Book Review: 50 Shades of Grey Trilogy
SPOILER ALERT: This post is going to contain INTIMATE DETAILS about plotlines in this book trilogy so if you seriously still have no idea what this book is about you are living under a rock with the people who still think Abercrombie and Fitch polos are a moniker of fashion-forwardness. This is going to be a long ass post so scroll down to the TL;DR if you don't know how to read.
So, I had a lengthy bout of travel recently and figured there was no better series of books to read than the notorious 50 Shades of Grey. Bitches been talking about that shit all over the goddamned place, twitterpated about whether Kristen Stewart is going to play the protagonist and OMG WHICH DICK WITH A MAN ATTACHED IS GOING TO PLAY CHRISTIAN GREY?!?!?! So OBV I had to check this out so I could continue to be a bastion of pop culture relevance to all you assholes. I read all three during my trip and was 100% weirded out that so many people enjoyed these books and were not straight up appalled by the implications of the story between the sexy parts. So here is my analysis of the series.
FIRST, the summary: Anastasia Steele is a mousy British Literature student in Washington state. She is a virgin, wears jackets from Wal-Mart, and is obsessed with 19th century literature which frames her entire lifeview. She meets super sexy 28 year old billionaire CEO Christian Grey who everyone thinks is gay but really just has a dark scary dom/sub lifestyle that he has to keep ubersecret. Christian wants Anastasia for his new plaything but actually falls in love with her and they fight and fuck their way through the entire series using methods such as spanking, restraint, vagina balls, and copious missionary sex. Christian has an abusive past and can only learn to love himself when Anastasia breaks him of his need to be a sexual deviant.
SECOND, Analysis:
THE SEX
The sex scenes are fun to read in the first book. They are kind of hot and let's be honest, any straight bitch is gonna want to get nailed by a guy who knows 15483409620 different ways to make a girl have an orgasm and also had BILLIONS OF DOLLARS and is also a sculpted Adonis with a huge dick. OBV we can all relate to this.
The second and third books, it gets a little boring. They have the same sex in different places: On boats, in cars, on beaches, in boathouses, elevators, in sex dungeon rooms, childhood bedrooms, etc etc.
But let us, for a moment more, dwell on the sex parts of the book. The protagonist pretty much has an orgasm every time Christian touches her. In one of the first scenes she climaxes from having her nipples played with for like, 90 seconds. She and her partner have mutual orgasms ever.single.time. they copulate.
Yeah.Fucking.Right.
I wanna hear about the times where they each spend like, 45 minutes trying to get the other one off and when both of them are unable to reach climax due to having consumed too many sausages and/or some latent genital insecurity they decide to watch Jimmy Fallon while eating ice cream out of the carton together and don't call each other out on the subsequent dairy farts that happen in the night. THAT is fucking love.
THE LEXICON
The author seems to have an extremely limited vocabulary when describing things. I cannot imagine this is an intentional facet of the characters' personality because, let us recall, the protagonist is OBSESSED with 19th century literature and you KNOW that bitches like Dickens are trying to use every single word in the goddamned dictionary. HOWEVER, she can only describe her own actions and even her own body in very limited terms.
The character uses the word "murmur" and "whisper" to describe how she communicates to everyone, but mostly Christian, almost 200 times EACH. She also mumbles, mutters, clambers, and pants with an alarming frequency.
She also has a VERY difficult time calling her body by its parts. Even after she is MARRIED to the guy, she refers to her VULVA, VAGINA, and BUTTHOLE (they never even do it in the butt, he puts his pinky back there in the second book and a skinny butt plug in the third. Boring.) as "there" "my sex" and "back there." She only ever refers to her lover's penis as "his manhood."
This is for real tho. If you cannot call your parts by what they are you are setting yourself up for an extremely uncomfortable doctor's appointment wherein you explain to your MD that you have "itchies in your hoo-ha."
