Month: June 2019

My Wife and I: Body Swap with Heart!

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Link to Film

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Now FREE on Amazon Prime, a new body swap comedy with well-developed characters who delve deep into their relationship issues via a magical body swap. Now, to get right into the TG elements we all love so much– yes, the man in his wife’s body has to experience the things that women go through– make-up, heels, hosting a bachelorette party– and much of this is played as broad comedy. It is fun, and the actors do a great job embodying their roles!

Where the film goes deeper than most broad comedy body swap comedies is in the exploring of the relationships not only between the husband and wife, but their two teen-age children as well. The relationship between the married couple is terrible as the film starts and heading toward divorce, but it isn’t the same old same old. The wife, a successful executive, resents her husband for embracing what she sees as a career of mediocrity while also being the “fun” parent the kids like. She meanwhile is stuck being the major bread winner and the tough Mom. The father, meanwhile, questions whether his wife even loves him and, true to male type, is not a good listener. When they argue, which they do a LOT and LOUD, we see how it impacts their kids. and it is not good.

As they experience life in each other’s bodies, they start to learn about each other, coming to understand not just their partner, but they also learn things about themselves. All of this unfolds gradually and artfully throughout the movie. Again, super well-acted and very moving in certain scenes.

Oh, and back to the TG elements, we do get to see the guy gradually accepting a female role learning to do make-up, helping his daughter deal with feminine issues, and even, spoiler alert– deciding to see what it’s like in the sack! I won’t tell you how that turns out, but this is a good movie worth watching! Oh, and just a as bonus, once he starts getting used to dresses, heels and make-up, the guy is super hot!

Check it out!

If you don’t have Prime, get it for FREE for 30 days!

Black Mirror (spoilers)

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Pom Klementieff, who plays Karl’s female avatar.

Does role-playing change us, or simply reveal us?

In the recently released episode Striking Vipers, Black Mirror finally plunges into the murky world of online gender cross playing– and I do mean finally! In this episode, two college buddies enjoy playing a video fighting game much like Mortal Combat. They each have a favorite character. Danny always plays Lance, while his friend, Karl, prefers to play a female character named Roxette. Neither finds this problematic.

Until a fully immersive version of the game becomes available. In this new version, the players find themselves inhabiting the bodies of the characters they play– and even experience the physical sensations. Jumping into the game, Danny once more plays Lance, and Karl, Roxette. Karl jokes about what its like to have boobs, and the two start fighting. Soon, the sexual tension simmering beneath their play- fighting turns to making out, and eventually hot, steamy sex.

The show explores how this impacts them and their relationships, both with each other and their wives/lovers. They question whether they are really cheating, wonder if they are gay. Danny, in particular, struggles, as he is a married man with kids. His suburban life bores him. Is he living a lie?

Each man discovers he is more fluid than he imagined, but that their sexual attraction exists only online– at least the physical side. Karl rhapsodizes about how much he enjoys the female orgasm, but he can’t get that in real life. Meanwhile, it is interesting to me that Danny’s wife is named Theo, drawing the gender fluidity out further. I don’t want to give away the specific ending, but once the men have opened up Pandora’s Box, let’s just say there in no going back. I feel what the show suggests it is not so much that the online gender bending changes them, but simply allows them to express a part of themselves that was always repressed.

Most people, in my opinion, are many genders, but society works very hard to make us comform to a specific notion of biological gender. This episode there is a little girl and guy in everyone just waiting for a chance to get out.

Check it out on Netflix!

AFK Series (spoilers!)

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Short Review

Love it! Go watch it right now! https://www.afkwebseries.com/home

Longer Review

AFK starts with the premise that a bunch of people who play an online role-playing game find themselves trapped in the game as their avatars. This, happily, leads to a lot of fun gender exploration that goes a little beyond the things we’ve seen before (TWSB).

In the world of the familiar, we do have a womanizing bro who finds himself trapped as a petite Asian “warrior princess” initially wearing a chain mail bikini. The actress who plays “him” does a great job depicting a guy in a naturalistic way, and the character is well-written– hiding his former gender out of shame, struggling to deal with male attention and sexual assault.

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In addition, we have the less common female trapped as a male– and though she is not explored as fully, there are some very fun scenes dealing with her discomfort over having male anatomy.

Most interesting of all, though, is a character who refuses to reveal their real world biological gender, telling anyone who asks “none of your business.” This character does the most to challenge gender steretypes because it is very hard to guess what her identity is– in the game she is biologically female, but her attitude and mannerisms could belong to either a man of a woman– which is true in real life of many people. So, I find her the most fascinating.

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The show is on a budget, but the love and care of the whole crew is evident in the work. In addition, if you have ever played a MORPG, the show is full of really fun little jokes about the gamer life and the culture inside these games. The identity explorations even getting into people discovering there are multiple versions of themselves inside the game (in the form of their other accounts.)

You can watch all episodes online! https://www.afkwebseries.com/home