Guilty Pleasures: The Really Guilty Edition

Guilty pleasures, we all have them. But there are levels of guilty pleasure. I can class many things I enjoy as a guilty pleasure: chick lit, rom coms, Wall’s twisters, etc. But many of these things I can find something to defend, they’re not something so horrible I lock away in the dark place as mine only mine the world must not know of our secret love!

The bottom of the barrel guilty pleasures are sometimes the sweetest though, if loving them is wrong we don’t want to be right,etc. SO here are some of mine. Look away now if you do not wish to judge me from now on every time you see me or read something I write and think “Mmkay, whatever, tasteless freak!” I make no excuses; we are none of us perfect.

Zac Efron:  Every decade I need a new actor who is nothing but shameful, shameful eye candy. It’s embarrassing because while they stay young, I do not! (In Zac’s defense, he is more charismatic than my previous decade’s eye candy Josh Hartnett). We all have actors we crush on, but often we can pretend with a straight face have a mainly intellectual bent due to their exceptional talent (David Tennant, etc.). It’s not even that Zac, as I call him, is a bad actor, but I can't really pretend it's an exercise in intellect, any more than the other half can when Bad Teacher comes on. I must watch his films alone, in secret, because when he inevitably rips off his shirt* for very integral to the plot reasons I cannot mask my embarrassing levels of delight - it's not pretty, for anyone involved. Except Zac. So pretty...

Strawberry Ribena: For non-U.K. readers, this is basically strawberry flavoured tooth decay in a bottle. The crackiest sugar crack in liquid form. When Tesco announced plans to get rid of it (For the love of God why?! It won't stop people getting sugar elsewhere if they want it!) I did feel a bit of panic – now I don’t drink it all the time, it’s a treat thing, but the thought of life without it is way less fun. I buy it in concentrate form and add it to fizzy (that's what they call sparkling water here America ;-) water and it’s delicious beyond all reason.

Made in Chelsea: (A reality show about stonkingly wealthy young London types for anyone who hasn't heard of it over yonder across the pond). Oh sure, I can come up with ways to sell it as an exercise in cynical modern Dionysian voyeurism, I savour the clever snark on Twitter that fans of the show use to excuse watching it, but the truth is I like to look at the pretty rich people living their vapid, likely scripted lives more than I can express. It's filmed in a sort of perpetual gauze filter with an 80's sounding pop soundtrack right out of Drive that makes it instantly soothing and addictive, contrasted nicely with the bad behaviour of it's stars. It's self aware, without ruining the illusion entirely. It's total escapism I guess, but I do feel shame, because I know it's bad, and I do sometimes want to write about why it's SO BAD IT'S ACTUALLY THE BEST THING EVER, but it's hard to put into words.

Bad, and I mean BAD made for t.v. movies: (Mostly found on True Entertainment or Channel Five, in the U.K., but they're mostly made for t.v. movies from America; though we don't get many Lifetime movies really like the recent spate of "Behind the Scenes" of Saved By the Bell, Melrose Place et al which I am sorely wishing I could watch because I am a freak). If there’s not a kidnapping or mistaken adoption or murder or stalking or something else ludicrous AND based on a true story I’m not interested.

Primark novelty underwear: Not the cute lacy stuff, the really tacky stuff designed for pre-teens with cartoon characters and such like. It’s cheap and it makes me giggle and it mostly sits in my underwear (PANTS!) drawer because it’s actually not very comfortable. I’m a collector of useless things.

Carly Rae Jespen songs: Need I say more? They all sound the same, they’re all quite silly bubble gum pop that is far too young for me, and they make me want to dance, preferably with Tom Hanks! I mean, how can you watch this and not smile/want to bop around? Just me?


 

So there we have it, some of my deepest, most shameful delights. What about you, dear reader, do you have a love that dare not speak its name?

*Note to viewers, do not waste your time on New Year’s Eve starring le Zac –it’s on Amazon Prime so I thought it worth a punt. It  resulted in the worst Zac Efron experience of my cinema going life: the shirt remained on the entire film – honestly, what it is the point? (Though the movie itself it's marginally better than the other Gary Marshall Love Actually ripoff Valentine's Day!) ;-0