10 TV Shows That Rely Too Heavily On Nudity

Cover your eyes...

by Jonathan Cordiner
Emily Rossum
Showtime

Nudity. It''s something we all have in common. We''re all born into this world in our birthday suits and end up that way again at some point every single day (and if that''s not true, please shower/change more), and sometimes we're even compelled to take pictures of our naked selves to send to loved ones or just out of idle curiosity. All harmless fun, but just be thankful you''re not a celebrity and your private images haven't been hacked, uploaded and pored over by millions.

The Fappening proved that naked curiosity, pardon the pun, is alive and well, but it''s also somewhat ironic in that so many of the victims were movie stars, yet nudity in the movies has actually become less prominent and more infrequent over the course of the last twenty years. Gratuitous killing is just fine, but you''re more likely to see movie stars on the toilet than in the buff.

Television, on the other hand, is a different story. Not so long ago, you''d rarely see so much as a nipple on mainstream TV but in recent times the gloves have come off, along with everything else. Ever since The Soprano's' gun muzzle flashes lit up the landscape in 1999, TV has entered a glorious golden age that shows no signs of slowing. From the serial killer proclivities of Dexter and Hannibal to the murky politics of House of Cards, nothing is off limits. And in a brave new world laid bare, it''s still nudity that grabs the headlines.

Is there too much of it on TV nowadays and do some shows rely too heavily on flashing the flesh? It''s a matter of opinion, but the shows that follow have all been accused of salacious salesmanship and caused the odd storm in a D-cup.

10. The Tudors

When it comes to medieval matters of the flesh, it's customary for Game of Thrones to eat up the headlines like Daenerys gobbling a horse's heart, but plenty of other shows with period settings have given us a look at how people amused themselves before the age of the iPhone. The Tudors, loosely based on the sexcapades of the Tudor dynasty in sixteenth-century England and focussing primarily on the reign of Henry VIII, ran on cable channel Showtime for four years. Never likely to be mistaken for a documentary, The Tudors took considerable liberties with the events it included and alluded to, but it's unlikely that many people were tuning in for a history lesson. Henry VIII is best known for having six wives and beheading most of them like some sort of gender-confused preying mantis, and as the portraits from the period show, he also looked absolutely nothing like Jonathan Rhys Meyers. Nevertheless, Meyers is probably the better looker of the two and this show wasn't exactly aimed at historians. Complaints about graphic content were inevitable as Henry was getting his end away inside five minutes of the pilot episode, and this was anything but an isolated incident for His Kingship and numerous other characters. Frequently accused of being gratuitous, soap opera tosh, The Tudors may have relied too heavily on nudity but it knew what it was and wasn't afraid to show it. All of it.

9. Rome

Kerry Condon Rome Staying with pseudo-historical shows, Ancient Rome has become synonymous with blood, circuses and sex, thanks in large part to depictions of sexual depravity you have to be a politician to get away with in this day and age. The aptly named Rome only ran for two seasons between 2005-07, but that was more than long enough to incense the history buffs and excite your average viewer. HBO, who produced the show in conjunction with the BBC and Rai Fiction in Italy, have arguably had more influence than any other TV network in pushing the boundaries of what can and should be broadcast, and they took it to another level with this notoriously expensive effort. Rather surprisingly, it was the BBC - that grand old institution of integrity and propriety - that opted to re-edit the show's first three episodes into two in a move director Michael Apted called out as a blatant attempt to boost ratings by amplifying the sexual content and violence. Meanwhile, in the show's motherland of Italy some of the more explicit moments were cut out and replaced with alternative scenes specially filmed for the faint of heart, which gives you some idea of the controversy that surrounded Rome. If you like your TV shows safe and sanitised, you're better of watching something else. When in Rome€ you can fill in the blanks yourselves.

