Stephenie Meyer : inspiration to millions.

This is just a caring, periodic reminder to all my aspiring/frustrated/undiscovered writer friends: you can do it.

You can get a book published or a screenplay purchased. You really, really can. Even if it's terrible. Even if it's the worst thing you've ever written and the embarrassment prevents even you from reading it. Even if you drop acid beforehand and forget to write a conclusion. Even if you just print out pages from your blog and bind them.

You can.

You can because this woman did.

Fun fact: she published this book with the intention of donating a portion of the proceeds to charity. Then offered it for free on the internet. Of course, I'm sure many will still dish out some cash for the opportunity to capture so rare a gem as this and fund another measure like Prop 8. (Probably.)

lol irl

BREAKING NEWS ON BREAKING DAWN!

Guys. You guys. Guys. It's official. It's been confirmed.

It will be two movies.

You know what this means, right? (Actually, I hope none of you have read it so I get to horrify you right here and now.) In order to get even one movie out of this god-forsaken aborted mess of a book, they will not only have to keep in everything, they may have to extend some parts. EXTENDED PREGNANCY/BIRTH SEQUENCE MAYBE?

I am trembling in terror and excitement.

PS - fingers crossed that "high-end director" means Uwe Boll.

I consider it a draw.

Yesterday, my niece asked me: "So, um, do you like ... Twilight, and stuff?"

My reaction in full:
[I read the newspaper.]
[I look up from the newspaper.]
[beat]
"No."
[I read the newspaper.]

She does, she says. And on the inside I wept and rent my garments. But on the plus side, she doesn't actually seem to know that much about it. She's Team Jacob, she tells me, and seems mostly interested in Taylor Lautner's bazillion abdominal muscles. Also, she heard Edward dies or something. Oh honey. If only.

So today my sister is taking her to see New Moon. "I can't help it. I love this Twilight shit," she told me a few weeks ago. (We were in a supermarket, and she expressed concern at a tabloid headline suggesting the terrible breakup of KStew and RPattz. "Oh that's sad! They were dating?" "[beat.] No." The level of knowledge I have about these thing is truly unGodly and is impairing my social functioning.) I was not surprised because, frankly, I expect this sort of poor judgment from her. Whenever there's a desperately painful-looking comedy out on the market (like, say, that new one with Robin Williams and John Travolta), she deems that it "looks pretty funny!" I don't ... please. Anyway.

On another hand, my mother was the one to tell me about this outing. She said they were going to see "that 'Dark Moon' or whatever the hell it is." My mom =/= a Twimom. <3<3<3<3<3<3

In a related story: Goddamnit, Michael Sheen.

Michael Sheen, what were you thinking? You are an excellent actor. You were going to be set playing any and every English person of note that you even vaguely look like. You were even in all three Underworld movies and still managed to hang on to your good will.



But frankly, sir, your career deserves what it gets.

And I see you in the back, there, Grindelwald. You're young, and you're pretty, but don't think you have an excuse.

PS ... lol.

Oh, in case you were wondering.

Twilight is still completely ridiculous.



THE REALISM.

You've made some very compelling points.

Top pro, from the Steph: I would make great Tweets. No one would know what I was talking about. That was the whole appeal, basically.

Top con, from the P@: I hate interacting with other humans! It's rather low on my list of likes, and very high on my list of dislikes.

So, percentage wise, how much do you predict my hypothetical Twittering could involve:
- Me entertaining myself (and perhaps, as a bonus, others) by shouting into the void
- Me actually talking to, interacting with, and, god forbid, meeting new others?

This is like part two of the Twitter Interview. The Twitter Callback. It's between Twitter and one other candidate. (The other candidate is "No Twitter".)

Also, as if this entry weren't already ridiculous enough: According to GoodReads, my post tag is literally actually true.

Full day.

Yesterday I:

- Learned of my cousin's engagement. (It was also her birthday. And the first I've heard from her in months.)
- Had a panic attack.
- Called 911.
- Got a new phone.

In list form, it totally sounds like these things might be related, but they weren't! They were all completely independent of each other, cause-wise. Oh, and everyone's fine. Well. Not the guy in that car, probably.

For your time: http://seemikedraw.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/twilight2.gif

Can't socialize -- obsessed with crappy book series.

