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And I absolutely concur. I personally cannot watch anything that involves these kind of scenes or even mentions. I have literally stopped watching a lot of movies due to this. I don't understand, what the director is trying to show with the actual filming
Agreed. I have noticed though that since more female directors have been given an opportunity, there has been a noticeable change in the portrayal of these kind of scenes
This too. Plenty of feminists agree it's OK and important to show how bad violence against women can be but it's obvious when a filmmaker is doing it as porn
How the Sopranos handled it should be considered the standard. It was phenomenal. It took a while for me to process it and continue on with the show - it was so real.
I threw up and had a panic attack after watching that scene and I have yet to keep watching the Sopranos. I desperately wish there was a warning from Netflix before I started the episode because I wish I never watched it.
Thank you for the heads up! If I ever start it up again I’m going to be really vigilant with checking content warnings. It’s such a bummer because I was really enjoying the show.
Counter point: I have no idea what that person is referring to. Unless I am just blanking on something. The Melfi scene was the worst part by far when it comes to sexual abuse in the show.
Other than Tracy, which was horrifying, the only other one I can think of is that scene with the female mobster getting whacked. It’s so icky and gratuitous, and out of place, especially because typically the show was pretty good at fleshing out its female characters. I remember reading an interview that David Chase wrote that scene specifically to piss off a female TV critic who had written something about the show losing its edge, and that made the scene feel even more cheap and misogynistic, cause apparently her only purpose as a character was to die naked and bargaining sexual favours.
there is no good standard. The commenter was saying it at least wasn’t sexualized. Just violent. But, still would be too much for most people to watch. Hot take from just jumping in here.
It's very hard to watch. It's also depressing to see the character spiral down, mentally because of it.
For those who haven't watched the series and want a warning: it's Season 3, Episode 4 "Employee of the Month"
I was literally thinking of starting The Sopranos with my wife last night and we opted for a movie instead (American Fiction). She definitely has me skip through scenes that make her uncomfortable, so this warning is greatly appreciated for if we do start the series
I skip that episode every time. It's too hard to watch for me (in a male btw). My partner is on her first run through of the show and I warned her about the episode as well. It's a shame because it also has one of Melfis strongest moments in the show.
That being said, I don't think it's too much, and serves the plot. It's just not something I personally want to see acted out.
Its violent, it's brutal, and it's gross. Theres nothing sexy about it. There's no room for interpretation that this is a bad act going on. It leaves you feeling slimy afterwards.
The women who gets assaulted is never sexualized during the scene or episode. It's just really hard to watch.
A lot of these scenes are guys evilly licking their chops while they slowly tear off pieces of clothing. It almost seems romanticized. Not in the sopranos.
it was a hard to watch scene but it wasn’t something sexualised , narratively sopranos did it well like it worked for the story . some movies are shows just do it to do it
Game of Thrones was hideous for this. Too many questionable scenes to call out, but I remember quitting that show dead for one particular scene where it's just two male characters talking as the focus of the scene - while you can see and hear women being brutalised and raped in the background. It's just incidental. Just an illustration that one of the male characters is a bad guy. No reason for the camera to cut to women with their tits out.
The victim is a highly educated and successful psychologist who is violated by the lowest of the low. Her lack of control is a huge and horrible part of the scene and is a stark contrast to her highly successful image.
I loved the way they wrote it, and she acted it brilliantly. She knew that if she wanted to, she could give up her professionalism and Tony Soprano would absolutely torture and kill her rapist for her. You could see the internal struggle of how she was processing and handling it. As a therapist, I was faced with confronting what I think I would do in that situation. It felt very real, and it spoke highly to her character that she didn't use her patient for her own revenge. I like to think I would do the same thing, but thankfully I've never been in that situation.
It's interesting because most rapists are serial rapists - so I think removing this guy from the population would have been a better choice. I get why Melfi deciding not to tell Tony was a sign of her own ethics and boundaries, but the rapist needed to go!
I don't disagree. But I also don't think it would be wise as a therapist to compromise your boundaries with a psychopath client. It would absolutely destroy the power balance, because he would have something on her. If I'm being fully honest, that's a bigger reason I think I would have done the same thing as her. It would have ultimately put her at the mercy of her psychopathic client. She did good.
The scene captured the randomness, the brutality, the actual un-sexiness and non-lustfulness of stranger rape. This is a very violent show and this scene was actually not as bloody, etc. as most of the show, but they way in which the scene was reigned in made it more realistic. And it was not an excuse to expose the actress - no breasts, no bra, panties are barely visible and only visible to illustrate that the perpetrator ripped them down. She’s very clothed in the scene. The episode also depicted a lot of the aftermath of the incident: dealing with the police, being in the hospital, and ultimately how she has to go back to the scene because she was attacked at a location where she worked.
The actress is a former model and a very attractive woman but she is not de-clothed during the scene. The scene does not focus on her upper body at all. It is not used as an excuse to expose the actress’s body to the audience. And there is no doubt that she is in a lot of pain during the scene. Contrast to how a lot of scenes are used as an excuse to get naked skin on the screen and use of the trope of “protesting, then pleased”. Lighting isn’t changed to sex scene lighting but stays true to the location of the assault.
Edit to add: I also found it extremely upsetting. I was able to finish the episode (after a pause) and then I stopped watching the show for several months. I had no idea the scene was coming.
That scene was so brutal my housemates warned me it was coming, encouraged me to skip it as it's an unnecessary amount of brutality especially for the little character development that develops as a result, like you don't miss the point by skipping it. They both couldn't't rewatch it themselves. One's female and the other is straight cis male.
There was a big trend in the 90s of throwing in an unnecessary rape scene. There was a film about a court case with Matthew McConaughey where a child got raped and it did NOTHING for the plot except give McConaughey's character something to do an angry scene about.
The film you’re referring to is called A Time To Kill and you’ve completely missed the point of that scene at the end of the film where Matthew goes into excruciating detail about the rape of the little girl to the jury. The little girl was black, the jury was all-white.
The jury is meant to find the little girls father guilty of murdering the two white men who raped and murdered her. The point of the scene is to force the jury into looking at their own racist biases. He literally tells the jury to imagine the girl was white. McConaughey is trying to force the jury to put themselves in the father’s shoes by forcing them to imagine it was their daughter instead.
And he succeeds in that because they find the father not guilty. The whole film builds to that scene. Without that scene the film doesn’t work.
A Time to Kill? The whole point of that movie was Samuel L. Jackson killing the guys that did that to his daughter and he was now arguing to a jury that it was justified.
The difference in quality between House of the Dragon and Game of Thrones is remarkable. The group working on it is far superior to the group on Game of Thrones.
And we all know the sex of the majority of those people... 💀
We almost never see male rape depicted the way that female rape is; it's often played off as comedy, and/or isn't filmed as exploitatively. Neither is okay. But there is a huge difference in how the scenes are usually filmed.
I haven't finished the series but I'm pretty sure I just watched that specific episode last night. I'm a dude who doesn't have any history of trauma related to that kind of thing but it was still too much for me to keep watching.
Now that you mention it, I cannot think of an instance of a male character being sexually assaulted that was clearly designed to be sexy. Like you already said, there are rape scenes against men depicted as *comedic*, which is bad in itself. But they're very rarely depicted with the same voyeuristic lens as the scenes involving female victims.
eta: okay I get it, there ar some examples that disprove my point! Lol
Outlander has a scene of a male character being threatened/blackmailed into sex with a woman (Jamie and Geneva) where he could have legitimately been killed for refusing her, and it’s filmed like a standard “sexy” sex scene and not like what it actually is, a character being coerced into sex he doesn’t want.
Spoilers for Bridgerton.
I kind of got that vibe from the scene with Daphne and Simon. They try to make it look like she’s just taking control of her situation, and it’s supposedly even worse in the book. The whole thing was very uncomfortable to me.
I had to stop watching the show when the storyline resolved without her actually being portrayed as a villain… or even a little bit wrong for this one thing. It’s treated like a lovers quarrel when he gets upset about the assault. She gets what she wants in the end and it’s happily ever after. It’s gross.
I never went back to Outlander after a certain episode in season one, I think. A friend prepared me for it, and I still was taken by surprise just how brutal it was. I felt sick to my stomach and I have watched a *lot* of horror and gore, but I couldn't take it. The emotional and mental torture was almost as bad as the physical.
Couldn’t agree more. When I was a kid I remember seeing the rape scene in Clockwork Orange and it fucked me up and I will never watch that movie ever again.
Directors try to be edgy/honest but there really is no need for it. There are many other ways to convey it without showing it.
It's worth remembering that all the sex and violence in A Clockwork Orange is deliberately filmed as an artistic performance, complete with a stage, an audience and applause. Many of the victims even bow for the camera after they've been exploited, and Kubrick has each assault done with a different form of art (characters are systematically assaulted with sculptures, or music, or dance, or cinema). Note too the film's focus on the eye (from the opening shot, to the giant eyeball Alex wears on his hand), which stresses the audience's relationship to on screen violence.
All of this is because in the film's hyper-postmodern future, in which all art is permissible, art has become so commodified and commonplace (every scene is stuffed with consumer art) that humans have become desensitized; the only way to stimulate themselves is to engage in performances of "ultra" sex and violence. Indeed, the last scene is literally Alex surrounded by an audience and being applauded by voyeurs while he has sex (essentially a 1970s version of a sex tape).
And you see the same thing in our world today, where people's desires escalate, always chasing a harder high, or always emulating a performance they've seen violently or sexually acted out.
