Twilight with JT Taylor

00:00:00
Speaker 1: On the beck dol Cast, the questions asked if movies have women in them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands, or do they have in individualism the patriarchy? Zef in best start changing it with the beck Del Cast. Hello, and welcome to the Bechdel Cast. My name is Caitlin, Miss Jamie, and we're here to talk about movies and how women are portrayed in those movies. Women rule, women rule, not according to movies, So no women suck. And that's especially true of the movie we're talking about today. We got a hum ding or today. Man, I'm sorry if this episode ends up being like two and a half hours long, because I have many pages of notes. I've got a lot. Yeah, there's a lot to say. I watched this movie once drunk, once sober, and tried to figure out what I was saying in the drunk notes. We'll see if I can piece it apart. I watched probably the first fifteen minutes of it on Netflix and then I was like, Oh, this movie blows. And then I happened to have the Riff Tracks version of it, so I watched the rest of that and it was a much more enjoyable way to watch it. Yes, but hey, let's jump in and introduce our guests. Let's do it. He is an educator, but his most impressive credit is that he is the best friend of a one Caitlin Durante. It's j T. Taylor. Guys, thanks for having me. Thanks for being here, my friend. Yeah. Thanks, that was a good introduction. I'm I teach the youth of America about commas and quotation marks and commas inside of quotation marks. What would you say is the most important piece of punctuation? Puberty? Okay, amazing? Yeah, yeah, it's usually where we start at the school year in English class, puberty, and by the end they're shaving. It's great, well in class and everything full service. That's amazing. In Massachusetts, I miss shaving at school. You're you're in junior high and you're like, let's sneak into the bathroom and shave each other. My friends just shaven, shave it away. Yeah. Well, this podcast is inspired by the Bechtel Tests. Right, do you know what that is? Maybe? Maybe not. If you don't, we're here to tell you that it's a test you that you apply to movies or whatever, anything that has a story. The test requires that the story has two female characters. They have to talk to each other, they have to have names, and their conversation can't be about a man. I would honestly be fascinated if this is the first episode someone would choose to listen to, because it speaks more to their movie taste than anything aft, like, oh, this is going to be my jumping off point for feminism. Hey, Jes, tell us about your your history. Well we're talking about Twilight, do you know? Oh no, you've misprepared. Were already give it five film. So I'm an educator that means I teach kids. And during my first interview, I knew this is the job, This is my dream job because the summer reading included Twilight. Real, what time do I start? Who? In their right mind? For what age? The Massachusetts? There there? It was a high school book for the high school reading list. It's not there anymore, right, So what what year would this have been? Tight? So that was when I was in high school. That's crazy. Yeah, do you want to transfer? Yeah? I want to go back in time. My mom loved these books and she bought the box set and was like, you've got to read them. She'd later do the same thing with fifty shades, but I passed. It was like your commings on these books. This is chriss Well. I first encountered Twilight by going to visit my friend J T. Hi. Yeah, that's my fault, that's my It was before I lived in Boston, and I think I went to visit you and you were like, hey, got to watch this movie Twilight. We watched it and it was bad, and you really at the time like I loved it. Those movies. I spoke. We got into fights about these movies because you were wrong and I was right, no, because I have been right all along that they've always been terrible, and now you're coming consistently believed that there. I've consistently been a detractor, but I was on board for you know, it's like this sort of like twist my arm. I guess I'll go because all my friends are going, but I think it's stupid. But I would always go. I mean same like I've seen. I think I saw the last three movies in the theater really midnight. I saw the first one in theaters God, and then I read the first book and a half and it was like, holy sh it. The pros in these books garbage, and I couldn't keep going. Also, I've been a long time team Jacob. Oh, I agree, I agree, I'm okay. Team Jacob is the right team. Thank you so much. I agree. Also worth mentioning that our producer Aristotle used to be a big Twilight head. Really wait, what team were you on? Okay, it's good that we have a split room. This is going to be good for discourse. I don't understand. Well, okay, we'll get to Edward. I just to Moody, give me, give me Jacob. He's got He's a red blooded American horny wolf. I'm into