I drooled on myself while I was laughing. It was undignified.

FURSPLOSION!!

I have to admit that I've been a little worried about New Moon. What with the closed set and the new director and the bigger budget and the use of colors other than blue, I worried that I might have to take it seriously. That it might be ... I don't know, kinda good? Maybe? Good enough to negate its value as a B-movie cult comedy classic at any rate.

This evening I saw the teaser trailer. WORRY CURED.

Update for the sake of updating.

I am still sad, and nothing has felt interesting enough to blog about, but I figured it was time to bump the dead cat post from the top of the list.

It was suddenly a billion degrees over the weekend, and I was ill. I figured the best thing to do would be to annihilate Madagascar with Fluffy Kitten Amoebic Encephalopathy, but the only time I managed to get them, Canada screwed me over by closing its borders and developing a vaccine. Curse you, socialized medicine!

Thank goodness for New Moon filming, though. It has kept me up to my ears in lulz, despite the super secretness of the production. If you ever wondered what happened to Merry's hair from LotR, don't worry. It went to a good home.

Speaking of filming, I may have teared up. I'm not saying definitely, but it might have happened.

yessssssss.

Incidentally.

I know that you all probably know by now that when I talk about Twilight, I'm not even kidding in the slightest bit.

But, seriously you guys. You guys? Seriously. I'm not even kidding in the slightest bit.

For Katy, or, I am lazy.

A while back Katy said that she would like to make a compilation of all the Gold that the Fountain Thereof has spouted. And I thought to myself, "I could totally do that. And then share such an endeavor to anyone it might interest!"

And then I didn't because I'm lazy. And also because he was giving an awful lot of interviews around November, and I was OD'ing on Twilight and needed to detox for a while.

Anyway, turns out that one of the lovely ladies at [name of Twilight lulz livejournal community] made some video highlights of the FoG. It's not quite what I was going for, I'll admit. That these are his "best" clips are debatable. It lacks the quotes that were only ever in print. Plus a lot of them are lifted out of context, making them only really funny if you've seen them before. But, on the other hand, I have seen them before, so it's all good for me, and this whole thing required nothing more on my part than writing the rest of this entry. Yay laziness!

Also, I made them purple.

A+; would lol again!

So a dear, tolerant, and understanding friend took me to see "Quantum of Solace" today and you can't prove otherwise. My choice of cinema was one that I should really spend more time going to now that I'm more comfortable driving for more than 10 minutes at a time. It's an amazing place: a multimegagigagoogolplex that never ever has anybody in it any time I go there. I really don't know how they stay in business, but I have a suspicion that the place might come to life on weekend evenings. I mean, I hope. Anyway, when we went there it was practically deserted, giving me a good idea of what I would like to have adjoining my fabulous house once I become super-rich.

We were the only ones in the theater except for one old dude sitting up front. Your guess is as good as mine. Before they got to the feature there was a lot of static and long periods of blank screen and I wondered aloud if God was seriously going to fuck with me like this. I was kind of grateful for the sketchy old dude, because what exactly would happen if there was a showing of a movie and no one bought tickets to it? Would they still play it? Anyway, luckily Jesus interceded in the designs of His Father or something, because suddenly it was all happening.

(I'll just pause to slip in my complaint that the Harry Potter trailer was not goddamn fucking shown. All they were showing was trailers for truly hideous "comedies". ... But hey, at least they've learned to market this series properly.)

I won't even lie to you: it was exactly the kind of transcendental experience I had been hoping for. After enduring about ten months of non-stop hype, it did not disappoint, and that's all I have to say about that.

I could say that I'm a little disappointed - I didn't laugh the entire time, so I occasionally had to pay attention to the plot that the screenwriter valiantly tried to inject this mess with. She tried her best. She tried real hard. But, seriously, I think I may have bruised a kidney. Fluid may or may not have burst out of my face at some point.

The Fountain of Gold was fantastic. I'm coming down on this. Anyone is free to disagree, because I am firm in my resolve. I think the deciding factor may be whether or not the observer has read the books. Because as someone who has, his performance was, in a word, understated. The man can only work with what he's given. He can't do miracles.

Jasper and Alice continue to be too good for this shit, constipated face included.

