By Ryan Broderick
For anyone with an X and Y chromosome, “Twilight” is something of a mystery. When early trailers for it aired on television, I quickly dismissed the movie, knowing nothing about it and thinking it was just like every other teen movie about some moody dude and some bookwormish girl falling in love or something. I had seen vampires in it and shrugged it off thinking, “Oh boy, what has Hollywood concocted this time?” It looked like “Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” mixed with “Dracula.” Anyone unfamiliar with any of it would judge it simply by the sum of its parts and immediately write it off as total Godforsaken garbage.
Well, you’d imagine the surprise of opening up the New York Times and discovering some hodgepodge-looking movie with a special-effects-quality circa 1998 becoming a full-blown cultural phenomenon. The article titled “Vampire of The Mall,” written by David Carr detailed how lead actor Robert Pattinson is currently (please hold laughter until end of the paragraph) touring Hot Topics around the country in support of the new film.
Now, this raises some very burning questions. One, who is Robert Pattinson? Two, why does anyone care about a book series about vampires? Three, people who shop at Hot Topic can read?
Apparently, Robert Pattinson and his humungous forehead are the star of a movie based on a best selling series of books that follows a girl named Bella who falls in love with a brooding, sulky vampire and has to fight his vampire friends or something to save her. And apparently the “Twilight” book series is a smash hit with teen girls.
What the book-turned-movie turned Harry Potter competition illustrates so hilariously is the mainstream status emo-culture has gained over the last five years. In the New York Times article Carr even writes, “Up and down the velvet-rope line were little girls, moms, goth teenagers, mall rats and even the occasional emo boy.” I wonder if they had to consult the AP style guide to figure out if “emo” was a proper noun and if it needed capitalization or not.
The movie comes out Nov. 21, and is expecting quite an opening weekend draw. Producers have even bought up the second and third books in the series just to go teeth to neck with Harry Potter’s final theatrical installments.
What seems so silly though, is how disgustingly condescending the plot outline is. Shy girl meets shy boy with a dark and mysterious lifestyle, and she loves him regardless of his dark and mysterious lifestyle. Just like the lyrical outline of any “Fall Out Boy” song. What a challenging and complex plot to get wrapped up in. Well, regardless of depth and complexity, at least he’ll look really cute in different peacoats as he flies around saving his girlfriend.
Ryan Broderick’s “What The F**k” column tackles all the things about pop culture that make you ask “What the f**k?”