it. They have good banter. They have an actual friendship. Yes, it doesn't start with like I'm gonna just look at you for a long time, although that is. That's how my high school boyfriend, uh he ensnared you, just by staring at you for a while. Yeah, there was one time where someone was like, oh, Steven stared at you for the whole math test. All right, I'll date him. He was really good at math, so I finished shortly and then he was just like it worked. We dive for four years. Romantic Nope, nope, listen, it was great at the time. Okay, I was, I was young. I was I was a baby. Gay Mowanna hadn't come out yet, so I didn't really know who I was. It just it spoke to me, and uh, I don't regret that books are movies first. For you the movie it was the trailer really for New Moon, when the parent government is introduced, right, correct, I was books first. Okay, I was still, you know, really knee deep into Harry Potter at the time. And give me a breath over Harry Potter, thank you alright, already came out. I'm irrevocably over Harry Potter, who didn't learn the word or have a complay from this. We just looked up the definition this morning, ten minutes before you got here. I remember reading this these books. I think it's the second book. But there's like a part where Edward disappears and then Bella just does nothing for like three months. Yeah, that's towards the beginning of News. And there's a couple there's a couple just like blank pages, and I remember seeing that and being like, oh, you can just do nothing for three months. This is such an interesting idea. It's society. I was I was like straight up turned on by the idea of doing nothing for three months, and so I was like, well, thank you Stephanie Meyer for just, you know, making this an option for young women doing nothing for three months because they're they're like, maybe a friend should I do the recap Alright, So Twilight centers around a young Bella Swan. Don't forget, there's no way to convey that a character is attractive unless you name her Bella, which means beauty, and then also give her the last name of a sexy bird, as we saw in the Pirates of the Caribbean episode with Elizabeth. I think that there are actually very dirty and mean. Have you ever met a swan? I don't know why I'm asking that as someone who actually I've met several swans and can confirm that they are the sexiest of all the birds. Swans have only been very mean to me. There's this place in Bracton called dw Fields Park and you would go, I mean maybe because they were city swans. It was very rude. You'd bring little scraps and they were loud, they were territorial. They would ship everywhere. Beautiful swan. It's it's a myth okay, well, not according to black swan, not according to the swan Princess. There's a lot of misconceptions about swans that I would like to spend. There is a lot too much. What about those other birds? How about pigeons? They have the worst reputation, But are they the worst birds? We don't know because we haven't seen enough theories about pigeons. They're about as dirty as swans. All birds are dirty and kind of scary. I think you're not wrong. Sorry, sorry to trigger all you bird lovers out there. I expect them strongly. So we've got bella swan. She moved to Forks, Washington, where there's never son. You know. She's in a new high school and she's trying to make new friends, but she's so clumsy and awkward that it's hard. Except everyone immediately loves her, including a person named Edward Cullen. He's mysterious, he's pale. He emotionally abuses her from minute one, but he's intriguing because it turns out, wow, he's a vampire. So they start to fall in love. She's like, I'm irrevocably in love with you. At one point they're playing baseball. The baseball scene is bananas. I love it. Well, this scene, it shouldn't be significant, but it is because this group of bad vampires show up who have been killing the townspeople and eating the sniffy ones. I like, I like the one named James who's always sniff in the air. Yeah. Um. And they show up because Bella starts hanging out with the Cullen family, which is this family of vampires that have just all been turned by Carlyle are all foster children, but they're also all fucking each other. Interesting precedent that, yes, So they're all playing baseball together and the bad vampire show up because the thing with the Cullens is that they don't eat people, even though they want to. They're vegetarians, so they only eat animals. Makes sense. So the bad vampires who do eat people come by. This guy James, this lady Victoria, and let's see the one name Laurent, and they're like, I smell a human, I'm gonna eat her. And James, the lead bad vampire, Sniffy Sniffy Sniffy Sniffy Magoo, decides that he's gonna turn Bella into a project and he's gonna chase her. That's exactly great, Like he's gonna fix her fix here by drinking all of her blood. And so everyone freaks out and they're like, we gotta get