comment on Thursday but did not receive a response by the time of publication. We’ll make sure to update this article if we hear back.
A Peloton spokesperson told the Hollywood Reporter on Thursday that it was not aware of the sexual assault allegations against Noth when it featured him in the parody video. Actor Ryan Reynolds, whose marketing company, Maximum Effort, produced the video, also removed it from his Twitter account.
The company is working on obtaining more information.
“Every single sexual assault accusation must be taken seriously,” the spokesperson said. “We were unaware of these allegations when we featured Chris Noth in our response to HBO’s reboot. As we seek to learn more, we have stopped promoting this video and archived related social posts.”
Noth told the Hollywood Reporter the allegations against him were “categorically false.”
“The accusations against me made by individuals I met years, even decades, ago are categorically false,” he said. “These stories could’ve been from 30 years ago or 30 days ago—no always means no—that is a line I did not cross. The encounters were consensual. It’s difficult not to question the timing of these stories coming out. I don’t know for certain why they are surfacing now, but I do know this: I did not assault these women.”
Although Noth questioned the “timing” of the purported assaults, it should be noted that the two women came forward with their allegations separately, at different times (in August and October), and do not know each other, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
Peloton debuted the “He’s Alive” parody video on Sunday as a lightning-fast response to the premiere of the first two episodes of And Just Like That, the HBO Max sequel show to Sex and the City, which dropped a bomb on fans when Mr. Big died after an intense workout on a Peloton. The company’s stock dropped 11% after the episodes as the Peloton scrambled to control the damage to its image.
First, the company issued a statement from a cardiologist on its health and wellness council affirming that Mr. Big’s death was due to his “extravagant lifestyle,” adding that riding a Peloton possibly helped “delay his cardiac event.”
Apparently feeling that wasn’t enough, Peloton released the parody video “He’s alive.” The video features an alternate ending to Mr. Big’s story in And Just Like That. In this ending, Noth has seemingly left Carrie Bradshaw to be with his (real-life) Peloton instructor and do more Peloton workouts. I originally found the video, which received heavy media coverage, to be hilarious and a good response from Peloton. However, in light of these allegations, it now makes me uncomfortable, although I am reserving final judgement until we know more.
Overall, Peloton’s attempt to reclaim the narrative after the premiere of And Just Like That has ended up in disaster, though to be fair it was by no fault of its own. When you add that to the other woes on its list in 2021, which included a product recall, a lackluster financial performance in the recent quarter, and people going back to the gym, the new year probably can’t get here soon enough for the company.
This post contains spoilers for Succession’s Season 3 finale.
In a stunning emotional epiphany during Succession’s season finale Sunday night, the Roy kids finally teamed up against their father in earnest—only to find out they’d been outmaneuvered once more, this time with an assist from their equally self-serving mother. Succession fans know better than anyone that there’s no low to whichLogan Roy’s nepotism babies would not stoop—but their collective loss was nonetheless devastating, thanks to tour de force performances from Jeremy Strong, Kieran Culkin, and Sarah Snook.
While Kendall’s breakdown in a parking lot precipitated the siblings’ miraculous reunion, it was Roman’s shattered pleas to his father that drove home their shared heartbreak when their glimmer of hope fell apart. The episode’s emotional stakes can be found in two shots of Kieran Culkin’s face—the first screwed in an anguished mixture of terror and excitement as the siblings decide it’s really time to “kill” dad, and the second childlike, teary-eyed powerlessness when he realizes it’s over.
Logan Roy might not have scarred his children’s backs like his own caretakers did his, but he’s emotionally tortured them throughout their lives. In Waystar Royco, Logan has constructed his ideal family: a powerful unit whose sole organizing principle is his own ego. His executives, unlike his children, live and breathe at his word—and more importantly, they have no claim to his legacy. Kendall, Shiv, and Roman’s mother said it best when she explained to her daughter why she could never keep dogs in the house: anything Logan loves, he’ll kick to see if it comes back.
