Twilight Series

[Jananz]

I don't know if this series is actually healthy.
I left the latest Eclipse movie today and felt anemic, oxygen deprived, immune depressed, heart deflated with a billious liver.

The entire excuse for the series is the sick drive of Bella Swan to become a blood sucking vampire supposedly to be for eternity with her blood sucking Edward. This dark and precipitous addiction is veiled in a false virtue of a bland chastity and the sick temptation of superpowers...with little regard for the fact that vampires are parasites and reliant on the life they suck out of others. I think this movie and its author are as blood sucking as the characters they portray.
Conceptually and energetically Twilight is not a healthy light to expose young kids to. But society is too sick to even know it.

[ButterflyWoman]

I don't know if this series is actually healthy.
I don't think so. For one thing, it encourages bland young women to take all manner of emotional abuse from monsterous men in the name of "love".


I left the latest Eclipse movie today and felt anemic, oxygen deprived, immune depressed, heart deflated with a billious liver.
I haven't seen any of the films, nor read any of the books, nor do I intend to. Vampires are not romantic as far as I'm concerned. They're addicts at best and predators at worst.


The entire excuse for the series is the sick drive of Bella Swan to become a blood sucking vampire supposedly to be for eternity with her blood sucking Edward.
Yes, and no matter how crappy he treats her, she keeps going back for more. Talk about codependent.


Conceptually and energetically Twilight is not a healthy light to expose young kids to. But society is too sick to even know it.
Oh, plenty of people have noticed, and commented (which is how I know so much about the books; I read the literary and social critiques). It's just that the masses are, in general, quite ignorant in all senses of the word. I can't understand why these books have become so popular, other than they tap into some sort of codependent need that some people have to be in addictive relationships. :(

The stuff that passes for "romance" and "love" always makes me wonder what the hell is going on in the world...

[Neil Templar]

I don't know if this series is actually healthy.
show me a big budget hollywood production that is aimed at promoting a healthy state of mind...with the exception of Avatar, i can't really think of any right now.

I left the latest Eclipse movie today and felt anemic, oxygen deprived, immune depressed, heart deflated with a billious liver.
it was a stressful movie to watch. i watched it the other day and was surprised at how tense i was during some parts.
isn't that the intention of most horror movies? it is essentially a horror/fantasy.


The entire excuse for the series is the sick drive of Bella Swan to become a blood sucking vampire supposedly to be for eternity with her blood sucking Edward.
come on, she's not driven to try to become a vampire. she's simply a teenager who believes so strongly in her love that she'll go to any length to keep it.

This dark and precipitous addiction is veiled in a false virtue of a bland chastity and the sick temptation of superpowers..
the dude spends the whole series telling her how awful it is to be soul-less, and persuading her that she doesn't want to become one of them. and the temptation of superpowers...like psychic ability?? hmmm...now if only i could find a place where i could discuss clairvoyance with folk... :roll: :lol:

with little regard for the fact that vampires are parasites and reliant on the life they suck out of others.
the whole movie is a sequence of moments where Bella is shown the human stuff, the "life", she'll be leaving behind, and in this movie, for the first time in the series, we see "new-borns", who are the raging animal/parasites you're talking about, and they're the "bad guys" here. there's plenty of regard to the fact that they're parasites, in this movie more than the others.

I think this movie and its author are as blood sucking as the characters they portray.
Conceptually and energetically Twilight is not a healthy light to expose young kids to. But society is too sick to even know it.
isn't there an age limit? i'm not sure young kids would be watching this without parental permission.
to be honest, with all the other really f*#ked up stuff out there available to watch, i'd say this love story is far less concerning than some of the real violent stuff out there.

and that's what this is, teenage love. we've all been there, felt it, right?
how all-encompassing it is in that moment. nothing else matters to a teenager in love.
we've all been there, and so the movies are hugely popular.
and i don't remember any part where he treats her like crap. he does nothing but protect her the whole series.

there's a vampire boom going on right now, in fact, all things supernatural are becoming more "mainstream" viewing.
i see it as a sign of the times, of our general awakening state. the understanding that we are more than just our five senses, is slowly becoming an acceptable idea, thru the medium of our tv's and movies. that's how it works...
when first contact happens, much of the population will be without fear, because the idea of alien beings is so commonplace within our psyche, thanks to tv and cinema.
what we see on the outside is a reflection of what we know on the inside. consciously or not.

