122 Thoughts About The Twilight Saga, Among Other Things
also known as, "the most absolutely out of her gourd Kelsey has ever been"
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Every time I try to think about The Twilight Saga in paragraph form my brain melts itself into a neat little blood smoothie for pregnant Bella to guzzle down before she even becomes a vampire??????
First, a brief origin story
My aunt gifted me the entire series sometime around the beginning of Twi-fever’s peak, which I would define as roughly 2008 - 2010. Obviously it maintained an enormous cultural presence past then, but as its target audience aged a bit so did the initial all-encompassing fervor around it. It became mainstream, less cult-y in its devotees, more available and acceptable for ironic consumption.
But let me not get ahead of myself. My mom read the first half of the first book before deciding if I was allowed to (I think I was in 8th grade) and in her, “actually…...no” talk mostly cited the intensity with which Edward and Bella become attached to each other as the reason I’d need to wait a couple years. They describe each other as drugs! It’s not great!!!! She was right!!!!!!
gif: Robert Pattinson putting a cigarette in his mouth in black and white
Honestly, I wasn’t that bothered. I had like, one friend at the time, so it’s not like I was being left out of ~The Discourse~ by not knowing what was going on, and I had plenty else to read so the books gathered dust under my bed until November 2009, when New Moon came out. (Which I guess….is not that long of a gap? Huh. Time in the teen years is weird.) Anyways, by this time I had a small cluster of speech and theater friends to go to movies with, so when they asked if I wanted to go see New Moon I think my parents were just too relieved to say no.
Now by this point…...I was quite irony-poisoned. And simply incapable of watching something I found ridiculous without pointing out the many ways I found it ridiculous. (And we wonder why it took me so long to make friends……….) So in our post-movie-cookie-dough-eating debrief at one friends’ house, I went no-holds-barred in dunking on the relationships, the plot holes, the special effects, until I was told that I wasn’t allowed to criticize Twilight until I read it.
So….I think it’s probably pretty obvious what I did next.
gif: Robert Pattinson laughing in black and white
Disclaimer however that for most of the rest of this I’m mostly talking about the movies because the only thing I remember about reading the books is how much mental agony the terribleness of the writing caused me.
That being said, I have requested Midnight Sun from the library shhhhhhhhh
Part of my reading the series involved hunting the internet for validation that I was right and these books were garbage (no small wonder that I somehow did not lose my friends during this process) led me to……~the Christian blogosphere~ which was/is an extremely messy space during the most regular of times, but which was absolutely losing its collective mind over trying to figure out whether Twilight was Bad or not.
This series…...truly caused a meltdown in evangelical Christianity, especially in the blogosphere. It was way more divisive than Harry Potter, which was vehemently opposed by a large faction because of ~witchcraft~, and accepted with a shrug by a quieter (but probably broader) portion. But Twilight was….a whole other matter.
The fights went a little something like this:
Stephanie Meyer is Mormon, which is close enough to mostly be okay, except for the polygamy, which is all the way Bad, even though there’s a lot of it in the Bible. But there’s no polygamy in these books…..or is there? And there’s that whole child marriage thing, but there’s not that in the books either, except for where…….there kind of is. Okay but Edward and Bella don’t have sex until they get married, which is GREAT, but Bella wants to, which is troubling, and Edward’s a vampire which means he’s going to hell, but also he’s worried about going to hell, so maybe he won’t? Once she turns into a vampire they can’t have kids anymore, which is extremely ungodly of them, BUT they do get pregnant before then! :) But with an interspecies baby so it’s probably demonic :( But Bella refuses to abort it, so it’s pro-life! :)))))) The Cullens are an adoption-based family, just like God’s kingdom!!! But the siblings date each other :(((( The whole thing is supernatural, which we have extremely conflicted feelings about, and we don’t really like the whole Garden of Eden imagery the books keep referencing. Forbidden fruit and forbidden love are Bad, but sex is forbidden and kind of like fruit and Good In One Specific Circumstance. And the neck biting stuff…...well we’re not sure why it’s so uncomfortable but let’s not talk about why. Drinking blood is obviously wrong, except for when we drink Jesus’ blood, but for most of us that’s just a metaphor. Also getting eternal life is good but only when you get it from Jesus and if you get it from someone else what the heck are you trying to do, put Jesus out of a job??? Jesus is freelance!