Kendall and Shiv have slowly, painfully come to terms with their father’s monstrosity in their own ways since Season 1. (Connor, Logan’s only child with his first wife, appears to have accepted it before the series began.) Roman has a harder time seeing through the distorted reality his father has created for him than his siblings do; he’s the only one of Logan’s kids who seems even remotely uncomfortable with the prospect of his death. A small part of Roman clings to the logic of a small, deeply hurt child—one who believes that if he just tries hard enough, he’ll earn his father’s approval. (And inheritance—because let’s face it, hurt or not this is a family of materialistic vipers.)
In other words, the Roys have all slowly, one at a time, been coming to terms with the fact they were raised by an abuser—something many survivors don’t realize until decades after the trauma has ended.
It’s telling that during his siblings’ attempt at an intervention, Kendall called himself Logan’s eldest son. Connor’s used to being dismissed by his family, and his isolation even among his siblings speaks to his father’s success in alienating them from one another to bolster his own influence over them. With Con out of the way, Kendall and Roman have battled for the crown for most of their lives—because as a woman, Logan never treated Shiv as a potential heir until she’d been properly starved to suit his agenda.
As much as Succession explores questions of legacy, intergenerational wealth, and family as an institution, its real concern appears to be abuses of power, both personal and systemic. Its setting—the upper echelons of the media elite—invites the viewer to consider how the two might intertwine. The Roys’ story makes clear the latter can’t exist without the former; abusive institutions only exist because abusive people do, as well.
It’s telling that Logan’s only reaction to receiving a photo of his son’s penis last week—intended for their colleague and Roman’s boss-slash-would-be-lover, Gerri—was to accusatorially ask if his son was queer. On their way to settle a deal with Lukas Matsson this week, Logan told Roman to “straighten himself out” and that whatever it took, he didn’t want to know about it.
The tenor of the conversation crystallizes the argument against the word “homophobia” (even if Roman has not been explicitly defined as queer)—Logan’s remarks do not come from a place of fear but are instead designed to hurt, humiliate, and destabilize his son. The truth of Roman’s sexuality is beside the point; if Logan’s concern were the health of his children’s relationships, he’d need to be worried about all of them.
“The truth of Roman’s sexuality is beside the point; if Logan’s concern were the health of his children’s relationships, he’d need to be worried about all of them.”
As much as Connor’s siblings love to denigrate him, he’s the only one of them who’s maintained an even halfway-functional romantic relationship with Willa, a former escort whose patience for the Roys’ dysfunction knows no bounds. Willa has grown more supportive of Connor this season—as seen when she told the coat check girl at Kendall’s nightmare birthday party to fuck off on his behalf. This week, she said “fuck it” and decided to marry him—in large part, it seems, because he was having a bad day. Connor and Willa’s might be an unorthodox arrangement, but when was the last time Kendall, Roman, or Shiv had a relationship that supportive?
It’s no coincidence that all of Logan’s kids, not just Roman, are plagued with weird relationship hang-ups and “sex things.” Their upbringing has instilled an extremely fucked-up relationship with power, so their sex lives are fraught with questions of whether they’re “fucking” or “being fucked.” (To say nothing about the homophobic undertones of that distinction.)
In spite of all the jokes Shiv has made this season at the expense of her brother’s “ricotta dick,” it’s her own marriage that brought everything crashing down in the end. As certain as Shiv seemed that she had the upper hand over her husband, that he was a “safe” outsider who would never overpower or outwit her or even want to, it appears she underestimated good ol’ Tom Wambsgans. How fitting that in the end, Logan has poisoned his children so thoroughly that they can’t form relationships strong enough to prevent even their spouses from pledging loyalty to him instead.
It was Culkin, however, who distilled the episode’s brilliant high-wire act in one moment—when Roman sees what might be his first real attempt to bet on his own power, on himself and his siblings as capable adults, blow up in his face. He dissolves into a child, a moment as comedic as it is tragic. “Dad… please.”
