History Series / MastersOfSex

[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/img_0705.JPG]]
[[caption-width-right:300:''"Can you squeeze me in now?"'']]

A 2013 {{Showtime}} series set in TheFifties (at first) that tells a fictionalised version of the story of the Masters and Johnson sexology research team, loosely based on Thomas Maier's biography of the same name and starring Creator/MichaelSheen as Dr. William Masters and Creator/LizzyCaplan as Virginia Johnson.

The show lasted four seasons and was cancelled in November 2016.

Now has a [[Recap/MastersOfSex Recap page]].

* NotSoDifferent: The reason that Virginia and Bill get along and engage in a romantic relationship is not simply because of the efficiency of their partnership or mutual sexual attraction, but the fact that both of them are dedicated intellectuals who refuse to listen to reason or common convention. It's why [[spoiler: their other love interests don't work out -- they don't have the drive the protagonists have]].

* TheModestOrgasm: [[RealityEnsues Not everyone is a screamer.]]

%% * YourCheatingHeart:
%% ** Austin to be with Jane...and a few others.
%% ** Mr. and Mrs. Scully.
%% ** Master.
%% ** Libby.

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Masters and Johnson were nowhere as strikingly attractive as Sheen and Caplan. In fact, by 1965, Masters was bald and grey.
Compare [[http://a133.idata.over-blog.com/600x417/4/06/17/09/2012-b/William_Masters6.jpg Real life]] vs [[http://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/stltoday.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/4/5d/45d305af-6602-5937-ad00-503e6274b9ce/559fcbb4e8427.image.jpg?resize=1200%2C800 fiction]]. After the series premiered, Thomas Maier's book was reprinted and the [[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/00/Masters_of_Sex.jpg original cover]] was replaced by a new one with [[http://cbsnews2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/2015/02/15/0f4a73a8-1616-4875-bcae-58a23e742cca/4c1ae77b4e70f02b46cc298d78e93871/masters-of-sex-cover-244.jpg the lead actors]].

* AntiHero: Bill Masters is a variant of this. The show is about him, he takes the Hippocratic oath very seriously and big ego aside, he wants to help people with his groundbreaking work. However his inability to express his emotions in a healthy way and his arrogance oftentimes leads to him making the lives of his wife and Ginny (who are much nicer people) hell, and several times, his manipulative, possessive schemes to assert control over Virginia turn him very close to a VillainProtagonist. The show also lacks a traditional villain as the enemy is the sexism, restrictive traditions of medicine and biases of their society.

* HelloNurse: Virginia does have lots of suitors, especially after appearing nude in the video for Masters' presentation.

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Masters and Johnson were nowhere as strikingly attractive as Sheen and Caplan. In fact, by 1965, Masters was bald and grey. Compare [[http://a133.idata.over-blog.com/600x417/4/06/17/09/2012-b/William_Masters6.jpg Real life]] vs [[http://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/stltoday.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/4/5d/45d305af-6602-5937-ad00-503e6274b9ce/559fcbb4e8427.image.jpg?resize=1200%2C800 fiction]]. After the series premiered, Thomas Maier's book was reprinted and the [[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/00/Masters_of_Sex.jpg original cover]] was replaced by a new one with [[http://cbsnews2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/2015/02/15/0f4a73a8-1616-4875-bcae-58a23e742cca/4c1ae77b4e70f02b46cc298d78e93871/masters-of-sex-cover-244.jpg the lead actors]].

** Averted, which is unsurprising given that the Masters and Johnson study was one of the major things to undermine Freudian psychology. Virginia and Jane scientifically disprove the immature orgasm theory (i.e. masturbation is ''biologically'' less satisfying than heterosexual sex). Masters is unsurprised by the results (thinking little of Freud) but they take it further than he had envisioned or done any work regarding.
** Played straight with Ethan who goes to see a shrink that has him lying on the FreudianCouch and insinuates various things, like him dating an older woman means he's attracted to his mother, etc.
* AnguishedDeclarationOfLove: [[spoiler: Masters to Johnson at the end of "Manhigh".]]

* AntiHero: Doctor Masters is a variant of this. The show is about him, he takes the Hippocratic oath very seriously and big ego aside, he wants to help people with his groundbreaking work. However his inability to express his emotions in a healthy way and his arrogance oftentimes leads to him making the lives of his wife and Ginny (who are much nicer people) hell, and several times, his manipulative, possessive schemes to assert control over Virginia turn him very close to a VillainProtagonist. The show also lacks a traditional villain as the enemy is the sexism, restrictive traditions of medicine and biases of their society.

