All Reviews

Review: Njoy Pure Plug (Medium)

Kate Sloan

When it comes to butt plugs, I have a bit of a Goldilocks complex. The Pleasure Plug 1 and Ripple felt too small and slid out too easily. The Ryder and Dipper felt too big and required me to be warmed up before I could insert them. I’ve been searching for a plug that’s somewhere in the middle – large enough to stay in and be noticeable, but small enough to go in without a fuss. And I’ve finally found it in the gleaming, stainless steel, medium Njoy Pure Plug.

I chose the medium size because it measures 1 ¼" in diameter, exactly halfway between my too-small 1" toys and my too-large 1 ½" ones. I think the medium is an okay size for a beginner, especially considering how smooth and dragless steel is. If your ass is really tight and virginal, go for the small, but ambitious beginners should buy the medium right off the bat because they’ll be less likely to outgrow it in a snap.

As with all Njoy products, my Pure Plug arrived in a black wooden box covered by an elegant white slipcover that displays the company name and a silhouetted illustration of the toy inside. The wooden box contains a styrofoam cut-out of the toy, covered in hot pink satin, so that the toy fits perfectly in its allocated spot. Njoy’s packaging looks classy as hell, but it’s actually one of the few things that disappoints me about the brand – the satin is cheap and the styrofoam falls apart if you’re even a little bit rough with it. Sad trombone!

The plug itself is gorgeous, however. It’s made of high-quality stainless steel that won’t tarnish, even if you neglect to clean it for days. The steel is smooth and perfect all the way around (well, mine has a tiny bump on the inside of the handle, but that’s a fluke). It’s heavy for its size, as you’d expect from steel, so it feels totally luxe in the hand and in the butt.

Like glass, steel doesn’t need as much lube as a draggy material like silicone does. I prefer to use only a couple drops of lube (any kind – silicone-based is great for anal play) with my Pure Plug, because if I use too much, it warms up and drips out of me, making me feel like I’ve soiled myself. Not a pleasant experience. In fact, in a pinch, I can actually just spit on this plug and that’ll be enough lubrication to get it to go in, though I don’t recommend this!

Another benefit of steel over silicone is that it doesn’t retain any ass smell, the way silicone has been known to do. A quick wash with soap and water gets this plug very clean and makes it smell as good as new.

Once inserted, it feels fantastic. Weighty enough to be detectable at all times, without feeling like it’s going to slip out. Bulbous enough for me to feel sufficiently filled up, without preventing me from using another toy vaginally if I want to. The steel warms up to my body temperature and eventually gets to a point where it feels like it’s warmer than my body. It’s a very sexy sensation and I often find myself getting turned on while just wearing this plug around the house.

The plug’s handle is flawlessly designed, at least for me. Widthwise, it’s practically flat, so it sits between my cheeks obediently and comfortably – but lengthwise, it’s definitely long enough to assure me that it won’t slip inside. And there’s a finger hole which allows for easy insertion and removal.

I tried this plug during sex and found that it didn’t really work for me, mainly because I’m so small down there that there just isn’t enough room for an intermediate plug and my boyfriend’s cock. The plug kept wanting to turn sideways to make more room for the intrusion. But if you’ve got more space in your trunk, this would probably be a great plug to add to your partnered sexytimes.

So if you want a comfortable, high-quality plug for long-term wear, I can’t recommend the Pure Plug highly enough. Check out the measurements, choose the right size for you, and you won’t be disappointed: this is a wonderful, satisfying plug that’s just as nice to stare at as it is to clench around.

Porn Review: Crash Pad Series #100

Kate Sloan

Crash Pad Series is a staple of the feminist porn scene. If you ask a hip-and-happenin’ queer gal about what kind of porn she likes to watch, she’ll probably mention the Crash Pad. The website currently has well over a hundred extremely hot queer sex scenes available for members to watch, and more clips get filmed on a regular basis.

Still, though, despite all the hotties and heartthrobs to be found all over Crash Pad, the main reason I wanted a membership was so I could see Jiz Lee and Nina Hartley’s scene. I’d just finished reviewing their first fuck and I wanted more.

Crash Pad chose to feature Jiz and Nina’s scene as their special 100th episode, and with good reason: these are two titans of porn. Nina’s background is more mainstream, whereas most of Jiz’s work has been feminist and queer (i.e. not mainstream), so this is an interesting and unexpected pairing in many ways.

