Livre d'Or

I think you're right, it's a genre with its own conventions, and we should understand and accommodate that when judging it. But those conventions aren't written in the laws of the universe for fan fic writers to follow - they are coming from the brains of intelligent writers, mostly women, who can chose to lazily propagate tropes or think how to write hot erotica that is less problematic.

I watched Secretary about 5 years ago, hoped to find it hot, was a bit underwhelmed, and have now mostly forgotten it. We probably have the DVD somewhere if you want to borrow (although 'somewhere' might be Inverness :-) )