As Sex And The City enters its third season – excited is an understatement – with Carrie Bradshaw navigating a complicated relationship with Aiden Shaw once again, viewers find themselves revisiting a question as old as dating itself: Do women really want the nice guy?
“It’s complicated with Aiden but I’m trying to figure it out,” Carrie admits in the season trailer. Her journey with Aiden – from passionate beginnings to infidelity, reconciliation, engagement, and heartbreak – has been anything but simple. Now, with Mr. Big gone for good, their rekindled relationship reopens the debate about what women truly want.
The Psychology Behind “Nice Guy Syndrome”
“Nice is boring, especially to the feminine,” says Dr. Robert Glover, psychotherapist and author of No More Mr. Nice Guy. “The feminine seems to like a little bit of drama, a little bit of tension. We men, especially nice guys, we want certainty. Let’s lock this thing down.”
This perspective helps explain why many viewers never believed Aiden was Carrie’s true match. Throughout the original series, she repeatedly chose the complex, emotionally unavailable Mr. Big over Aiden’s stability and reliability.
Viewers agree. “I’m rewatching SATC and there are times she doesn’t even seem to LIKE Aidan, let alone love him,” noted one longtime fan. “I believe she WANTED to love him, but he just wasn’t, and he still isn’t.”
Why Being “Too Nice” Can Kill Attraction
Dr. Glover might identify Aiden as exhibiting classic “nice guy syndrome,” which he defines as “somebody that is trying to become what he thinks other people want him to be, so he’ll be liked and loved and get his needs met.” The second component, he explains, is that nice guys “tend to hide anything about themselves that they think might get a negative reaction.”
This helps explain why the Aiden-Carrie dynamic felt unbalanced to many viewers. “The whole point of Aiden was to drive home that Carrie could not really love someone as much as she loved Big, even if he was an available, good guy,” says The Quantum Movement founder Jason Reynolds.
Nice Guys vs. Good Men: Understanding the Difference
There’s a big difference between being a nice guy and being a pushover. Dr. Glover notes that nice guys “put themselves in that friend zone by repressing anything that might create a little bit of tension between them and the woman, anything that might create a little bit of spark of arousal.”
Can People Change? The Case for Aiden 2.0
Some fans defend the Carrie-Aiden reunion, arguing that people change with time. “They’re twenty-plus years older and things have changed,” comments one fan. “He got his kids and domestic happiness for a while; she got the life she wanted.”
Another than points out that: “A real woman wants a nice man. However, not a ‘nice guy.’ The nice guy cliché is someone who always stands back, always apologises, who can be used or does not have a strong will, character, or presence.”
Finding Balance in Modern Relationships
This distinction between authentic kindness and “nice guy syndrome” may be key to understanding whether Aiden can now be right for Carrie. Dr. Glover explains that recovering from nice guy syndrome involves understanding that “if you actually let people give to you, fill your bucket, you actually have more to give to other people, rather than you giving all the time from an empty bucket.”
As the new season unfolds, viewers will watch whether Aiden has evolved beyond his people-pleasing ways and if Carrie has matured enough to appreciate authentic kindness rather than chasing the drama that defined her relationship with Big.
Perhaps one viewer summarised it best: “She never really loves a man for who he is; she loves him for the fantasy he provides her.” Whether that fantasy has finally aligned with reality remains to be seen.
Time will tell, and whatever happens, we’re here for it.