Honestly that’s not even all of it probably, but when you come to the point when you’re writing down the words “Jesus is freelance!” it’s best to stop for everyone’s safety.
I can’t believe how much time I spent in the 2010’s thinking Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart weren’t hot and Taylor Lautner……..was??? I mean, I know the movies mostly styled them both like crap, but come on, where was my RESEARCH!!!!
gif: Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson laughing on a talk show in sepia
Seriously do you know how close I came to making a “special edition” that was just Kristen Stewart photos alongside the lyrics to Taylor Swift’s ‘betty’?
like how wild would it be if I did that….
Why was I trusting any aspect of the ~saga’s~ creative taste, when this cover is absolutely the most disgusting thing I have ever seen in my life:
image: the cover of Midnight Sun by Stephanie Meyer. the background is black, the text white, and there’s a picture of half a pomegranate on it.
I have SEEN the inside of a pomegranate and it is not supposed to look like that!!! how is it dry and gushy at the same time? it looks like they scooped all the seeds out of one pomegranate, left it to dry out and go bad, and then took a totally different pomegranate and plopped its seeds into the dry one! and for what?????
betty I won’t make assumptions about why you changed your homeroom, but I think it’s cause of me...
image: Kristen Stewart with short blond hair and headphones around her neck
If you haven’t revisited the series recently (particularly if you’re not Native): however bad you remember the shit Meyer wrote about Quileute people, I promise you that it is one hundred times worse. There’s a lot to unpack about her depiction of the people themselves, but because she squished them in alongside, you know, a bunch of fictional crap, many non-Native people still don’t know that the Quileute Nation is real.
Some starting points to learn from Native writers on this:
And a way to learn more about and materially support the tribe today as they work to move their community out of a precarious tsunami zone: https://mthg.org/
It’s all egregious, but considering the obscenely high rates of violence against indigenous women, the fact that the only Native women in this series exist either as flat romantic supports for men or to be constantly told to get lost like Leah is is…..particularly abysmal. Check out and support the Coalition to Stop Violence Against Native Women.
I’ve learned some truly baffling things about Taylor Lautner in this process. According to Wikipedia his ancestry is 7 different kinds of European (specifically Austrian, Dutch, English, French, German, Irish, and Swiss) and he “has stated that he has "distant" Native American ancestry (specifically Ottawa and Potawatomi) through his mother.” Which…….look as a non-Native person myself I am not qualified to make a determination here but…...uh……generally speaking “distant Native American ancestry” tends to be a red flag (list item d above goes into this a little bit).
That’s actually not the baffling part, because Hollywood loooooves to cast non-Native people as Native characters. But probably most of us remember when Taylor Lautner and Taylor Swift were dating, yeah? Fun fact, he is currently dating….another woman named Taylor! And I don’t know why this is so funny to me! I don’t think it’s inherently funny to date someone with the same name as you, nor do I think it’s inherently funny to date someone with the same name as your ex! I’ve never gone on more than three dates with anyone so maybe that’s why I’m so immature about this! But my awful brain made up the word “homonominesexual—only attracted to people with the same name as you” at 11:11 pm and I am unwell.
scenario from my awful brain:
Taylor Lautner, meeting yet another Taylor: hey girl.......
other Taylor: no-homonomine dude!
betty one time i was riding on my skateboard when i passed your house/it’s like i couldn’t breathe
image: Kristen Stewart on a skateboard
Moving on, this doesn’t have to do with Twilight, but this video of Brie Larson singing Taylor Swift’s ‘the 1’ has been burrowing its way into my brain for weeks now and I just would like to invite some further conversation on it:
Okay we honestly do not have time for me to pontificate about how baffling I find everything about Carlisle Cullen’s career (plus I have already spoken about it at LENGTH on Twitter) but he is a medical fraud I do not care that he is a vampire
These are the first lines of Midnight Sun:
This was the time of day when I most wished I were able to sleep.