ALTERNATIVE LIFESTYLES SO EVIL
I don't have a ton of research or experience to back this up, but from what little I have gleaned it seems that people who participate in and enjoy the sub/dom lifestyle are healthy and functional human beings who simple enjoy this type of sex as much as I enjoy the type of sex where I lay on my back and eat cookies and don't do any work. They aren't all doing it to exorcise childhood abuse demons, to take out on the other person a general hatred of their gender, or because they are sadists. It is simply another way to have adult fun with another human being who is consenting.
Of course, this notion is an affront the Anastasia's Victorian sensibilities (as well as to her subconscious who is anthropomorphized as wearing half-moon spectacles that she routinely glares up from and her inner goddess who is alternately doing complicated ballet moves or cowering behind a sofa...).
What a trained dominant would never do is subject a prudish virgin to a room full of instruments of submission and then expose him/her to mid-level sexplay without considering the emotional impact. Which is precisely what happens in this story and sets the tone for the rest of the book.
Speaking of which...
SCARY CONTROLLING MAN SEEKS SHEEPISH BRUNETTE TO YELL AT
This part is feministy. Get ready.
Christian Grey is a terrifying man. Not because he has sexual tastes not celebrated in the mainstream, but because of his extremely controlling and abusive behaviors. It is explained through the book that due to his childhood trauma he has to control everything or he comes apart and becomes a violent alcoholic who ruins everything good about life.
So, in this relationship he has with his girlfriend-wife-mother of his fucking CHILD he imposes multiple restrictions.
1. She does not get control over her own body. Period. She has to wear the prescribed clothes right down to her underwear. Even when he eases up on this one she feels pressured to do it anyway. Anastasia has to eat when told, is pressured to change her hairstyle and wear makeup, and despite her already thin composition is talked into considering a personal trainer.
She also has to get on birth control with him because he hates using condoms. Since sex is primarily about what the guy wants OBV altering her body chemistry is the only option. When her silly little ladybrain can't figure out how to use the pill correctly he switches her to the Depo shot. Never mentioned are the hormonal impacts of either of these methods, or how they change a woman's body. Never is she ASKED how she feels about this, nor is anything like the IUD suggested to her. And when her silly little ladybrain can't figure out the shots and she accidentally gets pregnant, she is not offered any options. She immediately gets an invasive trans-vaginal ultrasound and a picture of her baby and pre-natal vitamins. The doctor (hired by her husband with zero of Anastasia's input) does not do anything to talk her through the emotional repercussions of this life-changing event nor does she discuss abortion or adoption options. Later, when Anastasia finally mutters to Christian that she is pregnant, he abandons her while she is crying, goes and gets drunk and hangs out with his ex-girlfriend. Anastasia is expected to be OK with this and is also blamed for getting pregnant. In the epilogue Christian decides that she is to deliver her second child by scheduled cesarian, although Anastasia insists she wants to have a natural birth.
2. She is not allowed to drive her own car, and is often escorted around by Christian's manservant and other security detail. Christian insists this is for her own good and he just wants to keep her safe, but also gets SUPER pissed when she goes out for drinks with her best friend or doesn't call him to check in EVERY 15 MINUTES. Any attempt she makes to be independent of him is either thwarted or punished. She tries to get her own job, he buys the company. She visits her mother, he secretly goes along and stalks her. She sees her oldest friend's photography show, he makes her leave after only 30 minutes. This is reiterated by all the times Anastasia gets into sticky situations and Christian has to rescue her. Like, she would have died a few times had Christian not intervened. She will literally not survive without him.
3. Her entire self-worth is made or broken by Christian. When she disobeys him she is terrified he will leave her. She feels as though she has to push her sexual an emotional boundaries for him to continue to desire her. He does not accept her for who she is an continually tries to dictate and control her every move. There is a consistent mention of how she feels as though she cannot do anything without upsetting him. Throughout she shrugs off this behavior as just another part of her "Mr. Mercurial" whom she loves unconditionally but does not get that love in return. OBV she marries him. Even then, she is in constant fear that he will leave her.
This sounds like an extremely abusive situation and not a love story. The glossy sex scenes do not compensate for the scary codependence and gender stereotyping (be a virgin, marry your first lover, have his child, let him earn the money and give up your sad little ladycareer).
