Demons of Wattpad

Fifty layers of chocolate (and vanilla)

[Article originally published in Italian. English translation made by Proudlyproserpinaa, with the revision of .]

"Christian Grey exercises control in all things: his world is neat, disciplined, and utterly empty– until the day that Anastasia Steele falls into his office, in a tangle of shapely limbs and tumbling brown hair."

It was the year 2011 when the literary phenomenon of Fifty Shades of Grey spread like a wildfire in the middle of August... a wildfire whose effects are still visible today.

Originally born as a Twilight fanfiction titled Master of the Universe (He Man is still asking compensation for copyright violations), then removed on various platforms due to Terms of Services violations and then published in three separate novels with minor edits to names and content, the book actually doesn't retain much of the original work, not to mention the passage from horror to horrid taste; still it shares with it the interplanetary success.
May it be due to the BDSM unveiled in every detail to romance readers? Or is it transgression, taboo and free expression of sexuality, readily available on the bookshelf?

None of them.

The responsible for the success of this saga is none other than the male protagonist of the story, the charming billionaire Christian Grey, who quickly conquered the hearts of the vast majority of the female readers (to the point he's considered the "Alpha Male" standard that will appear everywhere in the next Young Adult novels) and also gained the fury of who see him as the death of years of women's rights fights.
But who is, in detail, this polarizing figure, capable of sparking animated debates between drooling fangirls and haters?

Exploring the novel's scummy twists-and-turns (or, rather, getting our hands dirty with this so-called chocolate-made material), the profile of this youngster appears to be the one of a 27 (then 28) year old man, successful CEO of a Telecommunications company, socially committed, second adopted son of a wealthy couple, with refined taste in music, art and clothes, expensive hobbies and multiple talents (among which his favorite is to make love, if we could even call it a talent). And, last but not least, he's drop-dead gorgeous, as stunning as the Sun (PRAISE THE): after five minutes spent staring at him, you've gone blind.

Almost the perfect man, we could say... but we're not there yet. What's missing is that damnation, that dark past that he keeps in his battered heart every day of his damned (but lucrative) existence, to the point of waking up the most dangerous and degrading feminine instinct by cultural heritage: the "red cross nurse" syndrome.
After all, how could a story be captivating without the miraculous power of Love ™ that can do everything and fears nothing?

But don't you worry, because E. L. James has thought about that, too!
Christian Grey, in fact, comes from a horrible childhood of misery previous his adoption (his mother, a drug addicted sex worker, dead because of overdose and abuse from her own pimp), which caused him to develop aphephobia (fear of being touched) and receive sexual gratification via inflicting pain to women as dark haired as his mother, masking everything under the guise of BDSM, practice to which he had been introduced at sixteen by his mother's best friend.

Isn't all of this absolutely adorable?

After this description of our Amphitryon of bad boys in suit and tie, we must get into the merit of the relationship he creates wit this poor girl, Anastasia Steele, in order to answer the question "but what is it that women find so irresistible about Mr. Fifty Shades?".

The relationship starts initially kind of like an unpaid internship, with a contract and an NDA: Christian wants Anastasia, but only on his terms (as Dominant and Submissive) while she, even if hesitantly, wants to understand him and then she wants to soothe his pain, tenderly love him like the heroine of a 19th century love story. Despite this, even if Anastasia does not become his submissive and the couple starts their journey towards a more vanilla type of relationship, the aftertaste of chocolate is still firmly there.
Christian is overbearing, obsessive, possessive and violent (as previously mentioned); catchphrases of the novels are his constant ordering her around "eat!", "don't roll your eyes!", "learn to accept my gifts!" and so on that we could summarize in "do what I want without objecting" (to the point I'm surprised how Ana never ended up calling him "daddy"), all of this with the threat of spankings and punishments.
Constantly horny like a teenager in a nightclub, he often proposed to his girlfriend small erotic challenges that are borderline ridiculous (like when he steals her panties before a party, ooh, how scandalous!), as long as her reaction is always under his control.
Male friends, brothers of friends or male bosses are not allowed because, as Christian is firmly convinced, they're all aiming to play like Indiana Jones with the entrance of Ana's temple, and, because of that, she can hang out with them only if he's clinging to her like a mussel to a pole.
Dulcis in fundo, the stalking, starting from using his company's employees (Welch, I hope they'll pay you enough, at least), to literal ambushes.