High school.
Or was purgatory the right word?
And like…...I just can’t stress enough…….how much they really do not need to be in high school? Like what honestly is the point???? They say it’s to be able to “spend more time in one place” but like, why not just say they’re homeschooling???? Who cares!
And also the risk factor of sending 5 vampires to a highschool full of humans is kind of…..gross?? Especially Jasper, who famously has control issues! This is reckless endangerment, folks!!!!!
And speaking of ‘reckless endangerment,’ I’ve been thinking a lot about how the series treats Rosalie, whose VALID CONCERNS about Edward dating Bella are really treated like garbage by her family and the series itself
you heard the rumors from inez, you can’t believe a word she says most times, but this time it was true. the worst thing that i ever did was what i did to you….
image: Kristen Stewart with short blond hair wearing a pink and silver top
Did you forget that Stephanie Meyer wrote and released a gender-swapped version of Twilight, because I fully forgot that.
With a MAJOR plot twist????
“Unfortunately, Joss has already bitten him and the venom has spread too far into his system, resulting in Beau becoming a vampire. The Cullens fake Beau's death for his privacy, and he continues his relationship with Edythe.” - Wikipedia
gif: Robert Pattinson acting startled
Stephanie Meyer said “yeah this is boring as shit when there’s less patriarchy in charge so let me just skip to the end”
Yeah Stephanie Meyer’s only two female character types are victim or total bitch and she herself is dismissive of Rosalie’s concerns but like…...Rosalie is right that it’s fucked up for the Cullens to constantly be putting Bella in an extremely dangerous situation for the sake of Edward’s ~feelings~
but if i just showed up at your party would you have me would you want me? would you tell me to go fuck myself or lead me to the garden...
image: Kristen Stewart with short blond hair wearing a white and black short sleeved shirt and leaning on boxing ring ropes
also this book is going to break my brain trying to figure out vampire anatomy, such as what exactly they need air for (I guess talking??) and whether the fact that blushing is apparently especially tough for them to hold back from due to the “pooling blood” do erections pose…...a similar issue?
“Oh for the love of all that was holy, would the catastrophes never end?” Midnight Sun, pg. 57
no i don’t know why some of those words are italicized, Stephanie Meyers’ mind is a mystery to me
gif: Robert Pattinson wearing a dark suit and running his hand through his blond hair
Thing the series gets wrong about living in a small town: why would Forks, which apparently has a FULL hospital…...have Carlisle Cullen be not only their main doctor but also their medical examiner, which is a FULLY DIFFERENT JOB????
Things the series gets right about living in a small town: if a new student shows up on a random Monday junior year that is ABSOLUTELY an Event™ even if said student is dressed……..like this?
“How confusing and incomprehensible the workings of her mind were! She must not think in the same way as other humans at all. That must be the explanation behind her mental silence. She was entirely other.” Midnight Sun, pg. 99
in the garden would you trust me if i told you it was just a summer thing, i’m only seventeen i don’t know anything but i know i miss you…
image: Kristen Stewart with short blond hair sitting outside wearing a black top and a large pearl necklace
As we discussed extensively, Charlie is absolutely the underrated hero of this series, despite being a cop. He is a good dad, and worries about Bella SO MUCH while she’s constantly like “GOD Dad, just let me run around with my supernatural friends and express no interest in any part of life that doesn’t involve them you just don’t GET IT!”