** The provost is an all-too-realistic example of this, marrying and having children.

* {{Blackmail}}: Masters gets the provost's support for his study by hinting that he knows that the provost has been having sex with male prostitutes.

* CallingYourOrgasms: When Bill and Ginny first start having sex ForScience, he pseudo-scientifically announces each stage of sexual response as it occurs: plateau, orgasm, AND resolution.
* TheCobblersChildrenHaveNoShoes: Doctor Masters has an appalling sex life, relationship with his wife, and inability to discuss the subject with her.

* ForbiddenFruit: While an academic success, the book about the study barely sells its first edition. Masters has the idea to wrap it under a plain brown paper to elicit curiosity from the public as something mysterious, illicit. It quickly finds a second wind among regular readers.

* GirlFriday: Invoked and averted, Masters first picks up Ginny because he's been told he needs a female accomplice, but it becomes pretty clear, pretty fast that she's just as important in the implementation of the study as Masters is.
* GoodPeopleHaveGoodSex: The morally pure Ginny is portrayed as having an active and healthy sex life, while Bill, who is portrayed much more [[AntiHero grey]] is sexually repressed and deeply conflicted about it. Subverted, also with many other people like Master's wife who is IncorruptiblePurePureness (in his eyes) and has a horrible sex life with her husband.

* HurricaneOfEuphemisms: A visual one makes up the theme sequence.

* IncompatibleOrientation: The provost and his wife. He's heartbroken when his wife insists on leaving him over it.

* LawOfInverseFertility: Played completely straight with Bill and Libby. She wants a child badly but he has a low sperm count and is too proud to tell her. Then his experimental fertility treatment works only for Libby to miscarry. [[spoiler:Ethan restarts the treatments without Bill's consent and Libby carries the resulting child to term in the first season finale.]]

* NotSoDifferent: The reason that Virginia and Bill get along and engage in a romantic relationship is not simply because of the efficiency of their partnership or mutual sexual attraction, but the fact that both of them are dedicated intellectuals who refuse to listen to reason or common convention. It's why [[spoiler: their other love interests don't work out, they don't have the drive the protagonists have]].

* SuffrageAndPoliticalLiberation: Lester is humiliated after he's rejected at a swingers' party. He goes outside and sits on the curb where he's joined by a black girl who is a cater-waitress there. She's somewhat exasperated with the party. In her opinion, the only "revolution" and "radical thing" of the event is a revolt against being bored. She insists she and her friends are busy with the true revolution and the civil rights movement. Somehow, Lester scores and they have sex in his car. Before she climaxes, she asks him to say something sexy, quickly. Lester delivers "civil disobedience", which she absolutely loves.

* VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory: As to be expected in this. What's surprising is some of the more shocking parts of the series are taken from real life. The plot begins to deviate more from reality in the third season. [[spoiler: Ginny has a third child and remarries George. The real Virginia Johnson only had two children and never remarried George.]]

* WouldHitAGirl: Ethan gives Virginia a bloody nose in the pilot when she tells him she only wanted to be FriendsWithBenefits, not to be romantically involved. They eventually make up, but don't sleep together anymore.

A 2013 {{Showtime}} series set in TheFifties (at first) that tells a fictionalised version of the Masters and Johnson sexology research team, loosely based on Thomas Maier's biography of the same name and starring Creator/MichaelSheen as Dr. William Masters and Creator/LizzyCaplan as Virginia Johnson.

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Masters and Johnson were nowhere as strikingly attractive as Sheen as Caplan. In fact, by 1965, Masters was bald and grey. Compare [[http://a133.idata.over-blog.com/600x417/4/06/17/09/2012-b/William_Masters6.jpg Real life]] vs [[http://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/stltoday.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/4/5d/45d305af-6602-5937-ad00-503e6274b9ce/559fcbb4e8427.image.jpg?resize=1200%2C800 fiction]]. After the series premiered, Thomas Maier's book was reprinted and the [[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/00/Masters_of_Sex.jpg original cover]] was replaced by a new one with [[http://cbsnews2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/2015/02/15/0f4a73a8-1616-4875-bcae-58a23e742cca/4c1ae77b4e70f02b46cc298d78e93871/masters-of-sex-cover-244.jpg the lead actors]].

* AllMenArePerverts: Played with. The revelation women can be too is a major source of tension.

** Played straight with Ethan who goes to see a shrink that has him lying on the FreudianCouch and insinuates various things, like him dating an oldr woman means he's attracted to his mother etc.