Logan’s disbelief is palpable—especially when he asks what his kids have to offer him in return for his mercy only for Roman to say, “I don’t know… Fucking love?”
“You bust in here guns in hand, and now you find they’ve turned to fucking sausages,” Logan growls. “You talk about love? You should have trusted me.”
With nervously folded hands, Roman asks the question underpinning this entire billionaire shitshow—in the small, timid voice of a wounded child: “Dad, why?”
“Why? Because it works. I fucking win.”
Come next season, Team Succession will have to contend with the fallout of all these betrayals; Shiv will need to suss out just how long her husband has been selling her out to her father, and Roman will have to contend with losing his status as Daddy’s favorite “ratfucker” once and for all. But as long as Logan’s kids continue playing this abusive game—with him or the company he built—he will always win.
You know your relationship with your mother is complicated when you give her a wedding toast that both calls her out for being an absentee parent and places her marriage in competition with your own. Shiv’s wedding speech for her icy mother in Succession’s Season 3 finale is one for the ages: “I’m jealous of the time you get to spend with her,” Shiv tells her new father-in-law. “I hope your marriage is as rich and happy and rewarding and fulfilling as mine.”
Last week’s episode ended on a cliffhanger: Kendall Roy floating face-down in an infinity pool after finally throwing in the towel in his own competition with he and Shiv’s other problem parent. The finale opens with a reassurance that, no, that New Yorker profile was not a send-off for Jeremy Strong. While the family plays monopoly, Logan assures Kendall’s son, Iverson, that his father is OK. Now, it’s time to watch mommy get remarried—and as one might predict, none of the kids are really alright.
Kendall is doing his best to put on his most normal, moralistic front when he first meets his siblings before the wedding. He informs his siblings he’s ready to “get into it all” and share the family’s dirty secrets with the press. (“We have been talking to Vanity Fair,” Comfrey murmurs at one point, “but it’s mostly us calling them.”) Shiv, meanwhile, won’t stop pestering Roman with jokes about how much he wants to fuck their mother—just one more humiliation for the baby of the family to try and shake off after last week’s dick pic fiasco.
Roman seems pleased when Daddy decides to bring him along to hammer out a final deal between Waystar Royco and the eccentric tech mogul he’s been courting, Lukas Mattson. But then come the questions: “So, what is it, son? Are you scared of pussy? Is it all screens up the ass with you, or what? … If you need to get straightened out, get straightened out, OK? I don’t want to know.” Prodding his sons about their sexualities is something of a hobby for Logan, who has asked not just Roman but Kendall if he’s “queer” before—usually as a bullying tactic.
This season has fixated on Roman’s “sex thing,” as Shiv calls it, but neither she nor anyone in the Roy orbit should really open their mouths on the subject. Shiv’s toxic relationships with her parents have rendered her incapable of trust; despite what her toast implies, the best flirting she’s done with Tom in years is making fun of Greg. In fact, it’s Shiv’s inability to see her husband for who he really is—and how he’s really feeling—that sends everything crashing down in the end.
But more on that later—first, down to business.
When Logan and Roman sit down with Alexander Skarsgård’s Swedish tech bro, things start to go south for the Roy Family Peewee League. Lukas doesn’t want to merge; he wants to take over, which jeopardizes the Roy kids’ plush positions. Logan sends Roman off to the wedding, and Roman is right to be pouty; it’s pretty clear Logan is thinking about Lukas’ proposal.
Roman arrives just in time for a kids’ table intervention with Kendall—who’s pretty sure he’s not the one with the problem, his siblings are. But then he says something fascinating: “Do you have any idea how it feels, as the eldest son, to be promised something and then just have it taken?”
Connor, the actual eldest son, just wishes someone had told him about last week’s merger of equals—or maybe ever considered him to take up his father’s mantle. “You’re hurt?” he asks. “I didn’t see Pop for three years, but your spoon wasn’t shiny enough, huh? This is not all about you.”