George Lucas continues to do an ace job at ruining movies with his additions, though to be fair it's not really conscionable to lay the blame for Twilight at his feet, as much as I would love to blame George Lucas for everything. They should really just borrow my nude sparkly eyeshadow for the sequel.

In conclusion, Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeere's Carlisle!!:


Sweet dreams!

What's wrong with Twilight, anyway?

I'm 99% sure that I'm going to be seeing the Twilight movie this Tuesday. You know, barring anything. This is good because (please pay attention to this part) on Thursday it will be my birthday. I will be one-quarter of a century old. And, quite possibly, too old for this nonsense. I can hope.

So to pass the time until then I'm going to write this entry, because I don't know if I've ever articulated what exactly my problem is with this whole Twilight thing. Y'know, as a *feminist type*. You may find it useful, if you are also so afflicted, if you're ever accosted by fangirls or something.

The problem with Twilight is two-fold. Or three-fold, I don't know. Let's count. First of all, it's horribly written. There's no plot. The characterization is poor. There's adjective abuse everywhere, with all the chagrining and the chuckling and smirking and the beautiful glittering. Stephenie Meyer could seriously drop at least a hundred pages if she weren't so terrified of just saying "I said." And of course, the vampires fucking sparkle.

Apart from the issues of technical and artistic skill, there's the issue of the story itself. It's not really a bad story, but the problem is the dichotomy between what it is and what we're told it is. The story is packaged and sold as The Story Of The Greatest Love You Have Ever Heard Of Or Will Ever Hear Of In Your Life. And ... it's not that. In reality, it's the story of a young girl and her abusive, albeit very attractive, creepy boyfriend.

Twilight is told from the point-of-view of Human Girlfriend Bella Swan. She's not really important, though. There are dozens of other characters in the books as well, but they're not really important, either. The only character who is actually important is Edward Cullen, Vampire Boyfriend. The most important thing to understand about Edward is that he is attractive. He's really attractive. He's pretty much the most attractive person that you or anyone else has ever seen. This is the only thing that matters about him. It's certainly the only thing that matters about him to Bella. The great dilemma of the first book is that Bella loves Edward because he's so pretty, but knows that he couldn't possibly love her because she is nowhere near as pretty as he is. A good two-thirds of the book is basically this, just with more detail.

His white shirt was sleeveless [no, sleeveless, really], and he wore it unbuttoned, so that the smooth white skin of his throat flowed uninterrupted over the marble contours of his chest, his perfect musculature no longer merely hinted at behind concealing clothes. He was too perfect, I realized with a piercing stab of despair. There was no way this godlike creature could be meant for me.

Or, as the Fountain Of Gold put it: "When you read the book it's like, 'Edward Cullen was so beautiful I creamed myself.' I mean, every line is like that."

So that's Human Girlfriend's deal. Edward is pretty, making him perfect and negating any flaws he might conceivably have. She's not as pretty, and therefore can never be good enough for him. Human Girlfriend doesn't really have any interests of her own. Supposedly she likes books, but we never see her read. At one point she's asked if she's planning on going to college, and her respond is basically, 'Why? I got a man.' The entire purpose of the character, the main character, mind you, is to be a cipher for the reader so that you too can have the experience of having a sparkling Vampire Boyfriend.

Let's talk about Vampire Boyfriend for a minute. Edward is a vampire, and he has angst such as we are all intimately familiar with from watching Angel or whatever other dozen other vampire angst stories we've encountered. So he's tortured, and he doesn't eat humans, and he goes to high school. For ... some reason. It's not important. The important thing is that Bella Swan has outrageous flavor that threatens to undo all his decades of abstinence such that he kind of wants to be on her immediately and all the time. And that's why they can't have sex until they're married. Also, Edward reads minds but the only person whose mind he cannot read is Bella's. She's just special. It's not important. Due to this confluence of Mary-Sueisms, Edward becomes obsessed with Bella and imagines that she must be, like, the most interesting person to ever exist. (The obvious joke is that if he could read her thoughts, and know that they are all shallow musings on how pretty he is, the whole series could have been avoided.)

