Monday, September 21, 2015

No Gratuitous Sex or Violence in Killer Series

I was watching Strike Back on the CineMax channel last night, hoping for another chance to see Dustin Clare, but he wasn't anywhere to be seen. What I did see was a ridiculous sex scene between Damien Scott, (played by Sullivan Stapleton,) and the newest hottie actress on the show. But it was a ridiculous scene. The female character's friend had just been murdered, and the woman asks Damien Scott to promise she can get revenge on the murderer, after which she proceeds to have sex with him, as if she had forgotten that her friend had just been murdered.

It was completely gratuitous. It did not advance the plot in any way. Of course it showed the complete act, nudity and all, as if it were a soft core porn show. Talk about gratuitous, it was the definition of it. It made me think about how my own Killer series doesn't do that. There is sex and violence in the Killer stories, but every sex scene has a plot advancing purpose, and none of them are graphic. There's a lot more violence, but those scenes are every bit necessary.

The word gratuitous connotes the scenes are unnecessary or overdone. In Strike Back, the latest sex scene was unnecessary. In my Killer Series, the sex scenes are not unnecessary, nor gratuitous, nor overdone. I still don't recommend them to anyone under eighteen, however. And being a Middle School teacher, I'm forever reminding my students that the stories are for their parents, not them. They can read The Vase. There's no sex scenes in that story. And my WIP, Inside the Outhouse is a story I'm writing specifically for them. Can't wait for that one to get finished. Time to go to work.

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