The Twilight Factor

"Darkness is so predictable. Don't you think?" - Edward Cullen

No I have not read the books. No I have not seen the movie(s). Yes I did get that line off of Wikiquote. If any Twilight fans have got a problem with that I will only tell you that I can't watch the movies because I haven't read the books, and I haven't read the books because I am enjoying a different fantasy series...cough!Dark Tower!cough! But hey I needed something and I'd like that line. This is a post not really about Twilight because, frankly, if I haven't read or seen the material I can't judge too much. It's more about my thoughts on the fandom and what I think the series will be like.

Twilight. In case a Twilight fan has dared to leave you uninformed, Twilight is your usual boy meets girl-girl has low self esteem-boy is mysterious-girl can't resist boy-vice versa-boy turns out to be vampire-girl turns out to not care-they fall in love-live morbidly ever after story. Let's start off with the fans. I don't care if it's Twilight or Star Wars or Battlefield Earth (well Scientologists love it at least) or Halo or Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 2 or...Jesus, fans are going to be annoying one way or another. Here are the traits of your typical fan: 1) whatever they are fans of cannot possibly be bad. 2) saying it is bad is blasphemy and punishable by crucifixion or lightsaber. 3) it is more than likely the focal point of most of their conversations. 4) any reasonable arguement against the fandom will be contradicted by any means and I mean ANY MEANS. 5) they will one day, hopefully one day, grow up and look back on the time that they were fans of a particular medium and be utterly embarrassed with themselves. But in the case of Twilight, seeing how most people I know enjoy the series, fans may never stop loving the series.

Being that Twilight is a romance series, it's not a vampire-romance series because the so called creatures of the night are not vampires, girls between the ages of nine to forty-five will respond positively to it.

I'm not trying to start an arguement, but based on what my Twilight loving friends have told me the "vampire" characters seem to rarely show any signs of vampirism: instead of burning in the sunlight they merely sparkle, I guess there are like two of them who actually drink human blood, and they have some kind of intoxicating beauty. Actually the intoxicating beauty part may have always existed, why else were all of those girls lunging there throats at Dracula and Lestat. Still, until I see some evidence of vampirism, I'm just calling them the Immortal Sparklers.

Back to the fans. They are enthusiastic to say the least. I can't imagine why there were people at Comic Con '09 dressed as characters because the characters seemed to have dressed like normal people. Oh and Robert Pattinson's hair doesn't count because you aren't dressing as Edward Cullen you are dressing as Robert Pattinson. The romance aspect of the story will catch many girls' attention and give them that "oh my gorsh it's so sweet" feeling. But from what I've been told and what I've read it sounds pretty hollow. Apparently throughout the novel the narrator and main protagonist Bella Swan is doing nothing but describing the appearance of her beloved Immortal Sparkler Edward Cullen. That's not a developing romance, that's a description for blind people. I don't think romance is the real attention grabber of Twilight, gazing into eyes isn't romance and talking about being together isn't romance and a description of how irresistable someone is isn't romance.

The real attention grabber of Twilight is hot guys. I have never heard any Twilight fan talk about how romantic Twilight is in the context of the story. This leads me to believe there is not actual romance. What they do talk about though is Edward Cullen or the actor who portrays him, Robert Pattinson and how attractive he is. The negative reviews for New Moon have described it as porn for women pure and simple. And due to fan clarification that seems to be what it is. I could've guessed that would be the case when watching the New Moon trailer, all it seems to be is a shirtless and pale Edward Cullen, a shirtless and muscley tan Jacob Black, or his equally shirtless and muscley tan clan of "dogs" (those don't look like werewolves to me, those look like goddamn anamorphs). Sure you've got the hotness of Kristen Stewart, who a lot of people think is repetitive and sucks but not me. It still doesn't catch my interest anymore.

What originally caught my interest, other than the awesome book cover art, was what I first heard about Twilight: it was to be a vampire-romance novel, two genres I enjoy and would not have minded involving myself with. Then the fandom and the news came along. From what has been revealed, Twilight shows vampires in an image that doesn't appeal to me, has stalled if not soap operaish romance and is more frequently classified as chick porn. So yeah, as of right now I'm kind of uninterested.

I will read the series one day when the time feels right. The Dark Tower is too much fun for me. Even in the vast intricate universe of The Dark Tower series there is time for good romance: the main character Roland has a brief romance in the beginning, the relationship is mercenary but involving still as he could not care too much about anyone as anyone would have to be shed emotionlessly from his life for the sake of his mission. In the second book there is a very good romance between two newly introduced characters, to each other and the reader, Eddie Dean and the woman then called Odetta Holmes. In just a few pages you can tell just how much these two people care for each other and need each other and begin to fall in love. It is very effective and convincing. And this relationship has a conflict too, being that Eddie is a recovering drug addict and Odetta has a homicidal multiple personality. Twilight fans, once the euphoria of that series wears off and if you are interested begin reading The Dark Tower series. God help you when The Dark Tower comes to the big screen, then all of the fans I had to hear huddling together giggling about Twilight will have to endure me as I rave about The Dark Tower's epicness.

So in the end, I won't have a real problem with Twilight until I've read the series. I am still skeptical though. Fans enjoy your series, I look forward to your banter of the future movie adaptations. Peace out.

This has been my thoughts on Immortal Sparkler hype of Twilight from Your Modest Guru. Thanks for reading.