To say Che Diaz was divisive right from the start of “And Just Like That…” is putting it lightly. In an attempt to make this sequel more diverse than “Sex and the City” — which glossed over people of color and queer individuals in New York City, electing to focus on four white ladies instead — Michael Patrick King and his team created the character of Che, a non-binary and queer stand-up comedian, and cast Sara Ramirez. To be absolutely clear, the reason that Che divided fans of “And Just Like That…” has nothing to do with the character’s sexual preferences or gender presentation, and it shouldn’t. Che puzzled the show’s audiences because they were just a crappy character.
Across two seasons, Che is selfish, vapid, narcissistic, over-the-top, awkward, and perhaps worst of all, unfunny (a particularly bad trait for a stand-up comedian). The fact that they spent their podcast “X, Y, & Me” — which they co-hosted with lead character Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) — jamming a button that yelled “woke moment!” didn’t really help anything.
Ramirez told Variety in a June 2022 interview that they avoided comments about why fans were not, as Miranda famously once put it, “craving some Che” en masse. “Other people’s opinions of a character — that’s not something I can allow into my process,” they said. The actor also noted that since King and his crew were the ones behind the writing, it wasn’t their fault, and they’re right. At the end of the day, it wasn’t Ramirez that fans couldn’t stand. It was Che.