SO,
TL;DR: These books glamorize a codependent, emotionally abusive, and controlling relationship that glorifies typical gender roles and men acting as heads of house, companies, and relationships. Oh and there is some shower sex.
FIN.
So, I had a lengthy bout of travel recently and figured there was no better series of books to read than the notorious 50 Shades of Grey. Bitches been talking about that shit all over the goddamned place, twitterpated about whether Kristen Stewart is going to play the protagonist and OMG WHICH DICK WITH A MAN ATTACHED IS GOING TO PLAY CHRISTIAN GREY?!?!?! So OBV I had to check this out so I could continue to be a bastion of pop culture relevance to all you assholes. I read all three during my trip and was 100% weirded out that so many people enjoyed these books and were not straight up appalled by the implications of the story between the sexy parts. So here is my analysis of the series.
FIRST, the summary: Anastasia Steele is a mousy British Literature student in Washington state. She is a virgin, wears jackets from Wal-Mart, and is obsessed with 19th century literature which frames her entire lifeview. She meets super sexy 28 year old billionaire CEO Christian Grey who everyone thinks is gay but really just has a dark scary dom/sub lifestyle that he has to keep ubersecret. Christian wants Anastasia for his new plaything but actually falls in love with her and they fight and fuck their way through the entire series using methods such as spanking, restraint, vagina balls, and copious missionary sex. Christian has an abusive past and can only learn to love himself when Anastasia breaks him of his need to be a sexual deviant.
SECOND, Analysis:
THE SEX
The sex scenes are fun to read in the first book. They are kind of hot and let's be honest, any straight bitch is gonna want to get nailed by a guy who knows 15483409620 different ways to make a girl have an orgasm and also had BILLIONS OF DOLLARS and is also a sculpted Adonis with a huge dick. OBV we can all relate to this.
The second and third books, it gets a little boring. They have the same sex in different places: On boats, in cars, on beaches, in boathouses, elevators, in sex dungeon rooms, childhood bedrooms, etc etc.
But let us, for a moment more, dwell on the sex parts of the book. The protagonist pretty much has an orgasm every time Christian touches her. In one of the first scenes she climaxes from having her nipples played with for like, 90 seconds. She and her partner have mutual orgasms ever.single.time. they copulate.
Yeah.Fucking.Right.
I wanna hear about the times where they each spend like, 45 minutes trying to get the other one off and when both of them are unable to reach climax due to having consumed too many sausages and/or some latent genital insecurity they decide to watch Jimmy Fallon while eating ice cream out of the carton together and don't call each other out on the subsequent dairy farts that happen in the night. THAT is fucking love.
THE LEXICON
The author seems to have an extremely limited vocabulary when describing things. I cannot imagine this is an intentional facet of the characters' personality because, let us recall, the protagonist is OBSESSED with 19th century literature and you KNOW that bitches like Dickens are trying to use every single word in the goddamned dictionary. HOWEVER, she can only describe her own actions and even her own body in very limited terms.
The character uses the word "murmur" and "whisper" to describe how she communicates to everyone, but mostly Christian, almost 200 times EACH. She also mumbles, mutters, clambers, and pants with an alarming frequency.
She also has a VERY difficult time calling her body by its parts. Even after she is MARRIED to the guy, she refers to her VULVA, VAGINA, and BUTTHOLE (they never even do it in the butt, he puts his pinky back there in the second book and a skinny butt plug in the third. Boring.) as "there" "my sex" and "back there." She only ever refers to her lover's penis as "his manhood."
"I have pop-pop in the attic."
"Just the fact that you are calling it pop-pop means you aren't ready."
This is for real tho. If you cannot call your parts by what they are you are setting yourself up for an extremely uncomfortable doctor's appointment wherein you explain to your MD that you have "itchies in your hoo-ha."
ALTERNATIVE LIFESTYLES SO EVIL
I don't have a ton of research or experience to back this up, but from what little I have gleaned it seems that people who participate in and enjoy the sub/dom lifestyle are healthy and functional human beings who simple enjoy this type of sex as much as I enjoy the type of sex where I lay on my back and eat cookies and don't do any work. They aren't all doing it to exorcise childhood abuse demons, to take out on the other person a general hatred of their gender, or because they are sadists. It is simply another way to have adult fun with another human being who is consenting.