It’s become clear this season that Connor, Logan’s only child from his first marriage, became an emotional stand-in for his father with the other kids at some point—at least, he took his siblings fly-fishing when Logan couldn’t be bothered. But because this family has no sense of loyalty and because Connor is, to be fair, kind of a jackass, all Connor has ever gotten from his family is ridicule and bile.
On the bright side: To answer one of our burning questions ahead of the finale, Willa—clearly taking pity on Connor—decides to say “yes” to his marriage proposal from last week. “You know what? Fuck it… How bad can it be?” (Great story for the kids.)
But then things come tumbling down. Word gets to Roman, and then Shiv and Kendall, that Daddy is possibly, almost definitely working to sell the company out from under them.
Kendall sinks to the ground and laughs when Shiv asks if he has an “angle” on the deal. He insists he’s “not here.” Finally, his siblings give him the chance to tell them what he’s really feeling—and by some miracle, he takes it. He finally admits to killing the waiter at Shiv’s wedding. “It’s fucking lonely,” he says. “I’m all apart.” He sobs on the ground as Shiv says what we all knew was coming: Yes, this is a terrible time, but they need to talk about this merger. Now.
Another surprise: When Shiv asks where Kendall would like to wait, he asks to ride with his siblings instead. They say yes without hesitation. Roman throws his arm around his brother and rubs his freshly buzzed head, an echo of the playful warmth we saw during last year’s finale. In the car, however, Kendall reveals that thanks to their mother’s divorce settlement, the kids can now overrule their father.
“He sobs on the ground as Shiv says what we all knew was coming: Yes, this is a terrible time, but they need to talk about this merger. Now.”
The moment is electric, vulnerable, dangerous. Last season, we watched as Roman and Shiv each tried to suss out what the other was feeling on the yacht—and, you know, Shiv threw Kendall under the bus with Logan. This time, alone as they’ll ever be in the back of the car, the Roy kids tell one another what they’re really thinking—and they all agree it’s finally time to “kill” Dad.
Now we’re back to where Kendall was in the premiere: Cellphone theater. The kids call their allies on the ride over to confront their father. Roman calls Connor, Shiv calls Tom, and Kendall checks to make sure the loophole is legitimate. (It is.)
Unfortunately for the would-be mutineers on this old steamship, one glaring error sets their whole plan ablaze before they even walk in the door.
Shiv’s marriage has been crumbling before our eyes throughout Succession, but things have gotten dire ever since Shiv showed just how content she was to watch her husband go to jail. (Go figure.) It also didn’t help when Kendall condescendingly congratulated Tom on marrying his way to power.
When Shiv calls her husband to update him on her latest plan, he asks one very reasonable question: “Where do I fit in, Shiv?” Her answer? A very uninspiring “We’ll figure it out.”
Naturally, there’s only one person Tom wants to share this news with. When Greg gushes to Tom about his latest flirtations with a princess from Luxembourg, his curiously intent corporate confidante counters with a proposal of his own. (It’s all very Pride and Prejudice, isn’t it?)
“Things may be in motion,” Tom says, his voice dripping of conspiratorial intrigue. “You wanna come with me, Sporus?”
Savvy viewers likely know what’s coming next—but it’s the execution that makes Kendall, Shiv, and Roman’s confrontation with Logan so difficult to watch.
Logan’s not even remotely surprised when his kids storm the meeting room. His reasoning for selling the company, essentially giving himself yet another multi-billion dollar pile of money to throw on top of another while leaving his (still very rich) kids out in the cold? “Make your own fucking pile.”
And unfortunately for Team Succession, Daddy was one step ahead. Someone tipped him off, which gave him time to call the kids’ mother and talk her into taking away their supermajority share. The Roy kids’ parents—whose acrimony has forced them to act as go-betweens for all kinds of sordid messages—still teamed up to betray them.
