Stephenie Meyer's "Twilight" = SRZ BSNZ

[trinityofone]

A while back, I posted a review of a certain love-it-or-hate-it YA novel on Goodreads. (I posted the review here, too.) After a lull, I started receiving some truly hilarious comments:

I liked your review but not your language.

This is a YOUNG ADULT book. If you want sex, go buy danielle steele. it is not appropriate to have steamy sex scenes in a YA book. I didn't realize there were people who needed it that badly in a book that they will say a book sucks because of it. too bad for jane austen. she could have been WAY more famous and sold more more books if she just would have porned it up a bit.

But the real kicker came today:

what's wrong with you people. this is an amazing book and all you guys are concentrated on are your misconceptions and hypocritical view points. seriously i doubt any of you didn't like the book, it's just you're too stubborn to really think about the book (or anything else for that matter), or maybe you're just all liars (and bad ones at that). either way, i don't like any of you, and i judge you all. and I'm not sorry for it.

Do you hear that? He judges us ALL. Noes!

ETA: Mr. "I judge you all!" has posted another comment in response to something someone else said in the thread, though he seems to think he is still responding to me:

first of all, i will have fun reading Eragon, thank you very much. secondly, i could have spent a long time giving you a list of proof to back up my claims, however i don't like to waist my time trying to teach stubborn people who are incapable of looking deep into a situation (in this case a book). also, you seem pretty obsessed about this book, considering how much you like to talk about it, be it good or bad. you know what i think, i think that you really love this book, you just wish you didn't cause maybe your friends don't like it, or maybe you think people will laugh at you, whatever the reason is i have a feeling that I'm right. lastly, i don't hate you because you don't like Twilight, i don't like you because if you didn't like Twilight that means there's a good chance you don't like Bella, therefore you can't be like Bella in many ways (unless you hate yourself), and since Bella has almost every good quality a person can have it's possible, if not probable, that you are a terrible person. have fun slaughtering puppies.

So, we are judged, and judged PUPPY-SLAUGHTERERS. This gets more delightful by the second!

On a semi-related note: seriously, what did people do at work before there was shit to look at on the internet? Today I have had David Caruso putting on his sunglasses over and over, the Doctor's excitement over his potential crotch void (warning: possible S4 spoilers), and this alarmingly fat cat, and I am still bored out of my skull. How did ANYONE keep a desk job before the invention of the interwebs? A theory: The answer relates to why it used to be okay to drink on one's lunch break.

Comments

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

I dunno, that all sounds pretty good to me! If there were a Christopher Judge Saying Indeed mailing list, I would sign up.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Heh. That's like the perfect, way-more-awesome counterpoint to that David Caruso vid!

[sonofzeal.livejournal.com]

I'll see your Teal'c "Indeed" and raise you every "Fuck" from The Big Lebowski. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU2ZgaQ_H-Y)

[randomeliza.livejournal.com]

OH MY GOD HE DOESN'T LIKE YOU. Whatever are you going to do with your life? You might as well end it all right now.

Way to take everything waaaaay too seriously, dude. WTF.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Some random stranger on the internet doesn't want to be my friend! Alas, no more vampire proms for me! *single blood-red tear*

[randomeliza.livejournal.com]

Oh my god. Just woke up to see the ETA puppy slaughtering thing. WOW. Almost every good quality a person can have? Really? That's... wow. I really do feel kind of sorry for people with this level of stupidity. Kind of.

*headdesk*

[ladyoflisquill.livejournal.com]

I have to say thanks for posting this. I was hmming and hawing about reading Twilight as I'd heard a lot of talk (not plot just 'Oh-my-God!It's-awesome!' kind of stuff) but after reading your review I'm definitely gonna give it a miss. For people who grew up with Buffy I think the idea of old vampire and young thing has been done (or just look at Anne Rice for uncomfortablely younger girl and older man).

Also, how much do I not want to read that ending? Seriously, candyfloss my brain right now!

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Yeah, in some ways Twilight has a "My first vampire novel" vibe to it. If you, as you say, grew up with BtVS—or anything else like it—it's liable to feel old hat, especially as it possesses absolutely NONE of the cleverness Joss Whedon brought to the (still often icky—remember the lollipop scene?) Buffy/Angel relationship.

Also, I think I can pretty much guarantee that any book that has a happy ending that takes place at a prom is NOT FOR ME.

[taurenova.livejournal.com]

All the Twilight novels should only be read as comedies. To be fair - I'm only reading them because of RPattz being in the films.

What I won't do for that young man...

(Seriously - I wanted to become a vampire and turn Bella myself to put an end to the emo-whineyness of the second one. Ugh)

I wish I had a desk job. I spend my day on my feet wrangling bingo. *sighs*

[randomeliza.livejournal.com]

Dude, did you see RobPat in the trailer that just came out? I whimpered. He's so fucking hot it's almost painful. I actually had to fight the urge to lick the computer screen.

Hi, RobPat. Please to sex me now, kthx.

[taurenova.livejournal.com]

Yeah. He is pretty hot there. Particularly the slow smile at the end. Actually - he was the only thing that made me squee about the trailer. Because, well, it's obvious really.

Mmm. Pattinson.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Man, I wish I could see what you guys see! I feel both crazy and blind for utterly missing the RobPat hot.

