A New Low

Shawn, Miss February

 Is it really too much to ask for Playboy to return to its glorious past? I'm not even referring to the 1980's and 1990's, when the magazine churned out spectacular and superior women as Playmates who were truly iconic. I'm not looking for even that kind of standard anymore - we've gone too far down the rabbit hole for that. I'm just talking about some quality women like we saw 3 or 4 years back, in the mid-2000's. Women who are hand-picked for their talent, then placed into a pictorial setting where they can jog our imaginations.

The truth is, a good Playmate candidate doesn't need much work. Put them in an intimate setting with a little costuming, and let them go about their magic. All the greats have that talent, as anyone on my Hall of Fame list would show. It's just natural.

In 2012 and now starting off 2013, there's a disturbing trend. Where is my beloved magazine with its talented and unique women? These are cookie cutter girls that have been crowded with setpieces and gimmicks that constrict their true nature, and cloud the real subject matter here.

To exacerbate the problem and prove my point, take a look at Shawn Dillon, Miss February 2013. This spunky 26-year old is someone that I really banked on, someone who I'd set my hopes on ever since I laid my eyes on some of her awesome lingerie and modeling shots. Shawn is innately a gorgeous girl, with probably one of the most appealing faces we've seen since Laura Croft. She's very youthful and genuine, and although she seems to have always lacked the posing talent, she's still wonderfully great to watch.

Until Playboy got ahold of her, that is. So my utter dismay, Playboy took one of the most promising Playmates in months, a potential star in the early running for PMOY, and destroyed her. They took a perfectly fine model and stuck her in one of the worst pictorials I've ever seen a Playmate in.

Where do I start with this thing? It's just a disaster. Shawn has so much color and life, and they sucked everything out of her in this putrid display. Instead, she looks pale, her hair frazzled and unbecoming. She looks constantly strained and out of place in the maritime setting, struggling to find a single ounce of spice or flash. She's shot in awkward sitting positions, which never captures the great shapeliness of Miss Dillon's body, ignoring the fact that she has a wonderfully plump ass.

Can you find the vaguely naked
woman in this photo?

That's just the start. What about the plethora of uncropped and unfinished photos of Shawn fishing from afar, without a single hint of nudity or even a close look at the model at all? There's a row of 23 shots in this pictorial that are virtually IDENTICAL! It's almost as if the editors over at Playboy are just playing a game with us here, thinking that their readers and fans are just a group of fools. The introduction of rookie photographer Tony Kelly might have something to do with it, but no Playboy point man should be this out of touch.

Through all the horrifying shortcomings of the pictorial, you never are able to get a feel for how great Shawn is, and that's the travesty here. If this was a passive, boring woman like Lisa Seiffert of last year, it would be mildly passable. But this was a model with loads of potential, with supple skin and a great energy about her that could have been something very special. What a shame.

• Face: A
  The photographers almost try every dopey move to try to obscure or downplay Shawn's beautiful face in this pictorial, but I still won't knock the fact that she is one lovely model, and this is her greatest strength. Take a clean look at her pearly smile and those inevitable eyes, and you won't doubt this woman for a minute.
• Body: A-
  Finally, we get a Playmate with the physical tools: a centerpiece of a face, a balanced and slim body, and we get stuck with a subpar performance. There's still no denying that Shawn does possess those tools, most notably her absolutely lovely butt. There's not much definition or curvature to her backside, but her buttocks protrude in a nice bubble, which is never captured to the extent that it needs to be. This should be an obvious focal point in her photo set.
• Talent: B
  Shawn deserves another shot to prove herself, because there should be more to her than this. When you go back and look at her previous modeling work, though, it's easy to see that she's a bit thin on moves. She never gets into any rhythm with her PM pictorial, jet skiing and fishing and doing anything but actually posing for the camera.
• Pictorial: C-
  I think I've said enough about this photo set entry of Shawn's, and how unfortunate it's been. I can safely say that it is one of the worst pictorials I've seen in years, possibly the worst in decades. This kind of output is totally unacceptable, and I hope newcomer Tony Kelly and the rest of the crew step things up, and fast.
• Centerfold: C
  The centerfold falls into the same vein as the rest of the photo set, with Shawn standing in a beach setting with an obscured body and absolutely no attention to detail. 
• Overall: B
  The miserable pictorial set of Miss Dillon drags her down from a possible A-caliber Playmate to a mid-grade model. This is just not fair to Shawn or her fans, and hopefully her Playmate exclusives performance does her some justice and brings her back in time for the Playmate ranking. For Shawn, I might make an exception in my year-end ranking and boost her rating if I see a better pictorial, because she just didn't perform on a level playing field. She's a model with loads of potential who just got a raw deal.