away from here. So they drive to Phoenix and Bella things. Is this about Fury Road? Can we do figur Road? Oh my god, it's been done. I would rather do this than Fury Road. Honestly, I like this movie. Oh my god, No that I'm having a stroke. Jamie hates. I hate mad Mag's Fury Road. Give me any Twilight movie over it. I have to go like be here in Robert Buttons and handsome Tom hardy handsomer. I'm already boring. No, his character is born because the handsome Okay, yes, team Jacob, but kiss me on the lept. I love that he wears a wig. There's like a lot of especially later in this series, a lot of Jacob objectification, speculation on his abs. He's wearing wigs. He's like Nicole Kidman, like he's like, look at my body, look at my wig. It's great. That wig was huge on Gate Twitter. Really yeah, wait, Nicole Kidman's wig or Jacob Black's Okay, Okay, I was going to say because I was really into I feel like I've brought up this exact wig before, the one that she wears is in in Big Little Eyes, Nicole Kivin's wigg and Biggle Little Wise is something I think about at least once a week. So they're in Phoenix now and James is like, I'm when I eat you, fella, and She's like, Okay, I'm gonna die in the place of someone I love. She's okay with it, and she's fine with it. It's the opening line from the movie, right and and just so, so there's no mistake made. You see a deer being consumed, as if to say, like, don't worry, we have no problem selling out our protagonists in the place of someone hot. Yeah. Yeah, this is a movie that starts with a female deer being hunted by a male hunter. And that's a perfect metaphor for how I grew up in Pennsylvania. Did you get Hunting season days off? We did, but I didn't go. I stayed home and played video games like a normal person. I didn't know that was a thing. Yeah, I didn't have to go to school on the first day of Like there just was no school in the first day of Buck season and does season? Who does sides? But the first day of Buck season, and it's different. The Bock season and Do season are two different seasons. Yes, it's the Vaultori the designs. Actually this is new information to me. That's crazy. Yeah, grow up in rural Pennsylvania and then you won't have to go to school when there's hunting to be done. Okay. But so she's like, I'm gonna die for Edward because I revocably love him, And then of course he has to show up and they fight James because James has bitten Bella. All the vampire venom is coursing through her veins, and she's like and it's like so she's like lying there on the floor nearly dying. And then they kill James the vampire by Alice ripping his head off. And then Edward, who has expressed this entire time that he wants to suck Bella's blood more than any humans blood. He has to suck the venom out of her blood stream, and he's like, oh god, am I going to be able to stop in time? Good raw dog in it? Well I knew that's basically what the metaphor is. He's like, I don't know if I'm gonna be able to not come exactly. Yeah, he's raw dogging it hot more raw dogging in movies, Edwards the raw dog So the betrayal of women in Twilight, you went your turn? Do you only speak when you're spoken to? Well, the first time Bella had sex, she raw dogs are right? And then she gets pregnant with a little demon. They should maybe consider protection. But he's so strong that parent come is impervious. Was that the thing? He's like, Oh my, I have like badtery acid come and there's no use in stopping me. And then he's like, oh guy, this is so sick all other sniffys. Can we just okay, can we skip forward to the end of the fourth book really quick before we finished summarizing the first movie, please, of how all this stuff happens. There's a love triangle forever and then it turns out that Jacob the were wolf was actually lusting after Bella's unborn egg baby. Yeah, this is it. That is so fucking gross. It is horrifying because we see them form a friendship here that I'm like, this seems like puppy love, seems like there's something there, but he's actually like horny for her egg puppy, He's horny for her egg what is it, renesme or whatever fucking stupid ass name. Grow up. I remember having to stop reading the book and going back and being like, surely this is not the implication, because the whole thing is that someone imprints on the werewolves. I think she's still a very young child that he sees her for the first time. To be fair, Edward is ninety years older than Bella, so a colonial England, Like this is so fucking d Yeah, he like sees this and then he's like, oh, exactly, that's exactly what happens. And it is disgusting and one of many reasons I fucking hate this series. That to me is the worst part of the whole series. I have a high tolerance for garbage and trash. But the dog man seeing a baby and saying I'm going to that baby, and then in the book being like, and here's the resolution thing you've been waiting for years is the dog wants to fund a baby. Like