tristan taormino

Fuck Fifty Shades of Grey; this is what couples should be watching if they want to learn how to have kinky fun together.

Tristan Taormino’s Guide to Kinky Sex for Couples is a no-nonsense, no-shame guide for people who know nothing about kink. It introduces all the basics of BDSM play, one by one, in a way that’s gentle and non-judgmental.

As with all Tristan’s instructional DVDs, this film is formatted to alternate between educational spiels from Tristan and super-hot sex scenes that illustrate what she’s just explained. In the past, I’ve sometimes found Tristan’s explanations the tiniest bit grating – “Get to the sex already!” – but they seem a lot more natural and enjoyable in this film. Tristan seems happy and excited to be imparting every piece of information, which adds to how totally un-intimidating the film is.

Tristan starts out by defining some key terms, like kink, BDSM, and scene. She explains a little bit about why someone might enjoy kink – the fine line between pain and pleasure, the hotness of power exchange, etc. – which I think is really useful information for the target audience of this film, who might be curious but confused about kink. She then goes on to explain other crucial concepts, including enthusiastic consent, safewords, and safe-signals.

As an introduction to the first sex scene, Tristan goes over some of the kink implements the performers will be using – blindfolds, feather ticklers, edible body dust, and massage oil candles. These descriptions are interspersed with clips from an interview with the performers and clips from the sex scene itself, which makes for a nice preview of what’s to come.

The first sex scene involves Danny Wylde (my love!!) and Lyla Storm. At the outset, Danny is dressed in a lavender button-up shirt and a silver tie, and he looks fucking adorable as always.

Lyla is very giggly. My boyfriend and I watched this together, and he found Lyla’s “bubbliness” tiresome. I mostly just thought it was cute. She giggles her way through the entire scene, and I think it’s a good way to start off the film, since it makes kink seem fun and friendly instead of scary and intimidating.

They play with a feather tickler and edible body dust. Danny licks her clit while tickling her (and, as always, dude appears to be a stellar cunnilinguist). She moans and giggles all over the place.

At one point, they find themselves in a very inventive position: she’s on her stomach with her hands behind her back, and he thrusts into her hands. It’s the strangest handjob I’ve ever seen, but totally hot.

Shortly thereafter, while fucking her from behind, he drips oil from a massage oil candle onto her back. He doesn’t continue to thrust while he massages her, but my boyfriend and I had a whole debate about whether or not he could massage me and fuck me at the same time. (He thinks he could; I doubt he has the coordination. Maybe we’ll try it one day…)

The rest of the scene is pretty much a standard fuckfest, without a lot of explicit kink involved. He fucks her in a position I associate with James Deen while she uses the We-Vibe Touch on her clit. My boyfriend thought Lyla sounded “like a dinosaur” during her orgasm; I thought she was cute. The scene ends with Danny coming on her stomach.

Overall I thought this scene was a good warm-up for what’s to come, but it didn’t strike me as anything amazing. I don’t think Danny comes off as a natural dom in this scene; he’s being really gentle and playful, not especially commanding. But, then again, that might be a good thing for a viewer who just wants to dip her toe into the world of kink.

In her intro to the next scene, Tristan defines terms like top, bottom, and switch. She describes and explains orgasm control and denial, and why someone might enjoy wearing nipple clamps. In a clip from an interview, Danny Wylde provides one of the best takeaway quotes from the film: he says that kink is “like cowboys and indians for adults… This is a game.”

Sex scene numero dos stars Evan Stone and Adrianna Nicole, both people I don’t find particularly attractive but who always bring all their energy and enthusiasm to every scene they do. I gotta respect that, man.

Evan comes off as way more dominant than Danny. He forces Adrianna to strip for him slowly, throws around a lot of ownership-related dirty-talk, and even squishes her face into his balls. There’s plenty of face-fucking, gagging, rimming, and ball-sucking. This scene is an oral servitude fetishist’s wet dream.

In a demonstration of what Tristan calls the “tease and torment” game, Evan alternates licking Adrianna’s pussy and slapping it. It looks painful but kinda hot, and is a vivid example of that orgasm denial stuff Tristan explained earlier. (I love that she explains things and then they’re immediately shown in the next scene. I think it would make these new terms and concepts a lot easier to learn and process for beginners to kink.)

He makes her beg for his cock, and then takes it away and puts some nipple clamps on her instead. Later, he makes her beg again, and when he finally starts fucking her, there are a couple of moments where his dick slips out of her by accident and she begs for him to put it back. Girl is a killer sub, and she’s definitely met her match in Evan.

When Adrianna blows him until he finally comes, he makes her lick all the semen off him and then tells her, “You missed a spot.” Then she asks permission to get herself off with the Hitachi, and he says, “Yes, you may.” Did I mention that Evan is an amazing dom…?!

