50 Shades Darker: A Hilarious Watch-A-Long

Note: This is actually very old! Quite a while ago when I first watched this movie I found it so ridiculous that I narrated my reactions to my friends in real time. I rediscovered it recently and though it was still funny so here it is for posterity, hope it entertains somebody else as well. ;)

Part 1- Everybody Loves Ana

So the movie opens with stock scene number 5 of domestic abuse. It could be touching except it keeps getting interrupted by Jamie Dornan's prominently displayed naked chest and I think the director gave him the Disney Princess Guide To Having a Nightmare instead of direction.

Roll the credits which look like they belong in Alien 8 or a psychological thriller or something because there is this weird unidentified organic-looking matter in the background.

Oh, wait. It was meant to be a close-up of a white rose. Epic fail, movie - now you're just making me think of that absolutely ridiculous PSA about not missing your cervical smear which features a rose that looks like your private parts. Maybe it was intentional? Let me break it to you - roses that look like vaginas don't encourage people to go to the doctor and roses shot so closely that they look like the surface of alien monster pods aren't sexy or romantic.

Anyway, the movie starts for real with a montage of Ana moping about her breakup with Christian. It's as interesting as it sounds. In fact, Ana herself looks incredibly bored with her own drama.

Ana's new boss is, of course, improbable levels of attractive and, of course, he can't stop staring at her ass.

The movie wastes no time in establishing that EVERYBODY IN THE WORLD is obsessed with Ana when she goes to her stock-best-friend-with-a-crush-on-her's photo exhibition and realises that pretty much all the photos are of her. The horror.

Part 2 - A Woman's Right to Quinoa Salad

Ana and Christian trying to emulate the trademark Twilight stare doesn't quite work on account of the fact that Bella and Edward looked like they were going to vomit and Ana and Christian look like they just farted and are feeling very awkward about it.

It's the second movie so poor Jamie has finally realised what he's gotten himself into (in all fairness, it wasn't THAT clear from the first movie which I actually thought was passable considering the source material) and he has lost all ability and incentive to act. Dakota is valiantly still kind of trying as much as the script allows her. She'll never be as bad as Christine Stewart so that's something. Jamie however is giving Robert Pattinson a run for his money.

On one hand, I get it - the boys both hated what they were doing. On the other hand, if you cannot get over how superior you feel to the source material, don't take the job. Follow the example of more humble actors like Hugh Jackman who is 100% committed regardless of what absolute nonsense he has to perform and it shows and he's respected for it. In fact, if we had Hugh Jackman as Christian this movie would still be bad but it would be adorably bad.

Anyway, moving on.

Christian wants Ana back but Ana is a strong independent woman who can choose to change her order from steak to quinoa salad if she wants to dammit!!

To this adaptation's credit, I don't hate movie Ana. I thought she was all right in the first one and she hasn't given me too much reason to hate her in this one yet either. If anything, she comes off as both the more sensible and the more in control out of the two of them in both movies. In fact, the dynamics here so far seem more like a whiny child and his older sister than ex-lovers. And reading just from their expressions, I can't help but imagine that the silent dialogue between the actors goes something like:

Dakota: Dude, it's your line.

Jamie: ... I have no clue what my line is.

Dakota: Come on, man, really?

Jamie: I'm sorry, I got piss drunk while I was reading the script.

Dakota: OMG, Jamie, get over yourself, you're at work. A little professionalism, please, for Pete's sake!

Seriously, watch it and see if this doesn't fit perfectly pretty much every time they start staring at each other.

Part 3 - 50 Shades of Non-Smudge Lipstick!

Oh, wow! The movie got a giggle out of me INTENTIONALLY! Like, once. But still. Waiter interrupting deep conversation by slowly opening wine was fun. Moving on.

Christian: My birth mother died when I was four. She was an addict. Crack. You can fill in the blanks.

No, no, Jamie, honey, you don't get it. We know your tragic backstory is as generic as it gets but you still have to tell it. I'm sure 'You can fill in the blanks' was just a note from the writers telling you to improvise because they couldn't be bothered either, not a literal line.

Okay, seriously though, HOW rich is Christian Grey because this is hilarious. "Oh, I bought an airline. Oh, I'm buying the publishing business you work for." That's not a live-action character, it's Scrooge McDuck! I expect him any moment to go "Ana, it's time I showed you my OTHER play room... the one where I swim in a giant pool of gold coins!"

And here we come to the first sex scene and at least for the first half minute of it, this is NOT how a woman's anatomy works. Also, repetitive dialogue is repetitive.

Jamie: What do you want, Anastasia.

Dakota: Um, no, Jamie, you already said that line. Like, literally a few seconds ago. And I already said I wanted you. It's the whole reason our characters are here right now participating in this anatomically improbable soft-porn sequence... Okay, I guess I'l reiterate, then? I want all of you? Like, in case there was any confusion?

Christian (later): Why do you think you waited to have sex?

Ana: I was reading Austen and Bronte and I guess nobody ever measured up to that.

You wanted your SEX LIFE to measure up to the writings of Austen and Bronte? Um...

