Twilight Sucks: A Vlad Rant

Vlad Piranha · Posted: Sun Jul 08, 2012 11:58 pm Post subject: Twilight Sucks: A Vlad Rant

I apologize for something so trite and long, but this has been bouncing around in my head ever since I saw the godawful trailer for the latest movie when I went to go see The Amazing Spider-Man recently. I've been trying to eloquently sum up my spite ever since.

This is no ordinary rage-induced internet rant. Countless people, mostly with Y chromosomes, have expressed a deep disgust with Twilight over the past few years, but I've done my best to ignore it. Pulp entertainment will never please everyone and there will always be a fad to aggravate the self-appointed cultural elite. I remember when the worst thing I could imagine was the Boy Band craze of the Nineties, but I've since come to realize there will always be something new to revile and that was merely the beginning of a lifetime of disappointment in pop culture. In the years that followed, I made my peace with such things as Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber. Then along came Twilight and my stomach turned.

Why do I hate Twilight so damn much? How is it that I can rant about something being awful never having actually seen any of the films in question in their entirety? Why do I waste my time ranting to a demographic that, in all likelihood, probably hates it just as much as me anyway? It's the principle of the thing. There are layers of ignorance in the culture that surrounds Twilight and you can discover fresh forms of idiocy if you only peel them back. Allow me to illustrate this for you with a bit of a history lesson and a philosophical discussion.

Vampires are quite an old phenomenon in folklore. Countless cultures around the world have their own variations of their legend and their sinister purpose is equally varied. They can be as simple as an undying corpse seeking violence upon the living in Norse legends, or the more familiar blood-suckers from the Balkans. In its nascent phase, the vampire myth revolved around the notion of a creature going bump in the night and little more. A flesh eating corpse lurking in the shadows was a good enough story to tell at that point. At its roots, vampires are monsters to fear and they served no other purpose in stories at that time.

What changed things was the Christianization of Europe, particularly the easternmost parts. As the Church found influence, myths evolved. The most important change was the role of the vampire. No longer dead, they were unholy. Wretched and demonic, sometimes minions of Satan himself, it was in this period that vampires became vulnerable to holy water, crucifixes and other Christian icons. These additions fleshed out the lore, but it was the morality and spiritual philosophy of the Age of Enlightenment that defined the creatures.

The Christian sacrament of Communion is to drink the blood of Christ, a symbol of eternal life through faith. Beliefs held that vampires slew and drank blood to live forever as well, their murderous viciousness fueling their unholy lives. Through immorality and blasphemy, they achieved all the ends that decent, faithful people aspired to and were abominations as a result. It's hard to say exactly which of the Seven Deadly Sins this would qualify for: Wrath for the violence, Greed for the act of stealing (blood) from others, Pride for the shunning of Christian morals toward the afterlife, Envy for the imitation of a living person, the list of potential arguments goes on. Somehow, age-old folklore was suddenly a Sunday morning teaching tool. Is it any wonder that vampires are often depicted stalking virtuous maidens to bite them on the neck for their blood? Sexuality found its way into the legend as well and has remained there ever since.

The sum of these tales found their way into Bram Stoker's Dracula in 1897. The Christian influences were there, but not overwhelming as they had once been. Weaved together over the centuries, tales of vampirism became a morality tale for Victorian readers. They had become a story about greed and taking the easy path being a dangerous and monstrous philosophy. To live off of the suffering of others, in any context, is disgusting and less than human. Monsters from a darker place in history were preserved to help us remember what makes us men and to live like men.

That takes us full circle, back to the festering pile of feces that is Twilight, the Mary Sue story about vampires and how awesome it is to be one. When you're a vampire, you have immense strength, speed and agility. There's no need to sleep or breathe and you heal wounds quickly. The only drawback to this is that you don't eat regular food, you consume blood. Since, in the Twilight world, animal blood is acceptable, there's no real sacrifice to this. This is especially true as a point is made of explaining that blood to them is like regular food to us. There are no drawbacks to being a vampire. It's no wonder that the Bella character decides to become a vampire, it's like becoming one of the fucking X-Men, except you get to use all of your powers exclusively for selfish things.

The worst part of all this is how Stephanie Meyer credited her Mormon roots as her inspiration for the original book, a supposed tale of abstinence. First of all, Bella doesn't abstain from being fucking awesome by the last book. Second of all, it's hard to credit your Christian heritage as a moral inspiration when none of the shit I mentioned above is touched on. Go figure that Meyer has never read Bram Stoker's novel and that Linkin Park was one of her inspirations for this body of work. Twilight Sucks. Hooray for Fifty Shades of Gray. That sucks too, I hear, but at least it doesn't pretend to be anything it's not.

Eugene · Posted: Mon Jul 09, 2012 12:34 am Post subject:

fifty shades of gray is a product of twilight, the author read the twilight books and decided there wasn't enough sex. As for Twilight, it accomplishes nothing except teach that bestiality and necrophilia is okay.

It took the awesome concept of the Vampire and the Wolfman and bastardized them into a sparkly douche and a repressed homosexual douche. Frankly, I love the idea of the Wolfman as a cursed being; unable to control their transformation and having to fight with their alter-existance. The vampire on the other hand is everything a monster should be: powerful, unholy, neigh-invincible, and appears to be human. Think of playing Castlevania, and right at the end after having defeated Death itself you come upon the Dark Lord of Evil, Dracula. You feel terror, because you know that shit is about to get real. Now imagine that same thing, and at the end you see some pale motherfucker with a bad hairdo.

TL;DR: Fuck Twilight for making vampires and werewolves so fucking stupid.

Berry Punch · Posted: Mon Jul 09, 2012 2:21 am Post subject:

I like werewolves, lycans, worgens, etc etc... But Twilight... Twilight just made my brain sad. The entire movie was a young girl's decision between beastiality or necrophilia.

Pharaoh Man · Posted: Mon Jul 09, 2012 3:04 am Post subject:

An oldie but goodie:

TYPE YOUR NAME: David
TYPE YOUR NAME WITH YOUR ELBOW: dxav ijd
TYPE YOUR NAME WITH YOUR CHIN: dsav ujdx
SLAM YOUR FACE ON THE KEYBOARD: About three things I was absolutely positive. First, Edward was a vampire. Second, there was a part of him-and I didn’t know how potent that part might be-that thirsted for my blood. And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him.

I've never seen Twilight and have no opinion on it, but I know many of my manly friends have seen it because apparently it makes girls wet.

Vlad Piranha · Posted: Mon Jul 09, 2012 9:21 am Post subject:

Eugene wrote:

Frankly, I love the idea of the Wolfman as a cursed being; unable to control their transformation and having to fight with their alter-existance.

This is exactly the kind of duality that I love and Meyers simply doesn't understand.

BarytaQ · Posted: Mon Jul 09, 2012 11:18 am Post subject:

I'm sorry to say, but the only thing I can think whenever someone mentions Fifty shades of Shit is the phrase "Pointer finger circled my puckered love cave 'Are you ready for this?' he mewled, smirking at me like a mother hamster about to eat her 3 legged young"

WHAT. THE. FUCKING. FUCK.
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