I think this scene is the roughest and most extreme on the whole DVD – but it’s not so intense that it would scare off beginners to kink, so long as they’re open-minded. This scene is chock full of enthusiasm and chemistry, and it demonstrates a healthy model of mutual pleasure within a D/s dynamic. I probably enjoyed this scene the most of any of them.

Tristan intros the next scene by explaining something really important: how to communicate and ask for consent in a scene without breaking character. This is super crucial information for beginners to know, since it can often seem awkward or impossible to ask for consent without breaking the mood, until you know how.

The third sex scene features Aiden Starr and Christian. I adore both of these performers. Aiden is an adorable, tiny, loudmouthed dom chick, while Christian won “Heartthrob of the Year” at the Feminist Porn Awards this past year, so you know he’s a hottie.

This is the only scene on the DVD where the dom is a woman and the sub is a man. I kind of wish there was another femdom scene in the film, for reasons of gender equality/balance, but this scene is so good that it almost doesn’t matter.

Aiden is one of the best lady-dommes in the biz, and she really struts her stuff in this scene. Right off the bat, she sets up the rule that Christian isn’t allowed to come until she does (which isn’t exactly true, as she comes many, many times before he does).

She makes him beg for her pussy, to which Christian responds, adorably, “Please, can I have your vagina?” (I didn’t know how to feel about the fact that he used the word “vagina” when she had been saying “pussy,” so I just laughed.)

There is lots of kinky stuff in this scene. She blindfolds him and puts a collar and leash on him. She sits on his face in such a way that she’s practically smothering him. She makes him literally kiss her ass. She talks dirty to him the whole damn time. There’s even a part where she tells him to remove her shoes, and when he takes too long to do it, she berates his shoe-removal technique. Aiden Starr is a fucking powerhouse, and looks gorgeous while domming the shit out of her sub.

There is lots of fucking, and she uses a Hitachi. She comes practically a zillion times, and every orgasm is accompanied by a cute eye-roll (I love when people have distinctive orgasm faces!).

The actual scene doesn’t show Christian’s orgasm, but earlier in the DVD, when Tristan talks about orgasm control, they do show that part of the scene. It is hot as hell: Aiden tells Christian he can come when she finishes counting to 10, and he does. I’m not sure why the editor(s) didn’t include that part in the scene itself, but it is hot and worth watching nonetheless.

Before the last scene, Tristan talks about spanking – how to do it safely, what implements to use, why it feels good, etc. She also talks a little about anal play, and drops another of the best quotes in the film: “Realize that it’s your butt in the driver’s seat.” She goes over some stuff that beginners to anal play usually worry about, like pain and cleanliness. “If it hurts, you’re doing it wrong!”

The final sex scene stars Derrick Pierce and Asa Akira. This scene has a more relaxed D/s dynamic, sort of like the first one with Danny and Lyla – Derrick is clearly running the show, but he’s smiling the whole time and is more of a benevolent dom than a bossy one.

He uses Lelo Luna Beads on her, which she had apparently never tried before. He inserts them before spanking her with his hand and with a paddle. It had never occurred to me that Kegel balls would pair so well with spanking, but after seeing this scene, I think it’s pretty much the best idea ever and am dying to try it out.

There’s some more orgasm denial in this scene: Derrick holds a Hitachi on Asa’s pussy, and just as she’s getting close to orgasm, he jerks it away. He tells her that she’ll have to stay perfectly still, or he’ll move it. She obeys, and as she comes, he pulls out the Luna Beads really fast (is this a thing? I thought that was only supposed to work with anal beads?).

She blows him while he spanks her, and she says, “I wish I could just live my whole life like this!” There’s some choking/gagging during the BJ, which always turns me off instantaneously, but she handles it like a true champ.

Asa is definitely a sub, but she’s very active compared to the other subs – she takes action, initiates things, talks dirty, begs for Derrick’s cock without being asked, and so on. It’s good that her sexual style is so different from the subs in the other scenes, because it gives viewers a different perspective on what submission can look like. Yay, sexual freedom!

Toward the end of the scene, Derrick starts warming up her ass, using a Tantus Little Flirt and a larger metal plug. He smiles and says to her, “It’s your cock, I’ll let you put it wherever you want.” (Ungh, swoon.) Then they have anal sex, she comes several times, and she brings on the end of the scene by shouting “You can squirt in me” until they have a simultaneous orgasm.

I really like this scene because it has a very friendly, playful vibe to it. It feels like an actual, real-life couple rolling around in their bed.

To summarize, I really adore Tristan Taormino’s Guide to Kinky Sex for Couples. It’s the best introduction I can possibly imagine for beginners to the world of kink. It’s easy to understand, full of information that every kinkster of any skill level should know, and the sex scenes are unbelievably hot. As per usual, Tristan has created what will be an invaluable addition to anyone’s porn library.

Thank you so much to Tristan Taormino for sending me this film! All photos courtesy of Tristan, too.