Twilight! The latest craze in vampire fiction, the book swept the continent off their feet a scant couple of years ago, followed hotly by Stephanie Meyer's next books in the series. A film adaptation was announced, then released, earning a whopping $70.4 million in box office sales. The hype for the movie alone induced hundreds of thousands of Americans to read the series, and now there are few homes in the country that don't have a copy of at least the first book in the series.
And I hate it.
What?! How could I? The book was well written! Well, to a point, you're correct. The book was well done, and Meyer's a bit of an innovator. I doubt that she realized her book would take the world by storm as she was writing it, really; I'm sure she simply wanted to offer readers a new take on the vampire species, one that romanticized them and brought them a little closer to home than most gothic fantasies.
However, being the anticonformist that I am, I now suddenly find myself hating the series. Firstly, everyone's accepting the books as canon now. I didn't mind the unique viewpoint on how civil vampires operate, but vampires don't sparkle. They were never meant to. These creatures of myth were supposed to be the apotheosis of everything evil, so wicked that mirrors wouldn't reflect their image and angry villager mobs would storm castles with pitchforks and torches. They were NOT vegetarian, but rather craved blood as a pregnant woman would crave pickles and chocolate ice cream.
Second, EVERYone's raving about it. Hey, people! Find something new to talk about, to do! Trends come and go, and small minds are the ones that get sucked in and carried away by the tide. Remember the last trend? Harry Potter was the in thing, and I nearly began hating that too because of the mass hysteria and general idiocy of the public over it. Fun books, awesome concept, but JUST A BOOK and after you read it, you're faced with reality again. Grow up and recognize the trends for what they are.
Third, Edward in the movie was hideous, no joke. And all the girls of America are all swoony over this ugly b*****d saying how handsome he is... you know something else that glistens in sunlight? I do. Bullshit.
Fourth (whew, I'm on a roll, I guess), Edward himself is hyped to godlike proportions. I love his chivalric attitude, his selfless devotion to his love and his willingness to do anything under the sun for Bella. It's quite romantic, and I think that a lot more guys in our world would be better served by taking a leaf out of this guy's book. But see, when a girl looks at Edward, she sees the epitome of what a guy should be, and suddenly she's hypercritical of all the guys she's surrounded by. Us men are no longer good enough -- after all, we don't sparkle. I've got news, googly girls! Ed's a vampire. Vampires aren't real. Forgive us men for not being your fantasy man, but we can't fling ourselves from tree to tree and smell you from across a room. We're only mortal, and so is that grotesque actor that plays Edward.
I saw this demotivational recently that infuriated me and summarized my rants. It was a heroic kind of picture of Edward Cullen, in his eyeliner and dark clothes and sparkle makeup. The motivator said "Jealousy: This is what your girlfriend imagines when she screws you." Yeah, that sounds about right. Pretty sad when we can't pick a girlfriend without being scrutinized for how similar we are to the ugly Cullen.
One final thing before I go. I have a close friend that I talk to quite often, and she and I connect on more than one level. We also enjoy many of the same books and music, so we always have plenty to talk about. She's confided in me that she hates World of Warcraft, the mmorpg that is now over 16 million strong worldwide, because people obsess over it. I can sympathize -- there is a real life outside the game, and I've seen some people utterly forsake their life for the virtual world opened to them in WoW. However, it's also a shame that she can no longer appreciate the game for what it is: a well put together, well thought out story line; an immersive game with incredible graphics; an experience unlike many others. In moderation, the game is great fun... too bad she misses out on it.
Now, however, she's staying up to all hours of the night on the computer, staying home as often as possible, getting online the first moment she comes home -- she can't unglue herself from that screen. She eats in front of it, drinks in front of it, watches TV in front of it, conversates while on it, and last night she even slept in front of it. No, it isn't WoW that she's on (though those are all the behaviors of a WoW addict)... instead, she's reading Twilight fanfic, looking at Twilight pictures, talking to Twilight fanatics, rewatching the movie again (and again), et cetera, et cetera. She's become the very thing she despised about Warcraft players, only she's in a world of Twilight.
I wouldn't say it's ruining her life, but it turned her into a hypocrite. All this obsession over a bloody vampire that won't even suck someone's blood (an oxymoron if I ever heard one) is making me hate the books more and more. Which is a shame, because I used to like them.
Please comment this journal. Your opinion is important to me, if not everyone else.
