What I've Binged: Fifty Shades Edition

The other day I saw the trailer for the third installment in the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy and realized I hadn't seen the first or second.  Not sure if watching two films in a trilogy on the same day qualifies as a binge but I'll allow it. I haven't read the books and I won't so I don't know how much was changed or condensed in the films but like it's progenitor, Twilight, it raises so many questions. 

Anastasia Steele meets Christian Grey because she steps in to interview him for her sick friend.  She lives in Portland, he's in Seattle, that's a  3 hour drive in each direction.  She's a really good friend, I guess, especially because she's got finals coming up and that is a good chunk of time to spend helping out a sick friend. Sure, sure.  All the women working for Christian Grey are really attractive and all have specific bodies and wear super high heels, what kind of telecommunications company is this? Also, it looks cold in there and I saw no cardigans.  Okay.   The interview is awkward and suggestive (on his part), but fine, she's majoring in English lit not journalism. They are both intrigued right away and the light stalking begins.

Before we get to that can we discuss Jamie Dornan?  Charlie Hunnam was originally cast as Christian Grey but I don't see him in this role.  I've watched a season or two of Sons of Anarchy and Hunnam can do intensity and sex on screen but this specific kind of kink, I don't know if he can pull it off.  I may be biased by Dornan's role in The Fall, where he plays a mild mannered therapist by day and sadistic serial killer by night.  

The sex, when he asks her what she likes and she says she doesn't know because she's never done anything and she's a virgin, I yelled "WHAT".  Nothing wrong with being a virgin at the age of 21/22, but like she's never made out with or had a heaving petting session with a guy before? Again, sure, sure.  What made me raise my eyebrows more was her reasoning, after reading Jane Austen novels no guy ever matched those expectations.  STOP IT.  As a English literature major myself, I can tell you that there is nothing that happened, in say, Wuthering Heights (Charlotte Bronte) that made me long for my own Heathcliffe on the moors and ruined all real dudes for me.  

Here's a running list of thoughts I had watching these movies (not distinguishing between the two): 

Loud cackle at the line: "I don't make love, I fuck" har-dee har har 

How could she afford that apartment on a editorial assistant salary? Even as a share? 

She was using a flip phone before he gave her an iPhone. 

Why didn't they take a trip to the Aspen house? 

The danger from Leila didn't have a lot of bite or make much sense

Jack's (Ana's boss) sudden come-on and it's ferocity was like "boy that escalated quickly"

How is Ana the default editor when it is clear the other girl has been there longer or is she an intern? And they only had one fiction editor?! Like not even a junior editor? 

Why is he (Jack) a stalker now and not getting litigious when he knows her boyfriend is a billionaire? What's the end game with that? Like how do you go from being a spurned super creep with a bruised ego to full on stalker? (Yes, I know this will be addressed in the new movie) 

This is a misuse of Marcia Gay Harden

What did Rita Ora do to deserve that haircut in the first movie? 

She's okay with him just showing up in Savannah when she's with her mom? 

Stalk much? Very similar to Edward/Bella situation. 

Yes, to calling out Christian's "relationship" with Elaine (Kim Basinger) as abuse since it started when he was 15 

Why/How is Jose still friends with her? She  curved him hard, let Christian yell at him and then ignored his calls and texts days after.  She abandoned him at his art show after she agreed to go to dinner to celebrate. To have dinner with someone she broke up with.  Is he supposed to be holding out hope after showing his own obsession with her? Victor Rasuk deserves better.  (really watch him in Raising Victor Vargas, currently streaming on Hulu 

What's the deal with her friend Kate/Katie? She's dating Christian's brother but didn't she also just graduate from college? Homegirl isn't working and can still afford to live in that apartment with Ana? 

How much time has elapsed between these films? Weeks or months?

Christian Grey is only turning 27? And there are fireworks for his birthday, every year? 

Jamie Dornan should have a beard, always, stubble minimum

From a helicopter crash to the red room in just a few hours? For real tho? Like no mild concussion or trauma? Cool, cool 

Is it weird that I found the sex a little uneventful? That bit with the bar cuffed to her legs was interesting.  but overall meh

Happy that her pleasure seemed central even though she's the submissive. 

Oh she's going to marry him, without asking him to get therapy for the night terrors?
Or the fact that he wants to punish women that look like his mother?  Super healthy

These movies are fine, like basic cable on a rainy day fine.  These are not date movies. Please don't take your date to see the newest release on Valentine's Day.  These aren't  romantic movies. Would I watch it again, sure, when I find it on basic cable on a day when I have nothing to do.  I'm not pining to find my own Christian Grey.