So VB's first plan of how to handle this situation is to be the hugest dick possible to HG. HG is of course very sad about this, because VB is so pretty, and must be judging her with the righteousness that the very pretty have for those who aren't as pretty. Then he saves her life and blows his asshole cover, so he has to amp his levels of dickishness up as high as they will go. HG finds him so intriguing. And pretty!

Then VB decides that they should just have a relationship or whatever already. HG is skeptical, not so much because of all his toolery, but because 'WTF he's too pretty to like me!' Anyway, now that they have a Forever Love and everything (seriously, it happens that fast), it is time for VB to come clean about how he's been breaking into her house every night for months to check out all the rooms and stare at her while she's asleep.

Of course I'm not kidding. And I'm also not kidding about the fact that HG doesn't get upset about it, because his creepy behavior is incredibly endearing. And he's pretty.

"You spied on me?" But somehow I couldn't infuse my voice with the proper outrage. I was flattered.
He was unrepentant. "What else is there to do at night?"
I let it go for the moment and went down the hall to the kitchen. He was there before me, needing no guide. He sat in the very chair I'd tried to picture him in. His beauty lit up the kitchen. It was a moment before I could look away.

Then we get three more books of VB being a controlling creeper. I'm just going to put some quotes up, and you tell me if this sounds like the story of a girl and her abusive boyfriend. I did not make these up:

We were near the parking lot now. I veered left, toward my truck. Something caught my jacket, yanking me back.
"Where do you think you're going?" he asked, outraged. He was gripping a fistful of my jacket in one hand.
I was confused. "I'm going home."
"Didn't you hear me promise to take you safely home? Do you think I'm going to let you drive in your condition?" His voice was still indignant.
"What condition? What about my truck?" I complained.
"I'll have Alice drop it off after school." He was towing me toward his car now, pulling me by my jacket. It was all I could do to keep from falling backward. He'd probably just drag me along anyway if I did."

"Turn around! You have to take me home!" I shouted. I struggled with the stupid harness, tearing at the straps.
"Emmett," Edward said grimly.
And Emmett secured my hands in his steely grasp.
"No! Edward! No, you can't do this."
"I have to, Bella, now please be quiet."

"You're kidnapping me, aren't you?"
She laughed and nodded. "Till Saturday. Esme cleared it with Charlie; you're staying with me two nights, and I will drive you to and from school tomorrow."
I turned my face to the window, my teeth grinding together.
"Sorry," Alice said, not sounding in the least bit penitent. "He paid me off."
"How?" I hissed through my teeth.
"The Porsche. It's exactly like the one I stole in Italy." She sighed happily.
[...]
Alice hopped out gracefully and went to stroke her hand along the length of her bribe.
"Pretty, isn't it?"
"Pretty over-the-top," I grumbled, incredulous. "He gave you that just for two days of holding me hostage?"
Alice made a face.
A second later, comprehension came and I gasped in horror. "It's for every time he's gone, isn't it?"
She nodded.

Like any fugitive, I couldn't help looking over my shoulder a few times while I jogged to my truck, but the night was so black that there really was no point. I had to feel my way along the side of the truck to the handle.
My eyes were just beginning to adjust as I shoved my keys in the ignition. I twisted them hard to the left, but instead of roaring deafeningly to life, the engine just clicked. I tried it again with the same results.
And then a small motion in my peripheral vision made me jump.
"Gah!" I gasped in shock when I saw that I was not alone in the cab.
Edward sat very still, a faint bright spot in the darkness, only his hands moving as he turned a mysterious black object around and around. He stared at the object as he spoke.
"Alice called," he murmured.
Alice! Damn. I'd forgotten to account for her in my plans. He must have her watching me.
[Edward does a long creepy monologue in low tones]
I listened to his musing in stony silence.
"I'll put your car back together in time for school, in case you'd like to drive yourself," he assured me after a minute.
With my lips mashed together, I retrieved my keys and stiffly climbed out of the truck.
"Shut your window if you want me to stay away tonight. I'll understand," he whispered just before I slammed the door.

And that's just the overt crap and what doesn't delve too much into boring story points. There's oh so much more. For the record, that last section was the only time in this series about vampires that I actually felt scared. So, Edward Cullen is a creepy stalker who becomes a controlling boyfriend. But it's okay, because he's very attractive. There are also other fine lessons to be learned from these books like how, if you're a woman, your value as a person is dependent on producing children, and if you can't produce children, 1. you'll be a miserable bitch for all your life and 2. you're not really even a woman. Plus, the actual literal I'm-not-kidding pedophilia. I'm not kidding.