The scene starts with Nina admonishing Jiz for being late and wearing a hat indoors. This immediately sets up the dom/sub dynamic that will continue through the rest of the scene. Jiz will call Nina “Sir” for the entire duration of their fuck, a nice touch of strange but sexy queerness that’s lovably typical for feminist queer porn. Both performers seem very comfortable in their roles, and it makes for some very convincing domination and submission.

Whereas their encounter in Live Sex Show was frank and matter-of-fact, Jiz and Nina’s Crash Pad scene feels much more sensual and sexually charged. There’s some sweet, slow kissing, and the scene is rife with impact play – Nina squeezes, slaps, punches, spanks, and bites Jiz at different times. Not once does Jiz seem to react in pain to this treatment; instead, they make pleasure sounds every time they’re hit.

I’d never seen Nina Hartley wear a strap-on before this scene, and she’s wearing a great one – it’s the meaty Maverick. She keeps her jeans and boots on the entire time, and combined with her huge dick, this adds immensely to her aura of authority.

Nina is a fantastic pussy-eater, and Jiz’s reactions definitely reflect that. Someone must have briefed Nina on Jiz’s genderqueer identity since their last meeting, when Nina kept using female pronouns instead of Jiz’s preferred “they/them,” because this time she uses terms like “front-hole” and calls Jiz “boy” a couple of times. It’s nice to see queer identities not only being respected, but being made into something sexy and natural.

There’s fisting in this scene, of course. I’m not sure if I’ve ever seen a Jiz Lee scene that didn’t involve them being fisted. And as usual, it’s intoxicatingly dirty. Nina must have wicked strong arm muscles.

One of the sweetest and hottest parts of this scene is when Jiz is using the Hitachi on themself while being fisted by Nina. Jiz asks permission to come, and when Nina grants it, Jiz has a thunderous orgasm and says “Thank you, sir” while they are coming. In the behind-the-scenes portion of this clip, Jiz admits that they worried about their ability to act and improvise as the sub character, but you’d never know it from watching them: they totally sell their sub-ness.

After some fucking with Maverick, this scene has maybe the best ending of any I’ve ever seen: during some additional fisting, Jiz says, “Sir, will you punch my hole?” and Nina literally punches Jiz’s junk with her fist. This causes Jiz to immediately squirt all over everything. It’s honestly one of the most epic things I’ve ever seen in porn – and best of all, it’s real, unlike a lot of the squirting in mainstream porn.

The only bad thing I can say about this scene is that the audio quality isn’t as good as it could be – there are occasional weird bumping and banging noises in the background, and sometimes I can’t understand what the performers are saying.

Aside from that, though, it is fucking sexy and I’ll definitely be watching it many more times. If you don’t have a Crash Pad membership already, this scene should be great motivation for you to get on it!

Review: Tantus Acute

Kate Sloan

The Tantus Acute is my ninth Tantus toy. You think I’d be used to the company’s excellence by now. You’d think some of the charm would have worn off. But nope – my love for their toys has persevered. (Hence the zillions of Tantus reviews that have been popping up on my blog lately, and will continue to do so for a little longer!)

I saved up reward points to buy my Acute, because I’m worried it might be discontinued. It’s currently hanging out in the closeout section on Tantus’ website, often a sign of impending discontinuation. I haven’t heard anything to confirm this, but I was concerned, so I snapped one up, and I’m glad I did.

The Acute is the smallest silicone dildo I own. It has an insertable length of 5" and a diameter of 1 ¼" at its widest point. These measurements might make you think that this is a toy for beginners, and true, it would work just fine for someone with little penetration experience under their belt. But the beauty of the Acute is that it’s not just for beginners. Unless your vagina flat-out needs to be filled up in order to be satisfied, you might find the Acute surprisingly pleasing. I certainly did.

As its name suggests, the Acute boasts an acute angle. Because it’s top-heavy and leans heavily to one side, it can’t stand up by itself. I’ve been propping it up against a lube bottle and affectionately calling it “little baby,” like a child who hasn’t learned to walk yet.

But what that angle lacks in balance, it more than makes up for in G-spotting ability. The Acute is a G-spot dildo, through and through. Its pronounced head finds my spot effortlessly and rubs it with every thrust, creating that need-to-pee sensation almost immediately, while the gentle ripples along its underside massage my vaginal wall and opening. This is a dildo that knows what it wants to do, and does it very well.

Sometimes, the Acute doesn’t feel completely fulfilling, as you’d expect from a toy of its size. When that happens, I just switch to a bigger one. It makes for a great warm-up dildo. Many people love it for anal, too, since the same curve that enables it to reach the female G-spot also brings it into direct contact with the male prostate. And of course, it’s harness-compatible, so peg away, ladies.

