Just because a window's open doesn't mean we want to peep in.
Voyeurism at its most artistic and yet troubling, Tell Me offers such an intimate, explicit glimpse at coupled life and sexual coupling that it almost forces you to look away.

An unstable mix of thoughtful domestic drama and soft-core sex manual, Tell Me ultimately comes across as nothing more than a desperate cry for attention from a struggling network: Stop watching TNT and FX, stop writing about Showtime and AMC, and look at us.

Odds are HBO's calculation is correct. Some viewers will look for the sex and some will look away, but people are already talking about the show in far greater numbers than they would be if nudity and sexual activity weren't part of the package.

Though those sex scenes go beyond all previous American TV bounds in frequency and intensity, the show isn't pornographic. The sex, while revealing, is too workmanlike, too devoid of romance, lust or fantasy to be arousing. As for what's on display, male nudity does go past former limits, but we still see more of the women more often, so the double standard holds.

But to what end? TV has often probed the problems of married couples who can't conceive; what is gained by seeing them try? You don't have to be a prude to feel that the sex exists not to tell the story, but to sell the show, and that it obscures far more than it reveals.