no that that you're like, oh, closure, like, no, call the police, right. Just back checking a bit to the end of the first one, the Good Vampires the Collins, they show up, they destroy James. Meanwhile Edward is sucking all of the blood out of Bella. Cut to the end of the movie whereby she's done nothing to resolve anything, and they go to prom. The end they do that. Look though, I will because I was in high school when this movie came out. I remember specifically, So this came out like meat two thousand eight, and then the prom season after two thousand nine, everyone was doing the bell of Swan thing with a prom dress and converses. That was like a thing for for the next couple of years. You know, I'm in support of like wearing practical, comfortable shoes in a formal occasion. That's fine, But what's gross is being inspired by Twilight. But that totally was what Yeah. Yeah, everyone was like, I'm doing the Bella Swan, I'm wearing a kid dress. I'm awkward, I can't dance. Also, I'm awkward, I can't She also wearing a cast because of Vampire had broken her leg. Yeah, which might have informed the shoe decision, but it went over all the high school girls were like, oh, this seems easier, which is true. Well, where do we jump in with this hard Tovie, we can start it. Charlie's tom Selleck mustache. Yeah, let's go there. Let's go there first. Are we into it? I'm into it. I'm into it, honestly, Hot Dad, I'm team Charlie. Yeah, hot Dad. He's doing his best and he's hot. Okay. One of the first things that happens, which I was grossed out by, is Bella arriving at the new school. All the boys are like, who's the new girl. She's so pretty and oh my god. And then one of the characters, Tyler, swoops in for a kiss just like surprise and then runs away. But this is now, like, I don't know, the tense movie that we've talked about on this podcast where a man just like surprise kiss is a woman, which don't forget there's all such thing as a surprise kiss, right, it's all it's assault, And I just don't know why this always happens. The first thing that bothered me about the movie is that they used the word chill ax and you're like, oh, yeah, it's two that in eight was like chill ax Bella. I was like, oh no, feature yeah, I'm just lamping over. She has a moderate amount of anxiety about being interviewed as the new kid for the school newspaper, which would never happen, and he immediately back pedals and he's like, relaxed, woman, chill acts, I'm just trying to lamp over here. Do you remember. People will be like, I'm just lamping. I have no idea what that means. People would say that in my high school. They'd be like, oh, funk, I'm trying to think of all this because this was my back this yeah, this was the best, the best years of my life. Just kidding. I was wearing a back brace for these years. But people would be like, oh, we're lamping on the east side. For some reason, there was a time where you could say lamp and I just meant to hang out. Yeah, like Chilla hack sing if you will, but like lamping. Yeah. Bella's first steps into Forks really really interesting. A lot of people talk to her about the weather. Tyler throws a twizzler at her and then his van. He does throw a van at her, and then Edward throws it back. He's like, no, certain, not on my watch. I protect her. She's gonna save her. She's not. I watched her when she sleeps just like, ah, how romantic. Okay, yeah, so I made a list of all the ways in which he is extremely abusive. There's a scene he straight up gaslights her whenever he's he saves her from the van crashing into her because he has to like speed across the parking lot to get to her in time, and because he's a vampire he can do that. He's lightning fast. In the hospital, She's like, how did you get over to me? How did you do that? And like, also, how do you stop a van with your arm? And he's a reasonable questions. He's like, I was already right beside you, and she's like, no, you were across the park. She keep saying, I know what I saw. I know that was like scary to watch. Knowing what gaslighting is now you're just like, oh my god. And it being presented as like a funny little plot point of like it's not time for her to know. But I'm like, no, this is like a textbook example of something that happens in abusive You're just like, why you hit your head? You're confused? Yeah, that's like sample text question her reality and make you think she's crazy. And then she here's the thing. She does stand up for herself. In this movie, a lot things happen to her and she's like she tries, but it's always undermined by the fact that she then just keeps staying with this very abusive person. Like there's a scene where those like scary rape dudes in Port Angels, Washington come after her Port of Angels. They're like being all creepy, and she's like, get off, don't touch me. She like even kicks one of them. Like she does fight for herself. She stands up for herself, but it never laughs long, or