[lilac-way.livejournal.com]

Seriously -- what is the DEAL with the people and their comments to your review of Twilight! You didn't like the book and you explained WHY you didn't very well. I think "I judge you all" is going to be my new go-to phrase.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

I'm tempted to change my little LJ call-sign thing to that, to be honest. ;-)

[sol-se.livejournal.com]

A lot of my flist is sooooo in love with that series. I kinda get the impression that I'd really hate it. So, I'm just avoiding reading it. Your review just convinced me I'm probably right not to read them.

Also! David Caruso One Liners! Teal'c Ineed! I love this! I used to watch Law & Order a lot, and they did the same thing with Jerry Orbach. Right before the intro song, Lenny would say some sort of pun. We called them Lenny's Lame Line. "Did I miss Lenny's Lame Line? No? Ok!"

[sol-se.livejournal.com]

Also? "I judge you all" will never not be funny.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

"Lenny's Lame Line" sounds like it would be a fab name for so many things! A comedy club, among others.

I am looking forward to histrionic declarations of "I judge you all!" among my friends for months to come. *eg*

[20thcenturyvole.livejournal.com]

My flatmate is reading it and loving it, but it is very much her thing. She keeps quoting me bits that make her squee, including the revelation that when vampires do finally go out in the sun? They sparkle like diamonds. Yeah, I'd much rather have them burst into flames, thanks. I won't be touching that book with a ten-foot pole.

[jade-dragoness.livejournal.com]

*blinks* They sparkle like diamonds? What? ...yeah, I'd rather they just exploded into ash.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Clearly someone needs to write a Twilight/Buffy crossover, STAT.

[jade-dragoness.livejournal.com]

I can just see the expression on Spike's face at finding the vampires don't go out into daylight because they're sparkly.

*falls over laughing*

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Sparkly, sparkly vampires! Oh, the potential Buffyverse crossovers, they would be hilarious.

[girly-curl-3.livejournal.com]

Okay, somehow I missed your awesome review of Twilight when it posted.

I actually ended up reading this book because of all the secrets posted on fandom_secrets and OMG I HATED IT. It was so horrible, exactly for all the reasons you said. Also, I was really peeved it was never explained why Edward couldn't read her mind.

The responses to your review are hilarious, most especially I JUDGE YOU ALL. Hee.

[jade-dragoness.livejournal.com]

That large 'Garfield' cat made my eyes grow huge, and wonder for a moment if he was a stuffed animal.

It reminded me of the giant bunny pic I saw a couple years back. Whoa.

[notpoetry.livejournal.com]

Dude, at my office, all we DO is look at stupid things on the internet and then send them to each other.

A few months ago this video (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,336750,00.html) was going around, and I remember sitting in the office and hearing, every now and then, that loud scream at the end of the clip, and then UNCONTROLLABLE LAUGHING, coming from the cubicles. It was kind of hilarious.

[amy13.livejournal.com]

PUPPY KILLER!!! HOW DARE YOU!?!

LOL - oh, Lord... that's exactly the kind of hilarious stupidity I needed tonight, thank you for that.

[delurker.livejournal.com]

Do you hear that? He judges us ALL. Noes!
And he's NOT SORRY! *weeps inconsolably*

lastly, i don't hate you because you don't like Twilight, i don't like you because if you didn't like Twilight that means there's a good chance you don't like Bella, therefore you can't be like Bella in many ways (unless you hate yourself), and since Bella has almost every good quality a person can have it's possible, if not probable, that you are a terrible person. have fun slaughtering puppies.
*iz ded* This twisted logic is hilarious, in a disturbing kind of way.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

That last paragraph reads kind of like the Sparklypoo head of house unloading on some wide-eyed first-year Slytherins. I LOVE IT.

[scifigirl.livejournal.com]

OMG Twilight is so, so, so bad! I am always disappointed when I find out people whose opinions I respect love the book. It makes me think their taste isn't worth crap. I fear for the future if our teenagers think Bella and Edward are the best thing ever.

[ladyoflisquill.livejournal.com]

I was thinking about this more today (because, yes, when I should be working I actually spend my time contemplating books I haven't even read) but how can any reasonably intelligent person not understand that the subtext of the vampire mythology is sex. In literature, movies and television the representation of the vampire has always been used as a commentary on the sexual need and desires of humanity. From the earliest portrayal of private dark desire and erotic terror in Bram Stoker's Dracula to the sexual allure and bad boy image of Joss Whedon's Spike (I'm deliberately bypassing Angel here because if ever there was a text book example of emasculation he's it!). The enticing gaze, the allure of the night, the penetration of the bite, the exchange of fluids and the ultimate transformation from being an innocent to being sexually aware. Vampires have always been used to represent The Other; the sexually aware, the erotic, the homoerotic as well as highlighting issues surrounding gender, race, disease, xenophobia, religion, hegemony, and youth culture.

To say we are wrong to assume and discuss this Reading of the book simply because Twilight is a YA series is absurd and stifles not only the creativity of the reader but infringes on the freedom of speech and freedom of expression.

Every reading of a book is valid and every person has a right to their opinion.

I really wish I had my film theory books to hand so I could back my rant up with footnotes and reference articles.

[darcydodo]

Have you seen this relevant "summary"?