Sex And The City: 9 Episodes To Watch If You Miss Carrie & Berger

Carrie Bradshaw enjoys several major relationships across Sex and the City‘s six-season run, and most are relatably troubled. But while her relationships with Big, Aidan, and Petrovsky have just as many happy moments as they do sad, Carrie’s fling with writer Jack Berger proves to be unique in its dysfunction.

With much of their relationship spent bickering or caught up in squabbles over minor issues, the couple just can’t seem to straighten out their course. But especially in their beginnings, the pair had tons of chemistry and were alike in several significant ways (both writers, both sensitive, both neurotic) – factors that make their scenes absolutely worth a rewatch. For fans of Carrie and Berger, the couple’s brief but memorable fling can be appreciated in a handful of iconic episodes.

9 “The Post-It Always Sticks Twice” (Season 6, Episode 7)

After enduring the show’s most bewildering break-up in the previous episode, Carrie struggles with the aftermath of dumping via Post-It. Unfortunately for Carrie, despite her assertions that she’s over Berger, she spends the entire episode embroiled in a post-mortem of their troubled relationship.

Her attempt at a girls’ night at a hot new club called ‘Bed’ is derailed when she spots a group of Berger’s friends and, in one of her most cringe-worthy scenes, launches into a break-up tirade to a frustratingly unsympathetic audience. But when a frazzled Carrie and friends escape outside to engage in some illicit activity, the infamous Post-It somehow proves to be just the defense they need.

8 “Plus One Is The Loneliest Number” (Season 5, Episode 5)

Carrie meets the love interest whom she is perhaps most alike in this episode. Jack Berger is introduced to viewers by Carrie’s publisher as the male Carrie Bradshaw, an incisive funnyman whose writing New York City men can’t get enough of.

After sparks fly between the pair, Carrie invites Berger to be her plus one to her upcoming book launch but is shocked to discover he’s taken. A wistful cab ride home after running into him at the party caps off this lonely episode for Carrie – but the couple’s obvious chemistry suggests that Berger isn’t gone for good.

7 “Great Sexpectations” (Season 6, Episode 2)

This episode perfectly captures the hopefulness and joy of beginning new relationships – and equally, the let-downs they occasion. Carrie and Berger can’t get enough of each other, whether flirtily shopping for housewares or dining at a restaurant until way past closing.

But when their first (and second) times getting intimate are dead-silent and stilted, Carrie fears they can’t translate their everyday chemistry into bedroom thrills. But all it takes is some open communication to get things going.

6 “Lights, Camera, Relationship!” (Season 6, Episode 5)

Berger’s insecurities turn out to be a serious problem for his relationship in this painful episode. After Carrie brings him to Prada, he’s shocked to later discover she has bought him a ridiculously expensive shirt with her $25,000 publisher’s advance. His second book, meanwhile, has been dropped by their shared publisher.

The bickering couple runs into more issues at the Brooklyn red carpet leading to Smith’s hot new play, as paparazzi clamor for photos of Carrie – alone. It’s one of the couple’s saddest episodes as Berger’s jealousy leads them astray from the happy duo they once were.

5 “Hop, Skip, and a Week” (Season 6, Episode 6)

In this episode, Carrie and Berger can’t get past their bickering ways and their relationship seems to be nearing its end. Berger is overly sensitive about his floundering writing career, and he even lashes out at Carrie for her ordering choices in a restaurant. Although Carrie considers breaking things off, she changes her mind after she witnesses an odd incident while serving jury duty that she knows would appeal to Berger’s quirky sense of humor.

But the episode ends on the sourest possible note as, despite the couple having made up the night before, Carrie awakens to find a break-up Post-It from Berger.

4 “To Market, To Market” (Season 6, Episode 1)

Having just rung the opening bell at the Stock Exchange, Carrie wonders if she’s over-invested in her upcoming date with Berger in the season six premiere. Her plan to look like a bombshell is almost foiled when she spots him on the street while sporting an unusually frumpy outfit.

In the end, Carrie decides to invite Berger to a movie that same day, and while they both admit they aren’t dressed as they’d intended, it’s their clear excitement to be in each other’s company that matters. In this episode devoted to the anticipation, the payoff is absolutely worth it.

3 “I Love a Charade” (Season 5, Episode 8)

Berger returns in the season five finale as Carrie and friends make their way to the Hamptons for Bitsy von Muffling’s summer wedding. While the girls snack on fries at a gas station off the highway, Berger pulls up on a motorcycle and Carrie invites him to the party Samantha’s throwing at Richard’s Hamptons home.

But when Berger shows, Carrie’s “zsa zsa zsu” butterflies cause her to word-vomit about past breakups and her date scrams. The episode ends on a hopeful note for the couple, though, as Berger reappears at the reception and officially asks Carrie out.

2 “Pick-a-Little, Talk-a-Little” (Season 6, Episode 4)

Carrie and Berger are hitting a stride in their new relationship, and Berger is hitting it off with Carrie’s friends. But shortly after the couple declares they love each other, they become embroiled in conflict over a bemusingly petty issue.

When Carrie claims that the powerful New York woman at the center of Berger’s new novel would never wear a scrunchie as he specified, it leads to an episode-long feud as Berger fumes over the slight. In an episode that testifies to the ultimately silly squabbles that always plague relationships of a certain age, it’s heartening that Carrie and Berger eventually manage to overcome theirs.

1 “The Perfect Present” (Season 6, Episode 3)

Carrie is haunted by mentions of Berger’s ex-girlfriend in this episode. “Lauren” is responsible for decorating choices in Berger’s apartment, a loud ‘forest sounds’ sleep radio, and most troublingly, a voicemail asking him to lunch that inspires disturbingly intense anger.

But it turns out that Carrie needs to look inwards to solve her ex problem. Once she cuts off her phone-sex relationship with new Californian Mr. Big, Berger clears up that his ex cheated. Carrie officially inaugurates the couple’s ‘present’ by gifting Berger a new and more relaxing sound machine, marking a peaceful end to a momentary hurdle.

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