What is Wrong (and Right) with Twilight?

By Abbie Stokes, Paige Bourquin, Leanne Beane, and Savannah Higley

Fashion and its consequences by Abbie Stokes

The fashion of Twilight is certainly a time-capsule to look at. With extra skinny jeans, layered cardigans and shirts, and shoes that seriously do not stand the test of time, Twilight’s looks are very dated. That being said, let’s dive into some of the worst outfits created to grace screens worldwide.

Bella:

Her prom outfit is questionable at best. I mean, the dress is realistically fine on its own, but the capri leggings and the low top converse? C’mon Twilight, do better. Also, I get that Washington state is super cold, but if it is, wear a decent jacket rather than just wearing heavy duty gloves…

Edward:

This peacoat wouldn’t be bad if Edward was supposed to be a normal mid-twenty-something in Europe. But as a highschooler? This just feels too wrong and too old.

Jasper, Rosalie, Alice, and Emmett.

Once again, what is with the early 2010s and weirdly layered clothes and accessories? First with Jasper’s Jeep outfit and the three layers (and unnecessary amount of white he’s wearing) and next with Alice’s bracelet-over-the-cardigan moment that’s happening. Jasper’s *fully* buttoned up white jacket is also an interesting choice, and I feel like a plain t-shirt with the jacket lightly layered on top would be better. Lastly, Rosalie’s baseball outfit is. Something. Again, it’s not the worst, but I think those padded vests are just not it whatsoever. The pants are a bit strange too, but I can accept it since it’s baseball-wear.

Overall, the looks of Twilight are certainly memorable, if only for their extremely dated looks and the questionable layering. Please, if trends really are a cycle, don’t make Twilight’s outfits a reality.

Vampires and werewolves by Leanne Beane

Twilight’s two main rival groups are the vampires and the werewolves. Although supernatural characters are subject to creative liberty, as seen with Edward’s sparkling sunlit introduction, there are basic guidelines that define each species. Twilight manages to accurately display vampires, but their werewolves are a little more iffy.

According to Britannica, vampires are typically portrayed as fanged creatures that consume a human’s blood, essence, or lifeforce. They are described as having pale skin and being either horribly grotesque or supernaturally beautiful depending on the source material, and they are usually undead and sleep underground in coffins, buried in their native soil and only emerging at night. They do not appear in silver-based imagery, such as mirrors or photo film, due to silver’s poisonous properties towards them, and they possess superhuman abilities such as enhanced healing.

Vampires can be turned in a myriad of ways, most often through biting, but other, lesser-known ways are sorcery, illness, being born with teeth or on Christmas, and having a cat jump over a person’s corpse. They can be killed via a wooden stake through the heart, fire, decapitation, and sunlight. They dislike garlic, running water, and holy items, though none of them are immediately deadly. Protection against vampires includes entering an abode, as they cannot follow unless they are invited, and scattering seeds that the vampire then desires to count.

Twilight’s vampires generally follow the rules listed above: they have sharp teeth that they use to feed on blood, they are typically pale, are generally beautiful, and possess superhuman healing. The movie does not touch on silver, garlic, running water, or holy items, but they do heavily focus on decapitation (and the removal of arms) and fire. However, it is explicitly stated that Twilight’s vampires do not sleep, so they do deviate from the norm in that regard.

On the other hand, Twilight’s werewolves are mildly more questionable in terms of supernatural accuracy. The major issue lies in the usage of the word “werewolf;” according to WikiDiff, a werewolf is only able to change during a full moon while a wolf shifter is able to change at will during any moon phase. Ethereal Melody differentiates their temperament, naming werewolves as “rapid wol(ves) on steroids” and describing wolf shifters as having civilized societies. Twilight’s canine characters seem to be more similar to wolf shifters than werewolves.

If Twilight’s so-called “werewolves” are assumed to indeed be wolf shifters, they are fairly accurately portrayed. According to Native Languages, indigenous wolf shifters are associated with “courage, strength, loyalty, and success at hunting.” These traits are strongly represented within Jacob’s pack, and Leah Clearwater’s wolf form in particular represents the connection between the color white and indigenous wolf shifters.

