Yes, it’s been over a year since I last did one of these posts…I know, I know! 

I decided to take a break from blogging for a while because, well, big lockdown last year made me a bit too introspective and my blogs lacked in humour.  Not that I didn’t want to share the wonderful world of spinsterdom in these unprecedented times, but in the end no-one was having a good time, and blogging simply added to the constant, endless internal focus that summed up the generally shitty time lockdown was for me.

Anyway, here we are over a year later and I have been tinkering with all sorts of writing in the meantime – mainly haiku, even submitting some to the New Zealand Poetry Society competition. There has also been a reasonable attempt at a book – reasonable in that it’s about 80% finished, as opposed to it’s a reasonable book. It’s been fun trying to scratch out a story that may end up going nowhere, but allows me to play with words and characters. I have also watched an awful lot of very good and very mediocre television over this time as well, and occasionally almost been moved to share my views on some of these shows.

So I figured why not resurrect the ole blog and review stuff?! Review the good, the bad and the ugly of Saturday night Netflix trawlings, or other things that I find interesting or amusing or truly dreadful. This little spurt of activity may not last, after all, New Zealand seems to be out and about a bit more this year (touch wood), so I may not actually follow through for very long. And more importantly, a blog is not an accountability buddy – I’d prefer to think it contributed to the collective wisdom from our generation and experiences. Like a school social studies project.

Today, I am reviewing the truly dreadful.  I stumbled across a series called Sex/Life on Netflix.  I say stumble because it popped up on the “trending” list, with a blurb promising an examination of middle age sex and relationships, people with histories – all the sort of fodder that fed this blog in it’s original form.  But I realise I shouldn’t trust anything Netflix tells me is “trending” or “popular in New Zealand today” because this has thrown up some absolute howlers, which leaves me questioning the intellectual competency of my fellow kiwis.

So let’s talk about Sex/life.  For starters, who names a show with “/” in the title?  It’s like the writers threw in a placeholder for the general theme of the show to decide on a good name for it later, but in line with the abysmal writing that characterises this series, clearly failed to come up with anything better and left it as it was.

I’m going to cut right to the chase.  This show is shot entirely around the impressively pert and erect nipples of the main character.  I don’t even know what her name is.  Her nipples are clearly the star of the show, constantly.  Don’t get me wrong, they are lovely nips, spectacular even in their pertness, but they feature far more than any semblance of an actual storyline.

I thought 50 Shades of Grey was possibly the most badly written “erotic” book I had ever read, let alone the movie being phenomenally disappointing for anyone hoping for some of that cheeky mummy porn the book had promised. But it is a masterpiece compared to this show.   The dialogue is clunky, obvious and awkward, much like a school play, but performed by adults constantly grinding on each other.

The story is frustrating to say the least. The characters are one dimensional and not especially likeable, and maybe they aren’t supposed to be – perhaps this is the deeper meaning I was supposed to find in this, but I suspect not. I wanted to shake the main character and shout at her/my TV (I’m going to call her Nipples because I can’t remember her name). Nipples seems to make all her decisions with her vagina, despite being highly educated. While this is somewhat relatable because my vagina has featured in some bad decisions at times in my life (NOTING I normally see reason and move on), she is completely ruled by her vagina. She is rendered helpless by a Bad Boy. And Danger, if you consider lots of sexual intercourse and touching in public places dangerous.

Now, while Nipples is/are star of the show, keen viewers were rewarded about four episodes in with a fleeting glimpse of the Bad Boy’s big cock in a shower scene not involving any form of shagging.  It took me by surprise to be honest.  So much so I had to put down my glass of pinot noir and sit up and rewind to check what I had seen was right.   But after all the nipple shots it felt so gratuitous, you know?

The Cock belonged to Nipples former Bad Boy lover, effectively the reason for all Nipples’ angsty suburban mid-life crisis and unaddressed personal baggage (an apparently unfeasible situation given she was a student of psychology).  He was also completely unlikeable, as an emotionally manipulative and emotionally retarded man-child who realises he loves her far too late.  Yep, the standard fodder of every trashy Netflix romance drama.

There is a lot of sex.  It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but the limp storyline is simply a tedious distraction in amongst the pool sex, the fingering in the bar, the stairwell sex, the bath sex, the every room in the loft sex, the car sex…  There was so much sex that in the end, it became tedious too.  At least porn is over within one episode. 

There was a sex situation I had a problem with though, when the so-called friends of Nipples and her tormented Type A banker husband took them to a sex party and there was absolutely no discussion about consent at any point, which is not generally how these things work, where consent is very much front and centre.  But no, lots of nipples and people going down on each other was the priority here.   I think this was supposed to be the peak tension point in Nipples relationship with the Banker, but it seemed lazily contrived and poorly researched.

Anyway, I’m now becoming a bit bored writing about this pointless show.  I’m down with nudity, cocks, nipples and shagging on screen, but in the end it was all just a bit repetitive.   There’s only so many times Nipples can have flashbacks to the Cock banging her into next week while angsting over her safe marriage to the Banker, before one starts to crave mentally challenging dialogue and chooses to make it all stop by exiting the whole thing altogether.

If you are thinking of watching this show, I would advise inviting friends over and opening up several bottles of wine and turning it into a drinking game requiring sipping every time you see Nipples’ nipples, or grinding or shagging. May I also suggest sculling when you finally get to see The Cock.  Being shitfaced is probably the best and only way to view this, but buy supermarket wine because this will completely plunder your supplies.

If you want to watch a quality show about the middle age condition with nudity, sex and hilariously, witty dialogue, then there is nothing better than Californication (which, coincidentally, I’m searching for on Sky Go right now to resurrect my Saturday night in).

So what is the score for this review, you may ask? Given I think I’ve (unbelievably) seen a couple of worse shows on Netflix, I’m giving Sex/Life 2 beautifully pert nipples out of 10.