In Which I Read Twilight: Chapter 11 -- Complications · 4:09pm Jan 16th, 2018
Bella and Edward share some weak lovey-dovey flirting in biology class. It seems like the teacher had the class watch a movie just so Bella and Edward wouldn’t be interrupted while gazing into each others’ eyes. When school’s done, they leave to see a bunch of people clustered around Rosalie’s car, proving once again that people trying to hide out shouldn’t be driving flashy cars, you idiots.
“What kind of car is that?” I asked.
“An M3.”
“I don’t speak Car and Driver.”
“It’s a BMW.”
When asked what type of car a vehicle is, who only responds with the model name?
They drive home, and Edward alternately flirts with her and talks about how he’s dangerous. Something we still haven’t seen yet. Maybe if he’d thrashed the guys he rescued Bella from, but he just scattered them with his car. Not very dangerous in a personal way.
The next day, we come to the crux of the problem with Twilight. During their free time at school, Edward begins asking Bella about her. Her likes and dislikes, her history, all that jazz.
While he walked me to English, when he met me after Spanish, all through the lunch hour, he questioned me relentlessly about every insignificant detail of my existence. Movies I’d liked and hated, the few places I’d been and the many places I wanted to go, and books — endlessly books.
Now, this could’ve been a really sweet scene. Just two people getting to know each other. It’d been one of the main things the romance so far has been lacking. But there’s a problem with this. It’s in the section above. Can you figure it out?
We never see them talking.
It’s all glossed over in Bella’s narration. We don’t hear her answers. There are times when we come close, but it never goes all the way:
His questions were different now, not as easily answered. He wanted to know what I missed about home, insisting on descriptions of anything he wasn’t familiar with.
We sat in front of Charlie’s house for hours, as the sky darkened and rain plummeted around us in a sudden deluge.
I tried to describe impossible things like the scent of creosote — bitter, slightly resinous, but still pleasant — the high, keening sound of the cicadas in July, the feathery barrenness of the trees, the very size of the sky, extending white-blue from horizon to horizon, barely interrupted by the low mountains covered with purple volcanic rock. The hardest thing to explain was why it was so beautiful to me — to justify a beauty that didn’t depend on the sparse, spiny vegetation that often looked half dead, a beauty that had more to do with the exposed shape of the land, with the shallow bowls of valleys between the craggy hills, and the way they held on to the sun. I found myself using my hands as I tried to describe it to him.
Seeing someone trying to describe something that’s hard to put into words can tell you a lot about them. In 2008’s Prince of Persia, hearing the normally charming-douchebag Prince go quiet as he struggles to describe snow to Elika was surprising and wound up being one of my favorite moments in the game. Here? Nah, not important. Bella tells us what she’s trying to get across when seeing her try to get it across would be so much better.
What could be character-building is summarized. It’s told. One of the key parts in a relationship — knowing the other person — is completely skipped over.
Well, not completely skipped over:
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d talked so much. More often than not, I felt self-conscious, certain I must be boring him. But the absolute absorption of his face (Again with the looks! Shut up about the looks!), and his never-ending stream of questions, compelled me to continue. Mostly his questions were easy, only a very few triggering my easy blushes. But when I did flush, it brought on a whole new round of questions.
Such as the time he asked my favorite gemstone, and I blurted out topaz before thinking. He’d been flinging questions at me with such speed that I felt like I was taking one of those psychiatric tests where you answer with the first word that comes to mind. I was sure he would have continued down whatever mental list he was following, except for the blush. My face reddened because, until very recently, my favorite gemstone was garnet. It was impossible, while staring back into his topaz eyes, not to remember the reason for the switch. And, naturally, he wouldn’t rest until I’d admitted why I was embarrassed.
“Tell me,” he finally commanded after persuasion failed — failed only because I kept my eyes safely away from his face.
“It’s the color of your eyes today,” I sighed, surrendering, staring down at my hands as I fiddled with a piece of my hair. “I suppose if you asked me in two weeks I’d say onyx.”
The only time we actually see the question and answer, it relates back to the fact that Edward’s so frigging hot like whoa. Because that’s all that matters in this relationship. Looks. That’s all it’s based on. Bella barely knows Edward. We never saw Edward getting to know Bella. Personality? Ha, that’s not important. Who needs personality when you’ve got a face like this?
In the middle of questions, Jacob and his father Billy show up, prompting Edward to bolt, but not before Billy spots him. From the look in his eyes, Bella decides that Billy believes the stories he told Jacob, which she finds surprising, even though he’s at least right about the Cullens. And this is written like it’s a cliffhanger. I guess “tension” in this book is something coming between Bella and Edward.
And if it looks like this entry was mostly me ranting, guess what? This chapter was twelve pages long.
Wow. Wow. The sheer magnitude of the squandered opportunity here is staggering.
4774754
Weeeee've got opportunity
In this "ro-mantic" story!
He's Ed
He's Jake
And they're both so friggin' hot like whoah!
Shallow love interests nonpareil.
It's amazing to look at this train wreck and see what might have been, had the writer been actually competent. How did this get so popular in the first place?
4774813
Most people, if pressed, could not produce better. :B
I mean, I'm not a good writer in any respect, but even I know better than to skip over things like that...
4774832
At least half of what I've read on this website has been better.