LO: So, what did you think of Tell Me You Love Me?
EM: I loved it, even though the sex scenes made me squirm more than Curb Your Enthusiasm. I think I like background music with my sex scenes. All those kissing noises made me feel funny in a bad way.
LO: I really liked the sex scenes--they seemed real, authentic. Not as cheesy as porn, but not as polished and fake as Hollywood blockbusters.
EM: I think that's why they made me blush. It was like watching real people have sex.
LO: Plus, hello, they showed balls and a bit of shaft! Finally, equal-opportunity objectification in the sex scenes! Though that prosthetic they used in the hand-job scene was not very convincing--it was like a petrified baby arm!
EM: That was no shaft, that was a can of beans! It was kind of scary how lifeless it was. Also, I TOTALLY don't buy that a guy could come from a 30-second DRY hand-job. Where was the lube?!

LO: One of the problems I had with the sex scenes was the lack of mess afterwards. I mean, that scene where the couple abandons their dinner guests to go have a quickie in the bedroom: She just put her teeny panties back on and her little cocktail dress and was gonna walk back out there?!?!?!
EM: I don't know, during the other husband's secret morning masturbation routine he at least wiped himself off with a Kleenex.
LO: But all I could think of was, "Dude, you're getting it all over the sheets!" I don't think he was careful enough, which hurt its authenticity.
EM: And if he's trying to be all sly, why leave the Kleenex on the floor by the bed...such a giveaway! That's like a clichéd masturbation crime scene.
LO: Totally!
EM: So what was up with how freaked out everyone is that their partners masturbate?
Are people really that bothered by the idea that their other half rubs one out?
LO: I think a lot of people think of it as a form of cheating: "Am I not attractive enough, am I not enough for you?" His wife, poor thing: obviously not a masturbator herself. May not even be an orgasmer, by the bug-eyed response she gave when her therapist asked if she climaxed regularly.
EM: Toward the end of the show, when she started rubbing that moisturizer into her arms in bed right next to husband, I SO was hoping she was going to do it right there in bed beside him! Jill off! Just do it
LO: They're saving that for season two. The only other major problem I had with the sex scenes was the lack of female orgasms. Besides that one cunnilingus scene, which was much appreciated, and the hand-job scene, all the other sex scenes were straight intercourse sessions: pull down each other's pants, insert, thrust, repeat for about one minute, then climax. I'm sorry, but are we supposed to believe that the women were coming too? Where was the attention to the clitoris?!?!
EM: True. Maybe we'll find out at the therapists' office that all the women are faking. Except the 60-plus-year-old therapist herself, of course. That old-people sex scene between the therapist and her husband made me squirm, too. I'm glad it exists even if it was a little hard to watch. It's good for me...like Metamucil!
LO: Oh please, grow up. As precious and contrived and predictable as the geriatric sex was, it was great, because you NEVER ever see that portrayed on television. Didn't you think it was sweet, even just a little. Didn't it give you hope for your future sex life?
EM: I thought it was sweet, yes. But it still made me squirm
LO: For a sex writer, you sure squirm and blush a lot. For someone whose favorite movie sex scene of all time is in Don't Look Now, I would think you'd eat this shit up.
EM: I think that scene had music, didn't it?
LO: Do you have to have music playing every time you have sex?
EM: Um...sometimes. Depends how quiet the room is!
LO: Not sure how much good you're doing your rep as a "sexpert" right here and now...