Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Late at night on pay cable

Have you seen that new HBO series, Tell Me You Love Me? Last week, Mr. Tangerine was watching the first episode after I'd gone to bed. He raced into the bedroom to tell me what I'd missed (and this weekend, showed me the scene when the episode aired again): the money shot. Woman giving her male partner a handjob, a spurt ending up on his chest. (CGI spooge?) Other fictional couples on the show have fairly convincing sex on screen (pumping and humping), and there is no shortage of naked butts, penises, breasts, or cooter shots. And yet the rest of the show plays as a standard soapy/whiny drama about couples in counseling and the self-involved problems in their relationships.

The cast isn't cheesy porno people, either. There are people you've seen before. Sonya Walger was the Englishwoman on Mind of a Married Man (the "happy ending" show) and was also on Lost. Ally Walker played The Profiler back in the day, and has lost the furrows on her brow. The psychologist or psychiatrist the characters see is played by Jane Alexander, and apparently E.R.'s Sherry Stringfield will pop up too.

If you have not seen this show, you may be saying to yourself, "Wow, that show sounds hot. TV-MA, strong sexual content, explicit nudity? Whoo!" It actually turns out to be entirely unerotic. (Mr. Tangerine agrees.) It may look like real sex on screen, but it looks like real bad sex. Nobody's having fun. Nobody's moaning. Nobody's laughing. Man, this show could ruin real people's sex lives! It's highly irresponsible and an abuse of the TV-MA rating.

So if you're up late and want to watch something risque on cable to get into a frisky mood...don't watch this show. If you like rather depressing shows about imperfect relationships, though, it might be a decent choice.

9 comments:

Mona Buonanotte said...

Did they actually show a hand job, or just the woman from the chest up with her arm pumping up and down and then a cut to the guy's face? And what's with the no moaning or laughing stuff? Have the writers of the show ever HAD sex? I mean, puh-leeze.

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Delia Christina said...

so my roomie told me one night, 'hey, i recorded that new hbo show.'
and i said, 'how depressing was it?'
and she said, 'complete, total, neurotic wankery.'

you've confirmed our initial assessment!

Orange said...

Mona, yeah, there was a hand moving on some sort of shaft. Mighta been a prosthetic one with hydraulic pumps, Mr. Tangerine points out. But hand on shaft was the image shown. Apparently the drama of the show lies in the dysfunctional relationships the couples have, and for whatever reason, nobody's got great sex lives but horrible fights about money. It's all about the lousy sex, apparently.

Ding, yeah. I don't think I will be watching this show a month or two from now. Unless! What if Jane Alexander, the couples counselor, fixes everyone and the sex gets hot??

Lisa said...

Dammmmmit! That is very disappointing. You realize I'll have to check it out for myself, right...? I'll let you know how it works out, you can count on that!

:)

barrywep said...

As Linda Stasi pointed out in the NY Post, if you had caught Mr. Tangerine watching he could have said: "It's not porn, it's HBO".

Alana said...

Well, glad that for once I don't feel bad about not having HBO.

Bobita said...

No HBO at my abode, but I will admit that after watching the series on Showtime, I have very little desire to go back to the networks. They make some good stuff! Too bad about the Bad Sex Show.

Thanks for your thoughtful comments over at my place. It was encouraging to hear from the blogosphere on such a topic.

I'm working on putting something together that might make me feel better...or at the very least make me feel like I am doing something, anything, about the situation in Congo.

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