The Tantus Acute isn’t a glamorous dildo, it doesn’t rock my world, it hasn’t changed my life. But it’s a reliable G-spotting toy that provides just enough girth for those days when my vagina needs a rest but still wants to be stimulated. It’s definitely going to be a staple of my collection for a long time to come.

Review: Tantus Tsunami

Kate Sloan

Yep, there’s been a lot of Tantus around here recently! And there’s still more to come. What can I say? I’m a lucky, lucky girl.

I count myself as especially lucky because one of the Tantus items I was sent this month is the Tsunami – and it is about as perfect as a dildo can get. Remember when I said I loved the Echo? Yeah, this is way better.

The Tsunami is designed to look like a wave, as its name suggests. It has a curvy, rounded tip, followed by three large, jutting ridges. The bottommost ridge doesn’t quite fit inside me – the Tsunami is 6 ¾" insertable, and therefore longer than my vagina – but the other two are delicious. They need a fair bit of lube before they start to feel pleasurable rather than pointy, but it’s worth it.

There are also three small ridges on the back side of the dildo, toward the bottom. I feel ambivalently about stimulation on the back wall of my vagina, but if you’re into that, you’ll appreciate this feature.

The Tsunami is made of Tantus’ classic silicone – squishy and bendable, but firm; beautifully colorful; 100% boilable and bleachable. As usual, Tantus leaves nothing to be desired in terms of material quality. And the base is flat and flared, so you can wear the Tsunami in a harness if you want to fuck your lover with a badass tidal wave.

So why do I love the Tsunami so much? I’m going to try to refrain from saying unhelpful things like “it just feels really fucking good,” and instead, try to explain why it feels so good. For one thing, its ridges are marvelous at hitting my G-spot. They stroke past it every time, with little effort on my end, and manage to be satisfying without being overly intense like some other toys can be.

But truly, the real reason I’m in love with the Tsunami is its tip. The top of the wave is smooth and rounded, and acts like a slender penis or a thick finger. And it rubs the fuck out of my A-spot.

A-spot stimulation is something I don’t hear a lot about in the sex toy reviewing world, or in the world in general. I think this is owed to the fact that many people don’t know what the A-spot is. Maybe they have some semblance of an understanding that it feels good when they thrust a dildo really deeply and hit a spot somewhere near their cervix, but they don’t know it’s an actual erogenous zone with a name and a specific location.

I’m very aware of my A-spot, or “deep spot,” because it’s the source of most of my melty, tingly, “oh my god don’t stop” feelings when my boyfriend is fucking me. I’m also hyper-aware of it because, in order to stimulate it, I have to be very careful that I don’t bump my cervix. Cervical contact is, for me, uncomfortable at best, and agonizing at worst. So it’s bloody annoying that one of my favorite pleasure zones is located right next to my cervix.

But back to the Tsunami… Its tip has the perfect shape, size, squishiness, and curve to hit my A-spot without ever giving my cervix any grief. And that’s the main reason that the Tsunami will remain in the top drawer of my sex toy storage system, along with other all-time favorites like the Fling and the Amethyst. When I’m craving deep, satisfying, intuitive A-spot stimulation (with some kickass G-spot rubbing to boot), I’ll reach for the Tsunami.

Now, before I demand that every one of my readers buy one of these dildos, let’s just make sure you know what you’re getting into… This toy is 1 ¾" at its widest point. It’s squishy, so I can fit it inside me even though I’m on the smaller side, but it needs plenty of lube. If you’re tiny, you’ll want to skip this one (or just use the upper half, which, frankly, robs you of the toy’s greatest advantage). Likewise, if you don’t like texture, this is definitely not the dildo for you. And if you’re a size queen in search of something to stretch you and fill you up, the Tsunami won’t do it.

But if you like ridges on your G-spot, and firm but sweet A-spot stimulation, and both of those things in tandem… well, you need the Tsunami, pronto.

Thanks so much, PinkCherry.ca, for this stunning piece of silicone!

Porn Review: Live Sex Show

Kate Sloan

Live Sex Show is a film by Courtney Trouble, the mastermind behind QueerPorn.TV, among other filthy hot projects. It was shot at a Masturbate-a-Thon in front of an audience of 200 people, so it’s quite different from any other porn I’ve seen. There is crowd interaction, there is an almost theatrical dynamic sometimes, but mostly, there’s just a lot of really hot fucking.

