Spoiler alert - You might want to give R100 a miss

The cover of a DVD going on release this week has a by-line that might pique your curiosity - "Scenes of whipping, punching, slapping, choking, kicking and beating".    Something for everyone, one might think.

Alas, no.   R100 is not quite like that.

All the action is centered on a Japanese business man, whose wife is in a death coma, who pays for a one year subscription to "The Dungeon Club" - one rule of which there are no early cancellations.   So, from time to time, he is leaped up at random by female dominatrices, who, in the main, kick the hell out of him, kung fu style.   One crushes his sushi to an inedible mush - but she is an exception.

So unless you relish watching a Japanese guy being publicly  humiliated to the limits of his tolerance, you are not likely to get many jollies from this extraordinary piece of art.    And, for a mere spanko fan, it gets worse.

The SM scenes are filmed in colors so washed out that they are almost in black an white:  to heighten the unreality of all that is going on.

And - according to some in depth reviewers - those scenes never really happen.   They are there merely to depict the way in which stronger recreational drugs can cause havoc to one's life.   A theory with some merit, for as the film goes on, the episodes get wilder and wilder in content - pretty much the same way a brain can get addled on too much of the good stuff.   And a theory that explains why the plot persistently falls apart in ways that seem quite random, at first sight.

So - unless David Lynch's works were far too mellow for you, and the sight of a high kicking dominatrix hits one of your major buttons - you might want to give this one a miss.    The makers did put on the warning label - "No one under 100 will be admitted": which accounts for the R100 rating.

You couldn't make this one up

As a writer of spanking fiction, I have imagined more than one rather odd set up in my time.   But sometimes life has a way of coming up with an event almost beyond belief.   The following is copied as printed in the Washingon Post:

A Florida father looking to punish his daughter without committing a crime had a deputy come supervise him spanking her, police said.

The father’s 12-year-old daughter had gotten into a heated argument with her sister, and the father wanted a deputy to come supervise him disciplining her, according to the Okeechobee County Sheriff’s Office.

A deputy supervised the spanking, determined no crime had been committed, and left, police said.

“You are entitled to paddle your child, whether you use your hands, use a belt, or use a paddle — as long as you’re paddling the buttocks,” Undersheriff Noel Stephen stated.

Police said the seemingly bizarre request is nothing new. Officer Stephen said he personally has supervised a dozen spankings.

“It happens,” he told the station. “It’s definitely not something we advertise to do, and even though law enforcement has been willing to help out in this situation, watching a parent discipline their child is something that’s done only when a deputy has no other calls to handle.”

There are a number of reasons I could not have come up with this in a tale:  for starters, I never write about young kids getting spanked.   And like most spankos. I have a natural aversion to any form of corporal punishment being administered to youngsters.    But even if I had been writing about, say, a sixteen yea old, I would never have dreamed of adding a supervising police officer to the tale.

Reality seems to go out of its way, at times, to trump fiction.   And the laws of our land do often assist in coming up with some rather strange motives to ensure our acts remain strictly legal.

What the Heck! Where was Sue's spanking?

The sitcom "The Middle" is a fairly successful sit com, running on ABC.   It revolves around the mis-adventures of the Heck family, each member having their own peculiar quirk to give rise to chuckles in various comedic set-ups.

Sue Heck is the middle daughter of the family and is invariably insanely cheerful no matter what mishap.

Until last night's episode.   The plot had her allow a large gang of rowdy teens hold an impromptu rave in the quarry that her father supervises.   (Not a well-paying job, for they seem to spend their lives in abject poverty to a degree that social services really ought to take a look at them...)

The reason the gaggle got access was that Sue let them misuse the keys temporarily in her possession.  She had not planned such a party, but was instrumental in it taking place.  Sue's cheerful nature completely deserted her, and in one scene writhed on the floor in tearful, wailing shame of what she had done.

Her dad was right royally furious.   Machinery could have been turned on - with all sorts of bad consequences.   The terrain was so fractious that a serious accident could have taken place.  He could have lost his job.   When discussing the matter with her mother, he opined that a six-month grounding was in order.