she always succumbs to whatever abuses being tossed her way, or very often just being removed from one abusive situation and placed into a different one where like obviously the guy is harassing her in port Angelist, that is bad news. I think if we're playing out that situation realistically, she would not have been able to rescue herself. We don't know that she has any like physical training that would allow her to fight off multiple grown men. I mean, if there's like a bit of ice she slips on it, Yeah, she can't. She has no hand eye coordination. She'sward, she's awkward, but she knows what about No, She's like, I hate that, but he has a crush on me. I'm cute, I bought hair colored to box and I'm awkward. Okay, So this is a hard thing to discuss because many women find themselves in abusive relationships and we must not victim blame them at all, because we can just be like, well, why didn't you get out or why didn't you fight back, or why didn't you stand up for herself? Like that's obviously not how you approach, of course, not that. What I what I think is the dangerous precedent set is that we can't We're not gonna blame Bella because she is sixteen years old. Who male or female at sixteen years old is like emotionally equipped to deal with gaslighting vampires, especially when he's ninety years older than her. And that's the gross thing where he is somehow attractive. He's like a hundred year ol man and that's like, you know, takes you into a whole weird fiction world of like what you're gonna do a corpse? But like we don't know, we don't know. But speaking to like the abusive relationship angle, I think that the real problem with it is that obviously the target of these movies are girls that age and the way their relationship, Like I think the characters is one thing, because it's so fucking fictional that, you know, obviously we can't really make value judgments on those characters. But because sixteen year old girls are the intended audience, and the relationship between Belle and Edward is positioned is an ideal and like taking abuse and standing up for yourself but later saying I was wrong to do that is positioned as true love and an ideal. Like, I think that that's the real core of the issue, is that they're just justifying young women accepting abuse from a man. Fun The characters they don't you know, none of the characters make any sense. These characters are they're they're not real, right, There aren't vampires. I mean, I've been too Forks. I've looked. But someone whether it's the author the screenwriter, decided to portray American culture in Forks, Washington as this is the norm, this is what young women should aspire to be, aspire to do right and then bella kind of I mean not to bring up Harry Potter because I'll pass out, um out of rage, to be clear, But Bella like kind of the same as Harry Potter. You know, she's Bella's a central character and she has the least personality out of everybody, which is kind of done intentionally so that the intended audience plugs themselves into that character. So it's like not like teenage boys are watching this, or you know, at least not to the same degree, but like, teenage boys are watching this and they're like, I totally relate with Edward Colin, but teenage girls almost universally if shoe choices at my junior promor to be believed related with Bella and I had to model themselves after her. Yeah, you make a very good point about how the story positions this as true love and your relationship is like this, then oh how romantic? What a like a romance for the ages, which I guess people fell for that because this is a worldwide phenomenon, But I mean that moms fell for that, which is even more in my mom but like, but moms, we're into this series and that it's just like whoo, whoof this goes back? Well, this came out or this was like kind of the height of its popularity right after college for me, I think, and I had people my age, like in their early twenties, and then I remember talking to my friend and her older sister who was like late twenties. They were just all enamored with this story. And I never understood it because I have exquisite taste and self respect. Back to the point of her being continually abused throughout this story by Edward and standing up for herself. But then also no, yeah, she completely acknowledges her the quota. So the lion fell in love with the lamb. What a stupid lamb, sick masochistic lion, right, and then they're like, let's kiss, yeah, and there's a romantic song, right, the music swells. Well, this goes goes back a little bit. But Bella's relationship with her mom is very weird, where I don't remember if she's like if it's expressed that she's like a little bit frustrated or resentful of her mom. In the book and the movie, her mom is like, yeah, I'm married, uh, minor league baseball player, and I'm just gonna go watch a fun ton of minor league baseball baseball team. But but we see her call her mom