Remember ‘Guys Gone Wild?’ This is undoubtedly going to age most of us…
During the early days of the last technological boom and infancy of the internet, there was a film series through Mantra Entertainment titled ‘Girls Gone Wild.’ It was the closest thing to fully female-led pornography without there being actual acts of intercourse. It featured young, attractive, female college-aged girls willing to do anything for the camera. Mostly, however, it was just a lot of inebriated, easy influenced women showing their bodies and breasts to the camera for little to know compensation and the fear that a loved one or employer would find the content at a later date. Despite the insanity, Girls Gone Wild built its founder, Joe Francis, an empire worth $140,000,000 by the mid-2000s – which would actually equal $245,000,000 by today’s standards.
The Girls Gone Wild titles were churned out by the dozen and were easily available on VHS and DVD through the Mantra Entertainment website or a 1-800 number (oh, god) for $19.99. As things tend to do, especially due to pornography becoming more readily accessible on the internet by 2013, the production company ended up going bankrupt and sold to Bang Bros in 2014. Only after its liquidation did the seedier aspects of filming coming to light. The events were first documented in TNT’s ‘Girls Gone Wild: Exposed’ in 2022 and Peacock’s ‘Girls Gone Wild: The Untold Story’ in 2024. Numerous tales of debauchery included the heavy use of alcohol to influence the women and massively overlooked consent forms and ID checks – with many previous participants explaining they were underage when filming the content, experienced some sort of sexual abuse on set or needed therapy due to the emotional repercussions of their actions while caught up in the most negative form of peer pressure.
Girls Gone Wilds’ founder, Joe Francis, even racked up quite the criminal record with charges including underage sex, nonconsensual sex, child abuse and prostitution. Francis has since denied all these claims and is currently living in Mexico to avoid extradition. It seems like this would be the end of the story, with the production company now out of business, its creator living in solitude and the women who participated in the ‘reality TV of porn’ beginning to seek solace and therapy for the mental anguish they experienced due to their participation in Girls Gone Wild. But the world media as a whole has neglected to address another pivotal part of the story because we often protect women more than we do men. And we often paint men as these hypersexual beasts and women as the damsels in distress. Mantra Entertainment had launched a sequel series, Guys Gone Wild, in 2004 – and that’s where our story truly begins.
The cash grab was charged and fully loaded when it debuted, with three titles hitting the market all at once – ‘Guys Gone Wild,’ ‘Guys Gone Wild: Spring Break’ and ‘Guys Gone Wild: Frat Boys.’ It was the same concept as Girls Gone Wild, obviously, but instead it would feature ripped, college-aged men doing anything for the camera. It was meant as more of a joke – aimed solely at sorority girls or women over 30 – with the intention of being a gag gift of sorts. However, it was the gay community who really pushed the sales to become a million-dollar business. With the early to mid-2000s not being a safe space for queer people, gay men were able to purchase ‘Guys Gone Wild’ from the safety of their own home without fear of being outed. No more trips to the X-rated section of the video store, unless you didn’t have a credit card to purchase over the phone.
The first three titles in the ‘Guys Gone Wild’ series were a massive success. They were nearly free to produce and had an underground market, and they didn’t have to pay anyone for their contributions except for the crew. At least another eight movies were released to the public including hits like ‘Guys Gone Wild: Young & Hung,’ ‘Guys Gone Wild: 6 Pack Attack,’ ‘Guys Gone Wild: Canadian Bacon’ and ‘Guys Gone Wild: Everything’s Bigger in Texas.’ Videos included drunk, tan, hung and well-muscled young men flashing their privates and butts, rubbing oil on themselves, flexing in their birthday suits, showering, swimming, playing sports or being athletic while nude and even playing monkey in the middle on hotel beds. Unlike their predecessor, the one thing they didn’t include was man-on-man action, despite most of their core audience being gay men.
In an old press release shared by CBS News, one of the crew members is quoted as saying: “Let’s face it – there’s a double standard when it comes to guy-on-guy as opposed to girl-on-girl. It’s sexy to see two girls making out. It’s not considered sexy to see two guys making out. That’s just the reality.” What’s sad about this situation is an industry profiting off of the desires of gay men while also saying that no one wants to be grossed out by the content they were filming. As with ‘Girls Gone Wild,’ it’s also sad to see impressionable young people being taken advantage of to put money in other people’s pockets. Sure, some of the participants were probably very aware of the fact they were being consumed by the machine for a pickup line of “hey, I was in one of those infomercial videos,” but what about the ones who were too drunk to know any better? We’ve come a long way in examining consent when it comes to sexually explicit content or sexuality in general, and that’s the main reason why this franchise could never exist today.
What horror stories have gone undocumented because the public doesn’t want to talk about man-on-man activities? Why hasn’t ‘Guys Gone Wild’ received the same tell-all profiles that ‘Girls Gone Wild’ has? I’m sure dark, questionable things happened to these men while they were in front of the camera – and I’d love to hear some of their stories. Even on Wikipedia, there’s an easily accessible article that states female crew members needed bodyguards on set to ensure they weren’t sexually assaulted during filming. Can the same be said for the men? How many of them were outed by their appearance in the franchise? I implore someone out there, a producer or director, to get to work on this story because I feel like it’s something that’s been glossed over and forgotten about. Titles are still available on Amazon and Ebay, with rarer entries going for as much as $200, so there’s clips that can be used for B-roll.
Suggested: Spicy Content Creators With a 19-Year Age Gap Speak Out on Love and Judgment
Did You Ever Own a ‘Guys Gone Wild’ Movie?
What are your memories from this tragic footnote in pop culture history? How many titles did you own? Which was your favorite? What are your thoughts on the morality of the concept? Did you or someone you know appear in one of the movies? Comment all your thoughts and let me know!