[Korpo]

isn't that the intention of most horror movies? it is essentially a horror/fantasy.

I'd say the intention of most horror movie makers is to gain fame and fortune. However, the effect can be cathartic - releasing fear.

Oliver

[Neil Templar]

isn't that the intention of most horror movies? it is essentially a horror/fantasy.

I'd say the intention of most horror movie makers is to gain fame and fortune. However, the effect can be cathartic - releasing fear.

Oliver

i dunno about that.
i'm quite sure some of the classic horror movie makers are more about their art than achieving fame and fortune.

[Korpo]

What would be a "classic horror movie" to you? I was more thinking about the last decades of splatter movies.

Oliver

[Neil Templar]

What would be a "classic horror movie" to you? I was more thinking about the last decades of splatter movies.

Oliver

ok, yeah, fair enough.
i was thinking like George A Romero... Living Dead and all that kinda stuff... :twisted:

[Jananz]

Yes the sensitivity, viseral communication and psi were good to see, but in the context of such pathology...this made it all the more sick and sickening.

Perhaps humanity is in a love crisis in general. We are having to move away from the romantic, codependent, addictive, possessive, nuclear models of relationship...but we have no examples, models or seriously focused description of what a higher-creative male-female relationship would be. This is what the movie industry should be focused on...after all the ♥♥♥♥ers are supposed to be goddam artists...not parasites!
Zero Care.

http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/201 ... ar-weapons (http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2010-07/6/japanese-artist-nuclear-weapons)
See the Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto’s amazing animation of the history of the world's nuclear explosions. This is an extremely grave, but present problem of the world...the problem of "male mental illness" associated with testosterone and the lust for power combined with a paranoid fear of the "other."

[CFTraveler]

I have to say that I have read the books (thanks to having a niece who is very much into this) and they are not at all as you all have portrayed them.
It's not a story about a bland person who wants to turn into a bloodsucker, and it does not make a woman go back to her abuser.
It is a stupid teenage tale of two supernatural groups who are at war against each other and the one human teenager who somehow makes them unite against evil.
In a literary level it is maudlin, cheesy and juvenile, and overdramatizes all the teenage-angsty things that it portrays in a very shallow way, and it reflects the shallowness of the culture that spawned it.
However, it is empowering for women and it promotes understanding and peace, if you can take all the overdramatic crybaby stuff, especially in the second book *bleah*. Luckily they cut it shorter in the movie.

[ButterflyWoman]

In a literary level it is maudlin, cheesy and juvenile, and overdramatizes all the teenage-angsty things that it portrays in a very shallow way, and it reflects the shallowness of the culture that spawned it.
Maybe that's what's so objectionable about it. The international celebration of vapidness.


However, it is empowering for women and it promotes understanding and peace, if you can take all the overdramatic crybaby stuff, especially in the second book
Well, I'll take your word for it, but I'm not going to read the books to find out firsthand. ;)

In my universe, I can't imagine how a teenaged girl who is "in love" with a how-many-year-old vampire (what is he, more than a century old or something?) is in any way romantic or empowering, even if the dude DOES sparkle. I guess I'm just not into the bloodsucking thing. (I generally don't like Ann Rice novels, either, I must admit.) And I'm probably too old. *shakes cane*

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03jmrAv0A60

;)

[CFTraveler]

Unfortunately I can't address the reasons why it's empowering or why she is in love with him, because it would spoil the ending for anyone who likes the series and wants to watch the last movie.
However, my point is that you are all jumping to conclusions about it without having the pertinent information.