multiple times, and she's like, I missed you, mom, I love you Mom. I was just like, are you not? But then the mom follows up with what about the boys. Are the boys cute at your new school? Hey? Many new boys? Yeah? Yeah, And then she says I don't know, I'm not great, and then she's like, Okay, I gotta watch some baseball. Feeling she's always it like a batting cage on a pay phone or like what are you doing? Like why is she not? Why is Bella not furious at her mom of like, thanks for dumping me in Washington with my tom Sel like dad who like rules. But also if my mom just abandoned me in the middle of high school because she was fucking a minor league baseball player, I would be furious. Yeah. Well, and one of the many conversations that Edward overhears or you know, tries to very voyeuristically spy on, He's like, what's in Jacksonville? What's what's your story? Tell me everything about it? I can't figure you out. I just can't read you. Tell me everything, and she's like, well, my mom stayed home with me, but I could tell it made her unhappy, Like in what world? But it doesn't. I'd rather be watching minor league baseball than stay home with you, feel like daughter. The typical teenager would use that to be like hard or the ship out of it right, be like I did this for my mom, and I deserve some attention because look at what I'm doing with the sacrifice. And that's not the story. No, it's like barely a plot point. And it's like her mom pops up. I don't even know, because it's not even like her mom ever provides new information or Bella, and Bella doesn't really tell her anything. It's just like two actors getting their SAG card. They're in a batting cage somewhere in Arizona, and and and then one time the scene is interrupted by the fact that Edward has been in her room for hours. Right, so he doesn't have to know how to read her mind if he's just watching her and listening to all the words she says at all times. Okay, so that's one of many very problematic things, is that she's the only person who's thoughts he cannot read, because I guess as a vampire you also have special powers to funk that stupid thing. But he can simple yeah, but for whatever reason, we find out later that Bella also has superpowers. Everyone has special power. She just needs to become a vampire to figure it out. Accepted a voice inside you, so he can't read her thoughts, and I think this is part of what draws him to her, because he's like, I have to figure you out. You're my new project. Everyone wants to make Bella a project. Well, it's it's fair to say that the new girl in school in a small town, she's new, she's different. I can't read her thoughts. That is interesting, right, But it's it's the crux of his interest in her that and he becomes so grossly obsessed with it too, Like he goes way too far with it. In fact, there's a scene where he we're lamping. There's a scene where they go into the woods and she's figured out that he's a vampire. He confirms it. They go up this mountain and at one point he like pins her against a rock wall, puts both of his arms up, so she's basically trapped, and he's like, I have to know what you're thinking. Tell me what you're thinking all the time. And it's so weird way to try to control someone like he just he can't read her thoughts, so he's like, I need to know what you're thinking. I must control you. Right, But if we put that in the context of a teenage girl who's never had a relationship before, it's like, oh, here's a boy who really cares what I think. Again, it's like this very dangerous precedent to set where teenage boys are fucking morons obviously and don't understand how to function around anyone. Yeah, right, the expert. I'm an educator. I educate this fuck dumb. But but it's like, you know, that's a very appealing I know when I was sixteen, I was like, Oh, a boy who really wants to know my innermost thoughts. Wow, I'll let him pin me to a rock. And it's like, you know, ten years later, obviously you're like, don't touch me and stay away from me. But it's so fucking insidious and a bummer. Some right after or right before he admits he's like, I've killed people's right after it doesn't matter to me, and of you, I'm like, Okay, that's not you. That scene is so crazy, like that whole sequence and then he and then it's in the big reveal. Wait, which one that scene where after they've admitted everything, they've talked about what it means to be a vampire, he takes her through the cloud break we finally see the true Edward. Yeah, oh yeah, where he That is such a weird real because if you don't know that that is the exact reveal it's coming in the books, it's like, what is he doing? And he walks and it isn't like a dazzling like shing, which is how I pictured there was a sound effect though there wasn't when the sun hits my skin. I was expecting listen not to criticize this amazing movie. I wasting a bigger reveal that he was sparkly. If I had not known and had been waiting