And just like that, Carrie and Franklyn are over. (Warning: Spoilers ahead if you haven't finished the first two episodes of And Just Like That… season two).
As a refresher, the podcast producer simmered in the background during season one until he and Carrie had one hell of a passionate kiss in the elevator during the last few seconds of the finale. While Carrie had gone on dates with other men following Big's death last season, Franklyn seemed to hold the most promise given that he understands the media world, had earned her trust, and honestly, was as hot as the concrete on a summer's day in New York City.
When Glamour spoke to Ivan Hernandez, the actor who plays Franklyn, last May, he told us that the producers wanted the ending to be a surprise. In fact, Hernandez hadn't known until he got the script that he'd be locking lips with Sarah Jessica Parker.
“I was just as surprised as everybody else…but it was such an exciting ending,” he said at the time. “I mean, nobody knows where this storyline is going to lead and if Franklyn's going to be sticking around. I have my own thoughts, but it's not up to me. It's up to the writers.”
In the opening scene of And Just Like That… season two, we see Carrie Bradshaw sauntering over to Franklyn in bed, but that's about as hot as things get for the duo. Later in the episode Carrie tells Franklyn she wants takeout only on Thursdays (code for their time together) and isn't quite in a relationship-y place. By the end of episode two, the podcast studios get bought out and Franklyn and Carrie are out of work. Although Franklyn tells Carrie he wants more, she's not ready yet. So, just like that, they're kaput.
“They're not soulmates,” executive producer Michael Patrick King tells Glamour. “They just had comfortable sex. And from the writing point of view, it was exciting because what that relationship is, as Carrie says, is ‘going-out-of-grief sex.’ It's comfort. But he was one of those great Sex and the City characters where they're in your life for a reason, but it's not maybe the love of your life, if that is a phrase that is accurate anymore. Some people have many loves.”
Although the chemistry between Carrie and Franklyn was palpable at first, “I think that that was never going to be something that could be sustained,” Sarah Jessica Parker adds. “I think as Carrie characterised it, Franklyn was somebody who was important and kind and the right person to allow her to experience a new relationship in an intimate way. I don't think she exploited it, but…I think Franklyn was somebody that made her feel good professionally, that saw something in her, but also that allowed for a romantic interlude that was important for her to step out of grief and into a new life as a single woman.” (Or maybe for Aiden to enter the picture again?)
Season two of the Sex and the City revival is already more fun and flirty than season one.
While Franklyn and Carrie seemed to have cooled off for now—was it me, or did he seem to be more interested in cooking videos than the woman he just slept with?—King wants it to be known that he has nothing but admiration for Hernandez. “Ivan is a wonderful actor and stunning,” says King. “I wanted the audience [during season one] to go, ‘Who's that hot guy in the booth?’ And then slowly, slowly, slowly, he becomes a person. The kiss at the end was to show that anything is possible now that she's let go of Big. It's a surprise. She's open.”
With that said, King didn't want Franklyn to be seen as a sure thing either. “We [as an audience] don't know who Franklyn is, we don't know what their chemistry is,” he says. “They don't even know what their chemistry is. So we put them in bed together.”
Now, of course, the question remains as to whether Franklyn will resurface later in the season, as many characters in the Sex and the City and And Just Like That… universe do. “Look, I don't want you to know anything,” King says with a laugh. “I don't want you to know what scene the other nail polish is in that [Carrie wears]. So I'm not going to tell you whether Franklyn will be back. But I was really happy. From the writing and acting point of view, it was exciting to explore something and put Carrie in a situation that she didn't know what it was. And that's the through line. Life's too short to not try something new like poaching an egg or having casual sex.”
This article originally appeared on GLAMOUR US.