During the night, Sue continued to push letters of abject apology under her parent's bedroom door - and her sentence slowly reduced to a six week grounding.   On appeal, Sue had it increased back to eight weeks, on the grounds that six was too lenient.   The narrator revealed that after four weeks, everyone forgot about it and things drifted back to normal.

So - it is not my script and I have no jurisdiction in such matters - but, what the hell - where was the spanking?

It had been stated in passing in a prior episode that the Heck parents had never spanked their kids - but if ever an exception was screaming to be excepted, this was it.   A mid teen girl wracked with guilt needing a punishment that would bring instant forgiveness and closure - a perfect set up for the "there is going to be a spanking" segment of a narrative.

And think of the fun that could be had with the negotiating over the actual details of the chastisement.   Number, implement, position, place, and so on and so on.    Even, say, that as a matter of compromise, it was finally agreed that half he spanks were to be delivered on a pair of clothed buttocks and the rest on a bare bottom.    (Not that any of the actual beating would be on screen, mind you - this is a PG sitcom, not a Mood Pictures video).

But our gallant writers, not realizing that spanking has gone mainstream, missed a glorious chance to add another amusing tid-bit to the arsenal of modern tv spankings.

Ah well.   Perhaps next time.

Galavant-ing

Between 8 and 9 million Americans watched the first episode of the new multipart extravaganca "Galavant" but only about half of them returned to watch episode two.   Set in medieval Englnd, knights and royalty have a royal skit and song romp over all the cliches that might be seen in more somber movies.   So we have a show that has British eccentricity AND corny musical numbers that is failing to hold its own?   How can that be?

Well, there are two main styles of TV comedy: the humor that can be harvested when one or more silly people are placed in serious settings, and when one or more serious people are placed in silly settings.   Dad's Army had a squad of eccentrics facing up to Hitler's war machine - and Black Adder had Rowan Atkinson as a deadly realistic aristocrat in attendance at an insane version of Elizabeth I's court.   Both were full of British eccentricity, and each were received by wild acclaim.

So why the big difference?   In a word - gravitas.   It is almost an unwritten law in British comedy that the comedians do not indicate in any way that they know that they are in a comedy.   Basil Fawlty - certifiably insane in real life - was played by a grim faced John Cleese who acted as if he was being perfectly natural in all the crazy things he did.   And he pulled it off.   (In a Harry Potter cameo, as a ghost, he smirked knowingly at his own presence on the set, and thus came over as a self parody.)

The cast of Galavant smirk, wink and giving knowing nods to the camera to make it quite clear that nothing is to be taken seriously, particularly their presence in the episode.   And I am willing to bet that that lack of gravitas will be the unwinding of what could easily have been a great production.

So - dear would-be spanking author - what has this got to do with you in your career to become the richest spanking author of all time?

Well, I would advise that your stories - even those wild over-the-top laugh-aloud frolics - should be written with dead-pan seriousness when dealing with character action and dialogue.  

For instance, if you watch spanking videos, you will have learned that those studios who present spankings as realistically as possible tend to thrive, while those whose scripts are full of unrealistic touches tend to fall by the wayside.  

The reason for the spanking can be quite ludricous - Flight Officer Fennington got a right royal caning in video where the beating was part of her training to be a British spy.   The silliness of the set up was forgiven though the acting - and the realism of the actual spanking.

Those studios that work with well crafted scripts have a huge advantage over those where the performers are expected to ad-lib though their performances.   It is easy to act to a script in an earnest manner, but almost impossible to wing it.   Which means, I would opine, even a poorly written script is better than no script at all.

So - back to the chase - if you want to write spanking fiction that is more likely to resonate with your readers than turn them off - the more serious your characters are, the more likely your tale will be received with acclaim.

You might get away in Chapter One of your spanking epic with a recipient of a hearty spank reacting with a knowing smirk:  but be aware that the numbers arriving to read Chapter Two might have significantly dwindled.   Even Megan - in one of my charming comedy series (advt.) - always acts as if she is being perfectly rational:  which tends to add to the humor, not weaken it.

The producers and directors of Galavant knew precisely what they were doing by having such a large amount of "look at me - aren't I being silly" reaction shots in their comedy.   The mistake they made was that they thought that such devices would enhance the experience, not be such a turn off to the average viewer.