fun fact I have learned from this book: Edward also cannot read Charlie’s thoughts???? like he can hear their general “tenor” and direction, but not actual words and pictures (?????) like he can with everyone besides Bella, who to him is an absolutely blank slate
Relatedly, Billy Burke…...could get it
gif: Billy Burke saying “It’s apart of the charm.” and winking
And like……..Bella and Edward’s relationship is objectively SO unhealthy! And this is one of the other baffling parts of the series because everyone else in her life is raising red flags all over the place about how unhealthy their obsession with each other is but I guess the ultimate message of the series is that they were all…….silly and wrong?? because of “true love”?????? kay!
betty i know where it all went wrong/your favorite song/was playing from the far side of the gym...
image: Kristen Stewart with short blond hair and a cigarette in her mouth, wearing sunglasses and a white shirt, leaning against a pole outside
“Pay attention,” Rose hissed at him. “Alice sees him falling for a human! How classically Edward!” She made a gagging sound.” Midnight Sun, pg. 84
Classically Edward!!!
At one point Daniel M. Lavery wrote a superb sketch of what he imagined Bella and Edward’s life to be like after 1000 years of marriage [full of ennui] and I cannot find it anywhere but it was great and if you know where it is please send it to me
there’s a possibility that it was not written by him, in which case deepest apologies to the actual author
i was nowhere to be found/i hate the crowds, you know that/plus i saw you dance with him...
image: Kristen Stewart dancing with a man
ICY HOT
All of that being said, I…..am Team Edward? I guess I’m not really Team Anyone in this because I both don’t think any of these three are good for each other but at the same time I think they should be in a throuple
I find myself saying “they should just be in a throuple” an awful lot for someone who probably would not enjoy being in a throuple herself but then again neither have I found myself in any genuine love triangles over the years, so it just seems like a practical solution to a problem I myself have never had
That being said, the sexual tension in this scene is I think unparalleled by anything in the entire series:
Some evidence, from a page of Midnight Sun that I forgot to note:
The boy followed Bella as she escaped to the kitchen — ah, his infatuation was clear in his every thought. But it was not hard to listen to his mind, the way it was with Mike Newton or her other admirers. There was something very...engaging about Jacob Black’s mind. Pure and open...I felt suddenly sorry that this particular boy was born my enemy. His was the rare kind of mind that was easy to be inside. Restful, almost.
i was walking home on broken cobblestones/just thinking of you/when she pulled up/like a figment of my worst intentions...
image: Kristen Stewart with short dark hair and sunglasses pushed over her head sitting in a ca
The absolute VIBE these books provide in the way of completely, painstakingly ignoring the person you have the most feelings for! I feel seen, okay!!!!
At some point in our live texts we started talking about how this triangle is what happens when three enneagram 4s are into each other
In high school I was Team Jacob because at age 16 the act of Taking Off One’s Shirt To Reveal Abs was the sexiest thing I could possibly imagine
But now…..
Robert Pattinson really started Working for me starting late 2019, around The Lighthouse, which, I mean….it’s not like he’s particularly hot inThe Lighthouse, so I’m really not sure where this come from but I guess it was one of those “finally realizing the person who was there in front of you the whole time” situations
gif: Robert Pattinson smiling while leaning back and wearing a white button-down
she said “james get in let’s drive”/those days turn into nights/slept next to her but/i dreamt of you all summer long...
image: Kristen Stewart with blond hair sitting in a car
do we like how I started out with really coherent ideas and sentences and now I am just doing This?
no one can deny, this series had a bangin’ soundtrack. these movies had me walking around my hometown listening to Iron & Wine singing “Now I'm a fat house cat/Cursing my sore blunt tongue/Watching the warm poison rats/Curl through the wide fence cracks” on my iPod thinking “not only do I understand this, it is specifically about my crush”
“To think it had come to this! I was utterly fixated on the petty high school dramas that I’d once held so in contempt.” Midnight Sun, 94
image: image set of Captain Barbossa from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. In the first he is a human and in the second a ghost. the text is altered so he is saying, “You best start believing in petty high school dramas, Mr. Cullen. You’re in one!”
I like how in the final movie the cast just gets soooo batshit, as your Hotness Ranking List reveals, because they had to bring in all these one-time characters and had a bunch of money to burn. Hence, the gift of Lee Pace.
gif: Lee Pace yelling “Sexy as hell!”