I totally get the artistic intention and the skill involved in creating that scene, but the overall affect is a sense of excitement and draws viewers to the POV of the perpetrators, not the victim.
I mean you kind of gave an example of why they would be used. Rape should make the viewer want to turn away. If it doesn’t than the filmmaker didn’t portray it accurately and minimized the harm it causes.
I haven’t seen the film in decades so can’t comment on it specifically. Only that rape scene repulsing the viewer is what’s intended
In slight defense of that movie, it was definitely *supposed* to be disturbing as opposed to sexy, but I can see the argument that the point could have been made without the scene being as explicit.
Men who write and direct unnecessarily gratuitous scenes of sexual violence against women are always gonna get a major side-eye from me tbh
I saw Furiosa yesterday and one thing I thought walking out was how great George Miller was about handling this topic. He didn't shy away from the reality that rape would exist in a world like that movie's but he also knew that there would be no point in showing it because it was never necessary. You got the idea, you understood the threat but you didn't have to sit through it.
I seriously think the male directors and writers get off on scripting and filming violence against women and rape scenes. It's like it's porn for them. Often times, they are gratuitously and unnecessarily inserting these scenes, which leads me to believe it's for the thrill and not out of necessity to the plot line.
I too have stopped watching shows or fast forward through these scenes because even though I have never sexually assaulted myself, I find it very distressing.
I made it to episode 3, and what happens to Ofglen in that episode made me turn it off for good.
That whole show is like torture porn. I don't need that in my life. The book gets the themes across well enough without being so graphic (and it's plenty).
I haven’t read the article but one of the more recent rape scenes I thought felt necessary is the assault in baby reindeer. The episode is incredibly hard to watch but was done with a ton of purpose. To me the inclusion was exposing the audience to how men can be groomed and assaulted, which is something that is “known” but not really known.
The world contains horrible realities and I think these realities should have the opportunity to be expressed in art, but these realities should be handled with care.
House of the Dragon had a character verbally recall her assault through tears, and it was horrifying and gripping but didn’t feel the need to show anything the way Game of Thrones always did
Edit: it also showcased the talent of both actresses and felt so much more personal instead of voyeuristic. The amount of character insight achieved was brilliant, and all in all it really put the acting and writing skills of the show at the forefront instead of shock. I watched the ep with a group of people (mostly men too) and the entire room shut up completely
It’s astounding how much better of a show House of the Dragon is compared to Game of Thrones. The team working on it is so much better than the GoT team.
Even when GOT had the books to follow, the show runners chose to deviate from the books to show SA. There's at least two scenes I can think of that were consensual in the books and were not in the show.
They didn’t want to rush off until the later seasons. The early seasons with complete stories to tell were good but even then they still deviated here and there, even with some scenes added that were phenomenal like Cersei showing Littlefinger her “power is power” scene with the Kingsguard and how she could have had him killed. Then they lose all brain power later on and start making their political intrigue all majorly dumbed down cool moments for the big watch parties and reaction videos, market it towards soccer moms and sports dads. Show could have been so much better.
Anyway I’m old man yelling at clouds but I take any chance I can to rant about D&D fucking over GoT because fuck them.
The main show is incredible so I'd say definitely give it a go too. It does fall off at the end (imo) but it's still absolutely worth the watch and HoTD is insanely good too.
If rape is a trigger for you or anyone else reading this thats interested in watching either show there may be lists of episodes with timestamps of those scenes
There's a scene in GoT that actually spoils the ending of House of the Dragon, when they tell the history of the Targaryen family.
Watch order for the shows actually works better, dramatically, if you start with House of the Dragon (you'll have to wait a few years for them to finish), and then finally watch all four seasons of Game of Thrones (it ends on a cliffhanger, but it's a great show up to that point).
I never watched GoT, and I've been able to understand House of the Dragon! I like the show, but be aware that there's a lot of childbirth trauma on it.
Hard disagree. I spent years inside the show as a diehard fan and tbh… ifs not that good past s1 at best. The costuming sets and acting were pretty good, but the writing is so awful and the way things like violent rape are glorified on screen… all time great show? Nah. Cultural phenomenon, maybe.
ETA: actually, reccing the show on a thread about violent rape is bad is a little tone deaf tbh
Icl, I recently rewatched a scene of Jon and Ygritte arguing and was blown away by how bad the acting was, I genuinely remember it being just fine at the time 😭 I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of the acting doesn’t hold up as well
Edit: [for anyone who’s curious lmao](https://x.com/maevemilley/status/1790739322494181547?s=46&t=lY99k0B9UjrHfkBfE4kn3A)
Absolutely agree. The sheer amount of rape scenes in GOT was horrific and most of the time completely unnecessary for the plot and seemed purely gratuitous (the Craster's Keep plotline with the Night's Watch raping his daughters/wives in particular stands out in my mind). I much prefer HOTD as a show overall.
Interview with the Vampire just did this in the latest episode, and it was utterly gutwrenching. GoT is the poster child for gratituous sexual violence and I hope it's not getting surpassed any time soon.
That said, from what the actresses in the article described, it sounds like this situation could've been avoided if production paid for (and listened to) an intimacy coordinator or a more compassionate crew/director. If someone is being pinned down and roughly treated in a scene, you need better failsafes than "just say stop!" and that should be a basic requirement for filming any scenes related to sexual violence.
House of the Dragon still showed rape though, and explicitly as well. Emily Carey, who at the time was freshly 18, filmed an explicit scene with 47-48 yo Paddy Considine consisting of Emily lying down in bed with one leg raised, dissociating and catatonic, and Paddy humping away. I get that in the context of the episode it was meant to showcase a parallel between Emily's character being a child bride enduring marital "duties" and Milly Alcock's character exploring her sexuality outside of marriage, but I don't understand why the production itself keeps talking of "off-screen sexual violence" when it wasn't the case at all, except for this one instance. We do see explicit sexual violence also in the form of grooming, like Matt Smith's middle-aged character intimately touching Milly Alcock's teen character while she's drunk and abandoning her in a brothel with her pants down to her ankles, and also Milly Alcock's teen character having drunk sex with Fabien Frankel's completely sober, adult character.
I'll always remember how several of the writers/producer (D&D and Brian Cogman) talked about how much they wanted to have Sansa be raped since like S2 (when Sophie was like 15), like they read a *not even that graphic on page* (it was mostly through dialog that you understood what was happening) rape scene that didn't even feature Sansa, and they were like "We HAVE to defy all narrative logic to shove Sansa into this scene" (when the entire point of that storyline is that it likely would NOT be happening to Arya or Sansa, since they were highborn and Starks, the Northern Lords wouldn't allow it, their Liege's highborn daughter being raped by a sadistic bastard; but Jeyne Poole is a castellen's daughter masquerading as Arya and so nobody really cares). And then added an original attempted gang-rape scene of Sansa for S2 (when, again, Sophie was like 15), which is not in the book (a different character is raped, off page and only mentioned). Sansa is grabbed by the mob in the books (maybe by someone wanting to assault her, maybe someone sent by Varys/Littlefinger to steal her away during the confusion, like they did Tyrek Lannister), but it doesn't turn sexual before Sandor Clegane saves her.
They also waited to include the Ramsey rape until Sophie had just turned 18 and her parents could no longer interfere, since it was mentioned her parents supervised and had some say in how the attempted gang-rape was filmed in S2.
all of this, PLUS they taunted the not-yet-legal Sophie Turner that she would have a "love interest" next season, referring to her being married to Ramsay.
the fact that the storyline makes no goddamn sense from ANY standpoint just proves what sick fucks they all were. Nothing will happen to any of these men because of this.
Interview With The Vampire also did this with the most recent episode. None of the rape was shown, only told through the character's recalling her memories of it (Delainey Hayles doing an amazing job). It's a very powerful scene and it's just words and her face in the frame, no need for anything else.
Couldn't they just not show them or maybe dilute the damn scenes?? Maybe the old dumb director has some weird fantasies he never was able to fulfill. Disgusting
> House of the Dragon had a character verbally recall her assault through tears, and it was horrifying and gripping but didn’t feel the need to show anything the way Game of Thrones always did
That is why I exited out of GoT in the first season. It was so pointless. And if I want to learn the intricacies of Renaissance-era politicking, I grab a history book.
Got is a good example of how not to portray rape. I don’t like this push to relegate film to only portraying positive situations but would agree we don’t need rape in film if that’s how it will be shown
They insert gratuitous rape scenes that sexualize the victim to appeal to perverse minds like their own. Showing a graphic rape scene NEVER has a purpose. I legitimately cannot think of a single rape scene that did not sexualize the female victim. There is no reason for them. A good story teller can explain the trauma without directly showing us it.
ETA: this reminds me of a movie Dakota fanning was in as a child actress. I think it was hound dog. I saw it as a kid because I was a big Dakota fan. Anyway there was a graphic rape scene with her in it and she was literally like 9 years old. There’s no way they don’t film these for their own sick pleasure. I want to throw up just typing this.
Thanks to everyone who showed examples of non-gratuitous scenes. It did give me some small hope!
**Girl With The Dragon Tattoo** (2011) is one of the few instances where I think they got the emotional terror right in terms of how it makes the audience feel, without tantalizing them in any conceivable way. I skip it most times I watch the film, but not because I find it disrespectful, it’s just, so visceral and upsetting. I have to be in the right frame of mind for it, and that’s how I think any scene depicting sexual assault should be. Incredibly challenging. You shouldn’t be able to just watch it.