Anyway, Ana and Christian bicker about him not letting her touch him and being generally a weird possessive a-hole who employs his own secret service to spy on girls. This leads to what I'm sure will be hailed by future generations as one of the most emotionally charged romantic scenes of our generation.

(The following is not actual dialogue but it says something that I have to clarify this.)

Christian: I guess I need to learn to be vulnerable in front of you and open up about my trauma.

Ana: Okay, sounds cool, how?

Christian: (deadpan face) You're gonna draw a square on my chest. With lipstick.

Ana: Okay, that's not... It's so hard to take you seriously right now. (Dakota as herself) I'm not getting paid enough for this...

Moving on, the couple is preparing for a party and nothing happens except for the overly long introduction of a randomly selected sex toy which the author thought was cool and the incredibly brief and equally pointless introduction of a gay Italian hairdresser who comes to the house to do a fairly basic bun on Ana's head. Was that necessary? You're a big girl, Ana, you can do a bun.

On to the party we go and there's a creepy guy there taking a photo OF A PHOTO of Christian's family. Why??? They're filthy rich and famous, I'm sure you can find that online!

Anyway, nothing really happens. Ana meets Christian's old dominatrix/MILF and mouths off to her even though, honestly, the woman makes a couple of good points. They go home.

And now, are you ready for this? HOURS LATER after they've been to a party (to which he wore a white shirt), they've had sex and now they're back to his place and taking a shower HE STILL HAS THE LIPSTICK SQUARE ON HIS CHEST! What brand is this because I want it! It must be some amazingly non-smudgy stuff! And why did he not wipe it off? I thought it was symbolic. Is he really going to redraw lipstick lines on his chest every day to mark his no-touch zone?

Obviously creepy boss who obviously wants to get into Ana's pants acts obviously creepy with her and demonstrates that he wants to get into her pants. Suddenly, Ana's intimidated, even though he's pretty much been like this from the start and he's much less scary than Christian. I'm not blaming a girl for getting scared while being sexually harassed but this just seems out of character and serves NO purpose other than trying to make Christian look good. Anyway, she - deservedly but unnecessarily since there were, in my opinion, easier ways out of the situation - kicks her boss in the balls and runs into Christian's arms.

The movie briefly and abruptly switches genres to a Disney teen comedy when Ana has to take her fired boss's place at a senior editors' meeting and impresses everyone by saying something utterly unimpressive. She is then hired for a position she is completely unqualified for.

This movie has more plots (although much less sex) than Game of Thrones and yet nothing at all happens.

Also, watching it you'd think Anastasia Steele will have an orgasm if you so much as sneeze near her.

Out of this entire insanity, here's what annoys me: Christian's suddenly crazy ex-sub whom I haven't mentioned until now because that plot wasn't going anywhere in a hurry shows up at Ana's apartment with a gun and Ana handles it much more calmly than when a coworker was being a sleazeball. Maybe I'm alone in this but this right here is my biggest problem with representation of women in the film so far. A jackass who's trying to grope you but not threatening your life in any way is NOT more intimidating than a crazy girl with a gun who has a personal vendetta against you just because he's male. We have a woman taking another woman less seriously than a man. And then afterwards what she's upset about is not that she nearly got shot but that she might not be the right kind of girlfriend for Christian. Ana should get her priorities straight.

Part 4 - The Movie's Inability to Stick to a Plot Gets Worse but Then It Mercifully Ends

This film wins the award for most completely random events that lead nowhere. We're two thirds of the way in and we've gotten rid of two separate completely unrelated villains. Now Christian asks Ana to move in. Then he asks her to marry him. Then it's almost his Birthday. Then he's in a helicopter crash and goes missing ... for about a minute. SERIOUSLY, WHAT WAS THE POINT?? Ana barely has any time to even look worried before he walks into the room completely unharmed. And his family who are there and have thought he might be dead until a second ago hug him once and then they're like 'Okay, well, you're alive, guess we'll be on our way, then. See ya.'

So anyway, she says she'll marry him via a cheap key chain she got him for his birthday. What? I get that it's supposed to be cute but it's just really random. Then they get into the shower to have sex and as soon as they're in she's like 'Take me to the red room!'. And poor Christian is probably like 'Seriously? Now? You couldn't say ten seconds ago when we weren't soaked?'

He spends five minutes cuffing her and immediately uncuffs her for no reason. Does anything in this movie have a point? And then they have normal sex but with a blindfold. So... why did this have to happen in the red room?

Moving on, it's Christian's birthday party and - because we didn't have enough villains in this movie - Hot Dom MILF is now swearing revenge. She gets a drink in her face and a slap from Christian's mom who has ONLY NOW realised her son used to sleep with her friend when he was a kid. This is very last-minute drama and, of course, it goes nowhere.

Then Christian proposes properly with a ring on a glass floor over a pool full of flowers or something. Okay but we don't really care, they're engaged already, they even announced it to everyone. Then there's fireworks and we end on Ana's creepy ex-boss creepily watching them from afar and burning a hole through the photo-of-the-photo of Christian and his family. OH NO! WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT?

And this, my friends, has been 50 Shades Darker. Truly the movie with the worst attention span I've ever seen! If you've read this to the end at least now you can be up-to-date without having to watch it. Have a great day!