Other famous person Anna Kendrick famously “forgot” she was in Twilight which, can I be honest, I do not believe. I think that was a bit. Also I really like her book Scrappy Little Nobody, which people like to dunk on because sure, it’s kind of corny to call yourself a “nobody” in the title of a book that is specifically going to sell because you are very famous, but the book is literally about how weird and uneven the experience of gaining Hollywood fame and success can be.
One of the things that stuck with me most from the book is how the Twilight Saga was paying her day to day bills while living with a roommate and going out for “real” roles and the cognitive dissonance of being nominated for an Oscar while sleeping on secondhand furniture.
gif: Anna Kendrick in Twilight saying “Movie night with Bella!”
okay now that I’ve ranted, what I meant to say was that the book includes some fun anecdotes about filming the Twilight movies, like how she accidentally only brought one book to read while staying at a nearly empty and very cold hotel while filming Breaking Dawn and that book was The Shining
betty i’m here on your doorstep/and i planned it out for weeks now but/it’s finally sinking in….
image: Kristen Stewart and Mackenzie Davis standing next to each other
two theories, each alike in indignity:
over the course of five movies, the makeup department either was increasingly phoning it in on ‘making RPattz look vampiric’ or (because I don’t like to accuse technical departments of phoning it in) received instructions to look less vampiric
evidence a
image: Robert Pattinson in Twilight
evidence b
image: Robert Pattinson in New Moon
evidence c
image: Robert Pattinson in Eclipse
evidence d
image: Kristen Stewart with an arm around Robert Pattinson’s neck in Breaking Dawn: Part I
evidence e
image: Robert Pattinson in Breaking Dawn: Part II
he literally just looks human in these last two???
this one is worse: as Bella becomes closer to Edward and closer to sharing his fate, he looks less and less “other” to her
gif: Robert Pattinson smiling slightly with his hand next to his mouth
“Could a dead, frozen heart beat again? It felt as though mine was about to...My life was an unending, unchanging midnight. It must, by necessity, always be midnight for me. So how was it possible that the sun was rising now, in the middle of my midnight?” Midnight Sun, pg. 109
I, along with many others have over the years, have given a lot of thought — probably too much — to why these books and movies hit so hard for 13 year olds. And as I’ve been reading Midnight Sun and remembering the experience of reading the initial books, I keep thinking about how these stories are constantly teetering on the edge of self-awareness. They’re so absurd that at multiple points I’ve thought, “is Stephanie Meyer…...actively trolling me?” Just a few degrees more over the top and the books would be an undeniably silly spoof, but it’s juuuuust restrained enough to be able to take itself seriously.
betty, right now is the last time/i can dream about what happens when you see my face again...
image: Kristen Stewart with short curly brown hair looking at the camera
And in a lot of ways…….that’s similar to the experience of being an adolescent or pre-adolescent. I don’t reflect often on my memories of being 11-14 because who would want to relive that, but the experience I remember is of feeling everything very close to the skin, having a lot of reactions to the world around me, but also not having the self-awareness to reflect on or understand those reactions in a meaningful way. And that’s the experience that the books really tap into.
“Attraction. It was a problematic thing to contemplate. So many sides to it. So many different meanings and levels.” Midnight Sun, pg. 142
Edward spends about 200 pages in this book thinking “I feel compelled to know everything about her and maybe touch her face, but why???” before he realizes he has a crush and unfortunately that is very relatable to me
the only thing i wanna do/is make it up to you...
image: Kristen Stewart standing next to a metal structure wearing a grey tshirt, black shorts, and a large black coat
Truly Edward is…..painfully insecure in this book?? Like he truly cannot comprehend why Bella would be more into him than “average boys” and I find it…….kind of endearing?? I don’t know but I am kind of being sucked in by this book!!!