I could go on, but we haven't even gotten to the second major problem with Twilight.

The second major problem with Twilight is that it is very popular. This, really, is why I'm talking about this at all, or why anyone talks about it at all. There are tons of horribly written books with terrible messages out there. I may have read some, most of them I haven't, and I don't really care. I probably wouldn't care about Twilight except for the effect I see it have in other people. Specifically, I'm talking about young women: millions of them, to be exact. There are millions of girls who read these books, and take them for exactly the Epic Love Story they claim to be, become obsessed with them as some sort of gospel of Ideal Love, and are completely blind to how fucking messed-up the whole thing is.

Back about a year ago, I was ambling around the internet and discovered the Edward Cullen fangirls. Most of them go by the moniker "Mrs. Cullen." And let it be known that they love Edward Cullen. What is the top reason they love Edward Cullen? Because he's so hottttt!!!!!! Now, here's the thing. I think Robert Pattinson is pretty nice looking. I have no problem if anyone else thinks likewise. Or hey, even if they don't. There are any number of actors that you can conjure up that are nice looking. But Edward Cullen doesn't exist. He is a fictional character, and these sentiments date back to before Pattinson or anyone else was physically attached to the character giving him any sort of objective appearance. (Ask me about the Transitive Hotness of Vampire Boyfriends Property.) I like the way Bill Maher put it when he said "What can't you convince people of simply by saying it?" (Of course, he was talking about the idea that Barack Obama is a sekrit Muslim, but whatever.) Edward Cullen doesn't have eyes. He doesn't have muscles. He doesn't have anything that one could objectively consider and decide is attractive because he's not real. What he does have, though, is several hundred pages devoted to talking about how goddamned attractive he is. And that makes it true.

What he also has are hundreds of pages devoted to talking about what a chivalrous gentleman he is, and how he's the epitome of what any girl would want from a boy. The pages are adamant that he loves loves loves loves loves Bella Swan, and everything he does -- whether it's putting her life in danger, leaving her for her own good, preventing her from seeing her friends, talking about how he'll kill himself without her, calling her "ridiculous" and "absurd" when she disagrees with him, having her followed, having her go places she doesn't want to go and do things she doesn't want to do, physically restraining her, and having violent outbursts all over the place -- he does because he loves her. He's so sweet and thoughtful. He's just worried about her. He cares about her. He's just being protective. He never means to hurt her. It's okay because he loves her. And because he is so very, very pretty. And that makes it true.

But it's just a story, right? And works of fiction have never influenced anyone ever, correct? Should anyone really care?

Well, when you have thousands of girls calling themselves "Mrs. Cullen" and talking about how desperately they want a boyfriend like Edward, I think that's a problem.

When you have girls who sleep with boys because they are named Edward, I think that's a problem. And when they get knocked up and name their resultant offspring after the author, that's really a problem and no I am not making this up.

When you have girls who have clearly never sorted out the difference between fantasy and reality cutting their necks and telling the actor playing Edward that they did it for him, I think that's a problem.

When you have adult women talking about how they want to take the virginity of one of the underage teenage actors in the movie because they love his character, I think that's a problem and no I am not kidding.

When you have underwear, marketed to teenagers, upon which are the words "Edward Cullen can bruise my body any day." I think that's a problem and no I am not making this up.

When you have a generation of young girls zealously devoted to the disturbing backwards-thinking mentality displayed in these books, I think that's a problem.


So that, now that we've made it here, is what's wrong with Twilight.

Plus, furthermore, the vampires fucking sparkle.

Also, jsyk.

I have not seen Twilight yet. But I've heard thrillingly terrible things.

I love this nutball.

No, not Robert Pattinson. Jacob, from TWoP! Yes, him again. And probably all but two of you have already stopped reading. I DON'T CARE. Also, even though this entry is about Jacob, it's still about Twilight because, well.

