Overview:
Remember when epic movies made their official comeback in 2001, when the first Lord of the Rings movie won a bunch of Oscars? Since then, cinema goers have been inundated with the likes of The Chronicles of Narnia, 300 and more superhero movies than you can shake a lightsaber at. Shit, there's even been a parody of all these epic movies that was lazily/hilariously titled Epic Movie. It was only a matter of time before fans of more adult movies decided that they too wanted more bang for their buck; more angels and demons; more epicness.

Wicked Pictures is an adult film studio based in sunny Canoga Park, California that has been around since 1993. In their 15 year existence they've helped create stars like Chasey Lain and Jenna Jameson, who have both achieved phenomenal success with Wicked and out on their own. Wicked has always been known as one of those porn studios that puts a lot of money and effort into their productions - this ain't no "grab a camera and start shooting" kind of studio. Pornographic parodies of mainstream box office hits sit side by side on the Wicked shelf with original creations (Operation Desert Stormy, anyone?) born from the sick creative hive mind that is the Wicked production team.

Wicked Pictures dot com is the company's flagship online venture and a classy, professional sheen covers each and every page like a hefty load from superstud Randy Spears. The design of the site is loaded with graphics and flash videos but as long as you're on a decent connection they shouldn't cause any problems. Upcoming photo and video updates are listed at the top of the main members' page along with the site's most recently added DVDs. Most DVDs have four or five scenes and can be viewed as streaming videos or still photos.

A menu bar at the top of each page helps you find something smoking hot to get your genital gears grinding, with links to such browse options as Movies, Photos, Adult Stars and a Search tab for those with something specific in mind. The search function comes with such a multitudinous and diverse set of options that pretty much every possible type of porn and performer is covered. Sex action, cumshot location, prop, body detail, race, genre, position, costume, coupling and location criteria takes care of pretty much every variable. You can also browse for scenes via the aforementioned Movies, Photos and Adult Stars pages.

Searching for a particular model is a breeze. At the top of each model index page you'll find large portrait thumbnails of the contracted Wicked Girls: Kirsten, Carmen, Stormy Daniels, Kaylani Lei and Jessica Drake. Beneath that illustrious roster and a selection of famous Wicked Girls of the past is an alphabetized display of each and every model on the site, male and female. If you really dig the work of Peter North, Barrett Blade or Mr. Marcus, you have the option of looking up every DVD they've co-starred in and watching them pound poor young pussies into oblivion. The same goes for gals such as Penny Flame, April Aubrey and Dani Woodward.

After clicking on a DVD cover and preparing yourself for some furious fucking, you'll find a detailed synopsis of the plot, yes, there is almost always a plot, and info on the director, release date, DVD features (including 5.1 surround sound, bonus scenes, behind the scenes footage, etc.) and finally links to what you can watch right now. You can opt to watch the various scenes from the film, check out some photos taken on set or purchase the DVD. Unfortunately you'll need to exchange some cash for the physical product in order to reap the full benefits of Wicked's high production values. None of the DVD features are available online and the videos that are available are comparatively shitty in quality to those you'll see after popping that shiny silver disc in your DVD player. A pictorial cast list is also shown and each face can be clicked, leading you to that performer's list of content.

Each scene from the DVDs can be viewed online thanks to the streaming Flash video format. There are no video downloads at all on Wicked Pictures, which will disappoint every single user, I'm sure. It's hard to justify forking over your hard earned cyber-bucks when you can't even download a single scene, let alone every clip that you think you'll want to watch later. The Flash videos look pretty good but most seem too washed out and hazy to be considered great, even at "Super" quality. There's also the issue of some DVDs being listed but not viewable, available for purchase only. It's the small things like this that makes it seem like the company doesn't give a poot about their customers as long as the good ol' green stuff keeps rolling in.

Photo sets are also available for most scenes and usually contain around 50 shots of the performer or performers getting nasty for you. Clicking one of the thumbnail images on the photo set page will open up a new image viewing window that shows all of the set's thumbnails on the left hand side. Clicking one of these thumbnails will open the corresponding full-size image in the right hand side frame. The newest shots hit a resolution of 600x900 pixels, which isn't exactly huge. Sure, the photography is really well done and the superhot girls all look superhot, but if the photo sections are going to be truly worthwhile there needs to be some hi-res images added soon.

Ok, so the resolutions might be fairly low and the videos are stream-only, but what the fuck happens in the scenes? Well, there's a lot of fucking, that's for sure. Many of the movies open by diving headfirst into plot and character before getting down to the nitty gritty. If you don't want to watch the plot sections, fast forwarding is a pretty simple process. Personally, I find the dialogue and various dramatic scenarios to be pretty amusing. Why just bust a nut when you can bust a nut with a smile on your face? In terms of the type of sex that takes place, every base is covered. Just look at the search options! The stories themselves are, as I hinted earlier, pretty epic when compared to most porn movies. You've got angels and demons clashing with sex monsters and period dramas (thankfully not the monthly kind). Everything is exaggerated at Wicked, not just the sex. The plots and characters are so ridiculous that you'll be on the floor laughing, if you're not too busy beating off like Borat watching a Baywatch marathon.

$29.99 is what you'll have to fork over for a monthly membership, but there's also the option of signing up for the $4.95 3-day trial membership. It is a limited access trial, but certainly worth a look before you take the near $30 plunge. Need even more info? That's what the Pros and Cons are for!

Pros:
- The hottest pornstars in the world are all here, from Wicked contract girls to up-and-comers like Nikki Rhodes and Sativa Rose.

- The DVDs cover a wide variety of sexual subjects, in both original and parody concepts. Many are very entertaining in regard to both the sexual and story elements.

- A great search function improves the navigation of any site and this one is no exception.

- A huge collection of scenes and photo galleries is on hand and more are added every single day.

- The content is all original and almost entirely exclusive!

Cons:
- The video quality could definitely use a boost as it looks a little washed out and lackluster as is.

- Photos, too, could do with some better resolutions.

- The absence of downloadable videos is a crushing blow to what could be a top quality porn site. There are no zipped photosets either. Man, Wicked don't want you to keep anything without paying extra!

- Some DVD titles are listed but only have photos available for viewing, forcing you to make an additional purchase if you want to watch the video content.

Conclusion:
It won't be hard for Wicked Pictures to keep a steady flow of paying customers coming back to their site; they are one of the biggest porn companies in the world, after all. Hopefully, for the sake of their business and their customers, word will continue to spread about this site's shortcomings and it will force Wicked to make some pretty drastic changes in order to continue turning a profit. The content is very enjoyable and the performers are all world class. If only you could save some high quality videos to prove it to your friends - they'd sign up for sure.