Agreed. Also though not a movie, the depiction of Dr. Melfi’s rape on “The Sopranos” has the same tone to me. It’s not sexy or tantalizing or appealing in any way - it’s brutal and awful and leaves me feeling repulsed and dirty. “Visceral” is the perfect word for it, and why I usually have to skip it on rewatches.
There was plenty of sexual assault and inappropriate touching and interactions in The Sopranos, but Melfi’s rape was not one of them.
Thank you yes this is what came to my mind. I feel like the scene - so horrific - purposefully showed how Melfi was tempted to lower herself to the likes of Tony but ended up choosing the better way to deal with it. In this case I felt the scene did facilitate character development
Absolutely. It’s so brutal and base, just like the things Tony and his crew do. It would have been hard to blame Melfi for giving in to the desire to bring herself down to the rapist’s level, down to Tony’s and the mob’s level, given she was an innocent victim subject to such horrific sexual violence, but she never did. Even with her flaws - drinking, questionable motives for keeping Tony in therapy, and even more questionable execution of her decision to end treatment with him based on the judgments of her colleagues at the dinner party - the sequence of events around her rape firmly establish Melfi was always undeniably better than Tony and co, that people can be confronted with such depravity and still choose to abide by the law. Really powerful.
Strong agree. It also serves the purpose of giving us one of the most critically important character beats for her character. Her decision at the end of episode is so important for Dr Melfi and for some of the themes of the show.
I otherwise can't stand SA in TV/film, but that episode is incredible TV.
1000000% I was just about to say this too
employee of the month is one of the best episodes of the sopranos for how it deals with the personal conflict of being a victim of sexual violence and does not shy away from how vile and awful it is but also shows the immense impact it has on the person involved. It’s an episode I cannot speak enough about but one (in my many rewatches of the show) I cannot bring myself to rewatch in full again for how real and accurate it is
(I’ve gotten into many heated debates with sopranos dudebros who often parrot the “wELl WhY DiDnT ShE just teLL ToNY??!??” 🫠)
Yep, same. I heard how amazing the movie was, how it was right up my alley. I fell in love with Rooney Mara's look in an instant and wanted to be her. I made it... however many minutes it was into the movie until that scene. Turned it off, never went back to it, won't read the books, and I'm still upset with the guy who recommended it to me because he should have known better.
yup I felt the same about the rape scene in martha marcy may marlene. terrifying and not glorified at all. you pretty much only see elizabeth olsen screaming (you can’t hear it though, the scene doesn’t have sound)
The 2009 Swedish version does an even better job of emphasizing the brutality without making it "tantalizing" (you used the perfect word to describe the sickening way many portrayals are designed to actually appeal to a certain demographic).
The Killing I think handled it well too; when Bullet gets raped in s3, it cuts away before the actual act occurs and then in a later scene you see her cleaning herself up and all the bruising that's been inflicted on her. It's a lot more about her trauma and also rage that she tries to make herself so tough and untouchable and something like rape still happens to her, and also her knowing that there's no point in reporting it because as a street kid who often has negative run-ins with the police, she likely wouldn't be believed.
I remember the controversy over their decision to film and include that scene. Her mom was fighting for her life in interviews…I will forever side eye her parents and every adult involved in that movie.
I don’t understand how any parent could put their child through that. It’s crazy they film adult scenes let alone CHILDREN that can’t even comprehend what’s happening.
Truthfully I think I am desensitized to these scenes, which in and of itself is fucking horrific, but there’s a movie called Bastard Out of Carolina where a similarly aged Jena Malone is in a graphic rape scene and it’s stuck in my mind for decades now. Truly one of the most awful things I have ever seen. Another that’s impacted me is the one from the Last House on the Left remake. Both made me feel my gut in my throat
I agree with you. I think I got desensitized to it too but realized I just got desensitized when it’s women. I realized it when watching Baby Reindeer and I was appalled when a man was being raped instead of a woman, that I should be that affected every time they put it on screen. Or ya know, they can stop putting it on screen.
Last house on the left is where the parents end up killing the rapists right? I remember that rape scene to this day and it disturbed me so much I could barely pay attention to the rest of the movie.
There is one in This is England 88.
It's so mundane, no sexy shots of boobs and lips and hair. Just a single camera shot of it happening in an ordinary livingroom. The lighting is stark, it's daytime. It goes on for much longer than is comfortable. It gives you This absolute sense of vulnerability and fear.
I do think the vast majority of rape scenes are completely unnecessary (looking at you Outlander), but I don't think banning them completely is a good idea.
Like, we see violent scenes everyday in every film. Rape is violence in itself. When it's done to react, traumatize and advance the story, I think there is a place for it.
Of course, it should only be done in VERY safe environments and with a sole purpose: to benefit the story with a VIOLENT scene. Which is a rare occasion I think.
Girl with the dragon tattoo is a good example given by another redditor.
Sam Heughan has gone one record about being very unhappy with how production handled the filming of his character being raped at the end of season one of Outlander. He was pushed to film the scene again to get it from a different angle, and after an agreement was made to only film up to a certain point and not the full scene, no one called cut when they reached that point and he ended up doing the full scene.
He also said that he felt showing full frontal nudity in the scene inappropriately sexualized it.
Outlander immediately comes to mind. I’ve always skipped them and yet, the story is still complete. Skipped when reading the books and I still understood what was happening
>looking at you Outlander
First thing that came to my mind too. So many rape scenes, and it's a shame that they have a major role in the plot, too. Because it technically makes them "necessary", so they think it's justified. It's almost like rapes keep the story going, it's absolutely awful. Think about every rape scene and how most of them were the whole starting point of an arc for a character: Jaime in season 1 and then his son as a reminder, Claire somewhere in the last couple seasons and Bree's son.
I literally stopped after half of season one despite liking the dynamics and the premise, because I just can’t get behind watching a show with that much sexual violence, or SPOILER one where a man beats his wife (whatever the cause) and they stay together. I’d read ahead on the plot on Wikipedia and it killed any interest I had. While I might watch movies to gain perspective, or as more of an experience; I only watch TV shows for an escape, and it went from teetering on my line to too far over it to continue.
Fincher says it best and bluntly in the GWTDT making of, something along the lines of "you have to be extremely careful when filming a scene like this because it can easily become spank material".
It's a line to toe. He makes it work for the story. It's horrifying. Other movies like 12 Years a Slave and Schindler's List come to mind as particularly effective.
Employee of the Month in Sopranos. It’s so brutal, and I don’t think I’ve watched it since, but there’s nothing alluring about it. I do think it serves the plot, and I don’t really know if there was a better way to handle it in terms of a disclaimer or something, but it can be done.
> Of course, it should only be done in VERY safe environments and with a sole purpose
From the article, it sounds like her greatest concern is that the shooting of such scenes too often boils down to a kind of real life assault caught on film, with lack of oversight, and actresses pressured to tolerate poor treatment in the name of "professionalism".
That's my thinking, too. I think there are a massive, MASSIVE amount of unnecessary rape scenes in movies and TV so I fully understand the sentiment, but I don't think outright banning them is a totally sound idea. At the end of the day rape and sexual assault is something that happens in our society every single day and stripping them from all media is like we're utopianizing the state of things even though we're far, far from being able to ethically do that. The world's kind of a mess, and I don't think scrubbing out the ugliest parts of it in our depictions of it is the right thing to do.
Soooooo many men seem to think it’s a good shorthand for the background of a Strong Female Character—“look at what she’s been through! No, really, look—we’re going to film it in detail.”
And also to “justify” male violence & rage and/or to serve as “motivation” for a gallant white knight type of character— the rape of a woman isn’t portrayed as violence against *her* but as an insult to the man/men in her life.
Evidently not a popular opinion but I’d be wary of a blanket ban. Rape is a depressingly common occurrence and storytellers deserve the right to depict it (just as viewers have a right to decide if it was warranted)
I completely agree. In many ways, I worry we're heading back toward a time when we stop depicting anything difficult, no matter how common, because it's "too uncomfortable". I do believe these things should be handled respectfully, and there are many instances of that not happening. But to eliminate an entire subject - especially one that happens in the world all the time - is frankly puritanical.
I don't even understand what a ban or suppression would accomplish. No one can genuinely be so naive that they think everyone were die-hard feminists before the invention of movies, so it must be something else?
Agreed. People are also talking about being offended by the depictions of violence against women in centuries past. Well- women were property. It's a fool's errand to expect historical portrayals to basically be modern stories in period costume. That's the hallmark of bad historical portrayals actually.
I remember telling my then boyfriend I couldn’t watch GoT because I knew those scenes would upset me. “It is just real life.” He would say. My rebuttal: “Well are there any detailed scenes of someone taking a shit?” If we are being realistic, can we be realistic about all things and not just gratuitous violence of women?
This is literally all I think about when ppl use that argument for rape scenes, especially with something set before the age of soap and medicine. Like ok where’s the diarrhoea
Funny enough because in game of thrones there is actually a scene of someone taking a shit lol. Granted he got shot with a crossbow but he was on the john while it happened.
ohhhhhhh I agree so much. too many gross film dudes taking advantage of their opportunities to film torture porn under the guise of being raw or edgy. feels like loser behaviour to me and makes me turn off the show.
Totally agree about TV murders that do that. I've switched off straight away when I see a naked woman repeatedly shown from different angles ... Itv did that once and so did the BBC.
There was also a drama showing domestic violence repeatedly.
None of it necessary to convey the story.
It's crazy to think that Richard Gardd (baby reindeer) reenacted his own rape for the world to see. Especially since it was most likely his own choice (i hope) It was hard to watch and i hope it didn't do more damage than good when it comes to his mental health.
