One of the things that annoys me the most about most primetime television is the lack of sex. Don’t get me wrong: It’s not the lack of sex scenes that bother me; I’m not looking for cheap thrills in the 8:00 hour or anything. It’s the lack of sex that TV characters seem to be having that drives me absolutely bonkers.
Back in the day, long before I started writing about television, I was a huge fan of Ed. For those of you who need a refresher, Ed (Tom Cavanagh) came back to small town Ohio to woo his high school crush, Carol (Julie Bowen). It was a cute, funny show, but watching Carol reject Ed season after season drove me up the damn wall. The writers wanted us to believe that Carol still saw Ed as the dorky guy from high school. The problem with this is that it assumes that neither Carol nor the audience has eyes. Because Tom Cavanagh is hot.
Not only is Tom Cavanagh hot, but Ed is funny and sweet, and he owns a freakin’ bowling alley. Also, have you seen his eyes? Come on. For Carol to not see that for so long was completely unrealistic, because here’s the thing: When two single people spend that much time together, they have sex. They might not get married and have babies, but those two are going to bone at some point — and that point isn’t going to be in season six.
This is especially true if you are thrown into an intense situation, which is why — despite the smoke monsters, the hatch, the polar bears, the Others, or the freakin’ time travel — the thing about Lost that made the least sense to me is how everybody kept their clothes on.
If you crash on a desert island, the first thing you do is assess your likelihood of being rescued. The second thing you do is find food and shelter. The third thing you do — if you were on Oceanic flight 815 — is look around and go, “Holy shit. This is the most attractive group of people that has ever been assembled on a single airplane. Imma get my swerve on.”
Sure, Shannon and Sayid proved pretty quickly that they knew what was up, but it was ages before the triumvirate of adventurers, Jack, Sawyer and Kate, started getting busy. Sitting and watching them run around the jungle like assholes week after week was infuriating. All I wanted to do was yell at the TV. “You are all pretty! And single! And in a land of no responsibilities! Who gives a shit about the hatch???”
Comedic supergroup Garfunkel & Oates put the Lost problem perfectly in their song, “Why Isn’t There More Fucking on This Island?” (As the title suggests, the audio is very NSFW).
Lost‘s finale didn’t end the problem of course. Recent episodes of Castle have just gotten ridiculous. Castle and Beckett are both attractive. They are both (usually) single. They work closely together, yet neither of their careers is tied to the other, so a messy breakup actually wouldn’t be that catastrophic. Yet, for some reason, they have not gotten naked together.
I don’t have many hard and fast rules in my life, but here are a couple:
1. If I nearly freeze to death in a meat locker with an attractive gentleman with whom I am obviously in love, I will take that as a sign that the time to get down and dirty is nigh.
2. If, not even 24 hours later, I find myself a whisper away from dying with the same attractive gentleman in a nuclear explosion in midtown Manhattan, I will also see that as a sign that it’s time to stop playing hard to get. Because seriously. NUCLEAR EXPLOSION. What am I trying to prove?
These seem pretty reasonable to me. Yet, when Beckett and Castle find themselves in these very situations, not only do they not take a couple of personal days, fire up delivery.com and lock the door to Beckett’s apartment, but Castle can’t even get up the nerve to say that he likes her. WEAK.
This is why I love Community: they dispense with the bullshit. For most of season one, we had Jeff following Britta around like a little puppy dog. It was weird and borderline annoying — but THEN. Then the paintball episode happened, and Community actually did something that makes sense: Jeff and Britta had sex.
Why did Jeff and Britta have sex? LOOK AT THEM. Once again, they are two attractive, single people who spend a lot of time together. That’s all it takes. Was it the beginning of an epic romance? No. Because, let’s be honest: For most people, the number of times you’ve had awkward hookups in study rooms greatly outnumber the epic romances in your life. Community keeps it real.
What’s even better is that Jeff later realizes that Britta isn’t the only attractive lady in the group, so he makes out with Annie. Then he realizes it’s weird because she’s twelve. Everything about these peoples’ actions makes sense to me. After years of television characters making dumb decisions and acting as though they’re ugly, it’s so refreshing to see a group of characters acting like the pretty people they are. I only hope more shows follow their lead.
Clacked by Kona Gallagher 
on Mar 15, 2011 @ 13:54 EST5EDT
*puts on Lost nerd hat*
Ok, so you have to keep in mind that thre first three seasons all happened in about 2 or 3 months of on-island time, so it’s not like people were being abstinent for 3 years.
Plus, they didn’t find the hatch (and therefore a shower) until season two.
Then there was the whole get pregnant and die problem, and I don’t think there was an overabundance of Dharma brand condoms.
*take off hat*
Wow, I miss that show.
*POST AUTHOR*
Two or three months? They should have been getting it on after two or three DAYS. Plus, it was forever before they found out about the getting pregnant and dying thing. There is a lot of irresponsible sex that could have (and should have) happened in that time period.
One word: SAND
One grain, one stinkin’ grain can do more to promote abstinence than all the parental talks and school programs in the world.
. . . . .
I miss it too, Bob …
Plus, you know, Sawyer and Ana Lucia. And Nikki and Paulo.
But you’re right. More would have been more realistic.
But Bob’s right too. Things like Toothpaste, Showers, Shampoo and Deodorant would impact the equation.