with bated breath for that to happen, I would be like what I said, Oh, he's got a little body glitter. He goes to players and he puts on his body glitters. You remember body glitter? That was fun? Are you boss? You ever buy body glitter? Yeah? I thought this tube of Victoria's secret body glitter that I never wore. I don't know why. I was like, I'm not a sparkly person, like, that's not something I would ever put on my body. Why did I buy this? And then I ended up throwing it away? We lived together in college and I actually saw it and used it once. It's like, oh my god, I'm glad someone used us. The body glitter and he usually smells good to five stars reviewing posthumously, irrevocably. That's my favorite adverb. So we're not we're not blaming Bella. At the center of the story, like, like Edwards medium baggage is he hasn't figured out what it means to be a vampire, right. He he knows what like popular culture tells him about being this mean, evil vampire, but he's not like the others. He's not like the other and he just he uses Bella to figure it out. He's like figuring out his morality and he's using this young seventeen year old to do it. He's ruining her right. The other thing one just well, fuck, I have a list of eight thousand things I want to say, but one of them is that it's so fucking creepy and weird to me and should be to everybody that he is. So we learned that he's turned into a vampire in nineteen eighteen hot, which means he was probably born in nineteen hundred. He's a trench warfare vampire, and he has gone through high school presumably dozens of times. But he well, yeah, because we see that all the I actually always remember. I'm like, that's a actually a really cool art piece suit in your house, And then I saw it this time, I'm like, you know what, I stand by it. I like all the caps. I like that kind of like I would put it in my very fancy all glass home. Right, don't throw any rocks around that house, the vampire house. Yeah, So, okay, we don't know how vampires and they're like mental and emotional maturity happens. Maybe when they turn into a vampire it stops, or maybe as they age they developmentally age like humans, so that he's a nine year old man inside, but he's he's stays in like a seventeen year old body. Either way, it's weird that he's alive for ninety years and you would think has the emotional maturity of a ninety year old and then it's still attracted to a teenage girl. You're raising your hand, yes, Jamie, what would you like to draw a parallel. Okay, have you seen or read Tuch ever Lasting? No, that is the immortal good text to text connection and thank you so much. An educator's approval means the world. Um No, but the Tych ever Lasting is the closest and non too inside because I like Tuch ever Lasting much better, But the Tych over Lasting book is way more fucked up because it's like in a hundred year old hot seventeen year old and he's like lusting after a ten year old, kind of like Jacob Renesme style, if you will. But in the movie they aged up so that it's someone who was on the Disney Channel lusting after Rory Gilmore a little bit older. But it's interesting because the way that that story plays out as a sort of a similar like it's a family who's drank from the Fountain of Youth, and the whole time they discourage the object of his affection, who is ninety years too young for him but looks age appropriate. They discourage her from drinking from the Fountain of youth and she doesn't, and then at the end of this story we see a still young hot Jesse something I forget his last name, drives up on his motorcycle and then he sees, you know, the grave of Rory Gilmore. So in that story, it's you know, it's more powerful because because she goes off and she lives her life life and she does not succumb to intense gas lighting from the object for refection. And it's also like said that, you know, it's like living forever may not be a great thing after all and all that stuff. So anyways, that's the closest parallel to this story that I can find. And there's not any gas lighting in that because they're always like, don't do it, and then she doesn't. So maybe it's just a more boring story. Yeah. I don't think Edwards that strong, right, he would never be able to control himself. He's a raw dog control himself his own personal brand of Heroin. Just for all my Tug ever Lasting heads out there, it's Jonathan Jackson who played the Hot guy and Tuck ever Lasting. They also go to the top of a mountain to discuss eternal life in that movie. If you're living forever and you're an innocent teenage on janu you're gonna have to go to the top of a natural formation to hash it out. That's a new movie rule. Oh man, too bad. We already have the loftist test. The lattictist hold strong, baldest woman in charge doesn't apply to this movie. I don't think no. I'd say the Well, the baldest woman in this movie is Alice, and she's the I would say she's the best female character