Season OneNow you can achieve multiple viewings of the bestSexon TV.  Winner of Golden Globes for Best TV Series and Best Actress,Sex and the Cityis based on Candace Bushnell's provocativebestselling book.  Sarah Jessica  Parker stars as Carrie Bradshaw, a self-described  "sexual anthropologist," who writes "Sex and the City," a newspaper  column that chronicles the state of sexual affairs of Manhattanites in  this "age of un-innocence." Her "posse," including nice girl Charlotte  (Kristin Davis), hard-edged Miranda (Cynthia Nixon), and party girl   Samantha (Kim Cattrall)--not to mention her own tumultuous love  life--gives Carrie plenty of column fodder. Over the course of the first  season's 12 episodes, the most prominent dramatic arc concerns Carrie,  who goes from turning the tables on "toxic bachelors" by having "sex  like a man" to wanting to join the ranks of "the monogamists" with the  elusive Mr. Big (Chris Noth). Meanwhile, Miranda, Cynthia, and Samantha  have their own dating woes, few of which can be described on a family  Web site.Seinfeldhas nothing onSex and the Citywhen it  comes to shallow, self-absorbed characters or coining catch phrases.  Episode 2, for example, introduces the term "modelizer": a guy who is  obsessed with and will only date models. Some may accuse this series of  male bashing. But women, after years of enduring shows with "men  behaving badly," will relish the equal time. Some may blanch at the  ladies' graphic language and ribald humor, or dismiss some of the  situations as unrealistic (Carrie doesn't bat an eye when she discovers  that an artist friend surreptitiously videotapes his sexual conquests).  Still others will viewSex and the Cityas documentary. Regardless of your view, this groundbreaking series will have you longing for more.--Donald LiebensonSeason TwoA smart and savvy (albeit highly stylized) look at the single lives of four thirtysomething Manhattan women,Sex and the City: The Complete Second Seasonbuilds on the foundation of its first season with plot arcs that are  both hilarious and heartfelt, taking the show from breakout hit to true  pop-culture phenomenon. Relationship epiphanies coexist happily  alongside farcical plots and zingy one-liners, resulting in emotionally  satisfying episodes that feature the sharp kind of character-defining  dialogue that seems to have disappeared from the rest of TV long ago.  When last we left the NYC gals, Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) had just  broken up with a commitment-phobic Mr. Big (Chris Noth), but fans of  Noth's seductive-yet-distant rake didn't have to wait long until he was  back in the picture, as he and Carrie tried to make another go of it.  Their relationship evolution, from reunion to second breakup, provides  the core of the second season. The fittingly titled and keenly observed  episode "Evolution" found Carrie trying to leave a few feminine  belongings at Mr. Big's apartment with little success, charting the  challenges and limits of intimacy. And the season's finale, "Ex and the  City," was a melancholy goodbye for Carrie and Big that took its cue  fromThe Way We Were. It wasn't all angst, though: among other  adventures, Charlotte (Kristin Davis) puzzles over whether one of her  beaus was "gay-straight" or "straight-gay"; Miranda (Cynthia Nixon)  tries to date a guy who insists on having sex only in places where they  might get caught; and Samantha (the exquisite Kim Cattrall) copes with  dates who range from, um, not big enough tofartoo big--with  numerous stops in between. Through it all, the four actresses cohered  into a solid ensemble that played on their complex relationships among  themselves as well as with men; in two short years, Parker and company  became one of the best TV casts in over a decade. And to top it all off,  the second season offers 18 episodes, six more than the first.  Sometimes size really can make a difference!--Mark EnglehartSeason ThreeThe third season was the charm for one of HBO's gold standard series,  which earned its first Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series to go along  with its Golden Globes for Best Comedy Series and Best Actress (Sarah  Jessica Parker). The writing is as sharp as ever, with more trendy  product placement than a Bret Easton Ellis novel and ribald banter  that's a cross between the Algonquin Round Table and the Friars Club.  