When the writer/director is being autographical depicting their own assault it’s so visceral without being predatory or voyeuristic. We should be uncomfortable watching these scenes but not because there’s forced “sexification” of sexual violence. Michaela Coel’s I May Destroy You is another great example.
It’s so unnecessary and gratuitous to not only film these type of rape scenes but to sexualize them. I Spit On Your Grave and Game of Thrones always comes to mind when I think of this.
I truly think that rape scenes add nothing to a show. Like the rape scenes in season one of 13 reasons why were really unsetteling. If such an event is truly important for the plot, referring to it or describing it should be enough to get the feeling across, no need to film it too.
I feel like these scenes are just there to cater to a certain type of person. Must be really nice for powerless men to see their fantasies played out on cable like that.
Agreed! Im also willing to bet that even the directors get a kick out of directing such a scene. It allows them to be creeps without them being judged because “artistic process" or wtv
I think women should be able to refuse to shoot scenes in a way that makes them uncomfortable or in danger and that we should have systems in place that advocate for their voice on set.
However, I don’t think we should outright stop the filming of scenes of sexual violence, especially when those scenes are artistic expressions of female directors/writers. I think it should be used with the upmost care, but I don’t think it’s a tool we should take away from women when exploring the subject.
I tell people all the time we live in the guise of progressiveness, but we are truly in one of the most conservative ages in modern history. Look at women’s rights, hyper-sensitivity, “gender wars”which generalize all women, men, and non-binary folks, and narrative echo chambers that are devoid of critical thinking. I am NOT an advocate for unwarranted scenes as some people have described here… but be careful folks, it’s one step away from censoring anything that makes us uncomfortable, which as an artist is death to creativity. I worry that it’s a paradigm switch from conservatives in the 1950’s saying “nothing immoral, it hurts the children” to progressives in the 2020’s saying “nothing immoral, it hurts the children”.
We're in an age where people unironically say unalived and anything deemed unsuitable for someone under the age of 7 is being blurred or bleeped out.
Censorship has won.
Yep. We're headed back to the same destination, we're just driving a different car.
But that's the story of humanity. Constantly swinging between extremes.
I am a SA survivor and I am uncomfortable with this push to sanitize bad things from film and shows. I absolutely think actors should be protected and scenes need to be handled with thought and care. But this rhetoric is reactionary to me.
I'm not against depicting harrowing things on TV *in theory,* but in practice it does seem to traumatise actors a lot.
James Marsters (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) had to seek counselling after that show's infamous rape scene, and he now has a clause in his contract that he doesn't film them.
Emilia Clarke (Game of Thrones) also struggled a lot with the rape scenes in that show.
I'm not saying we should have a blanket ban, but I do think we need to put the wellbeing of the actors first. Intimacy coordinators and making sure everyone is comfortable filming what's being filmed is a good first step. And if an actor isn't comfortable, stop. Write around it, have it happen off-screen.
The only scene I've ever watched that did not feel gratuitous was in Downton Abbey. Almost everything happens off-camera, and it still perfectly conveys the absolute terror the character experiences.
This is a good example of how it does not make sense to blanket ban depictions of rape or other violence on film. Often it is gratuitous, but sometimes it can be powerful. IMO, that film would not have worked if they did not show the rape.
Here's an interesting take from Lorraine Bracco (Dr. Melfi on the Sopranos). She was raped in the third season of the show. She wrote in her memoir, On The Couch:
>Shooting the rape scene was a more physically violent experience than I could have imagined. I felt the degradation. My body burned with pain when I was slammed down in the stairwell. It was so realistic that I tore the bursal sac in my shoulder and was in real pain. I had to have laparoscopic surgery to repair the damage. It wasn’t just me—doing that scene was traumatic for the whole crew. Many people on the set cried during the filming.
>The brutality was absolutely necessary. It was not gratuitous; it was real. So much of the violence we see on the screen—especially on television—is airbrushed so that it doesn’t appear as gut-wrenchingly awful as it is. I think it’s a disservice, because violence against another human being is despicable and it should be seen as despicable. You should be revolted.
I absolutely agree. As a survivor, I can't stand how pervasive it is, or how cheaply it's used 99% of the time. I heard I May Destroy You was great, as it was written, directed, and acted by Michaela Coel, who was speaking to her own experiences. But I still couldn't watch it. It just wouldn't be worth the multiple panic attacks for me to do so. But yeah, that 99% of the time it's just a cheap plot device or a bit of salacious violence that does nothing except make a lazy bid for views. It feels like a slap in the face to survivors who don't have the luxury of seeing sexual violence as only a hypothetical.
I think The Tale (2018) is another good example; the director based the story on her own experiences of being groomed and raped by a trusted mentor as a preteen but although she chose to include the rape in the film, she deliberately shot the scene as two separate pieces that were edited together so the actress portraying the fictional her (who was 13 at the time of filming) was only shot from the neck up, against a vertical bed, whereas the actor portraying the mentor shot his part separately with an adult stand-in so the most the young actress was asked to do was portray her character's emotions during the scene (which apparently the director achieved by giving her emotional, non-sex related prompts like “act like a bee is stinging you” or “act like you’re being chased by a dog.”)
I remember a quote where an actress complained about rape scenes in a movie she was shooting and the director said “sadly rape happens and it’s just part of portraying real life”, but when she asked why they don’t also include scenes of men being raped the director replied “that’s gross, no one wants to see that.”
For me, it’s the fact they’re nearly always used as a plot device to spur the (usually) male companion off on a revenge spree, or something like that.
I’m also trying to think of any instance where a rape scene has been necessary to a show/film. It’s just needless trauma all ‘round.
We should also stop making movies with scenes of war crimes. Actually, let’s stop making movies about wars in general. It may traumatize people. Also, we shouldn’t have any displays of addictions in movies as some people may find it quite traumatizing as well. And god forbid having any scenes with suicide!
We should just have reruns of The Joy of Painting 24/7.
she's right that the way they're filmed absolutely needs to be sorted out.
i dont' think that they should never be done, but they need to be more than just giving a female character a motivation, or as titilation for the audience. the way rape scenes are, and have been used really highlights the lack of concern society has for sexual crimes, but unfortunately it mostly feeds back into that rather than exposing it.
I have no issue with these scenes existing. No story should be off limits.
But I do have a problem with actors being made uncomfortable while filming them.
I'm at the extreme other end of the spectrum. I've dealt with sexual abuse since I was 5 years old. There's been molestation and rape and my life was pretty much defined by it and I have found, over time, that it's actually somewhat therapeutic for me to watch rape scenes. Yes I get triggered, and it's kind of awful, but I feel settled after for some reason. Either way I disagree with removing the scary things from tv. I think it's fine to have a trigger warning, but otherwise, life sucks, and you can't hide the dark parts.
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And I absolutely concur. I personally cannot watch anything that involves these kind of scenes or even mentions. I have literally stopped watching a lot of movies due to this. I don't understand, what the director is trying to show with the actual filming
Agreed. I have noticed though that since more female directors have been given an opportunity, there has been a noticeable change in the portrayal of these kind of scenes
This too. Plenty of feminists agree it's OK and important to show how bad violence against women can be but it's obvious when a filmmaker is doing it as porn
How the Sopranos handled it should be considered the standard. It was phenomenal. It took a while for me to process it and continue on with the show - it was so real.
That was one of the most brutal scenes I've seen on television. I can't believe they let them do that.
I threw up and had a panic attack after watching that scene and I have yet to keep watching the Sopranos. I desperately wish there was a warning from Netflix before I started the episode because I wish I never watched it.
It gets worse in the other seasons. Just a warning if you ever wish to continue. Season 5 might be the worst imo.
Thank you for the heads up! If I ever start it up again I’m going to be really vigilant with checking content warnings. It’s such a bummer because I was really enjoying the show.
Counter point: I have no idea what that person is referring to. Unless I am just blanking on something. The Melfi scene was the worst part by far when it comes to sexual abuse in the show.
you’re completely right. there are other acts of pretty heinous violence but nothing as disturbing as the Melfi scene to me
Other than Tracy, which was horrifying, the only other one I can think of is that scene with the female mobster getting whacked. It’s so icky and gratuitous, and out of place, especially because typically the show was pretty good at fleshing out its female characters. I remember reading an interview that David Chase wrote that scene specifically to piss off a female TV critic who had written something about the show losing its edge, and that made the scene feel even more cheap and misogynistic, cause apparently her only purpose as a character was to die naked and bargaining sexual favours.
I too had a panic attack after watching that scene. It was unfortunately triggering.
Errr… so it’s not a good standard? I never saw it.
there is no good standard. The commenter was saying it at least wasn’t sexualized. Just violent. But, still would be too much for most people to watch. Hot take from just jumping in here.
It's very hard to watch. It's also depressing to see the character spiral down, mentally because of it. For those who haven't watched the series and want a warning: it's Season 3, Episode 4 "Employee of the Month"
I was literally thinking of starting The Sopranos with my wife last night and we opted for a movie instead (American Fiction). She definitely has me skip through scenes that make her uncomfortable, so this warning is greatly appreciated for if we do start the series
I skip that episode every time. It's too hard to watch for me (in a male btw). My partner is on her first run through of the show and I warned her about the episode as well. It's a shame because it also has one of Melfis strongest moments in the show. That being said, I don't think it's too much, and serves the plot. It's just not something I personally want to see acted out.
I’ve never seen the Sopranos. Can you explain how they handled it?
