#which is fine...

the sex scene was awkward as fuck and I wish they had shot it in a different way. why not just give us a few suggestive close ups of them kissing and stumbling towards her bedroom - CUT - next morning waking up together? that would’ve been enough and would probably have looked less strange. you could’ve still done the fire effect by burning he rbedroom door or whatever.

I guess you could argue it was supposed to make you cringe bc he’s the main antagonist and he is sleazy and he did just tell Sheryl’s daughter that he’s turned on by her (which was a million times hotter than the sex scene). He does weaponsize sex and I can get behind an interpretation that it’s purely performative for him, but....

But the sex scene just didn’t seem organic or genuine at all. I have trouble believing that a woman like Sheryl would be turned on by Leland’s very technical and static approach to fucking. Their flirting in the previous episode and the snogging in the back ally was actually kinda nice and well done. But... the sex scene didn’t work at all imo.

I love Michael Emerson as much as anyone but it was painfully obvious to me that he was uncomfortable. Maybe so was Christine Lahti, I don’t know how her experience level is in terms of sex scenes. And if you have one or two actors who are uncomfortable in a scene like that then it’s better to make it more suggestive rather than explicit.