Tag Archives: twilight

Twilight books

Ok, so first off, there will probably be spoilers in this post. If you don’t want to know anything about the series, know that I enjoyed the story and stop reading.

So I got the books for Christmas. I opened them Christmas morning, and I started reading them around 6pm that night. I finished the first book about 3 am, started book 2 around 8am the 26th, finished book 3 around 2am the night of the 26th, and finished book 4 (and thereby the series) on Sat., 27 Dec.  Yes, I had nothing better to do. And I also wanted to read books 2 & 3 in one day because I thought it would be a fun goal. I also liked the story as a whole.

We’ll start with positives. I liked that Bella was very rational and yet still emotional. This might also be because I find myself reflected in her character. What I especially like is that she just goes with the crazy in her life. Vampires? Were-wolves? No problem! Sweet, what are we having for dinner? I like that kind of approach to life. I like the love and connection between Bella & Edward. I LOVE Alice & Jasper. I wish that they were around so much more. I would love to know more about them and hear about them before they met up with each other and the Cullens.

So what I didn’t care for so much in this story will take more time because I feel the need to explain why I don’t care about these parts. So here goes…

I don’t like that Edward requires Bella to marry him. I can kind of see where that fits with Edward’s character since he was born in the beginning of the 20th century and that would be something that would be part of his cultural upbringing. But he’s a freaking vampire who wonders about his soul! And I really don’t see how that fits with his character. It feels forced.

And speaking of Edward, I feel like his character is the one that I don’t know very well. I understand Bella; I understand Alice; I even understand Jasper and Rosalie! I don’t understand Edward as well as I would like for a major character. Why does he really want to marry Bella? Why does he get along with Alice so much better than Rosalie? Why didn’t he find someone to bond with earlier? What did he do during his rebellion? What were his parents like? How was he brought up? Why is he always smirking?

But really what I don’t like about the story is that it ends too happy. I know that Americans tend to really like happy endings, but this ending is close to perfect for them. Everyone we care about survives, and she doesn’t really loose anything. She even figures out how to become even more intimate with Edward by figuring out how to let him see her mind! Life doesn’t happen that way! It only works to perpetuate the fallacy of the happily ever after. The ending to the series in Breaking Dawn is the exact reason that people keep their kids from reading fairy tales because it sets up unreasonable expectations. And maybe I don’t like this overly happy ending because I’m slightly morbid, whatever; I think it’s over the top.

All-in-all I do like the story as a whole. I like a good vampire story, and this series develops the mythology of vampires in some interesting ways. If you read through this whole post, you’ll probably understand more about me than the books, but who knows…maybe you’ll see what I’m talking about.

Twilight

Ok, so to begin with, I haven’t read the books yet (I’m getting them soon, but I needed to stay focused on my work through the end of the semester), and I might have spoilers from the movie.

So I went and saw Twilight tonight, and while I still want to read the book, I felt very lost and confused. I felt like I did when I watched the fourth Harry Potter movie, except that I had read that book, so I could feel in the details. So I guess what I’m saying is I felt like what I assume people who hadn’t read the books felt like – very lost and confused. This was definitely a movie whose intended audience was readers of the series. Elements of the story seemed to be taken for granted, and the character development seemed to jump from stage to stage in rather large bounds. I’m sure all of that will make more sense once I finally get to read the books, but for now it was a little disconcerting. We got to the pivotal moment in Bella’s character development for this book, and I felt as though I had been side-swiped because I didn’t see where it came from.

And all of this is without comment on the acting.

I’m not entirely sure when we shifted to the “act like you would in real life” but I don’t care for it. The characters were supposed to be in high school, so I prepared for awkward moments. I did not prepare for excruciatingly long awkward sections. Especially since most of the awkwardness was communicated through the slight twitches in the actors’ faces. And the cinematography leaned heavily on the artistic side, which is fine, except when the same movement was repeated for the 50th time.

Overall, I enjoyed the movie. I’m looking forward to reading the books because I felt like I just heard a dis-jointed re-telling of the story by a young uber-fan of the series, so I want to see what really happened. I’m also interested in what the movie makers left out from the books. I love a good vampire story, so I am interested to see how the author plays with our ideas of vampire and our conceptions that go along with those.