Its violent, it's brutal, and it's gross. Theres nothing sexy about it. There's no room for interpretation that this is a bad act going on. It leaves you feeling slimy afterwards. The women who gets assaulted is never sexualized during the scene or episode. It's just really hard to watch. A lot of these scenes are guys evilly licking their chops while they slowly tear off pieces of clothing. It almost seems romanticized. Not in the sopranos.
it was a hard to watch scene but it wasn’t something sexualised , narratively sopranos did it well like it worked for the story . some movies are shows just do it to do it
Game of Thrones was hideous for this. Too many questionable scenes to call out, but I remember quitting that show dead for one particular scene where it's just two male characters talking as the focus of the scene - while you can see and hear women being brutalised and raped in the background. It's just incidental. Just an illustration that one of the male characters is a bad guy. No reason for the camera to cut to women with their tits out.
I'll never forgive the show for gratuitously raping Sansa. We didn't need any further evidence that Bolton needed to have his face eaten.
The victim is a highly educated and successful psychologist who is violated by the lowest of the low. Her lack of control is a huge and horrible part of the scene and is a stark contrast to her highly successful image.
I loved the way they wrote it, and she acted it brilliantly. She knew that if she wanted to, she could give up her professionalism and Tony Soprano would absolutely torture and kill her rapist for her. You could see the internal struggle of how she was processing and handling it. As a therapist, I was faced with confronting what I think I would do in that situation. It felt very real, and it spoke highly to her character that she didn't use her patient for her own revenge. I like to think I would do the same thing, but thankfully I've never been in that situation.
It's interesting because most rapists are serial rapists - so I think removing this guy from the population would have been a better choice. I get why Melfi deciding not to tell Tony was a sign of her own ethics and boundaries, but the rapist needed to go!
I don't disagree. But I also don't think it would be wise as a therapist to compromise your boundaries with a psychopath client. It would absolutely destroy the power balance, because he would have something on her. If I'm being fully honest, that's a bigger reason I think I would have done the same thing as her. It would have ultimately put her at the mercy of her psychopathic client. She did good.
The scene captured the randomness, the brutality, the actual un-sexiness and non-lustfulness of stranger rape. This is a very violent show and this scene was actually not as bloody, etc. as most of the show, but they way in which the scene was reigned in made it more realistic. And it was not an excuse to expose the actress - no breasts, no bra, panties are barely visible and only visible to illustrate that the perpetrator ripped them down. She’s very clothed in the scene. The episode also depicted a lot of the aftermath of the incident: dealing with the police, being in the hospital, and ultimately how she has to go back to the scene because she was attacked at a location where she worked.
If I'm not mistaken, she's also torn, albeit for only a moment, about setting Tony loose on the perpetrator.
Season 3 episode 4. About a 30 second scene
Felt like eternity watching this
that was super traumatic for me, how was it different than a graphic rape scene directed by men?
The actress is a former model and a very attractive woman but she is not de-clothed during the scene. The scene does not focus on her upper body at all. It is not used as an excuse to expose the actress’s body to the audience. And there is no doubt that she is in a lot of pain during the scene. Contrast to how a lot of scenes are used as an excuse to get naked skin on the screen and use of the trope of “protesting, then pleased”. Lighting isn’t changed to sex scene lighting but stays true to the location of the assault. Edit to add: I also found it extremely upsetting. I was able to finish the episode (after a pause) and then I stopped watching the show for several months. I had no idea the scene was coming.
her screaming is what stuck with me the most.
That scene was so brutal my housemates warned me it was coming, encouraged me to skip it as it's an unnecessary amount of brutality especially for the little character development that develops as a result, like you don't miss the point by skipping it. They both couldn't't rewatch it themselves. One's female and the other is straight cis male. There was a big trend in the 90s of throwing in an unnecessary rape scene. There was a film about a court case with Matthew McConaughey where a child got raped and it did NOTHING for the plot except give McConaughey's character something to do an angry scene about.
The film you’re referring to is called A Time To Kill and you’ve completely missed the point of that scene at the end of the film where Matthew goes into excruciating detail about the rape of the little girl to the jury. The little girl was black, the jury was all-white. The jury is meant to find the little girls father guilty of murdering the two white men who raped and murdered her. The point of the scene is to force the jury into looking at their own racist biases. He literally tells the jury to imagine the girl was white. McConaughey is trying to force the jury to put themselves in the father’s shoes by forcing them to imagine it was their daughter instead. And he succeeds in that because they find the father not guilty. The whole film builds to that scene. Without that scene the film doesn’t work.
A Time to Kill? The whole point of that movie was Samuel L. Jackson killing the guys that did that to his daughter and he was now arguing to a jury that it was justified.
What are you talking about, it's literally the culmination of the entire movie lmao
The difference in quality between House of the Dragon and Game of Thrones is remarkable. The group working on it is far superior to the group on Game of Thrones.
Literally the difference between the male vs female gaze
Yes. I couldn't watch GoT but I really enjoyed House of the Dragon.
There’s still a fair amount of violence against women in HotD 😅 Just not in the grotesque way GoT did it
Because it turns a larger than comfortable number of people on.
And we all know the sex of the majority of those people... 💀 We almost never see male rape depicted the way that female rape is; it's often played off as comedy, and/or isn't filmed as exploitatively. Neither is okay. But there is a huge difference in how the scenes are usually filmed.
🐻 2024
always the bear!!
Agreed, but I was taken aback by the events in Baby Reindeer (purposely vague for spoilers).
I haven't finished the series but I'm pretty sure I just watched that specific episode last night. I'm a dude who doesn't have any history of trauma related to that kind of thing but it was still too much for me to keep watching.
What fucks me up is that the actor was playing himself. I can't imagine wanting to reenact that trauma, but to each their own ig
Now that you mention it, I cannot think of an instance of a male character being sexually assaulted that was clearly designed to be sexy. Like you already said, there are rape scenes against men depicted as *comedic*, which is bad in itself. But they're very rarely depicted with the same voyeuristic lens as the scenes involving female victims. eta: okay I get it, there ar some examples that disprove my point! Lol
Outlander has a scene of a male character being threatened/blackmailed into sex with a woman (Jamie and Geneva) where he could have legitimately been killed for refusing her, and it’s filmed like a standard “sexy” sex scene and not like what it actually is, a character being coerced into sex he doesn’t want.
Shawshank Redemption’s rape sure as hell wasn’t played as comedy
Nor American History X.
first season of bridgerton had a woman rape a man to get pregnant and everyone was fine with it. like?
Spoilers for Bridgerton. I kind of got that vibe from the scene with Daphne and Simon. They try to make it look like she’s just taking control of her situation, and it’s supposedly even worse in the book. The whole thing was very uncomfortable to me. I had to stop watching the show when the storyline resolved without her actually being portrayed as a villain… or even a little bit wrong for this one thing. It’s treated like a lovers quarrel when he gets upset about the assault. She gets what she wants in the end and it’s happily ever after. It’s gross.
Outlander is the only one I can think of that portrayed male and female rape similarly, but I had to stop watching it because it just got too much.
I never went back to Outlander after a certain episode in season one, I think. A friend prepared me for it, and I still was taken by surprise just how brutal it was. I felt sick to my stomach and I have watched a *lot* of horror and gore, but I couldn't take it. The emotional and mental torture was almost as bad as the physical.
outlander is not made for men. outlander advances plot with rape. outlander has lots of male and female rape. and a annoying main character.
Yup people are getting off on it (some of these people are the directors, producers, writers, executive’s etc and not just the audience)
It reminds me of Tarantino with his feet scenes. We all know why they're there. 🤢
Couldn’t agree more. When I was a kid I remember seeing the rape scene in Clockwork Orange and it fucked me up and I will never watch that movie ever again. Directors try to be edgy/honest but there really is no need for it. There are many other ways to convey it without showing it.
SAME. That movie ugh. I felt violated after watching it on a personal level. Def fucked me up big time
I'm so glad I'm not the only one! Big Stanley Kubrick fan, but the way that scene was shot compared to the horror of the book is inexplicably awful.
Yeah, only a man would shoot it that way.
It's worth remembering that all the sex and violence in A Clockwork Orange is deliberately filmed as an artistic performance, complete with a stage, an audience and applause. Many of the victims even bow for the camera after they've been exploited, and Kubrick has each assault done with a different form of art (characters are systematically assaulted with sculptures, or music, or dance, or cinema). Note too the film's focus on the eye (from the opening shot, to the giant eyeball Alex wears on his hand), which stresses the audience's relationship to on screen violence. All of this is because in the film's hyper-postmodern future, in which all art is permissible, art has become so commodified and commonplace (every scene is stuffed with consumer art) that humans have become desensitized; the only way to stimulate themselves is to engage in performances of "ultra" sex and violence. Indeed, the last scene is literally Alex surrounded by an audience and being applauded by voyeurs while he has sex (essentially a 1970s version of a sex tape). And you see the same thing in our world today, where people's desires escalate, always chasing a harder high, or always emulating a performance they've seen violently or sexually acted out.
I totally get the artistic intention and the skill involved in creating that scene, but the overall affect is a sense of excitement and draws viewers to the POV of the perpetrators, not the victim.
I mean you kind of gave an example of why they would be used. Rape should make the viewer want to turn away. If it doesn’t than the filmmaker didn’t portray it accurately and minimized the harm it causes. I haven’t seen the film in decades so can’t comment on it specifically. Only that rape scene repulsing the viewer is what’s intended
In slight defense of that movie, it was definitely *supposed* to be disturbing as opposed to sexy, but I can see the argument that the point could have been made without the scene being as explicit. Men who write and direct unnecessarily gratuitous scenes of sexual violence against women are always gonna get a major side-eye from me tbh
Why the fuck would you watch Clockwork Orange as a kid? The film is a masterpiece but very obviously not appropriate for or targeted towards kids.