Kieran Culkin has never been more perversely heartbreaking than he is here. As undeniably revolting as Roman is, Culkin’s pathetic delivery of the words, “Dad… Please?” as his character realizes they’ve lost hits the same nerve as a child flinching after a slap. But Logan’s having none of it.
“Please?” he asks. Roman will have to do better than that. What does he have to offer Logan in return for his mercy, his support?
“What have I got?” the consummate failson asks. “I don’t know—fucking… love?” As Logan is quick to point out, the claim is a bit tenuous given the circumstances. “You talk about love?” he asks. “You should have trusted me.”
But that’s not the moment that seems to crush Roman the most—that comes when Gerri returns his pleas for help with a cool, “How does it serve my interests?” These kids need so much therapy.
In the end, Shiv faces perhaps the worst betrayal of all—the realization that her husband, the one she thought she’d pinned under her thumb, is almost certainly the one who sold her out. Her breath shakes as Tom murmurs, in that innocent and gentle voice: “Hey, Shiv, you OK?” One safe prediction for Season 4? Things can only get more sinister from here.
If you were a Sex and the City fan who happened to be on any corner of the internet over the past few months, you ran a high risk of inadvertently coming across major spoilers for the HBO Max revival series, And Just Like That.
Over the course of filming this past summer in New York City, paparazzi swarmed the set and eagle-eyed fans were regularly submitting real-time sightings of stars Sarah Jessica Parker, Cynthia Nixon, and Kristin Davis to Instagram gossip account Deuxmoi.
While most of the leaks were relatively innocuous—such as where Carrie Bradshaw, Miranda Hobbes, and Charlotte York were spotted eating lunch—sneaky photographers armed with long lenses were able to get a close-up view of a script that seemed to reveal a major spoiler: Carrie and her husband Mr. Big (Chris Noth) were no longer together.
Craig Blankenhorn / HBO Max
“I was taping the podcast; I was washing my hair. Yes, I wasn’t eating or sleeping, but at least I felt good about my marriage. Now I’m just one of the wives he was taking care of,” the leaked script for Carrie read.
While Page Six initially believed the on-off couple had been in a midst of a divorce, the premiere episode on Dec. 9 gave the true reason for Carrie’s loneliness (spoiler alert!): Mr. Big dies from a heart attack after his 1,000th Peloton ride.
To keep the shocking twist from getting out, showrunner and executive producer Michael Patrick King admitted on Friday to having some tricks up his sleeve.
King explained that while filming Mr. Big’s funeral scene, he had Noth come to set fully dressed in character to throw off ever-lurking fans and paparazzi, who indeed later published photos of the cast dressed in all black outside the funeral venue.
“We had to have some red herrings!” King laughed.
Actress Nicole Ari Parker, who plays newcomer Lisa Todd Wexley, also revealed there were several precautions taken to avoid leaks, saying contracts were so tight it was like “signing away your firstborn.”
King’s plan seemed to work. Noth had already been confirmed to return to the show and was even spotted in Paris filming with production, although that might have been another fake-out to keep the bluff going.
Instead, many people were convinced that the funeral was actually for beloved character Samantha Jones. After actress Kim Cattrall refused to sign on for the revival series, fans speculated that the writers had killed off the promiscuous publicist to explain her absence. Thankfully, they settled on a much more respectable excuse.
Warning: This review contains spoilers from Thursday’s And Just Like That… premiere.
As a longtime Sex and the City fan — I even watch the butchered and bleeped reruns they air on E! — I was a little skeptical when HBO Max’s revival And Just Like That… was first announced. The movies weren’t great, the ladies are in their mid-50s now and Kim Cattrall isn’t even involved. So it’s a relief to inform you that And Just Like That… — the first two episodes are now streaming; I’ve seen the first four — does a decent job of bringing Sex and the City into the modern era, infusing it with new blood and finding fresh layers within its classic characters. There are a few sticking points here and there that will annoy fans (like me), but the mere fact that this series isn’t Sex and the City 2-level awful, even with its core foursome fractured, is a victory to celebrate.