[ButterflyWoman]

However, my point is that you are all jumping to conclusions about it without having the pertinent information.
Errr, the Jananz was actually talking about having just seen the film, so I'm probably the only conclusion jumper here.

And my conclusion is: I don't want to read the books, I don't want to see the films, I think I'd spend more time rolling my eyes than enjoying any of it, and I do think it's all pretty shallow and vapid. On my deathbed, perhaps I'll regret that I never read the Twilight series, but somehow I kind of doubt it. ;)

Oh, I will say that I DID take the time some months ago to read complete synopses of all of the books. That's what convinced me I didn't want to actually read them.

[CFTraveler]

Ok, I'll take it back- I thought she had said she hadn't seen the movies or read the book either.
Maybe I'm defending it because I read the books, and I get that if someone saw the movie and didn't read the books they can't possibly get what it's about, other than a visual spectacle for young ones who enjoy mythology and like their teenage drama in a supernatural context.

[Jananz]

http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/bio.html

Stephenie Meyer---Second oldest of 6 children, lives in AZ (heatstroke) and graduated from Brigham Young University with a bach. She was obviously depressed at being a stay at home mum with 3 children and stayed in bed all day fantasizing about being a teenager again with no responsibilities. Her christian upbringing having repressed her most carnal desires which turned morbid and vampirous. Then she packaged her fantasies into some books and fed them to an equally repressed, depressed and purposeless christian population. Instead of presenting the cure to the vampirous christian church, she offers more of the sickness. But presented in such style and fashion, along with the promise of Native American wisdom/integrity it captures the interest of naive youth...who have no idea that church and state utilize their sexual frustration and energy in order to fight their wars of plunder.

[CFTraveler]

http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/bio.html

Stephenie Meyer---Second oldest of 6 children, lives in AZ (heatstroke) and graduated from Brigham Young University with a bach. She was obviously depressed at being a stay at home mum with 3 children and stayed in bed all day fantasizing about being a teenager again with no responsibilities. Her christian upbringing having repressed her most carnal desires which turned morbid and vampirous. Then she packaged her fantasies into some books and fed them to an equally repressed, depressed and purposeless christian population. Instead of presenting the cure to the vampirous christian church, she offers more of the sickness. But presented in such style and fashion, along with the promise of Native American wisdom/integrity it captures the interest of naive youth...who have no idea that church and state utilize their sexual frustration and energy in order to fight their wars of plunder.
Interesting opinion, but it doesn't consider the actual material in the book. First of all, the books criticize christian hypocrisy in the telling of the story of his vampire family, the Cullens, especially how the patriarch's character was the son of a preacher that so persecuted anything occult that he actually tried to kill his son when he was turned into a vampire, and later on in the characters of the Volturi which show how the church is essentially corrupt, with horrible things happening in the bowels of it's cathedrals. Both show that she considers religious institutions to be essentially corrupt and hypocritical. Personally? I don't know because I don't know her. But I know what the books portray because I actually read them.
The heroes in this are native american shapeshifters, so she actually points to a turning away from organized religion towards a more nature-oriented approach to reality, and in the end, there is a melding of realities. I will say no more.

Reading the above criticism makes me think that your objection is not to the story itself- it's to the fact that a stay at home mom should dare make something of herself and succeed at it- and the criticism about the church and state brings home the fact that they are not based in the material of the book at all.

[Jananz]

No not based on the books at all but only on the "effect" rather than the content of the movie.
But one cannot really blame the author for the movies.
Still to decry the church by turning heros into vampires is a strange assbackward step.

Personally I think new HEALTHY models need to be produced rather than pointing out the systemic evil in the human species.
These movies at least do not offer a viable alternative, and I am not sure what they do offer.

[ButterflyWoman]

turning heros into vampires is a strange assbackward step.
Yeah, I feel the same way.

