[BOOK SPOILERS] Sexuality in GOT Part Two

[Xenophon]

Seriously, what was up with that scene? Is Robert supposed to not know that his baby brother is going steady with flower boy, or is he just being an a-hole, and baiting Renly?

Well, it's not impossible. Plenty of gay men have slept with women before realizing they aren't built that way. Also, Renly could go both ways, and for all we know he and Loras aren't exclusive (he does get married later on, after all).

Robert might well know that Renly and Loras are an item but just assumes that Renly has other lovers on the side including women. After all, sleeping with tons of women is a self-evident good in his books. Westeros doesn't seem to have much of a concept of sexual orientation anyway, so I can imagine that Robert thinking that Renly generally likes women, but really likes Loras. Stannis is a bit more shrewd, with his joke about how Margaery is likely to die a virgin.

[Ser_not_appearing_yet]

I've always assumed Robert knew in the same way Stannis knew. Homosexuality didn't exist in the modern format during medieval times, there was no 'gay identity', just men who sometimes fucked men. I assume Robert knows about Renly's sexual proclivities but doesn't get how it would stop him from sleeping with women too.

[The Anti-Targ]

I've always assumed Robert knew in the same way Stannis knew. Homosexuality didn't exist in the modern format during medieval times, there was no 'gay identity', just men who sometimes fucked men. I assume Robert knows about Renly's sexual proclivities but doesn't get how it would stop him from sleeping with women too.

Yeah, I imagine to a womanising lecher like Bob to not fancy women in the slightest is simply beyond comprehension. Whereas while it's not his thing, I'm sure Bob can appreciate mano-a-mano being one of many sexual appetites that can coexists within one person.

As far as Ros' training day is concerned, that scene was a step furhter than I care to see in my dramatic TV series. HBO are really pushing the boundary here, there's only a paper thin line between where HBO have gone with that scene and "official" pronography. One wonders if HBO are going to try to do a true genre mash-up at some stage, a dramatic TV series that is actual porn, i.e. not simulated sex scenes but actual sex. Seems like HBO haven't got much further they can push with simulated sex.

[Xenophon]

As far as Ros' training day is concerned, that scene was a step furhter than I care to see in my dramatic TV series. HBO are really pushing the boundary here, there's only a paper thin line between where HBO have gone with that scene and "official" pronography. One wonders if HBO are going to try to do a true genre mash-up at some stage, a dramatic TV series that is actual porn, i.e. not simulated sex scenes but actual sex. Seems like HBO haven't got much further they can push with simulated sex.

Yeah, that scene didn't just feel porny, it was porn, nipple-sucking and all. Despite having been warned, I was still amazed by how far (and how pointlessly) HBO is pushing the envelop.

More generally, what do people think of "sexposition" as a technique? It's now become a pretty distinctive part of the GoT style. Personally, I think the whole sex = politics concept behind it is fairly interesting and true to the spirit of the books. But I think they've used it far too many times. It was clever with Viserys and Renly/Loras, IMO, but it didn't really add much with Tyrion or Theon, and I found Ros actually distracting from LF's backstory.

[Lady Blackfish]

I read over the locked Nudity and Sexuality thread and the I'm Sick of Ros thread to catch myself up a bit on the discussion that's been going on here on the board about this, but I'm trying to spread my limited time out over a number of threads so I skimmed stuff. Hopefully I won't be beating any dead horses too much.

I think sexuality on the show is pretty spotty. Sometimes it's enjoyable/acceptable, rarely is it brilliant, and on occasion it's truly terrible. I fastforwarded through the episodes on my DVR and jotted down the relevant scenes to comment on, hopefully I'm not forgetting anything:

Episode 1

Tyrion and Ros: I thought this was fine, silly slurping aside. It was an acceptable way to introduce a character in a way that's true to his characterization (Tyrion is capital H Horny) and the sexiness came across to me as very purposeful without being excessive (it can be done). It was light-hearted, and that's fine for season one Tyrion. I find it kinda weird that Jaime would bring Tyrion whores after the whole Shae thing, but that's more about character and not about sexuality.

Viserys and Dany: The undressing and nipple caressing was played for shock factor, which I think actually suits Viserys. But ass shots were really blatantly gratuitous and if you compare it to Esme Bianco's nudity in the Tyrion scene before it you can see a real difference in how natural it comes across (not very natural at all).

Ned and Cat: I just want to take this chance to point out that they could have done something different for Hollywood and showed older people being sexually active and showed the intimacy (and actually maybe some deeper issues) of the relationship. That's a relationship that the TV show is actually asking us to care about, and that the book did too, unlike the scenes where naked women were given expanded roles to help cover up lengthy exposition. They could have had sex and/or nudity that was very naturalistic and all in all normal, and all they had to do was decide that you don't have to be 20 year old models to be naked on TV. But they passed.

