"The Wrong Paris": Romcom with Pierson Fode, Harry Jowsey, and Paris. What else do you need? Ok, some nude Texans?

 

The Wrong Paris, a romcom about a girl who thinks she's going to Paris, France, but...you get the idea...dropped on Netflix with this photo, so I'm in.  At least until I determine if there are any gay characters, maybe the standard femme gay assistant or shade-casting best buddy saying "Girl, forget your career -- you need a man!"

Scene 1: Focus character Dawn (Miranda Cosgrove of ICarly), wearing overalls, is welding something in the barn of her stereotype-country farm.   She checks the mail, then goes into the house.  Geez, it's full of girls. She has like 83 sisters and no brothers. They discuss their Dead Mom, whose only goal in life was to see Dawn go to the Academie d'Art in Paris! 

Grandma sneakily produces the admission letter!  No financial aid, though, and Dawn spent most of her Paris Fund paying for Grandma's medical bills last year.  She can pay the tuition, but not room, board, or airfare.

Dawn goes out to her rusty pickup truck to look desolate.  Sister stops by, asking for a ride to the Piggly Wiggly.  OMG, the Piggly Wiggly.  We're in redneck territory. I guess we won't be seeing a gay/femme best friend.

Scene 2:  Dawn is in the diner, serving up coffee to Buck (finally some men!).  Her ex Levi (William Wilder) drops by to ask if they can get together again, but it's been two years, and besides "You're dating Debbie from the DQ."   The DQ, har har.  We gonna have grits and sweet tea later?

Left: I tried to research William Wilder, but this is his first movie and he has no social media presence, so here's a random Texas dude.

Sister knows how Dawn can get to Paris: Season 16 of The Honey Pot, a reality dating show, will be filmed there!  And if you're chosen as a contestant, you get a $20,000 appearance fee.  That will take care of her living expenses for the year.  

"Would you like some coffee with your crazy?"

"Don't worry, I'm a big fan, and I can coach you."

Scene 3: The garage, where Dawn is welding.  A partially finished painting of flowers in the background.  Sister explains: Each season, 20 ladies move into the swanky mansion of a rich bachelor.  Are there a lot of rich bachelors who want to participate?  

Activities are designed to "trigger that primal quest for love and mating."  Sounds very heteronormative, assuming that heterosexual desire is universal human experience, based on biology.  

He drops one every week, until the remaining contestant has to decide whether to stay with him or take the $250,000 prize money. Stay with the guy -- you'll get a lot more than that.

Uh-oh, Grandma found out that Girlfriend paid for her medical bills, and is not happy.  "You try to control everyone!  I could have come up with something!"  And another thing: why hasn't she tried to show any of her art?  Every single town has an art center that displays local talent.  

Scene 4: More instructions.  The contest draws four types: Cinderellas ("I have been dreaming of finding my prince my whole life"), Roughnecks ("I'm a biker chick looking for my Ride or Die."), Desperate for Babies ("I get hot when I'm ovulating"), and Small Town Girls Desperate to Get Out.  That will be Dawn's persona.  Right, persona, just pretending...

To the auditions in Dallas.  Previous seasons have filmed in Fiji, Zurich, Nome, and Rome.  Dawn says that she's a Small Town Girl, and a big fan of the show.  She especially liked the one with the "blind pilot from 'Nam."  Her notes are wrong: it was a bush pilot from Nome, har har.  A silly mistake.  Why would a pilot be blind?  And no one has called Vietnam 'Nam since 1975.  But anything for a joke.

"So, why do you want to go to Paris?"

"It's full of light and art.  It's the most beautiful city in the world."  Paris, Texas, is quite scenic, but surely the casting agent realizes that Dawn is thinking of the Paris in France.  Why not inform her?

"To be honest, I don't want to be stuck in a small town forever."  

The casting agent likes her, but the producer (maybe Torrance Coombs) wants someone with a social media presence to boost their numbers, so Dawn is out.  But she tells her sister she made it!  Quite a fibber, aren't you, girl? 

Scene 4: A country western bar back home, with two-stepping couples while the singer tells us that his girl don't need any of his money. Hint, hint.  

Dawn and Sister, playing pool, catch the attention of a blond cowboy -- with spurs yet!   Dawn approaches and accuses him of being a tech bro playing dress-up.  That's no way to get laid, girl.  They dance and flirt and -- uh-oh, Sister is being harassed by two guys, so it's up to Dawn to rescue her.

"We could have done better at Twin Peaks," one of them (Kaden Connors) sneers.  The gay bar on Castro Street in San Francisco?  

This enrages Dawn; she breaks the guy's fingers and throws him out.  The entire bar applauds her chivalrous act.  But she didn't get the Cowboy's name or number.