The thing is, this is a recurring pattern in human society. Things that are, at first, seen as horrifyingly frightening eventually get turned into figures of romantic and poetic stature, and eventually into jokes or something harmless or even children's toys.

Just to name a few things to which this has happened, bears (which went from Ursa Major to eventually the teddy bear), fairies (which went from fascinating but very dangerous otherworldly beings to cute little decorations we hang from the windows as light catchers and to a range of utterly harmless Disney characters), pirates (from the genuine terror of the seas to Pirates of Penzance to Capt. Feathersword and International Talk Like a Pirate Day), and plenty of others.

The same is true of vampires (think of The Count on Seasame Street, for an example of cute and harmless and children's toy). They're "romantic", they're "poetic", they're "misunderstood souls", they're anything but the horrifying supernatural undead predators they were originally... Oh, sure, they still sometimes prey on people, but only the BAD ones, and only when they can't keep their addiction under control... :roll:


Personally I think new HEALTHY models need to be produced rather than pointing out the systemic evil in the human species.
Good luck on that one. ;)


I am not sure what they do offer.
I don't get it, either. I really don't. But as I noted before, I really am NOT turned on by the whole vampire thing. Pale, dead, blood-addicted predators/addicts just aren't my thing. (I'm not codependent enough any more, I guess ;))

BTW, to those reading, I'm not actually arguing. This is all pretty lighthearted as far as I'm concerned, other than my genuine distaste for the whole Twilight phenomenon, which is in deadly earnest. *makes a deadly earnest face*

[Jananz]

The interest in Goth and vampirism could reflect the general energy depletion and fungi/pathogen/parasite infection of the population. A turning away from the sun and into the night and down into the earth for recycling of nutrients.
Now if there were healthy forms of teaching people to contact their subtle inner life, have initiations, build psi-visionary communities and regenerate body and earth...then we would lose our interest in war and the darkside in general. :idea:

Walk on into the rising sun and don't look back. As the giant's existence is threatened, it increases its tirade. There is no point in harming the subtle growth of new beginnings with the death throws of the old. It is a significant shift from old brain to new brain regions when we move from fighting with that which we don't want, to projecting the energy of what we do want out into the universe. I think this is perhaps the most significant challenge the human species is now undergoing...where the new warrior, the new hero is he or she who has the strength of heart to positively project the desired outcome, rather than simply shadow dancing with the darkside. We must call out our demons and name them…and set about creating the new way out of transcendent energy, rather than the direct reactionary response to the colossus. For who are not in touch with their inner visionary need to see the vision manifest if they are to believe there is any other way. Remember always, the Borg cannot be fought on its own terms. Instead spirit must be lit through inspiration to start a contagion of evolutionary fire.

[Korpo]

I doubt this is even remotely related to anything dark. It's just entertainment. "Transformers" made a lot of money, too - so what? I doubt we will remember any of this ten years down the road.

Oliver

[ButterflyWoman]

I doubt we will remember any of this ten years down the road.
Yeah, we will. We'll go, "Oh, wow, remember back when Twilight was all the rage?" and kind of laugh or just look embarrassed, just like people now look back on the disco era, "country geese" (the geese with bows around their necks that everyone used to decorate their kitchen), mullets (the haircut, aka business in the front, party in the back), and a whole host of things that we might now think are weird, stupid, pointless, or regard with nostalgia.

[ButterflyWoman]

My daughter (who has informed me that she loved the Twilight series even though it's literary crap - and she has a degree in English, so she'd know ;)) shared this with me:

http://twilightsnarker.blogspot.com/

I thought I'd pass it on for posterity.

[CFTraveler]

That's what I'm talking about. :D
Sparklepire speeds. :D

Just bookmarking it for further reading.
http://twilightsnarker.blogspot.com/

[ButterflyWoman]

http://www.thesmokingjacket.com/enterta ... heat-sheet (http://www.thesmokingjacket.com/entertainment/weird-wide-webs-definitive-twilight-parody-cheat-sheet)

The Definitive Twilight Parody Cheat Sheet

:P :mrgreen:

[Ouroboros]

Still to decry the church by turning heros into vampires is a strange assbackward step.