** The provost is an all-too realistic example of this, marrying and having children.

* BrattyTeenageDaughter: Ginny's daughter Tessa.

* DeliberateValuesDissonance: The different attitudes of the time is one the main motifs. The '50s are evoked as a pseudo-alien culture for a 21st century audience, much in the style of ''Series/MadMen''. The treatment of sex, the treatment of gays, the treatment of women in the work place, the treatment of women seeking a higher education, relationships between the sexes, and so on are just some of the things which get analyzed in detail.
* DistractedByTheSexy: Bill and Virginia almost always keep up their cool, scientific observer demeanors, but when Bill sees her topless for the first time, he's obviously rattled (both from seeing that his partner is a sexual being, and by the realization of his own attraction to her).

* LoveMakesYouEvil: Whatever well meaning nature the good Doctor Masters has in him is often overwritten by his unhealthy attraction towards Virginia, which turns him into an unapologetic ManipulativeBastard.

** Dr. Lilian [=DePaul=], the only female doctor at the hospital, can't get grant money for her Pap smear advocacy work, and has very few patients because (to paraphrase a manager at the hospital) few women like the idea of having another woman looking up their skirts.

* SuffrageAndPoliticalLiberation: Lester is humiliated after he's rejected at a swingers' party. He goes outside and sits on the curb where he's joined by a black girl who is a cater-waitress there. She's somewhat exasperated with the party. In her opinion, the only "revolution" and "radical thing" of the event is a revolt against being bored. She insists she and her friends are busy with true revolution and civil rights movement. Somehow, Lester scores and they have sex in his car. Before she climaxes, she asks him to say something sexy, quickly. Lester delivers "civil disobedience", which she absolutely loves.

* TinkleInTheEye: DefiedTrope. A young nanny hired by Libby Masters to take care of baby John is well aware that this happens, and puts a cup over his penis when she changes his diapers.

Now has a [[Recap/MastersOfSex Recap page]] that NeedsWikiMagicLove.

* Main/PunBasedTitle: Because "Masters" is his surname.

* TheLoinsSleepTonight: A problem with several men for a variety of reasons.

* VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory: As to be expected in this. What's surprising is some of the more shocking parts of the series are taken from real life.
** The plot begins to deviate more from reality in the third season. [[spoiler: Ginny has a third child and remarries George. The real Virginia Johnson only had two children and never remarried George.]]

* WomenAreWiser: Ginny's contribution to the study basically revolves around this. As medically brilliant as Masters is, he has a lot of trouble dealing with the mundane issues of carrying it out.

* LawOfInverseFertility: Played completely straight with Bill and Libby. She wants a child badly but he has a low sperm count and is too proud to tell her. Then his experimental fertility treatment works only for Libby to miscarry.

* AllPsychologyIsFreudian: Averted, which is unsurprising given that the Masters and Johnson study was one of the major things to undermine Freudian psychology.
** A CrowningMomentOfAwesome for Virginia is when she and Jane scientifically disprove the immature orgasm theory (i.e. masturbation is ''biologically'' less satisfying than heterosexual sex). Masters is unsurprised by the results (thinking little of Freud) but they take it further than he had envisioned or done any work regarding.

* IceQueen: Dr. Lilian [=DePaul=]

* {{Jerkass}}: ''Ethan''.

* MeaningfulName: ''Virginia'' Johnson could be seen as an ironic version of this.
** This is, of course, just an ironic coincidence since the show is VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory.

* YourCheatingHeart: Austin to be with Jane...and a few others.
** [[spoiler: Mr. and Mrs. Scully]].
*** And now [[spoiler: Masters]]. And [[spoiler: his wife Libby]].

* TheImmodestOrgasm: Betty fakes one in the first episode which prompts the study.

* DistractedByTheSexy: Bill and Virginia usually keep up their cool, scientific observer demanors, but when Bill sees her topless for the first time, he's obviously rattled (both from seeing that his partner is a sexual being, and by the realization of his own attraction to her).

* EthicalSlut: Virginia. She picked her own time to lose her virginity (and not within marriage) and is comfortable with her body and with casual sex, making her probably the most well-adjusted person in the series. But even when she and Bill start having sex with each other within the study, she makes it absolutely clear there has to be an emotional firewall between that and Bill's marriage, because she doesn't want to hurt Libby.

** There's also the fact there's a blindingly obvious flaw in his attempt to do a study about male and female sexuality without a woman assisting with the scientific parts. Basically, a lot of Masters' problems get averted when Virginia points out things common knowledge to women but little known to men of the time.

The show lasted four seasons and was cancelled in november 2016.