Of course, this notion is an affront the Anastasia's Victorian sensibilities (as well as to her subconscious who is anthropomorphized as wearing half-moon spectacles that she routinely glares up from and her inner goddess who is alternately doing complicated ballet moves or cowering behind a sofa...).
What a trained dominant would never do is subject a prudish virgin to a room full of instruments of submission and then expose him/her to mid-level sexplay without considering the emotional impact. Which is precisely what happens in this story and sets the tone for the rest of the book.
Speaking of which...
SCARY CONTROLLING MAN SEEKS SHEEPISH BRUNETTE TO YELL AT
This part is feministy. Get ready.
Christian Grey is a terrifying man. Not because he has sexual tastes not celebrated in the mainstream, but because of his extremely controlling and abusive behaviors. It is explained through the book that due to his childhood trauma he has to control everything or he comes apart and becomes a violent alcoholic who ruins everything good about life.
So, in this relationship he has with his girlfriend-wife-mother of his fucking CHILD he imposes multiple restrictions.
1. She does not get control over her own body. Period. She has to wear the prescribed clothes right down to her underwear. Even when he eases up on this one she feels pressured to do it anyway. Anastasia has to eat when told, is pressured to change her hairstyle and wear makeup, and despite her already thin composition is talked into considering a personal trainer.
She also has to get on birth control with him because he hates using condoms. Since sex is primarily about what the guy wants OBV altering her body chemistry is the only option. When her silly little ladybrain can't figure out how to use the pill correctly he switches her to the Depo shot. Never mentioned are the hormonal impacts of either of these methods, or how they change a woman's body. Never is she ASKED how she feels about this, nor is anything like the IUD suggested to her. And when her silly little ladybrain can't figure out the shots and she accidentally gets pregnant, she is not offered any options. She immediately gets an invasive trans-vaginal ultrasound and a picture of her baby and pre-natal vitamins. The doctor (hired by her husband with zero of Anastasia's input) does not do anything to talk her through the emotional repercussions of this life-changing event nor does she discuss abortion or adoption options. Later, when Anastasia finally mutters to Christian that she is pregnant, he abandons her while she is crying, goes and gets drunk and hangs out with his ex-girlfriend. Anastasia is expected to be OK with this and is also blamed for getting pregnant. In the epilogue Christian decides that she is to deliver her second child by scheduled cesarian, although Anastasia insists she wants to have a natural birth.
2. She is not allowed to drive her own car, and is often escorted around by Christian's manservant and other security detail. Christian insists this is for her own good and he just wants to keep her safe, but also gets SUPER pissed when she goes out for drinks with her best friend or doesn't call him to check in EVERY 15 MINUTES. Any attempt she makes to be independent of him is either thwarted or punished. She tries to get her own job, he buys the company. She visits her mother, he secretly goes along and stalks her. She sees her oldest friend's photography show, he makes her leave after only 30 minutes. This is reiterated by all the times Anastasia gets into sticky situations and Christian has to rescue her. Like, she would have died a few times had Christian not intervened. She will literally not survive without him.
3. Her entire self-worth is made or broken by Christian. When she disobeys him she is terrified he will leave her. She feels as though she has to push her sexual an emotional boundaries for him to continue to desire her. He does not accept her for who she is an continually tries to dictate and control her every move. There is a consistent mention of how she feels as though she cannot do anything without upsetting him. Throughout she shrugs off this behavior as just another part of her "Mr. Mercurial" whom she loves unconditionally but does not get that love in return. OBV she marries him. Even then, she is in constant fear that he will leave her.
This sounds like an extremely abusive situation and not a love story. The glossy sex scenes do not compensate for the scary codependence and gender stereotyping (be a virgin, marry your first lover, have his child, let him earn the money and give up your sad little ladycareer).
SO,
TL;DR: These books glamorize a codependent, emotionally abusive, and controlling relationship that glorifies typical gender roles and men acting as heads of house, companies, and relationships. Oh and there is some shower sex.
FIN.
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