It was better than New Moon!

Mark and I love to mock Twilight.  Once upon a time (can't remember when), a friend (can't remember who) lent me the Twilight books.  I read them and summarized them for Mark.  My retelling was much more interesting than the books were.  I've never been a big romance fan.  Eh.

So then the movies came out.  I considered actually watching the first movie in the movie theater (maybe on opening day or opening weekend?!) just so I could watch the Twi-hards (Twilight fangirls? what should I call them?) because I figured they would probably be more entertaining than the movie itself.  Unfortunately, I never quite got around to that.  C'est la vie.

We used our free Blockbuster rentals to watch the first two movies.  Last night, we Netflixed the third movie.

The second movie was so bad (or mediocre) that Mark and I came up with a new backhanded compliment for bad movies: "Hey, it was better than New Moon!"  We like the idea of, "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all." and figure this is a GREAT way to put that into practice. ;)

What did we think of Eclipse?

It was better than New Moon.
 
Of course!


After watching the movie, I went on IMDB just to see how bad the rest of the world actually thinks the Twilight series is.  It looks like the movies score 5.5 stars, 4.5 stars, and 4.8 stars respectively.  Phew, the world has not lost its sense!

My favorite review is the one in which the reviewer reflects on acting skills:
So surely this movie has some redeeming features? Perhaps the acting? Wrong. Stewart's (Bella), emotions range from mildly irritated to slightly concerned whilst trying to maintain an air of vulnerability that irritates instead of earning sympathy. For Pattinson (Edward), it's all about just looking pretty and his acting skills are reduced to nothing more bowing his head slightly so that he always appears to be gazing upwards in an attempt at looking intense. As for Lautner (Jabob), well we all know he can't act so he is reduced to a shameless and topless eye-candy prop.

The comment about Edward's appearing "to be gazing upwards" reminds me of Joey from Friends, where he talks about when he's acting in his soap operas and can't remember his lines he gazes off into the distance and tries to have a serious look on his face.  IT'S AWESOME.  So now I'm picturing Edward taking acting lessons from Joey on Friends and drawing up a continuum to categorize all of Kristen Stewart's emotions as somewhere between "mildly irritated" and "slightly concerned."  No, really.


And I have no idea where this actually originated, but I love going back and reading this every so often:
http://shaunlaurasmith.blogspot.com/2009/03/twilight-in-three-minutes.html



Disclaimer: I don't hate Twilight.  I mean, it would be masochistic of me to read all of the books if it was that painful.  They're not the best books ever (they're not even that good) but they were entertaining.  Some day the books (and the movies) will be a forgotten footnote in history.  Other fantasy book series, like Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings or The Hunger Games have actual timeless themes that will probably have people still reading the books 100 years from now.  Stephanie Meyer, I love you and all, but not all books are going to become classics.  I'm glad your series found a niche.