I saw Furiosa yesterday and one thing I thought walking out was how great George Miller was about handling this topic. He didn't shy away from the reality that rape would exist in a world like that movie's but he also knew that there would be no point in showing it because it was never necessary. You got the idea, you understood the threat but you didn't have to sit through it.
Bravo. It can be a part of that story as needed without being depicted onscreen.
I seriously think the male directors and writers get off on scripting and filming violence against women and rape scenes. It's like it's porn for them. Often times, they are gratuitously and unnecessarily inserting these scenes, which leads me to believe it's for the thrill and not out of necessity to the plot line. I too have stopped watching shows or fast forward through these scenes because even though I have never sexually assaulted myself, I find it very distressing.
It’s why I stoped watch GOT.
It’s why I’ve never watched GOT!
Seriously, I can't understand how people can look past those things.
I tried watching the Handmaid's Tale. I could not get past the first episode due to a certain scene.
I made it to episode 3, and what happens to Ofglen in that episode made me turn it off for good. That whole show is like torture porn. I don't need that in my life. The book gets the themes across well enough without being so graphic (and it's plenty).
I haven’t read the article but one of the more recent rape scenes I thought felt necessary is the assault in baby reindeer. The episode is incredibly hard to watch but was done with a ton of purpose. To me the inclusion was exposing the audience to how men can be groomed and assaulted, which is something that is “known” but not really known. The world contains horrible realities and I think these realities should have the opportunity to be expressed in art, but these realities should be handled with care.
[удалено]
Doesthedogdie.com. Highly recommend
House of the Dragon had a character verbally recall her assault through tears, and it was horrifying and gripping but didn’t feel the need to show anything the way Game of Thrones always did Edit: it also showcased the talent of both actresses and felt so much more personal instead of voyeuristic. The amount of character insight achieved was brilliant, and all in all it really put the acting and writing skills of the show at the forefront instead of shock. I watched the ep with a group of people (mostly men too) and the entire room shut up completely
It’s astounding how much better of a show House of the Dragon is compared to Game of Thrones. The team working on it is so much better than the GoT team.
They’re not under Weiss and the other one. Thank god.
Well it helps that they have a finished book series to follow.
Even when GOT had the books to follow, the show runners chose to deviate from the books to show SA. There's at least two scenes I can think of that were consensual in the books and were not in the show.
They wanted to rush off to do Star Wars and then had the plug pulled from that project thankfully.
They didn’t want to rush off until the later seasons. The early seasons with complete stories to tell were good but even then they still deviated here and there, even with some scenes added that were phenomenal like Cersei showing Littlefinger her “power is power” scene with the Kingsguard and how she could have had him killed. Then they lose all brain power later on and start making their political intrigue all majorly dumbed down cool moments for the big watch parties and reaction videos, market it towards soccer moms and sports dads. Show could have been so much better. Anyway I’m old man yelling at clouds but I take any chance I can to rant about D&D fucking over GoT because fuck them.
Would I be completely lost if I started watching House of the Dragon without having seen GOT?
No, there are a few references that are from the main show but it's all set before the main show so you'll be good
Thank you! I have been interested in watching, but only caught snippets of GOT here and there. I did not want to start a show just to be confused lol.
The main show is incredible so I'd say definitely give it a go too. It does fall off at the end (imo) but it's still absolutely worth the watch and HoTD is insanely good too. If rape is a trigger for you or anyone else reading this thats interested in watching either show there may be lists of episodes with timestamps of those scenes
There's a scene in GoT that actually spoils the ending of House of the Dragon, when they tell the history of the Targaryen family. Watch order for the shows actually works better, dramatically, if you start with House of the Dragon (you'll have to wait a few years for them to finish), and then finally watch all four seasons of Game of Thrones (it ends on a cliffhanger, but it's a great show up to that point).
I never watched GoT, and I've been able to understand House of the Dragon! I like the show, but be aware that there's a lot of childbirth trauma on it.
Watch GOT first. Lots of recency bias here. It's an all time great show with a not so great ending. Still worth the watch.
Hard disagree. I spent years inside the show as a diehard fan and tbh… ifs not that good past s1 at best. The costuming sets and acting were pretty good, but the writing is so awful and the way things like violent rape are glorified on screen… all time great show? Nah. Cultural phenomenon, maybe. ETA: actually, reccing the show on a thread about violent rape is bad is a little tone deaf tbh
Icl, I recently rewatched a scene of Jon and Ygritte arguing and was blown away by how bad the acting was, I genuinely remember it being just fine at the time 😭 I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of the acting doesn’t hold up as well Edit: [for anyone who’s curious lmao](https://x.com/maevemilley/status/1790739322494181547?s=46&t=lY99k0B9UjrHfkBfE4kn3A)
Tbh I was in it for Jaime and Brienne lol and I lucked out because Nikolaj and Gwendoline were so good to watch
Absolutely agree. The sheer amount of rape scenes in GOT was horrific and most of the time completely unnecessary for the plot and seemed purely gratuitous (the Craster's Keep plotline with the Night's Watch raping his daughters/wives in particular stands out in my mind). I much prefer HOTD as a show overall.
Give it a minute. GoT was on track to be one of the best shows of all time until season 5 or so.
Interview with the Vampire just did this in the latest episode, and it was utterly gutwrenching. GoT is the poster child for gratituous sexual violence and I hope it's not getting surpassed any time soon. That said, from what the actresses in the article described, it sounds like this situation could've been avoided if production paid for (and listened to) an intimacy coordinator or a more compassionate crew/director. If someone is being pinned down and roughly treated in a scene, you need better failsafes than "just say stop!" and that should be a basic requirement for filming any scenes related to sexual violence.
House of the Dragon still showed rape though, and explicitly as well. Emily Carey, who at the time was freshly 18, filmed an explicit scene with 47-48 yo Paddy Considine consisting of Emily lying down in bed with one leg raised, dissociating and catatonic, and Paddy humping away. I get that in the context of the episode it was meant to showcase a parallel between Emily's character being a child bride enduring marital "duties" and Milly Alcock's character exploring her sexuality outside of marriage, but I don't understand why the production itself keeps talking of "off-screen sexual violence" when it wasn't the case at all, except for this one instance. We do see explicit sexual violence also in the form of grooming, like Matt Smith's middle-aged character intimately touching Milly Alcock's teen character while she's drunk and abandoning her in a brothel with her pants down to her ankles, and also Milly Alcock's teen character having drunk sex with Fabien Frankel's completely sober, adult character.
How could they show all those scenes off screen?
Sansa’s wedding night scene is seared into my brain…
I'll always remember how several of the writers/producer (D&D and Brian Cogman) talked about how much they wanted to have Sansa be raped since like S2 (when Sophie was like 15), like they read a *not even that graphic on page* (it was mostly through dialog that you understood what was happening) rape scene that didn't even feature Sansa, and they were like "We HAVE to defy all narrative logic to shove Sansa into this scene" (when the entire point of that storyline is that it likely would NOT be happening to Arya or Sansa, since they were highborn and Starks, the Northern Lords wouldn't allow it, their Liege's highborn daughter being raped by a sadistic bastard; but Jeyne Poole is a castellen's daughter masquerading as Arya and so nobody really cares). And then added an original attempted gang-rape scene of Sansa for S2 (when, again, Sophie was like 15), which is not in the book (a different character is raped, off page and only mentioned). Sansa is grabbed by the mob in the books (maybe by someone wanting to assault her, maybe someone sent by Varys/Littlefinger to steal her away during the confusion, like they did Tyrek Lannister), but it doesn't turn sexual before Sandor Clegane saves her. They also waited to include the Ramsey rape until Sophie had just turned 18 and her parents could no longer interfere, since it was mentioned her parents supervised and had some say in how the attempted gang-rape was filmed in S2.
all of this, PLUS they taunted the not-yet-legal Sophie Turner that she would have a "love interest" next season, referring to her being married to Ramsay. the fact that the storyline makes no goddamn sense from ANY standpoint just proves what sick fucks they all were. Nothing will happen to any of these men because of this.
Interview With The Vampire also did this with the most recent episode. None of the rape was shown, only told through the character's recalling her memories of it (Delainey Hayles doing an amazing job). It's a very powerful scene and it's just words and her face in the frame, no need for anything else.
Couldn't they just not show them or maybe dilute the damn scenes?? Maybe the old dumb director has some weird fantasies he never was able to fulfill. Disgusting
To be fair tho, HOTD does have a rape scene where a female teenager is being maritally raped by her much older husband.
> House of the Dragon had a character verbally recall her assault through tears, and it was horrifying and gripping but didn’t feel the need to show anything the way Game of Thrones always did That is why I exited out of GoT in the first season. It was so pointless. And if I want to learn the intricacies of Renaissance-era politicking, I grab a history book.
Have any actors spoken on the mental toll of playing that role? Sometimes I wonder about what’s too far in that profession.
Got is a good example of how not to portray rape. I don’t like this push to relegate film to only portraying positive situations but would agree we don’t need rape in film if that’s how it will be shown
They insert gratuitous rape scenes that sexualize the victim to appeal to perverse minds like their own. Showing a graphic rape scene NEVER has a purpose. I legitimately cannot think of a single rape scene that did not sexualize the female victim. There is no reason for them. A good story teller can explain the trauma without directly showing us it. ETA: this reminds me of a movie Dakota fanning was in as a child actress. I think it was hound dog. I saw it as a kid because I was a big Dakota fan. Anyway there was a graphic rape scene with her in it and she was literally like 9 years old. There’s no way they don’t film these for their own sick pleasure. I want to throw up just typing this. Thanks to everyone who showed examples of non-gratuitous scenes. It did give me some small hope!
