What do I think about the finale? Well, they told at least 3 more seasons worth of story and character growth in the last 5 minutes of episode 12. I mean... it was so obvious the last part of the episode aka "the end" was written in last minute... to save face and MPK's reputation. To gaslight the public that they were not cancelled. They could have easily produced 2-3 more seasons (if they were successful and not so low in viewership) in which Carrie mentally travels to that exact location in life (Not alone, but on her own).
I am sure the initial plan was to have this season be the "breakup with Aidan" season with season 4 being more like SATC - Carrie dating different guys, being more carefree and getting that cynicism about relationships back. Having sex without any strings attached. And then she could have had at least one more Petrovsky type of affair (with some successful handsome older man) to have us cleanse our palate after the horrible Aidan Part 3 fiasco. And then she could have decided to be "not alone but on her own"... in season 5 or 6. That would have given us time to process her emotional journey instead of giving us pathetic lost Carrie for three seasons and then magically inserting a backbone and a fake catharsis (because of Aidan breaking a window and still thinking she is a tramp) in the last three minutes of a poop-themed episode. I mean WTH. I think the poop was a metaphor of how they think of the entire show at this point.
It was so sad and blatantly obvious how (after getting cancelled) MPK just tried to give us the final he envisioned for season 5 or 6. It just felt like we were watching the same stupid sitcomish jokes and all of a sudden... almost out of nowhere... we get the final curtain, the heroine suddenly realizes something she couldn't realize all her life... In the last couple of minutes. The end. Just like that. This is like making a series about Anna Karenina and after getting canceled in the middle of the story, you decide to finish the last episode with a voice over saying "And the woman dies in the end." It felt so inorganic and rushed... Even Carrie's little dance was bittersweet. This is the most shockingly sloppy finale of a series I've ever seen. If I was MPK or SJP... I probably won't be able to sleep for a few weeks knowing this is how everyone will last remember us. When SATC ended you remembered Paris, the bridge, Big saving her, beautiful scene with the girls, Carrie walking in the distance in the crowd of people. When you want to remember how AJLT ended you'll get a flashback of bizarre dancing and clogged toilet.
Pathetic and sad. But they have nobody else to blame but themselves. We tried making it happen. We turned hate watching into sport, but it was not enough to drive new viewers in. In the end it was so commercially (and creatively) unsuccessful... HBO had to put it out of it's misery.