Fifty Shades Freed

2018 climax

Rating: 6/20

Plot: These boring people get married, but their honeymoon is coitus interruptus'd when a figure from their past pops back into their lives. Following that, a whole bunch of other things happen, some which involve ass slapping and/or bondage.

Since I'm such a rebel, I almost always sneak in a water bottle with water, tea, or an alcoholic beverage when I go to the theater. I know what you're thinking. Man, this guy's a total bad ass! For the completion of the Fifty Shades franchise--and God, I hope this really is the end of this thing--my plan was to take my laptop, sit in the back row of a likely-near-empty theater, and type out an A-Go-Go entry as I watch. I had done the same with the other two, and I really didn't see the point in watching this thing without doing a Movies-A-Go-Go entry. (Note: That's where I watch a movie and type out my stream-of-conscious thoughts for my blog post.) I wasn't sure if the movie people would want me to take a Chromebook in there and didn't really feel like having a conversation, so I shoved it down the front of my pants and got it in that way. Yeah, I know. Total bad-assery.

When I walked in, there was a couple already in the theater. And--you guessed it--they were in the back row. So I just had to be a guy watching the completion of this steamily stupid all by himself and hiding his erection with a closed Chromebook instead of a professional movie blogger furiously typing away blistering criticism and reflective notes on a film.

I could have easily opened up the computer and typed away though. The couple behind me wouldn't shut up. I almost turned around and gave them a stink eye, but they wouldn't have been able to see it. They'd just see that guy who wears his bathrobe to the movie theater turning around.

It would have given them a story though, one that is arguably better than the story arc of this trilogy. "Yeah, we were making fun of that Fifty Shades movie and this guy in a bathrobe who kept sneaking drinks from a water bottle like anybody would actually see him or care turned around because we were distracting him from enjoying this stupid movie. You know he would have started Pee-Weeing himself if we weren't in there."

A tagline for this is a clever pun about not missing the climax. Do you get that? I think the main problem with these movies--other than the sloppy storytelling, the terrible acting and writing, the lack of chemistry with the leads, sex scenes that are more depressing than they are arousing, painful soundtrack choices, general shallowness--is that they are movies filled with too many climaxes. The sheer amount of traumatic or at the very least exciting events that happen with these characters in what doesn't seem like all that much time boggles the mind. At the beginning of this one, they get married, and I'm not sure about the women these books and movies were created for, but I'm shaking my head and thinking, "No! These two should not be getting married right now!" Early arguments about whether Anastasia should be topless on a beach and whether or not they should have children help prove that these two--a spoiled manchild with some severe psychological issues and a women who has the intellectual prowess of your typical Disney princess (the early ones)--A) have not really taken the time to think things through, B) know about as much about each other as the audience learns through the movies' weak characterization, C) are very likely not emotionally compatible, BDSM) are probably not even sexually compatible, and E) should never have gotten married.

The movie's events, just like in the other two, are kind of a blur. And we're probably in spoiler territory here, so you should stop reading now if you're planning on seeing this. Actually, you probably never should have started reading, and just like me, a middle-aged man in a bathrobe watching this movie, you should probably start questioning your decision-making. There's helicopter crash revelations, attempted abductions, suspected infidelities, explosions, surprise pregnancies, blackmail, thrilling car chases, and renditions of Paul McCartney songs on the piano. It's a lot of excitement for a pair of honeymooners, isn't it? But just like what this movie does with sex, it manages to make it all very dull. You come out the other side of this thing not caring about the characters at all and wondering what the hell was supposed to be learned from the whole thing.

What is learned from the whole thing probably isn't good. I'd have to devote a bit more brainpower to figure that out, and I feel like I've devoted enough time and energy to the Fifty Shades franchise. I'm done. And a little embarrassed.

I really need to wash this bathrobe, by the way.