Cameron’s joyless episode-ending booty call to Joe is yet another example of Halt‘s dire depiction of sex solely as a means of marking territory or venting aggression. Ditto Joe’s left-field tryst with Travis, the closeted arm candy for the would-be investor played by Jean Smart: What seemed at first like both a revealing character development and a refreshing fuck-you to the relentless heterosexuality of TV antiheroes was quickly revealed to be just another business maneuver.
While displays of dominance and lack of emotional investment are inexplicably popular drivers of TV sex scenes, they have almost no bearing on sexual relationships (however brief) in the real world, which result from a complex cocktail of emotional compulsion. To make a comparison invited by AMC itself: From its very first episode, Mad Men made its sex scenes sexy by using them to show its alpha males at their most vulnerable. Even at the apex of his ladies’-man days, Don Draper still looked flushed and moony-eyed every time he made a move, not like some kind of dead-eyed sex shark. Sex is everybody’s weakness. If you turn it into armor every time, you lose a chance to reach your characters where they really live.
Halt and Catch Fire got not-so-good again this past weekend; I reviewed it for Rolling Stone.
Tags: halt and catch fire, reviews, Rolling Stone, TV, TV reviews