Fifty Shades Of Grey has made an unusual, unprecedented journey from “adult” (by “adult” we mean “features people totally doing it and stuff”) Twilight fan fiction published online to altered Twilight fan fiction published in book form to incredible commercial success (if not critical, as author E.L. James keeps getting denied the Nobel Prize that is so rightly hers), and then to the source material for a $40 million film that will be released a day before Valentine’s Day. 

At every turn, the pervy litle engine that could has challenged conventional, society-dictated notions of sex as something that should only happen in the missionary position between married couples solely for the purpose of procreation, with its heavy-breathing depiction of naïve, masochistic young woman Anastasia Steele’s steamy, taboo relationship with sadistic, moody businessman Christian Grey. 

So when it was announced that the smash book would be adapted for the medium of film, there was fevered speculation as to how explicit and faithful to the book the film would be. Fans hoping the film would be, if anything, dirtier and more filled with nasty, nasty fucking between unmarried people totally uninterested in procreation than the book were disappointed to learn, via a Guardian feature on star Jamie Dornan (who plays Christian Grey), that the film was contractually obligated not to show what Dornan referred to as “my, um…todger” (which, contexually, we think means his “thingie”).

Now fans rooting for an ultra-pervy cinematic adaptation of Fifty Shades Of Grey have been dealt another cruel blow—not unlike the painfully pleasurable ones Christian inflicts on Anastasia. It’s been announced that the film will be receiving a relatively tame R rating, instead of an NC-17, or the even more ideal XXX. Yes, the only “erotic” novel your middle-aged aunt will ever guilty-read while sipping chardonnay has been adapted into a film with the same rating as The King’s Speech. The killjoys at the MPAA (whose moralistic mandates are already denying us long, lingering shots of Dornan’s todger) gave the film the R for containing “graphic nudity,” “strong sexual content including dialogue” (which we’re guessing involves Christian asking Anastasia, “Would you like to see my naked todger? It’s really quite impressive, here it is,” before cruelly cutting to the next scene), and “unusual behavior.” 

We’re guessing that the gloriously vague “unusual behavior” condemnation refers to the lead characters violating Americans’ sense of propriety by featuring non-married, non-procreative sex, occassionally with the assistance of a riding crop or satin blindfold, but we’d rather believe that this “unusual behavior” is entirely non-sexual in nature and could include any of the following eccentricities: 

• Characters having long, involved conversations about H. Ross Perot’s theories of taxation that somehow descend into fully clothed mud wrestling 
• Obsessively collecting toothbrushes from hotels around the world 
• An unusual amount of nostalgia involving the XFL, the WWE’s short-lived, “extreme” version of professional football 

We’re sure what this vague yet delicious “unusual behavior” won’t entail, tragically: extended scenes of Dornan proudly whipping out his todger and boldly displaying it in business meetings, brunches, and funerals alike for the whole world to admire. Sigh. Oh well, we’ll always be able to dream about that version of the film, and for the time being, at least, that will have to be good enough.