And Just Like That… picks up in a post-pandemic New York, with Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) and Charlotte (Kristin Davis) definitely older — Miranda’s signature red hair is now gray — but still close friends. The absence of Cattrall’s Samantha Jones, though, is glaring. (We’re told that Samantha has moved to London and doesn’t speak with the other girls anymore over a perceived slight, which doesn’t fit with the fiercely loyal Samantha we know.) Samantha was a bold trailblazer of sex positivity who gave the original series its sassy edge, and that edge is sorely missing here. The sex talk is minimal this time around, with a tone that’s closer to Sex and the City‘s later seasons — more relationship dramedy than raunchy sex comedy. (The episodes are around 45 minutes now, too, instead of the original’s half-hour, adding to the dramatic feel.)
We’re also introduced to a host of new characters… with some fitting in better than others. It’s clear that showrunner Michael Patrick King, who shepherded Sex and the City through its glory years, wants to atone for the original show’s objectively terrible track record on diversity. (As he should!) But the sheer number of new faces threatens to overwhelm the core characters at first. We meet Charlotte’s Black mom friend Lisa (Nicole Ari Parker) and Miranda’s Black law professor Nya (Karen Pittman) and Carrie’s queer podcast host Che (Sara Ramirez) all in the premiere, and it’s a bit dizzying. At times, it almost feels like a spinoff, or Sex and the City: The New Class. The writing can still be clumsy when it comes to race and sexuality, but to the writers’ credit, they do show Carrie and company grappling with these issues and often fumbling them. It’s not always pretty, but it’s encouraging that they at least acknowledge how not pretty it is.
And then there’s Mr. Big. Carrie is still with her beloved hubby when the show begins, but their relationship takes a sharp turn in the premiere, which sends shockwaves through the whole season. It’s a big storytelling swing, to be sure, but the mournful reaction to it from the other characters rings a little hollow. It also traces a lot of the same beats that Carrie went through in the first Sex and the City movie when Big left her at the altar. The twist just adds to the somber tone of And Just Like That…, with precious few flashes of the wit and verve of the original. (Even the peppy theme song is muted.)
Mostly, though, it’s just nice to spend time with Carrie, Charlotte and Miranda again. The actresses step right back into their roles, and their banter is just as quippy and zippy as ever. Though the new characters’ introductions border on awkward, Ramirez and fellow new addition Sarita Choudhury, who plays Carrie’s realtor Seema, bring a refreshing energy to the show. Plus, Miranda’s story takes an intriguing turn in Episode 3 that offers real promise as a storyline and makes us rethink everything we thought we knew about her. No, this is not the classic Sex and the City we first fell in love with… but what it is now isn’t bad, either.
THE TVLINE BOTTOM LINE: The Sex and the City ladies are back with And Just Like That…, a more muted but ultimately enjoyable new take on the original.
HBO Max treated Potterheads with a glimpse at the upcoming Harry Potter 20th anniversary retrospective, Return to Hogwarts.
Stars of the Harry Potter franchise Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint reunite for a conversation about their time on the fantasy film series in the first-look image, dropped on Wednesday. The retrospective special—premiering Jan. 1— is celebrating 20 years since the release of the franchise’s first film, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone with feature interviews and cast conversations.
In addition to the three stars, Harry Potter alumni joining for the retrospective include Helena Bonham Carter, Robbie Coltrane, Ralph Fiennes, Jason Isaacs, Gary Oldman, Tom Felton, James Phelps, Oliver Phelps, Mark Williams, Bonnie Wright, Alfred Enoch, Matthew Lewis, and Evanna Lynch, among others.
Return to Hogwarts is produced by Warner Bros. Unscripted Television in association with Warner Horizon at the Warner Bros. Studio Tour London—The Making of Harry Potter. Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts is executive produced by Casey Patterson of Casey Patterson Entertainment and UK-based Pulse Films.