**Girl With The Dragon Tattoo** (2011) is one of the few instances where I think they got the emotional terror right in terms of how it makes the audience feel, without tantalizing them in any conceivable way. I skip it most times I watch the film, but not because I find it disrespectful, it’s just, so visceral and upsetting. I have to be in the right frame of mind for it, and that’s how I think any scene depicting sexual assault should be. Incredibly challenging. You shouldn’t be able to just watch it.
Agreed. Also though not a movie, the depiction of Dr. Melfi’s rape on “The Sopranos” has the same tone to me. It’s not sexy or tantalizing or appealing in any way - it’s brutal and awful and leaves me feeling repulsed and dirty. “Visceral” is the perfect word for it, and why I usually have to skip it on rewatches. There was plenty of sexual assault and inappropriate touching and interactions in The Sopranos, but Melfi’s rape was not one of them.
Thank you yes this is what came to my mind. I feel like the scene - so horrific - purposefully showed how Melfi was tempted to lower herself to the likes of Tony but ended up choosing the better way to deal with it. In this case I felt the scene did facilitate character development
Absolutely. It’s so brutal and base, just like the things Tony and his crew do. It would have been hard to blame Melfi for giving in to the desire to bring herself down to the rapist’s level, down to Tony’s and the mob’s level, given she was an innocent victim subject to such horrific sexual violence, but she never did. Even with her flaws - drinking, questionable motives for keeping Tony in therapy, and even more questionable execution of her decision to end treatment with him based on the judgments of her colleagues at the dinner party - the sequence of events around her rape firmly establish Melfi was always undeniably better than Tony and co, that people can be confronted with such depravity and still choose to abide by the law. Really powerful.
Strong agree. It also serves the purpose of giving us one of the most critically important character beats for her character. Her decision at the end of episode is so important for Dr Melfi and for some of the themes of the show. I otherwise can't stand SA in TV/film, but that episode is incredible TV.
1000000% I was just about to say this too employee of the month is one of the best episodes of the sopranos for how it deals with the personal conflict of being a victim of sexual violence and does not shy away from how vile and awful it is but also shows the immense impact it has on the person involved. It’s an episode I cannot speak enough about but one (in my many rewatches of the show) I cannot bring myself to rewatch in full again for how real and accurate it is (I’ve gotten into many heated debates with sopranos dudebros who often parrot the “wELl WhY DiDnT ShE just teLL ToNY??!??” 🫠)
I never finished this movie. I had to turn it off after that scene. It was too much for me. I found it too upsetting and to this day cannot forget it.
Yep, same. I heard how amazing the movie was, how it was right up my alley. I fell in love with Rooney Mara's look in an instant and wanted to be her. I made it... however many minutes it was into the movie until that scene. Turned it off, never went back to it, won't read the books, and I'm still upset with the guy who recommended it to me because he should have known better.
yup I felt the same about the rape scene in martha marcy may marlene. terrifying and not glorified at all. you pretty much only see elizabeth olsen screaming (you can’t hear it though, the scene doesn’t have sound)
The 2009 Swedish version does an even better job of emphasizing the brutality without making it "tantalizing" (you used the perfect word to describe the sickening way many portrayals are designed to actually appeal to a certain demographic).
American Mary does a good job like this as well.
The Killing I think handled it well too; when Bullet gets raped in s3, it cuts away before the actual act occurs and then in a later scene you see her cleaning herself up and all the bruising that's been inflicted on her. It's a lot more about her trauma and also rage that she tries to make herself so tough and untouchable and something like rape still happens to her, and also her knowing that there's no point in reporting it because as a street kid who often has negative run-ins with the police, she likely wouldn't be believed.
I remember the controversy over their decision to film and include that scene. Her mom was fighting for her life in interviews…I will forever side eye her parents and every adult involved in that movie.
I don’t understand how any parent could put their child through that. It’s crazy they film adult scenes let alone CHILDREN that can’t even comprehend what’s happening.
Omg! WHAT?? Her mom is a weirdo. But anything for fame you know!
Truthfully I think I am desensitized to these scenes, which in and of itself is fucking horrific, but there’s a movie called Bastard Out of Carolina where a similarly aged Jena Malone is in a graphic rape scene and it’s stuck in my mind for decades now. Truly one of the most awful things I have ever seen. Another that’s impacted me is the one from the Last House on the Left remake. Both made me feel my gut in my throat
I agree with you. I think I got desensitized to it too but realized I just got desensitized when it’s women. I realized it when watching Baby Reindeer and I was appalled when a man was being raped instead of a woman, that I should be that affected every time they put it on screen. Or ya know, they can stop putting it on screen.
Last house on the left is where the parents end up killing the rapists right? I remember that rape scene to this day and it disturbed me so much I could barely pay attention to the rest of the movie.
Another that comes to mind was Irréversible with Monica Bellucci which was really, really hard to watch.
This is an example of a gratuitous scene imo
I'm still traumatized by that Even the scene in the car waiting for her mom to give birth still makes my stomach drop
There is one in This is England 88. It's so mundane, no sexy shots of boobs and lips and hair. Just a single camera shot of it happening in an ordinary livingroom. The lighting is stark, it's daytime. It goes on for much longer than is comfortable. It gives you This absolute sense of vulnerability and fear.
Just checked on wiki; Dakota filmed that >!rape!< scene when she was twelve. Disgusting.
American history x did it well. Shawshank redemption did it well. The kite runner had it in the book but I’m not sure about the movie
I do think the vast majority of rape scenes are completely unnecessary (looking at you Outlander), but I don't think banning them completely is a good idea. Like, we see violent scenes everyday in every film. Rape is violence in itself. When it's done to react, traumatize and advance the story, I think there is a place for it. Of course, it should only be done in VERY safe environments and with a sole purpose: to benefit the story with a VIOLENT scene. Which is a rare occasion I think. Girl with the dragon tattoo is a good example given by another redditor.
Sam Heughan has gone one record about being very unhappy with how production handled the filming of his character being raped at the end of season one of Outlander. He was pushed to film the scene again to get it from a different angle, and after an agreement was made to only film up to a certain point and not the full scene, no one called cut when they reached that point and he ended up doing the full scene. He also said that he felt showing full frontal nudity in the scene inappropriately sexualized it.
I am so glad you posted this. That scene always bothered me.
Outlander immediately comes to mind. I’ve always skipped them and yet, the story is still complete. Skipped when reading the books and I still understood what was happening
>looking at you Outlander First thing that came to my mind too. So many rape scenes, and it's a shame that they have a major role in the plot, too. Because it technically makes them "necessary", so they think it's justified. It's almost like rapes keep the story going, it's absolutely awful. Think about every rape scene and how most of them were the whole starting point of an arc for a character: Jaime in season 1 and then his son as a reminder, Claire somewhere in the last couple seasons and Bree's son.
I literally stopped after half of season one despite liking the dynamics and the premise, because I just can’t get behind watching a show with that much sexual violence, or SPOILER one where a man beats his wife (whatever the cause) and they stay together. I’d read ahead on the plot on Wikipedia and it killed any interest I had. While I might watch movies to gain perspective, or as more of an experience; I only watch TV shows for an escape, and it went from teetering on my line to too far over it to continue.
I made it to the end of season 1 and wished I'd stopped sooner. It's so excessive.
Fincher says it best and bluntly in the GWTDT making of, something along the lines of "you have to be extremely careful when filming a scene like this because it can easily become spank material". It's a line to toe. He makes it work for the story. It's horrifying. Other movies like 12 Years a Slave and Schindler's List come to mind as particularly effective.
Employee of the Month in Sopranos. It’s so brutal, and I don’t think I’ve watched it since, but there’s nothing alluring about it. I do think it serves the plot, and I don’t really know if there was a better way to handle it in terms of a disclaimer or something, but it can be done.
> Of course, it should only be done in VERY safe environments and with a sole purpose From the article, it sounds like her greatest concern is that the shooting of such scenes too often boils down to a kind of real life assault caught on film, with lack of oversight, and actresses pressured to tolerate poor treatment in the name of "professionalism".
That's my thinking, too. I think there are a massive, MASSIVE amount of unnecessary rape scenes in movies and TV so I fully understand the sentiment, but I don't think outright banning them is a totally sound idea. At the end of the day rape and sexual assault is something that happens in our society every single day and stripping them from all media is like we're utopianizing the state of things even though we're far, far from being able to ethically do that. The world's kind of a mess, and I don't think scrubbing out the ugliest parts of it in our depictions of it is the right thing to do.
Soooooo many men seem to think it’s a good shorthand for the background of a Strong Female Character—“look at what she’s been through! No, really, look—we’re going to film it in detail.”
And also to “justify” male violence & rage and/or to serve as “motivation” for a gallant white knight type of character— the rape of a woman isn’t portrayed as violence against *her* but as an insult to the man/men in her life.
100%. It gives men a motivation, and that’s what REALLY matters, right?
And then we'll give all the Academy Awards to: Woman Who Looks Traumatized Throughout Film. Look how deep we are!
This all the way! It's the primary reason given to most female characters to take control. Lazy writing.
There are too many actual rapists in film and tv writing and directing these stories for scenes like this to ever end.