More? I think it depends on the people. Some people have control of themselves and some people don’t, and everything in between.
Re: LOST – I think of the super handsome fellow on Survivor, that said that all he can think about is food, not, you know what.
If LOST would have focused more on that, I would not have watched. If folks want more of that, there are whole stores dedicated to that.
I’m just saying, fair madame, that I believe that more intimate relationships would have evolved in such a situation. Not necessarily that it would be a interconnecting web of relationships or anything, but I think people would become “couples” first, then evolve into small groups/cliques. We saw a little of that in the early episodes, but it happened much more quickly than I thought it would in real life.
Survivor is a much, much different story. These people are in a bubble. A very big, outdoor bubble, but they know, come what may, they’re not going to be stranded or starve, or whatever. The Lost survivors, I think would have been much more emotionally compressed together. Like you saw with Jack and Kate early on, but to a larger degree. And I think in a high stress situation like that, emotional compression like that would lead to intimate … erm … compression as well.
“Fair Madame” :) – I need to look for me pink parasol!
Might I refer you, good sir, to the aforementioned four-letter word I referenced. With regards to intimate relations it may be the most heinous of all four-letter words. Um…not that I know anything about it from personal experience, just what I’ve heard from “a friend.”
If I just survived a huge plane crash and there is a monster running around ripping the pilots apart. Deodorant and toothpaste wouldn’t deter me from one last spin around the frozen donkey wheel before I too got eaten by a polar bear.
Heck if it was a big deal to the other person I’d be tearing apart luggage to find some. Several people had to of packed that stuff as well as items that could reduce the chance of deathly pregnancy. Its something people pack when they go on vacation.
*POST AUTHOR*
Oh my god. “one last spin around the frozen donkey wheel” is my new favorite thing. Also, the future title of my memoir.
ROFL, good line. I wonder if you could get arrested for asking an undercover cop how much she’d charge for a spin around the frozen donkey wheel? Someone try it and report back.
They had the ocean to wash off in!! Or if the sand was a problem..have sex in the ocean!!
One word: jellyfish.
I think I’d rather deal with a grain of sand over getting tossed around in the rough surf. Plus the temperature of that ocean water can severely affect certain things. Just ask George Costanza.
. . . . .
“Why did Jeff and Britta have sex? LOOK AT THEM. Once again, they are two attractive, single people who spend a lot of time together. That’s all it takes.”
What? Ugly people can’t have sex … ?!?? *snort*
I was watching Barfly last evening (and if anyone reading this hasn’t seen the great Mickey Rourke in this film, run and do so … NOW!) and thought a lot of the same things – albeit in an entirely different manner – you’ve said in this post.
Nice post, Kona. Sometimes, we just can’t see the forest through the trees.
Well, IMO Chang and Shirley aren’t very attractive and they hooked up on the Halloween episode of Community. Community: Keeping it real.
Look, if ugly people didn’t have sex my kids wouldn’t be here. Hell, *I* wouldn’t be here, my parents wouldn’t be here, my grand…oh, you get the idea.
I don’t believe you ;)
You’re either very kind or very blind. ;o)
*POST AUTHOR*
You’re absolutely right in that obviously not only attractive people have sex. My point is more about the two people in question being on an even playing field. Being hot is generally a requirement of being a network TV star, so it’s annoying that shows constantly pretend that one hot character is out of another hot character’s league.
Being Human has a good amount of sex for characters who push other people away to keep them from getting hurt. Even Sally the ghost got some sweet makeouts in last night’s episode.
Only hot people should have sex, it’s better for the human race. It’s why I have so much sex. ;)
How I Met Your Mother is pretty good about people having sex. Barney has casual sex all the time. Robin had sex with Ted, Barney and Dan and it was implied she had sex with 5 other guys (who gave her dogs) before she met Ted. Lily and Marshall have been shown to be sexually active with each other and since they have never really dated anyone else that makes sense. Ted has slept with Victoria, Robin, Stella, and Zoe at the minimum. It is a pretty sex positive show.
Dean on Supernatural sleeps with lots of women, Sam doesn’t but having everyone you have slept with die, does put a damper on things.
On Vampire Diaries Damon has slept with practically everyone except Elena and Stephan has hit both Elena and Katherine. The rest of the cast are a bit chaste, but since they are supposed to be in high school, I’ll cut them some slack.
Admittedly TV is coy about sex, but some shows aren’t as bad.
*POST AUTHOR*
I agree with you on HIMYM. For the most part, they’ve done a great job with relationships on that show. We had the whole “will they or won’t they” thing with Ted and Robin, but they got it out of the way pretty quickly. That was great not only because it wasn’t dragged out and filled with false obstacles, but because when it was over, it freed up both of the characters to go in new directions. The “will they or won’t they” thing is limiting and gets stagnant really easily.
As a guy I have to give you big points on the Lost bit.If I was on an island with Claire(Emilie de Ravin) sex would always be on my mind!!That is one gorgeous woman.
But if you want to talk about a tv show for years with NO sex than you have to go with NCIS.About the only time there was sex was when Tony was under cover dating Jeanna Benoit *shudders*
Those Sawyer and Kate scenes were fabulous, serious chemistry, wish they had done that even more though.