As a whole, Twilight’s characters represent their historical portrayals decently, creative-liberty sparkling and misused diction aside. Seriously, though, the vampire speed-walking and flailing wolf shifts have got to go. Yikes.

Action and casting choices by Paige Bourquin

In Twilight, a big complaint about how bad the acting and casting choices are in the movie. As someone who has read both the books and only seen the first movie two days before writing this, I can personally say that yes, the acting was just as bad as everyone says.

The casting was done by Deborah Aquila and Tricia Wood’s were good in the way that they took one look at the characters and said yes, This is the one we are going with. Both Bella and Edward were good casting choices, as they were not actually bad actors, mediocre at best, but they do not deserve the amount of flack that they get. The original characters they were acting off of were really badly written already, so they only acted the already bad characters. Although, The way that the casting directors failed horribly is when it came to any of the Quileute characters casted, especially the second main love interest, Taylor Lautner as Jacob Black. Even though he did not appear much in the one movie I watched, It was very obvious that this was not a proper portrayal of the Indigenous people of the area, and even with the little bit he was in the one movie I watched, Taylor Lautner was not a good actor in it.

Another instance of casting the right-looking actor is the casting of Bella’s friends. They all portrayed the feeling of annoyance that Bella showed in the book, which worked great as a whole, but the characters doing anything other than being annoying background characters, such as when Tyler was in the hospital with Bella, They show that they are not skilled actors. Anna Kendric was another good choice, as she gives off the annoying mean girlfriend vibe in the area, which lends well to her book character of Jessica.

We can't talk about the cast without talking about the casting and acting of the vampires. The vampires in the book are constantly talked about as chalk white and beautiful, and the casting directors got the typical 2008 style beautiful correct, with the typical makeup and fashion of the time. The way that the supporting actors acted was nothing like what the characters were described as in the book. Their body language was also not correct for the characters, with them being romantic in a fully creepy way.

There were some good instances of acting that I did notice though, even in the sea of bad acting. Such as the two friends Charlie Swan and Billy Black. Even though they were background characters, You could tell the chemistry between the two friends, and the one scene where Bella had to ack mad at Charlie, Kristan Stewart was actually able to act properly, leading me to believe that Bella was a better actor than Stewart.

Music by Savannah Higley

There’s many qualms about the movie Twilight, some say it has bad acting, bad effects, or that it’s a bad story. While all these complaints do have evidence, one thing that twilight actually does right is the music. Across all the movies, the music of twilight is surprisingly good. The first movie was released in 2008, and as such features music from around that time. Twilight is an indie film, so it features more mid-2000’s alternative music instead of favoring pop. The soundtrack features iconic alternative artists such as Paramore, Linkin Park, Collective Soul, and Muse.

Muse’s song “Supermassive Black Hole” is featured in arguably one of the most Iconic scenes in the first movie -- the baseball scene. This scene features the vampires playing an extreme form of baseball accompanied by the song, and it also serves as a first look at some of the series’ main villains.

“15 step” Is a song featured on Radiohead’s hit album “In Rainbows.” 15 step is the first song featured in the end credits of the movie. As such, it is not actually included in the official track list. There is a common theme of Radiohead songs in twilight movies as “Hearing Damage” by Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke, is featured in the second movie Twilight: New Moon.

“Flightless Bird, American Mouth” by Iron & Wine plays while Edward and Bella are dancing alone together in the Gazebo at prom. It’s a perfect song for such a soft, tender moment shared between our two lovers. It’s got a very folky slow sound with soft instrumentals and vocals. The lyrics aren’t the most romantic but the vocals blend so well with the instrumentals that it’s easy to disregard them.

One song that isn’t necessarily featured in the first film but deserves to be mentioned is “Possibility” by Lykke Li. This song is featured in Twilight: New Moon and is featured alongside Bella’s intense depression after Edward leaves. This song is very heart wrenching and suits Bella's depression very well. It amplifies the situation and perfectly portrays Bella's sadness and desperation.

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