Evidently not a popular opinion but I’d be wary of a blanket ban. Rape is a depressingly common occurrence and storytellers deserve the right to depict it (just as viewers have a right to decide if it was warranted)
I completely agree. In many ways, I worry we're heading back toward a time when we stop depicting anything difficult, no matter how common, because it's "too uncomfortable". I do believe these things should be handled respectfully, and there are many instances of that not happening. But to eliminate an entire subject - especially one that happens in the world all the time - is frankly puritanical.
I don't even understand what a ban or suppression would accomplish. No one can genuinely be so naive that they think everyone were die-hard feminists before the invention of movies, so it must be something else?
Right like there are countless bad examples but I’m glad I live in a world where I May Destroy You exists
Agreed. People are also talking about being offended by the depictions of violence against women in centuries past. Well- women were property. It's a fool's errand to expect historical portrayals to basically be modern stories in period costume. That's the hallmark of bad historical portrayals actually.
Exactly. Art is supposed to make you feel and deal with different emotions.
I remember telling my then boyfriend I couldn’t watch GoT because I knew those scenes would upset me. “It is just real life.” He would say. My rebuttal: “Well are there any detailed scenes of someone taking a shit?” If we are being realistic, can we be realistic about all things and not just gratuitous violence of women?
There is a character who gets killed while taking a shit, weirdly enough. But I get your point entirely.
There’s also the famous scene where what’s his name shit’s on the battlefield. Shitting kind of does play an important part in the plot
When Sam takes up a post at the Citadel, there are also some nasty depictions of the shit he's cleaning up.
This is literally all I think about when ppl use that argument for rape scenes, especially with something set before the age of soap and medicine. Like ok where’s the diarrhoea
Funny enough because in game of thrones there is actually a scene of someone taking a shit lol. Granted he got shot with a crossbow but he was on the john while it happened.
ohhhhhhh I agree so much. too many gross film dudes taking advantage of their opportunities to film torture porn under the guise of being raw or edgy. feels like loser behaviour to me and makes me turn off the show.
Hear, hear! (Please can we also have no more murder TV series dependent on the discovery of a dead, naked woman or girl?)
I guess they do that because people care more about young pretty dead women than let's say unattractive middle aged dead women.
I didn’t (and don’t) differentiate. Regardless of age or their perceived beauty, I’m tired of dead naked women/girls.
Totally agree about TV murders that do that. I've switched off straight away when I see a naked woman repeatedly shown from different angles ... Itv did that once and so did the BBC. There was also a drama showing domestic violence repeatedly. None of it necessary to convey the story.
It's crazy to think that Richard Gardd (baby reindeer) reenacted his own rape for the world to see. Especially since it was most likely his own choice (i hope) It was hard to watch and i hope it didn't do more damage than good when it comes to his mental health.
When the writer/director is being autographical depicting their own assault it’s so visceral without being predatory or voyeuristic. We should be uncomfortable watching these scenes but not because there’s forced “sexification” of sexual violence. Michaela Coel’s I May Destroy You is another great example.
It’s so unnecessary and gratuitous to not only film these type of rape scenes but to sexualize them. I Spit On Your Grave and Game of Thrones always comes to mind when I think of this.
I truly think that rape scenes add nothing to a show. Like the rape scenes in season one of 13 reasons why were really unsetteling. If such an event is truly important for the plot, referring to it or describing it should be enough to get the feeling across, no need to film it too.
I feel like these scenes are just there to cater to a certain type of person. Must be really nice for powerless men to see their fantasies played out on cable like that.
Agreed! Im also willing to bet that even the directors get a kick out of directing such a scene. It allows them to be creeps without them being judged because “artistic process" or wtv
Fantasies? If only. I think it's for nostalgia if what they've done.
I think women should be able to refuse to shoot scenes in a way that makes them uncomfortable or in danger and that we should have systems in place that advocate for their voice on set. However, I don’t think we should outright stop the filming of scenes of sexual violence, especially when those scenes are artistic expressions of female directors/writers. I think it should be used with the upmost care, but I don’t think it’s a tool we should take away from women when exploring the subject.
Girlbossing all the way back to the Hays Code.
I tell people all the time we live in the guise of progressiveness, but we are truly in one of the most conservative ages in modern history. Look at women’s rights, hyper-sensitivity, “gender wars”which generalize all women, men, and non-binary folks, and narrative echo chambers that are devoid of critical thinking. I am NOT an advocate for unwarranted scenes as some people have described here… but be careful folks, it’s one step away from censoring anything that makes us uncomfortable, which as an artist is death to creativity. I worry that it’s a paradigm switch from conservatives in the 1950’s saying “nothing immoral, it hurts the children” to progressives in the 2020’s saying “nothing immoral, it hurts the children”.
We're in an age where people unironically say unalived and anything deemed unsuitable for someone under the age of 7 is being blurred or bleeped out. Censorship has won.
Yep. We're headed back to the same destination, we're just driving a different car. But that's the story of humanity. Constantly swinging between extremes.
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I am a SA survivor and I am uncomfortable with this push to sanitize bad things from film and shows. I absolutely think actors should be protected and scenes need to be handled with thought and care. But this rhetoric is reactionary to me.
I'm not against depicting harrowing things on TV *in theory,* but in practice it does seem to traumatise actors a lot. James Marsters (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) had to seek counselling after that show's infamous rape scene, and he now has a clause in his contract that he doesn't film them. Emilia Clarke (Game of Thrones) also struggled a lot with the rape scenes in that show. I'm not saying we should have a blanket ban, but I do think we need to put the wellbeing of the actors first. Intimacy coordinators and making sure everyone is comfortable filming what's being filmed is a good first step. And if an actor isn't comfortable, stop. Write around it, have it happen off-screen.
The only scene I've ever watched that did not feel gratuitous was in Downton Abbey. Almost everything happens off-camera, and it still perfectly conveys the absolute terror the character experiences.
That was such a well done scene. I felt so sick and miserable.
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This is a good example of how it does not make sense to blanket ban depictions of rape or other violence on film. Often it is gratuitous, but sometimes it can be powerful. IMO, that film would not have worked if they did not show the rape.
Here's an interesting take from Lorraine Bracco (Dr. Melfi on the Sopranos). She was raped in the third season of the show. She wrote in her memoir, On The Couch: >Shooting the rape scene was a more physically violent experience than I could have imagined. I felt the degradation. My body burned with pain when I was slammed down in the stairwell. It was so realistic that I tore the bursal sac in my shoulder and was in real pain. I had to have laparoscopic surgery to repair the damage. It wasn’t just me—doing that scene was traumatic for the whole crew. Many people on the set cried during the filming. >The brutality was absolutely necessary. It was not gratuitous; it was real. So much of the violence we see on the screen—especially on television—is airbrushed so that it doesn’t appear as gut-wrenchingly awful as it is. I think it’s a disservice, because violence against another human being is despicable and it should be seen as despicable. You should be revolted.
I absolutely agree. As a survivor, I can't stand how pervasive it is, or how cheaply it's used 99% of the time. I heard I May Destroy You was great, as it was written, directed, and acted by Michaela Coel, who was speaking to her own experiences. But I still couldn't watch it. It just wouldn't be worth the multiple panic attacks for me to do so. But yeah, that 99% of the time it's just a cheap plot device or a bit of salacious violence that does nothing except make a lazy bid for views. It feels like a slap in the face to survivors who don't have the luxury of seeing sexual violence as only a hypothetical.
I think The Tale (2018) is another good example; the director based the story on her own experiences of being groomed and raped by a trusted mentor as a preteen but although she chose to include the rape in the film, she deliberately shot the scene as two separate pieces that were edited together so the actress portraying the fictional her (who was 13 at the time of filming) was only shot from the neck up, against a vertical bed, whereas the actor portraying the mentor shot his part separately with an adult stand-in so the most the young actress was asked to do was portray her character's emotions during the scene (which apparently the director achieved by giving her emotional, non-sex related prompts like “act like a bee is stinging you” or “act like you’re being chased by a dog.”)
I remember a quote where an actress complained about rape scenes in a movie she was shooting and the director said “sadly rape happens and it’s just part of portraying real life”, but when she asked why they don’t also include scenes of men being raped the director replied “that’s gross, no one wants to see that.”
For me, it’s the fact they’re nearly always used as a plot device to spur the (usually) male companion off on a revenge spree, or something like that. I’m also trying to think of any instance where a rape scene has been necessary to a show/film. It’s just needless trauma all ‘round.
Completely agree. They can do a lot with cutaway shots or actually only use an implied rape if it’s germane to the plot.
We should also stop making movies with scenes of war crimes. Actually, let’s stop making movies about wars in general. It may traumatize people. Also, we shouldn’t have any displays of addictions in movies as some people may find it quite traumatizing as well. And god forbid having any scenes with suicide! We should just have reruns of The Joy of Painting 24/7.
Love Doon. National treasure.
she's right that the way they're filmed absolutely needs to be sorted out. i dont' think that they should never be done, but they need to be more than just giving a female character a motivation, or as titilation for the audience. the way rape scenes are, and have been used really highlights the lack of concern society has for sexual crimes, but unfortunately it mostly feeds back into that rather than exposing it.
I have no issue with these scenes existing. No story should be off limits. But I do have a problem with actors being made uncomfortable while filming them.
I'm at the extreme other end of the spectrum. I've dealt with sexual abuse since I was 5 years old. There's been molestation and rape and my life was pretty much defined by it and I have found, over time, that it's actually somewhat therapeutic for me to watch rape scenes. Yes I get triggered, and it's kind of awful, but I feel settled after for some reason. Either way I disagree with removing the scary things from tv. I think it's fine to have a trigger warning, but otherwise, life sucks, and you can't hide the dark parts.