One of this season's two principal story arcs concerned hapless-in-love  Charlotte (Kristin Davis) and her pursuit of a husband; enter (if  only...) Kyle McLachlan as the unfortunately impotent Trey. Meanwhile,  sex columnist Carrie has a brief but memorable fling with a politician  who’s golden, but not in the way she anticipated. She then sabotages her  too-good-to-be-true relationship with furniture designer Aidan (John  Corbett) by having an affair with Mr. Big (Chris Noth), who himself has  gotten married."Do we need drama to make a relationship work?" Carrie muses at one point.Sex and the Cityneeds drama to make it work, and Parker and Cynthia Nixon (as career  woman Miranda), this ensemble's better half, give the show its pulsating  heart as they wrestle with commitment and, in the episode "Don't Ask,  Don't Tell," sadder-but-wiser breakups. On the lighter side, the sexual  dalliances of "rude and politically incorrect" Samantha (Kim Cattrall)  provide great fodder for comedy. LikeI Love Lucy, the series  benefited from a brief change of scenery with a three-episode jaunt to  Los Angeles, where Carrie and company encountered, among others, Matthew  McConaughey, Vince Vaughn, Hugh Hefner, and Sarah Michelle Gellar. At  its best, to quote one character,Sex and the Cityis "sharp,  edgy, brutal at times, always a little juicy." It may be "very New  York," but the sex and relationship issues it tackles are universal. For  its devoted fans, the release of this 18-episode, three-disc set is, to  quote Gellar's clueless Hollywood junior development exec, "chick flick  big."--Donald LiebensonSeason FourThe fourth season ofSex and the Cityis just as smart and sexy  as ever, mixing caustic adult wit and sharply observed situation comedy  on the mean streets of Manhattan, though this time the quartet of  singleton city girls must endure even tougher combat in the unending war  of love, sex, and shopping. Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) finally seems  to have found her ideal life partner when she is reunited with handsome  craftsman Aidan (John Corbett). But can their relationship survive  trial by cohabitation? Meanwhile Charlotte (Kristin Davis) seems to have  both her dream Park Avenue apartment and a solution to her marital  problems with Trey (Kyle MacLachlan). But when the subject of babies  comes up, everything starts to unravel for her, too. It's not just  Charlotte who has baby issues either: after what seems like an eternity  of enforced sexual abstinence Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) is horrified to  discover she's pregnant. And as for the sultry Samantha (Kim Cattrall),  she's on a quest for monogamy, first with an exotic lesbian artist, then  with a philandering businessman, with whom to her utter dismay she just  might have fallen in love.--Mark WalkerSeason FiveIt was a short but sweet fifth season forSex and the City, as  HBO's resident comediennes found themselves affected by forces beyond  their control--the pregnancies of both Sarah Jessica Parker (Carrie) and  Cynthia Nixon (Miranda). A truncated shooting schedule to accommodate  the actresses forced this season to be reduced to a mere eight episodes,  and indeed, you can tell both actresses are expecting. (Carrie's  wardrobe became more outlandish and more concealing than usual.) Still,  the actresses and creators forged ahead, creating a handful of episodes  that if short in content were long on emotion and laughs. Whereas the  fourth season found all four grappling with various relationships, the  fifth season focused on the perils of being single, with a new intensity  lacking in the previous sexcapades. Carrie and Miranda wrestled with  their solitary lifestyles, albeit with new attachments--Miranda had new  baby Brady and single motherhood, while Carrie found herself in the  world of publishing as the author of a real-life book of her columns.  Charlotte (Kristin Davis) wondered if she'd ever find another man, while  Samantha (Kim Cattrall) finally got rid of the one that had been vexing  her far too much, hotelier Richard (James Remar). If the season as a  whole felt less than the sum of its parts, those parts were some of the  best comedy in the show's history, from Samantha's anointment as the  "Michiko Kakutani of vibrators" to Carrie's stressful,  one-degree-from-fiasco book launch party. (And fear not, Chris Noth's  Mr. Big does pop up now and again.) The season's climactic episode, "I  Love a Charade," found all four at the straight wedding of a seemingly  gay pal (Nathan Lane) and contemplating their future with a wry, bemused  tone. It was one of the series' best episodes ever, equally touching  and funny, and grounded the show in an emotional maturity that announced  that after all their wild travails, these women had truly grown up. --Mark EnglehartSeason Six, Part IAfter a long wait--like the entire fifth season--Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah  Jessica Parker) is dating again. The sixth season of the popular HBO  show starts with Carrie and her sparkly new potential, Berger (Ron  Livingston), trying to leave past relationships and hit it off. The  results are mixed (up to Berger's memorable exit), but the good news is  Carrie is at it again, and a new love interest can be found in the  member of a wedding party, an old high school flame (David Duchovny), or  an über-famous painter (Mikhail Baryshnikov). As Carrie plays the  field, her friends seem to be settling down, relatively speaking.  Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) decides that her affair with TiVo cannot compete  when Mr. Perfect (Blair Underwood, at his most charming) moves into her  building. Charlotte's (Kristin Davis) feelings for her "opposites  attract" boyfriend (Evan Handler, perhaps fans' most-loved boyfriend)  deepen, but they still have a few things to iron out. Most surprising is  Samantha's (Kim Cattrall) hot relationship with waiter-actor-stud Smith  Jerrod (Jason Lewis) taking on something resembling love, despite  Samantha's best intentions.Before the sixth season started in the  summer of 2003, a bombshell hit: it was announced that this would be the  finale. Fans, just getting over the truncated fifth season (due to half  the cast getting pregnant), were beside themselves. But it would be a  long season, and these 12 episodes plant the seeds for the final 8  airing the following winter. These dozen episodes illustrate the  maturity of the show: there's not a bad one in the bunch, with things  like old flames Mr. Big (Chris Noth), and Steve (David Eigenberg)  popping in with deeper resiliency. And the show is still flat-out funny.  Berger is the most intrinsically humorous of Carrie's beaus (his  introduction to Prada is a classic), Jarrod's earnest streak on Samantha  gets her flabbergasted in the giddiest ways, and Charlotte's attempt to  convert to Judaism is right in character. The touchstone episode is "A  Woman's Right to Shoes," in which Carrie loses her prized and expensive  Manolo Blahniks at a party. The comedy blends serious points of how we  perceive singles, couples, and parents (and the gifts we lavish on the  latter two). Carrie's method of celebrating her singlehood is just  another gem in this treasure of a series.--Doug ThomasSeason Six, Part IIWith these eight episodes, HBO's grand sitcom concluded, leaving untold  numbers of women--and many men--feeling deprived. The six-year series  certainly did not outlast its welcome; the final season is some of the  best TV had to offer in 2004. In many ways, the eight episodes served as  a single finale, with all four characters approaching a kind of destiny  and happiness, the theme of this last half-season (which aired weeks  after thefirst half).  Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) continues her romance with Russian artist  (Mikhail Baryshnikov), a flippantly arrogant man who's been around the  block, but able to supply Carrie's needed desire for magic. Miranda  (Cynthia Nixon) has settled down with Steve (David Eigenberg), but there  is more that will change with her, including her address. Charlotte  (Kristin Davis) continues to make baby plans now that the husband slot  is filled quite nicely (Evan Handler). Samantha (Kim Cattrall) brings a  good sense of drama to the show with a breast-cancer scare.Going  down the final stretch--and Samantha's cancer--gives the series a more  serious tone, but there's always a jab to tickle the funny bone:  Miranda's awkwardness with happiness, Charlotte's latest passion, Carrie  typing someplace new, and Samantha getting into Paris Hilton territory.  Like any series winding down, there is a wedding, a baby, old faces  popping up, and some star-ladened new ones (like creative consultant  Julia Sweeney as a nun). In the final two-part episode, "An American in  Paris," Carrie faces her romantic destiny, but also solidifies herself  as a fashion icon, an Audrey Hepburn for 21st-century television. In the  penultimate episode, she asks her friends an emotional question: "What  if I never met you?" Certainly fans can ask of themselves the same  question and reminisce how much better TV became since they first tuned  in these four women of the City.For the last of the DVD sets, the folks behindSATCgive their fans a few more DVD extras. As we find out in the  near-hourlong 2004 U.S. Comedy Arts Festival Seminar (with executive  producer Michael Patrick King, Sarah Jessica Parker, and the writing  team), the alternate endings seen here were false leads to throw off the  press. Thank goodness--what fan would want one of these endings? More  enjoyable is the 11 minutes of deleted scenes from the run of the show.  King's expert touches on the commentary are fun to listen to, if a  lovefest. And speaking of love, the two farewell tributes are filled  with reminiscences and favorite clips, all done with a beautiful  fondness for this series.--Doug ThomasSex and the City: The Movie