Dany and Drogo: I don't know how I feel about how this scene was rewritten. It's obviously different from the wedding night in the book, but TBH I was never comfortable with the reading of Drogo and Dany as romantic except through the eyes of a young girl who just didn't know any better. Seeing it as commentary on Dany's psychology keptit from being a cheap boddice-ripper type scene in the book, but the show played this relationship as straight up romance that started with some rape. It was also unnerving to see Dany go from frightened to trying to please Drogo more for her safety than anything else to cuddly wuddly in the next episode. Probably this scene had a lot of discussion so I don't know what else I could add that's probably not already said. It made me feel sorry for Dany and I'm glad that they didn't play this scene for titillation (although that should be common sense), but I get why the change bugged people.

Jaime and Cersei: I think they probably did it doggy style because Lena was pregnant? I don't think the changes took away anything too important and it was necessary that that scene was shocking in an explicitly sexual way. I was fine with it.

Episode 2

For all that I felt like Dany's lesbian scenes were the most fan-servicey in the books, this one where she gets some sex pointers is not one of the scenes that bugs me the most from the TV show so far. The sensuality worked to show you Dany's burgeoning sense of sexuality. I don't have anything to add to the Dany and Drogo part that I didn't already mention above, it weirds me out how seemingly quickly they move on to the cuddle stage, but the sex itself was done well.

Episode 4

I think Viserys and the handmaiden was the first time the sex felt blatantly, how are we calling it these days? Sexposition? I will say that I was pretty forgiving of it the first time.

Episode 5

Theon and Ros: It's in-character sexposition that could have been accomplished in season two. I do like knowing that the show finds Theon interesting enough to give him air time now, because I think Theon's a great character, but I also think they have to time wisely when they give attention to whom, and technically I think we could've done without this scene. Which is not to say that I require a good enough reason for sex to be shown at all, sex can be shown merely for sex's sake and that's fine by me. But I don't want them to cut really important or valuable scenes for non-canon sex either. The fact that it's a sex scene with a character invented wholly by HBO to have sex scenes (or show off her vag), well, it did not go unnoticed by me.

Loras and Renly: I did find it a touch too campy and cliched. Manscaping? But on the other hand I'm very happy to see the relationship shown more directly. I cannot believe that this scene caused more furor than all the ubiquitous Ros, at least Loras and Renly are two fairly important non-POV characters and at least their relationship is present in the books and at least depiction of a happy homosexual relationship is a worthwhile use of television time. The slurping was still silly.

Episode 7

The girl-on-girl scene with Littlefinger: possibly the worst scene of this entire show. Oh my sweet Jesus, it was terrible. The amount that it did for Littlefinger's characterization in no way mitigates the blatant porno-esque quality of the scene enough, and the sex does more to damage the character beats than enhance them. The screaming was just silly, Gillen's delivery was just not good enough, and the idea of him telling his employees about his great tragic romance is out of character. Giving away the information also takes a lot of the fun mystery and subtlety from Littlefinger, and it solidifies his association with whores and brothels more than his other enterprises. It's like taking bits of canon and paying attention most to the parts that enable the gratuitous girl on girl sex and nudity. The sex wasn't there for to help the exposition, the exposition was there to justify the sex. At this point in time I'm thoroughly sick of Ros.

Some people have been arguing that those objecting to any of the sex scenes are just not comfortable with televised sex or nudity. For me, it's not that. I want the sex to have some naturalism, explicit porn-like shots just make me feel like somebody is using this series to show off naked hot people, and we only have ten episodes a season! There is no way I'm going to find that justified! I like when movies and television do interesting things with the depiction of sexuality, and I think the right approach could find that with most of Martin's sex scenes too. But they aren't taking that kind of approach, they aren't going about this from an "Oh human sexuality is pretty fascinating!" angle. Sometimes they are playing it for sexiness in a way that I find tasteful and useful enough, if not particularly breakthrough (Ros and Tyrion, Dany and her handmaiden, Renly and Loras). Other times it's clearly because they can't or won't think of more creative ways to get across exposition. And sometimes it's like my intelligence is being underestimated because they think I won't see how obviously cheap the scene is (and it is sometimes really that obvious).

It says something that I'm as okay as I am with the Dany and handmaiden scene. Those were probably some of my least favorites in the books, yet it's one of the less annoying ones on the show. I think they're missing some opportunities to do really interesting things with the depiction of human sexuality on television, and instead using up their time for less worthwhile and innovative things.

In the show so far, these scenes are framed in an intentionally lurid way that, IMO, undermines the naturalism and normalcy that the author intended.

Or in short, what Dinas said in the previous thread.