Scene 5:  Dawn is welding when she gets the call.  She rushes out to tell Sister and Grandma: "I got the part!  I'm going to Paris!"  

Cut to the goodbyes as a hired car drives her to the airport.  She ineptly joins the line of contestants being filmed as they walk in slow motion, hair blowing in the wind, for the Honey Pot Season 16 promo.  On the plane -- wait, the flight attendant is speaking French.  Have all of the contestants been deceived?

Their cell phones will be confiscated until they go home.

Scene 6: Cut to the girls sleeping, as the flight from Dallas to Paris, France takes nine hours. As they descend, the windows are fogged so they can't see out -- the producer wants their reaction shots as they exit their plane at Orly...um, Cox Field in Paris, Texas, 100 miles from Dallas.  They've just been circling for hours!

As the photographer takes his stuff from the overhead bin, his bulge is visible (I couldn't get a good screen shot).  One of the ladies tells him to "get your baguette out of my face."

The girls exit, wearing berets, carrying French flags...to the desolation of East Texas.  Cries of "Hell, no!",  "What the f*k!", "Kiss my grits!",  "Wait -- there's a Texas in France?", and from Dawn, "I want the hell out!"  But she wants the $20,000 appearance fee, so she stays.  A dirty trick, and just for the reaction shots.  Now it will be an ordinary contest.  What was the point?

More after the break.  Caution: Explicit.

Jack Barlow: "Real Housewives" teen, Mormon missionary, hair-care guru, gay tease. With nude and bondage photos

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Harry Jowsey: New Zealand reality star, Boyfriend Dick Podcaster, Onlyfans nude model, "Call me gay."

22-year old New Zealand-based fitness model Harry Jowsey first appeared on screen on Heartbreak Island, and gained international fame on the Netflix reality series Too Hot to Handle (2020). It was based on the Seinfeld episode "The Contest": hetero hunks and babes had to live in close quarters without hooking up.  Proven "Master of his Domain," Harry split the $100,000 prize with the other  winners.  His "smouldering s*xual tension" with some of the ladies spun him into 4 million social media followers.  

And several podcasts. In Boyfriend Material, Harry and his guests give humorous relationship advice based upon his experience of hooking up with about 200 women.

It is notable for the viral term Boyfriend Dick, based upon Harry's description of his penis: No too big, not too small, looks nice, gets the job done.

More reality tv followed: Match Me If You Can, The Amazing Race Australia, Dancing with the Stars, and Perfect Match.  

Plus the upcoming movie The Wrong Paris (2025): a woman joins a reality tv show in "Paris," thinking that she's going to France, but it's the one in Texas. The women outnumber the men in the cast three to one, but there are a few hunks: Pierson Fode, Torrance Coombs, Kaden Connors (left), and William Wilder.

Harry seems to be veering back and forth between ally and homophobe. 

In September 2021, youtuber and trans activist Nikki Dragun included a picture of him in her video "Dick."  Fans got upset: "You hooked up with a dude, man!"  

Harry had assumed that the relationship would be private, but now that it was open, he explained, Nikki Dragun is a woman.  Trans or cisgender, what's the difference.

Sounds like an ally. except in October 2021, on his Tap It podcast, he complained that "some f*ggot" was trying to hook up with him.  He was referring to makeup youtuber James Charles.  Later he apologized, and stated that he supported the LGBT community.

In 2022, Harry demonstrated his support by posting some photos wearing a dress, and fans again became irate: "That's wrong, man." 

Boyfriend dick after the break

"Welcome to Plathville": Beefcake and bulges of a hard-core fundamentalist family, including the Boylicious model

 

Welcome to Plathville, originally on TLC but recently streamed to Hulu, is a six-season long reality series about the Plaths: "A strikingly blonde, blue-eyed Quiverfull family with 9 children in Southeastern Georgia, who are very passionate about traditional roles, their courtship rituals, music, God, and domestic life."

Brr.  Sounds too scary.  They must be wildly homophobic, but I imagine that they agreed to appear only if there were no "homosexuals" in the crew, so maybe they won't mention them at all.  Episodes appear to be soap-opera like, with marital problems, career troubles, treks into secular civilization, and lots of clickbait "dark secrets" and "startling revelations."

The elder Plaths belong to the No Greater Joy Ministries, an out-of-the-box fundamentalist cult that, other than hating homos, teaches that women must always be subservient to men -- working outside the home is a major sin, and will turn her into an evil lesbian.  Plus you must beat your children to ensure their subservience -- if you don't, they'll start to talk back and turn gay.

I'm definitely too squeamish to watch, but I'll check the Plaths for fundamentalist beefcake.

The parents, Barry and Kim, have broken up and gotten a divorce.  In my childhood church, that would have gotten them kicked out.

Their oldest child, Ethan,left,  married the outsider Olivia, who works as a photographer.  A woman working outside the home!  Shocking!