My Jacob-love is resurging right now for two reasons. 1. Because he is doing more than anyone else to ensure that "Vampire Boyfriend" enters the social lexicon. Way moreso than I am. 2. Because he explains vampire boyfriends (and werewolf boyfriends) like so:


-----
Why's it happening again? Why on earth is our culture playing out entirely vampire boyfriend/werewolf boyfriend right now? And I'm not just saying this because Twilight came out yesterday -- these three series of books I'm talking about started in 1993 (Anita), 2001 (Sookie), and 2005 (Twilight) and pretty much have ruled the bestseller lists since then, even with the variances in quality, readability and WTF between them; seven of the eight Sookie novels are bestsellers pretty much nonstop, which is not something that ever happened before. I think it's pretty easy if you follow the line of blood: The war and the Greatest Generation's reassignment and recapitulation of gender roles becomes the uphill battle of the '50s and the glorious global shout of the '60s becomes the delirious sexual abandon of the '70s becomes the cruelty and sexual artifice of the '80s becomes the total AIDS-related sexual freakout of the '90s ... and we grew up in that, doing the incredibly dangerous undercover work of becoming healthy sexual beings that people have been doing since there were people, with all that crazy on top, mediated for the first time by television telling us back to ourselves in realtime and the endless fucking Baby Boomer retellings and nostalgia and music videos disguised as feature films. We became men and women in the middle of that shitstorm. Vampire Guy/Werewolf Guy is just us telling that story back to the world and trying to decide what to do next.
-----


I mean ... have you ever? The raving starts here, it's in the middle of a True Blood recap, which I don't know if you care about, but just be forewarned, but he's only barely talking about it, if you are.

Seriously, he can do no wrong.

I mean, he complained about being a "nice guy" and I only got my feminist hat halfway on before I loved him again.





"If Edward was not a fictional character and you just met him in reality, you know, he's one of those guys who'd be like an axe murderer. ... He's like ultra-polite, really formal all the time like, 'Uh, let me open the door! Let me carry the bags!' and it's like literally just like, you can tell he'd just freak out one day and shoot someone."

omg omg omg HOME STRETCH.

So, as you've already probably heard by now, the Twilight movie is opening this Friday. I occurs to me that I may not have made my thoughts about this clear. I can't wait to see this movie. Although I won't actually be seeing it until Tuesday. But I am so excited.

There are several reasons for this, one being getting to see The Fountain Of Pure Gold in action. Another being that I will get to see the new Harry Potter trailer writ super large because it's being shown before it. Mostly though, I cannot wait because I am pretty sure that this is going to be the unintentional comedy of the year, and I cannot wait to MST3K that shit.

Actually, do you know what this movie is? This movie is The Rocky Horror Picture Show for the 21st century. I have been of this opinion for a while. It just lends itself too easily to such a treatment. A theater-full of people throwing glitter and opening up their rainbow umbrellas and yelling things at the screen. And recently, I discovered something that completely supports my theory: there's a local theater that does midnight showings of RHPS, and this week they are going to be showing a midnight premiere of Twilight instead. Amazing.

To conclude, here are some quotes from recent articles about how deeply creepy Twilight fans are:

-----
"But if you think Pattinson was the only 'Twilight' star earning shrieks last night, you may have chosen the wrong side in the 'Team Edward' vs. 'Team Jacob' battle. 'I think I'm dreaming, and I keep telling people to pinch me,' said an adrenaline-fueled Lautner, not yet 17 years old and already having fans twice his age throw themselves at him. "[An older woman] told me she was wearing 'Team Taylor' panties and [said], 'If you want, you can sign them.' Luckily, my publicist was there to save me!" "

NB: Taylor is the first name of the actor, not the character. Furthermore in the video of the interview, he said the woman was in her 40s.

-----
"Robert went on to tell a story about a group of girls who scratched their necks for him. "There were some girls who had scratched ... the side of their necks so [they were] freshly bleeding when they came up to get a signature. They were like, 'We did this for you.' I didn't know what to say. 'Um, thanks guys?'""

-----

And I don't know who this guy is, but, he's pretty amazing. I mean, except when he says that Robert Pattinson is a bad actor. I don't want this to be true, because we totally can't be bffs if that's true. I WILL LET YOU KNOW, THOUGH.

http://www.accesshollywood.com/mantz-rantz-twilight_video_838561

"It was so cheesy I got fat just watching the movie."