There’s a ‘Sex and the City’ reboot happening, but without Samantha. And Fans Are Not Happy

Sex and the City is set to return as a limited series, with most of the original cast rumoured to be reprising their roles.

Sources at HBO Max confirmed the news to Deadline on December 23, while reports emerged that while Sarah Jessica Parker, Cynthia Nixon, and Kristin Davis will return, Kim Cattrall will not.

The news comes over three years since it was confirmed that a third instalment of the Sex and the City movie had been cancelled back in October 2017.

Last September, Sarah Jessica Parker told Entertainment Tonight that “it’s really hard to ignore the deafening cry for a sequel”, adding that she’d like to do “some episodes of Sex and the City” but “wouldn’t call it a reboot, I would call it a ‘revisit’.”

“I’d like to see where all of them are,” she continued. “I’m curious. The world has changed even since the movie. I mean, the world has changed so much; technology and social media. Those characters never talked about social media, which I think would be really interesting, and also sexual politics and the #MeToo movement. I think Carrie Bradshaw would just be so greedy to share her feelings and thoughts.”

There have been no details about the HBO Max series yet, but Kim Cattrall has doubled down on her commitment not to be part of the show, essentially leaving her iconic character, Samantha Jones, behind for good.

In a new interview for the Women’s Prize for Fiction podcast, Cattrall talked about being “lucky” to have the choice to walk away from Sex and the City for good. She also got candid about the backlash she’s faced since publicly declaring she’s done with the franchise.

“It was a lot of fun and I loved it and being in new territory is always exciting,” Cattrall said. “Walking away, even if it’s the only thing to do, you always feel, it’s a bit of shame, I think. The taste of shame and you have to let go of that. You don’t want to become that caged bird.”

On the backlash she faced for not wanting to do a third Sex and the City movie, she said, “I remember getting a lot of grief on social media for not wanting to do a film. It was astonishing, some of the things people wrote to me—‘I work in a bank and I don’t like this person and I don’t like the hours, but I do it. So you just do it!’ [It’s like] Give me what I want. I do it. I’m miserable, you be miserable too.”

She added: “I’m lucky enough to have the choice, not that I haven’t worked for it. I have. It’s something I feel very lucky to have and I’m very protective of it. I wouldn’t be any good doing something that I really didn’t want to do.”

Following the news of the reboot, Twitter, of course, had a lot of things to say.

Samantha isn’t in the new Sex and the City reboot because she was raptured

— Carey O'Donnell (@ecareyo) December 23, 2020

I just feel like if Samantha can't be in a new Sex and the City they need to replace her with an ultra horny millennial or even Gen Z-er who is there to point out how problematic and prudish the other women are in 2020s terms

— Matthew Perpetua (@perpetua) December 23, 2020

Sex and the City is problematic as hell and absolutely does not need a revival sans the most important cast member. pic.twitter.com/TtjXciHFxH

— Matthew Galea (@mattygalea_) December 23, 2020

Samantha is the Sex in Sex and the City! Just leave it alone

— Dawn Crystal Chaffin (@DCCHAFFIN) December 23, 2020

Sex and the City coming back so that we can see how Carrie Bradshaw has become even worse of a person, I’m assuming

— Chloe Silverado (@atotheco) December 23, 2020

Carrie-less Sex and the City would be best. Well not rebooting it would be best. But if it has to happen….

And isn’t it basically NYC Golden Girls at this point but with really irritating women?

— ⚖️Imani Gandy ⚖️ (@AngryBlackLady) December 23, 2020

YOU CANNOT HAVE SEX AND THE CITY WITHOUT SMANTHA JONES WTF

— mika (@lamikaeu) December 23, 2020