8. Masters Of Sex

As per the title, titillation is a guarantee in Masters of Sex, another period piece from Showtime that recently finished airing its second season. Set in the late-1950s and early-1960s, Masters of Sex tells the story of William Masters, an American gynaecologist who, along with assistant Virginia Johnson, conducted pioneering research into human sexuality. Not a bad premise, then, but one made infinitely more interesting by the fact that Masters and Johnson took their research a little further than was strictly necessary by investigating each other's sexuality behind his wife's back. Masters of Sex has rightly received a wealth of critical praise for its strong writing and outstanding performances, but rather predictably the show has generated more headlines due to its saucy scenes. In truth, the nudity in Masters of Sex is fairly tasteful for the most part, but a show with this subject matter is bound to serve up nudity and acts of sexual congress with each new episode. Still, at least if a partner or loved one catches you watching such a scene and questions your viewing habits, you can chalk it all up to sociological research. Or something.

7. Shameless

The majority of attempts to take quintessentially British TV shows across the Pond result in abject failure, so it's a little surprising to see the U.S. version of Shameless go from strength to strength. Embracing the dysfunction and gritty humour at the urban heart of the Gallagher family, the Showtime series was perfectly watchable when it made its bow in 2011 but has since grown in confidence and earned critical praise to go with its enviable ratings. And the quality of the show itself isn't the only thing rising - likewise viewers' temperatures and, er, other things. Another show where the title is practically a promise, Emmy Rossum has given some impressive performances but some of her other rather impressive assets have received more column inches. Most of her fellow cast members are in on the act too, though thankfully we're yet to see a William H. Macy full frontal. Nonetheless, Shameless is a warts-and-all show with an equal opportunities policy when it comes to racy content. Not that it's shocking for shocking's sake - the nude scenes are mostly used in the name of comedy. Apparently.

6. Californication

Some pictures paint a thousand words, others leave you speechless. Either one could apply to the image above. A show revolving around sex addiction? Yep, pretty likely to show up on any list about TV shows heavy on nudity, although few of Californication's rivals have come in for quite as much criticism as a result. Californication starred David Duchovny as Hank Moody, an L.A.-based novelist struggling to get to grips with his alcoholism, drug use, familial duties, self-loathing and sex addiction, and it let viewers know what they were in for pretty much straightaway. Inside the first five minutes of the very first episode, we're treated to the sacrilegious sight of a fellating nun and Hank treating a church like a pay-per-hour motel room. The scene in question was actually a dream sequence, but it's hardly surprising that the show became an instant target for the religious right, who successfully lobbied advertisers in Australia and New Zealand to cease their sponsorship of the raunchy show and tried to have it removed from screens. However, such antipathy didn't stop Californication airing for seven seasons, and although it was running out of steam long before the end, it certainly showed plenty of stamina where it counts and went out with a bang. Several, actually.

5. Orange Is The New Black

Orange may very well be the new black, but Netflix is definitely the new power player in the broadcast stakes. The streaming service attracted a number of grateful new subscribers by reviving cult classic Arrested Development, and their original programming now includes one of the best shows going in political powerhouse House of Cards. However, perhaps their most controversial original output is Orange is the New Black. Based on a real-life memoir, OITNB tells the story of Piper Chapman, a woman sent to prison for an old crime and forced to serve time alongside her lesbian partner from years gone by. Rather inevitably, this causes complications with her fiancé Larry, but it makes things more interesting for viewers everywhere. Would the admittedly fairly common nudity in the show have attracted so much interest if it didn't involve, for want of a better phrase, girl-on-girl action? We'll never know, but some viewers have found the lesbian scenes to be on the gratuitous side, and in that OITNB opened with a revealing shower scene, you can understand why they feel that way. The show's second season also included full-frontal male nudity, so at least any claims of sexism can be put to one side, and they won't be shying away from explicit content any time soon. "I love graphic sex, the more sex the better," so says show creator Jenji Kohan. We hear you, Jenji.