They got divorced, also.

Ethan and a buddy at the gym.

Daughter Hosanna refused to appear on the show.  She has left the family, moved to Ohio, and married an outsider.  Shocking revelation!

Daughter Moriah visited San Francisco and had sex with her boyfriend Max Kallschmidt. A dark secret revealed!

 The younger children are Lydia, Isaac, Amber, Cassidy, and Mercy.  

Micah works as a model, which means he has to work with gay people.  Uh-oh, he's doomed. 

Wait -- a model?  He must have some n*de photos out there somewhere.

More after the break.

"Bad Ideas with Adam Devine": When you need to f*k the Sadness in a hurry. With bonus buddy bulges and butts

Sometimes you need to f*k the Sadness in a hurry, and your best bet is Adam Devine.  Not (just) because of his hotness, because his stuff is always upbeat, with no hatred, no tragedy, no angst, not a lot of heteronormative mishegas, just whimsical problems, humorous braggadoccio, and homoerotic bonds. 

But you don't have time for a whole movie, or an episode of  Workaholicsor   The Righteous Gemstones. What do you do?

The reality series Bad Ideas with Adam Devine, streaming on Roku, is a perfect solution. In each episode, Adam. "the world's greatest movie star, the world's greatest lover, the guy who clearly writes his own intros," teams up with one of his comedian buddies to do something dangerous:

1. Compete in the World's Hottest Pepper Eating Contest, in the Bahamas. With Thomas Middleditch from Solar Opposites

2. Compete in a demolition derby, the Night of Destruction, at Perris Auto Speedway, near Riverside, California. With Blake Anderson from Workaholics

Blake bulging as a cop-stripper

3. Become stunt performers in a Western movie (after seven minutes of training). With Rebel Wilson from Pitch Perfect

4. Drive an ice cream truck up highway P3 in Peru, called "the Death Road" for its hairpin turns and 1000 foot drops. With Anders Holm from Workaholics

More after the break

"The Strongest Man in History": Robert Oberst and his pals recreate Viking challenges. With bonus Danish dick

  

In The Strongest Man in History, on the History Channel, four contemporary strongmen try to recreate the stunts of legendary strongmen:

William Bankier, who lifed a piano in Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show.

Thomas Topham, who lifted three barrels of water weighing over 5,000 pounds in 1749.

Monte Saldo, who lifted a motorcar and five passengers in 1903 

The guys: 

1. Brian Shaw, "Shaw Strength"

2. Eddie Hall, "The Beast"

3. Robert Oberst, "Strong and Pretty"

4. Nick Best

I watched the first episode, where Nick takes the guys on a tour of Moorhead, Minnesota, across border from Fargo, North Dakota, the "center of Viking culture in the United States."

 Nick is a devotee of all things Viking, even going to Renaissance fairs wearing a horned helmet.  His signature stunt is the Viking Press.

They visit the stave church at the Hjelmkomst Center, go ice fishing, and hear about how the days of the week are named after Norse gods.  But for some reason they skip the biggest tourist attraction in Moorhead, the Hjelmkomst Viking Ship.  It's a replica built by Robert Asp in the 70s that sailed across the ocean to Norway before being housed in the Clay County Cultural Center

Most of the episode is devoted to the guys introducing themselves, explaining what they're going to do, discussing how difficult it will be, and then doing it:

1. Carry a 345-pound boulder. All Viking boys had to carry one to achieve fullsterkur, full strength, and be considered a man.  In Iceland, they still use the 409-pound Húsafell Stone as a test of strength.

Left: 18 year old Billy Crawford, the youngest person ever to lift the stone.

2. Thow a 13-pound hammer, with an ice bath penalty for the guy with the shortest distance. Nick loses, at 70 feet. 

3. Pull a 12,000 pound Viking ship.

4. Hoist a 1,433 pound mast. 

Some of the challenges in other episodes are interesting.  In Stoke-on-Trent, Eddie Hall's home town, they named an oat cake, sort of a savory stuffed pancake, after him.  It has six sausages and three pounds of cheese.  The challenge: whoever finishes first without throwing up wins.

In the last scene, the guys gift Nick with an authentic Viking-era axe, leading to a group hug and: "So, we all going to get on the bed and start making out?"  They jump on the bed, but we cut before the make-out session.

Beefcake: The guys are fully clothed most of the time.

History: Snippets.

Gay Subtexts: Deliberate.  An extraordinary amount of buddy-bonding, with the guys often discussing how attractive they find each other.

Reality TV: The breathless "It's 12,000 pounds!!!!" and the constant repetition become annoying.  I might watch this on the treadmill at the gym, but for regular viewing, it's too darn fluffy.

Bonus Danish dick and other Scandinavian guys after the break.  Warning: Explicit.