REVIEW: A History of Swear Words, Series 1 Episode Five 'P***Y'

 REVIEW: A History of Swear Words, Series 1 Episode Five 'P***Y'

One of my complaints from the previous episode in this series was that it seemed as though they had decided to reign in Nicolas Cage. To dial back on the Cageisms seemed like an extremely odd thing to do, given that those quirks are the main reason why many of us chose to watch this series in the first place. So it was great to see this episode embrace Nicolas Cage's personality more.

And boy, do we get those eccentricities here. From the very beginning, where we see Nicolas Cage painting on a canvas, it becomes clear that those aspects that were missing before are very much apparent here. The episode even ends with Nicolas Cage musing over whether the swear word in question is a vital part of the universe, which is an enjoyably daft conclusion.

I wasn't as much of a fan, however, on the sweeping statements made by some of the talking heads - something which I also found a problem in the episode prior to this one. Here, we are told the swear word in question is the 'only appropriate' way to refer to a woman's privates, which I totally disagree with. I would never dream of referring to a woman's lady parts in such a terrible way, and stand more by the belief that is also briefly mentioned that it's degrading to women.

The argument I find myself buying more is the notion of animal words like this word that can also be used for cat, being used because reproducing is seen as a very animalistic trait. To me this is an argument that makes complete sense. There's something quite wild and feral about the notion of two people engaging in this way, and it seems a more believable line of thought as a result.

There were some interesting facts in this episode, like how the word came from a 1500s slang term for a cat, before becoming a pet name for a wife in 1583. The original terms for the swear word seemed surprisingly unusual. Who would have pot people would have originally used 'honeypot' or 'bum trinket' for very much the same thing?

Even more weird is how a musical group called the Barrison Sisters apparently sung about the term in a series of public performances, where they surprised the audience with live kittens. That must have been a crazy watch for audience members, and certainly not something I could imagine happening now. You can just imagine how shocked many would be in this day and age, and rightly so.

The episode delves a tiny bit into the rise of porn, and how it apparently popularised the term in the 70s. I still don't understand the popularity of that kind of filth, and I often wonder why anybody would choose to watch something that must be so humiliating for the stars who choose to appear in them, but it's hard to deny that people, for whatever reason, do watch these movie equivalents of The Sun's original page three. It's certainly not something I have ever considered giving a watch, that's for sure!

Overall, this was an improvement on the previous episode. Nicolas Cage was once again Nicolas Cage, and we got some interesting facts on the swear word's history. Whilst there are some very sweeping statements in this episode, it does at least provide some interesting arguments from the talking heads on the word's overall useage.

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What are your thoughts on A History of Swear Words' fifth episode? Let me know in the comments section.