4. Girls

When it comes to what constitutes acceptable levels of nudity on your TV screen, few shows have engendered as much debate as Girls. Whereas some shows (like a couple we are yet to mention) can justify extreme content due to their essentially pulpy nature or because they are set in fictional worlds, some don't shake the accusations quite so easily. A few years ago, Lena Dunham was a virtual unknown, but that was before cable network behemoth HBO picked up Girls (so to speak) in 2012. She's since become an international celebrity and, in light of the fact that Dunham has written and directed a number of episodes as well as playing the lead, this recognition of her talents is well deserved. Nevertheless, she's also become somewhat infamous for the amount of time her character Hannah spends semi-naked, naked, naked on the phone, playing ping-pong in the nude or, as in the image above, eating cake in a toilet cubicle. Naked. On the one hand, Dunham has been applauded for her candid approach and pride in her "normal' body, but it's also led to her being subjected to criticism bordering on abuse and accusations that she plays the nudey card too often. Whatever your take, Dunham and her Girls - and boys too - are naked and proud. And often.

3. True Blood

As anyone who's tuned in to True Blood would likely know, the vampire saga is based in Bon Temps, Louisiana. And as language experts know, "Bon Temps' translates as "good times' and "Louisiana', we assume, means "naked'. Alan Ball's HBO show is difficult to categorise, lying somewhere between supernatural drama, Southern Gothic fantasy, horror and black comedy. However, one constant throughout True Blood's seven seasons is a nudity quotient to rival almost any show yet seen. This shouldn't really come as a surprise - the vampire has been a sexual allegory for centuries - but some viewers have found it difficult to contain their shock. From the very first episode, the audience was assaulted with fang-bangers, bondage, cosplay, threesomes, girl-on-girl, boy-on-boy, orgies and more, and that's without even going into the really weird stuff. Sookie's nookie is positively chaste compared to Eric and Nora's displays of sibling love, Bill literally twisting Lorena's head around during sex so he doesn't have to look at her, and Alcide's American werewolf in flagrante. If you've seen even half the stuff they get up to on True Blood and you've never been the same since, seek help and you should be okay. If you've done half this stuff, no amount of therapy can save you.

2. Game Of Thrones

So we finally get to Game of Thrones, and surely the only surprise is not that the show makes it on to a list like this but that it didn't manage to take the top spot. The fantasy drama series based on the novels of George R.R. Martin has been a headline grabber since day dot as the inhabitants of Westeros face off, feud, fight and do all sorts of other things that start with the letter "f'. Game of Thrones has rightly received an abundance of critical praise and regularly draws huge audience numbers despite also being the most pirated TV show ever broadcast. However, as engrossing as the exploits of Daenerys, Tyrion, Cersei and Jon Snow surely are, there can be no doubt that the blockbuster ratings have a lot to do with the steamy goings-on that punctuate almost every episode. When the show finally hit Chinese TV screens six months ago, the graphic sex and violence were edited out to such an extent that what was left over was barely comprehensible. Thanks to Game of Thrones, both "twincest' and "sexposition' entered the common lexicon, and even though there has been less nudity in recent episodes than was the case in previous seasons, controversy is never far away. Does the show rely too heavily on nudity? Perhaps, but neuter Game of Thrones, Theon-style, and what you're left with is "a medieval European castle documentary" as one miffed Chinese viewer put it. Well said.

1. Spartacus

So that just leaves the top spot remaining, and as you can see - and anyone who watched it would surely agree - the TV show that relied on nudity more than any of its peers was Spartacus. Spartacus was set in Ancient Rome (rings a bell) and revolved around a Thracian character of the same name who was loosely inspired by a historical figure, and ran on the Starz cable network for three seasons plus a miniseries. With swords, sandals, savagery and sex aplenty, some naysayers criticised the show's rather thin plotting, but they clearly weren't paying enough attention to the savagery and sex. Whereas it's not uncommon to see some of the cast members naked at some point in pretty much every show we've listed, in Spartacus there were a few characters for whom it was rare to wear clothes at all. No complaints about sexism or the objectification of women here - the men are exposed just as much as the women - but there were plenty of complaints when it came to exporting the show; Mediawatch UK tried to stop Spartacus from reaching British shores, thankfully to no avail. Rendering any attempt at a porn parody utterly pointless, Spartacus remains the undisputed champ of TV nudity, because sometimes grotesque, extreme violence simply isn't enough. Feel free to discuss your disgust below.
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Contributor

I watch movies and I watch sport. I also watch movies about sport, and if there were a sport about movies I'd watch that too. The internet was the closest thing I could find.