“At Books-A-Million's virtual live event in August 2020, Meyer announced that she has plans for two more Twilight books.” - Wikipedia
oh god oh NO I will not be fooled again!!!! (I probably will be)
“in my defense I have none” - Taylor Swift, folklore - Brie Larson (see above)
So like okay the first 300 pages of this book I was genuinely having a good time but then there were…...over 300 more pages
gif: Robert Pattinson wearing a suit and laughing in black and white
When I told my boss I was reading this (which like, why???) and that it was 658 pages he said, “I guess in some ways it’s impressive that she compressed four books into one” and like…..bless his heart
if you are a vampire insistent on watching me while I sleep for my “protection” I really think the least you could do is make yourself useful and do some tidying while you’re here. if there’s time to lean there’s time to clean, baby.
“It felt as if a new sun was bursting into being where our mouths met, and my whole body was filled to a shatter point wit the brilliant light of it.” Midnight Sun, 378
so i showed up at your party/yeah i showed up at your party/yeah i showed up at your party
image: Kristen Stewart with curly brown hair, wearing a yellow sweater
Aside from my skepticism about Carlisle’s career, rewatching the movies and reading Midnight Sun made me feel really skeeved out by Carlisle himself. Something about the absolute faith and submission the rest of the Cullen’s have to his moral authority is a little…..malevolent to me.
Sure he has the “most” “self-control” of all of them and has the firmest stance against drinking human blood…...but he also turned 4 of his 6 family members into vampires, dooming them to what he admits is a cursed existence!
And Rosalie, who openly resents being a vampire the most, is constantly dismissed as a bitch!!!
“Rosalie loved to get married. The chance to do it over and over was probably her favorite thing about immorality.” Midnight Sun, 389
gif: Lucille Bluth in Arrested Development and saying “Good for her!”
I think we can all agree, the superior Carlile:
image: Brandi Carlile on stage with a guitar
I know this is getting more and more off the rails I promise you we’re almost there
“I swallowed Bella’s tear. Perhaps it would never leave my body. After she left me, after all the lonely years had passed, maybe I would always have this piece of her inside me.” Midnight Sun, 444
This book really gives Stephanie Meyer to go into detail on the things the fans have been clamoring for: a thorough description of every play in the baseball scene, and a ten page long car chase with speeds and car brands explicitly detailed
will you have me/will you love me/will you kiss me on the porch in front of all your stupid friends
image: Kristen Stewart with short blond hair wearing a green hat, sun glasses, a necklace, and a grey tshirt, sticking out her tongue and holding two fingers up to her chin
Absolutely SCREAMING at the end of this book because I’d forgotten that the thing the Cullens tell Bella’s parents about why she’s in a hospital at the end is that she fell down the stairs and through a window?????
So okay, from Charlie and Esme’s point of view, here is the series of events as presented to them:
Bella breaks up with Edward and runs away to Arizona
Edward follows her
Bella “falls down the stairs” to such an extent that she’s hospitalized
And they’re like “yeah that checks out, that seems legit” not “holy shit this guy punished our daughter for breaking up with him and his family is helping him cover it up”???????? couldn’t! be! me!!!!!!!
“Music in the fifties was good. Much better than the sixties, or the seventies, ugh!” Honestly I forgot to write down on what page of Midnight Sun Edward said this but…….what an absolute menace to society
gif: Robert Pattinson wearing a blue suit and smiling in front of a blue background
Stephanie Meyer WISHES she could create imagine tension like this:
okay is this the end??? was that my last thought????????
oh right I need to finish something up
if you kiss me/will it be just like i dreamed it/will it patch your broken wings
image: Kristen Stewart with short brown hair with a cigarette in her mouth, holding a lighter, wearing a Triumph shirt and a chain
i’m only seventeen/i don’t know anything/but i know i miss you
image: Kristen Stewart with short brown hair, sitting at a diner table writing on a notepad
standing in your cardigan/kissing in my car again/stopped at a streetlight/you know i miss you
image: Kristen Stewart crouching outside, wearing a white shirt and jeans and sunglasses