I don't have a hard time with understanding that, really. Having been raised as a hardcore non-denominational semi-evangelic Christian, I know how easy it is to romanticize and idolize the things that Christianity decries.

I heavily romanticized Lucifer in my mind...the Angel of Light, the one being brave enough to form and lead an opposition against the Tyrant God Yahweh. I loved inverted crosses and pentagrams, images of Baphomet and depictions of demons. Some of those still do have an aesthetic appeal to me, but as time goes on it gets easier to separate the emotional fulfillment of defying a former belief system from the actual intents and purposes of the symbols I turned to for comfort. I very rarely actually desire harm to another, and most imagery of that type is bound with the intent to inflict harm. Still, sometimes there's just no getting around the fact that evil can look REALLY awesome.

I've never read the Twilight series and do not plan to. Just commenting on that one aspect of things. :)

[TheLawOfOne]

I agree, I've gotten up to Eclipse too and I'm getting sick of this Bella character (modeled after the writer herself). I hope that teenagers don't look at her as a role model. Here is a list of things in these books which I think is messed up.

1. Love in these books is portrayed as an obsession, with quotes like "I can't live without you" and "You are my top priority" even over family. Like there is no other reason to live except for your perfect mate.
2. Bella uses her human friends at school. She never cares about what they talk about, she just lets them ramble on while she thinks of other things. She only hangs out with them when she needs something or when she doesn't have vampires to hang out with. She walks away from them mid-conversation or interrupts them to tell them she has to go.
3. Bella constantly lies to all her human friends and to her father.
5. Bella doesn't care about leaving her father behind to become a vampire. The excuse they give for this "Well, everyone will be dead in a decade anyways" lol
6. Bella uses Jacob with the pretense that he is "a friend". She constantly leads him on.
7. It seems like the moral of the story is diss all the human friends and family for the wealthy, beautiful, powerful people aka vampires.
8. 2 beautiful powerful men fighting for a dull girl, actually a bunch of vampires and werewolves protecting one girl because bad things always seem to happen to her. Classic damsel in distress story.

The problem with these books is that there are never any bad side effects to Bella's selfish behavior, almost as if the author thinks it's ok to be like this and act like this towards other people. Anyways, I'm not wasting my time with the last book. I was reading them because a friend was urging me to, and frankly I don't see what it the big deal.

[ThePoliteSkeptic]

To the original poster.

As a novelist, myself, I have to sympathize with Stephanie Meyer. I don't suspect she actually believes in vampires, and if the series were to be interpreted the way one might interpret a dream (and you can sometimes tell a lot about authors this way) it's about a girl who's out of place, that keeps falling headfirst into destructive relationships, and goes from being somewhat innocent to becoming the same as the monster she originally fell for, and becoming irreversibly alienated from her friends and family in the process. I've met women like this a couple of times, and it's a heart-breaker.

Good or bad, right or wrong, novelists write only what they can write, because writing fiction is like emptying out an old closet. You get what you get.

As for the publishers...

[CFTraveler]

http://www.robertisbothered.com/

[Korpo]

Hi.


and if the series were to be interpreted the way one might interpret a dream (and you can sometimes tell a lot about authors this way)

That makes an interesting connection with the literature interpretations we did at school. Of course, this only works if the author is a bit unconscious to the symbolism she or he choses. By just writing it out you get an interpretation of what was "in the closet." However, the more an author tries to intellectually control the process, the outcome and the reader, the more thinking mind, design and control is involved, the less this become true, I'd say. The cerebral kind of author is not as "interpretable" in this way, as he or she tries to control the message too hard.

In this case it is more a game of guessing what the author wanted to convey than what elements of her or his unconscious made it on the paper. So, an overdesigned book would yield less to interpretation of this kind. Dreams are never "overdesigned" from the way I see it. Whatever creates the dream does not have to "try hard," therefore it cannot try too hard. The creation of the dream is effortless, while too much effort in creation can create cerebral and sterile outcomes.