The film opens with Kimberlee Cline performing a sensual striptease. Once her pussy’s exposed, she reclines on the big, colorful sofa that all the performers will fuck on, and gives herself a cute little clitoral orgasm with her fingers. The crowd cheers; Kimberlee giggles. It’s a good scene but it’s nothing mindblowing.

Next up is a fairly traditional girl/boy scene starring Jolene Parton and Peter Devries. They make out, exchange oral sex, and then fuck romantically in various positions. Jolene’s got a gorgeous, voluptuous body, and Peter makes noise (yay, man-moans!) while his handsome uncut cock gets sucked, but this is otherwise an unremarkable scene.

The next scene is where things start to pick up a bit. It features BBW hottie April Flores and her real-life lover, who goes by The Matador. April looks foxy in a velvet jumpsuit and pink fishnets, masturbating on the floor until her man shows up and puts his dick in her mouth.

The Matador wears a mask over his face for most of the scene. At first I thought it was to maintain his anonymity, but then I saw that he takes it off midway through the session to go down on April, so I guess privacy isn’t that important to him after all? I’m not sure what’s up with this.

Weirdness aside, it’s a good scene, made up of equal parts oral, fucking, and groping. April is her usual enthusiastic and sweet-faced self, and the pair are obviously very attracted to each other. One particularly lovely moment: the Matador rips April’s fishnets open to get a better grip on her juicy ass. Nice touch. The only major problem with this scene is that it’s not very well lit, so there are plenty of moments where I feel like I can’t see the best part of what’s going on.

Next comes the kind of genderfuckery that I’ve learned to expect from QueerPorn. Tina Horn, who I’ve written about before, acts as sub to her real-life partner (I think?), Roger Wood. In researching Roger to check on pronouns for this review, I found out that he identifies not as FTM but as “F to James Brown,” but that his porn persona is decidedly male.

I find Roger very attractive, and he certainly has a great connection with Tina, but I don’t think he makes a very convincing on-screen dom. His spanking, roughness, and domination just don’t seem wholly impassioned to me for most of the scene.

The turnaround comes when Tina and Roger take a bow, thinking their time is up. Someone tells them from off-camera that they’ve got more time if they want to continue, so they do, dropping all pretences and fabricated characters. They just fuck, and it comes off as way more authentic and pleasurable than the rest of the scene up til then.

The next scene is the crowning glory of this film, because it features two huge stars of the porno galaxy: Nina Hartley and Jiz Lee. (Don’t get confused when I use “they/them” pronouns in this part of the review; those are the ones Jiz prefers for themself.)

My boyfriend doesn’t think it’s sexy at all how Nina starts out this scene with an anatomical explanation of what she’s doing to Jiz, and I have to agree – but it is kind of endearing how Nina looks for opportunities to educate people on sex. The pair talk about their preferences, desires, and what’s off-limits (for example, Nina abhors being bitten), having never met before this performance.

This scene is fantastic because both of the performers clearly admire each other and are excited about fucking each other (and indeed, Nina liked the experience so much that she ended up working for Crash Pad Series solely for the opportunity to have sex with Jiz again). Nina fists Jiz to an orgasm with the help of a Hitachi. Nina’s a pro dirty-talker, telling Jiz that their pussy is “tight and slick and strong” while holding their throat and pumping her fist in and out like the expert she is. It’s astonishing to see two seasoned professionals clearly delighting in one another, not blasé or routine in the least.

Then they switch roles and do the exact same thing the other way: fast finger-fucking and a helpful Hitachi. When Nina finally orgasms, she grabs Jiz in a fierce kiss of gratitude and the audience goes wild.

The last scene of the film is an impromptu gangbang. Nina crows, “Let’s everybody get on Courtney!” and all the female-bodied performers proceed to pile onto the filmmaker, Courtney Trouble. Tina Horn straddles Courtney’s mouth wearing a strap-on, April blindfolds her and starts playing with one of her nipples, Roger handles the other breast, Nina puts her magic hand to work in Courtney’s pussy, and Jiz takes care of the clit stimulation. What results is an epic, if slightly repetitious scene, the likes of which I’ve never seen anywhere before.

Live Sex Show has its fair share of problems – it’s sometimes poorly lit, there are moments that come off as awkward and faked, and the first few scenes are unimpressive. But I still think it’s worth the price of admission, by far. The bodies are real, the orgasms are real, the attractions are real, and the second half of this film is some of the best on-screen sex I’ve ever had the pleasure of watching.