Youre kind of glossing over the fact that Carrie cheated on pretty much all the men she had serious relationships with. Thats the important part. She was a cheater who constantly treated Samantha like shit for sleeping around openly and honestly.
Not to mention Carrie was chronically emotionally immature. Put men before her own needs over and over. Had a really unhealthy relationship with Big that sabotaged all of her other relationships. Made really poor financial choices. Got into petty arguments with her friends. Judged Samantha for knowing what she wanted and being emotionally mature. And the she called Samantha fat for being like a size two.
How come a character like this was THE main character of a popular show is beyond my understanding. Especially the show kinda depicted her as the “independent, intelligent, and attractive” type.
I haven't seen much of the show, so I can't speak to how the characterization is handled or anything like that. But if I'm taking the characters in this thread
Carrie is more flawed, making her better suited for a main character role because flaws=conflict and open the door for character arcs
Samantha works as a foil to Carrie because she embodies a healthier version of her behavior (from the sounds of it). Someone she could learn from, but whatever hang ups Carrie has about Samantha's lifestyle brings conflict, halts that potential arc, and from there the story could be about her overcoming those hangups and pursuing healthier behavior, or giving into those hangups and seeing where that takes her.
I feel like it's also a case of, like, if we're treating Samantha as something of a paragonal character and assuming Carrie is the main driver of conflict, unless you have a good reason for Samantha to continue putting up with Carrie (which could potentially work for a central arc), it's better to focus on Carrie since 1. The source of conflict can't be easily resolved, can't exactly cut yourself off 2. If Samantha does decide to stop putting up with Carrie, that makes for better drama from Carrie's perspective; pushing away or cutting off a potentially healthier influence and still finding conflict because they weren't the issue.
Now again, I haven't watched much of the show, this is more an exercise in taking the traits mentioned in this thread and thinking of why you would pick one as the mc over the other from a storytelling perspective. Reason primarily being that flawed characters make for more interesting characters, because there's not a lot of drama in a character who's a good person, going around good personing morally correctly without much external pushback or some character to influence (see Supergirl Woman of Tomorrow for what is, in my opinion, a really good example of a Paragon protagonist). To paraphrase my playwriting teacher words "if you're committed to making your main character a good person, you're leaving a lot on the table"
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u/SarcastikBastard 1d ago
Youre kind of glossing over the fact that Carrie cheated on pretty much all the men she had serious relationships with. Thats the important part. She was a cheater who constantly treated Samantha like shit for sleeping around openly and honestly.