Anyway, I find the idea very interesting. Interpreting works of fiction in their symbolism and structure like dreams - very good idea. 8)

Cheers,
Oliver

[ThePoliteSkeptic]

However, the more an author tries to intellectually control the process, the outcome and the reader, the more thinking mind, design and control is involved, the less this become true, I'd say.

There is also an assumption of self-awareness there, though. An individual can be very ignorant to even the most simple truth about themselves. For instance, it might take someone more than a month to realize that they've developed the habit of drinking every day. The mind can guard very firmly against the realization of some things. I expect that these things will still come through in a work of fiction that is over controlled.

[CFTraveler]

Gave it it's own thread in this same forum section.

[defectron]

I haven't seen any of the films, nor read any of the books, nor do I intend to. Vampires are not romantic as far as I'm concerned. They're addicts at best and predators at worst.

I don't see why being a predator should be considered evil, maybe it's not heroic, but I think your looking at this from a human centric sort of view. Humans animals and even plants consume other life to survive (humans often do this in a much more barbaric way then vampires are portrayed doing so). Maybe being a predator isn't nessecerily heroic, but I think its equally wrong to demonize that sort of existence as that's what humans are as well, predators who feed on plant and animal life, often causing great suffering in the process.

Though , that being said from what I've seen of the twilight series it looks pretty bad.

[ButterflyWoman]

They're addicts at best and predators at worst.

I don't see why being a predator should be considered evil
Perhaps I've just had too much experience with predatory people, including psychic/emotional vampires. Those kinds of people seduce you in various ways and draw you in, only to use you for their own purposes, quite possibly to your detriment. Have you ever dealt with any serious addicts? It's not natural, it's not pretty, it's not romantic, and it's not sexy.

We're not talking about lions eating gazelles here. ;)


I think your looking at this from a human centric sort of view.
Possibly because I'm human? :)

I can step back and look at the situation from a much broader POV, yes. I can move to a point where there IS no good and evil, and I can see it that way and understand it fully.

That doesn't mean I want to read the Twilight series, or that I'm going to invite vampires (of any sort) over to my house to feed on me.


I think its equally wrong to demonize that sort of existence as that's what humans are as well, predators who feed on plant and animal life, often causing great suffering in the process.
I still don't find that sexy or romantic or appealing, which was my original position and which I still hold. Unless I want to step into a broader POV and do the whole "there is no evil/good" thing, which I can do. *shrug* It is what it is.

I'm going to stop talking now. I'm getting into one of those funks, possibly permanent, where nothing I say is understood the way I intended it to be. When that starts happening, it's time to shut up.

[defectron]

Perhaps I've just had too much experience with predatory people, including psychic/emotional vampires. Those kinds of people seduce you in various ways and draw you in, only to use you for their own purposes, quite possibly to your detriment. Have you ever dealt with any serious addicts? It's not natural, it's not pretty, it's not romantic, and it's not sexy.

We're not talking about lions eating gazelles here. ;)

Well that is true, an addict is something different then a predator, a predator is something that consumes other organisms to survive, wheras an addict indulges in something because its too weak not to. I guess it depends on how vampires are depicted in fiction as there are some who fit the predator model and others who fit the addict. I don't know which the vampires in twilight would be as I have no interest in the series given how dumb it looks.

[CFTraveler]

http://roflrazzi.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/23e82300-f563-4fea-9c6a-32b8f416efd9.jpg

[Ouroboros]

Serious Snape is Serious.

[CFTraveler]

http://www.cracked.com/article_19153_5- ... rc=fanpage (http://www.cracked.com/article_19153_5-trends-you-think-are-ruining-movies-are-older-than-film_p2.html?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=fanpage&utm_campaign=new+article&wa_ibsrc=fanpage)