because she kills someone. Yeah, she rips it that dude's head off. I loved that kind. Yeah, she's a real hot topic assistant manager. Hey, really quick? Are we to believe that Bella was also wearing sleeves and jeans in Phoenix the whole time? Because we see her at the beginning like I live in Phoenix, Arizona. It's hot. And then we see her in like two layers of sleeves and jeans because she's awkward, right, she can't show her shoulders, she's too awkward. She would she'd melt. But I'm just like, how did you live in Phoenix for your whole life with your chode of a mother. I don't understand your Well, that's why she gets kicked out. Remember that hilarious joke that everyone like cracks the over. Yeah, the scene where the fucking Mike Chode, who's like, oh my good Isabella right, and she's like just Bella. That's the closest to a real high school student that we see. I think, so yeah, Like that's like he's a Chode in a way that it's like, oh, I would know a choked like that. Anna Kendrick plays a high school or in this movie, well those she's like or someone says in that scene, you're from Arizona, are't she supposed to be like super tan? And then Bella I'm just like, I guess that's why they kicked me out, and they both ha ha ha ha. We have d cups, but we're not cool, Like grow up. If you have d cups in high school, you're cool dealing it. Let's talk about all these scenes that happened in the science room where when Bella first walks in. By the way, the science teacher's name is Mr Molina. I know, but it would have been a perfect opportunity. Well, you continue to talk about science, I'll figure out what offered Molina was I figure out what he was doing instead. I'm sure the part was offered to him because that could have been homage. Here's what he might have been doing. He might have been filming The Ten Commandments playing Ramsey is the Pharaoh. Obviously, he might have been providing the voice of Professor Jeffries and chill out Scooby doo wait chill acts, though not that what they meant. He might have been in pre production to be the narrator in Angels and Demons in two thousand and nine. He was probably filming The Pink Panther too. Probably he's busy all the time, all right. So she walks into the science room, there's a fan blowing, a gust of her scent travels to edwards nostrils. He borderline pukes, and then she sits down beside him, and he has a hissy fit the whole time, and then as soon as the bell rings he storms out. And Okay, to be fair, she's like I was to confront him, to figure out what his problem was, Like, she wanted to know what the funk his problem was. I'm not that brave. She doesn't get a chance, Well, she kind of doesn't get a chance to do it. Yeah, she does, because the next time they're in the science room together, they're looking at the onion slides on the microscope, which is a good Shrek reference. Onions have layers. We know it, we love it. Where's the where's the Shrek episode? Right? Where is it? It's coming. But that's a fun scene because she looks into the microscope and she's like, it's pro phase, and Edwards like, actually, can I look at it just a double check your work because I don't believe you more gas lining, and then he looks into it and then he's like, it's pro phase. Man's plaining it's unfair because he's been seventeen for ninety years, so he's done this experiment for probably fifty times. Show off somehow. Yeah, It's like, yeah, I've I've got this, I've got this. She so he Man's plains to her, but then to her credit, she says, yeah, like I said, the thing is like Bella. God. I feel Bella has the agency of an above average teenage girl, but she's shot down by the narrative repeatedly until she is just trapped. Like when I was sixteen, there's no way I would challenge anything on anyone any time because I was wearing a back brace and I was afraid of everyone. Like can you imagine confronting a cute boy at sixteen, Like that takes fucking guts, especially if you're new somewhere, Like I feel like she's displaying above average, Like I'm going to figure this out. And then Stephanie Meyer, fucking evil puppet master, is like, how can we destroy this young girl's agency. She's like, what happened in the parking lot? I know what I saw? And then Edwards like, no one will believe you, literally, no one will believe you. But it's romantic. But it's romantic, it's romantic gas lighting. Hey, wait a minute, though, Bella, so she knows all about prophase and Anna Face and all that stuff. I would call her a woman stem. She is a woman who has heard of STEM. Yeah, she's a better folly a woman. Yet she is a child, and that's part of the problem. True. And then oh, but in that scene, in that prophase and a Phase scene, we see Edward effectively defeat Bellot too, because at the end of that scene she stops checking his work, Like the last beat of that He's like, do you want to check? She's like I'm good, No, and then she's like I trust to. I was like, he's a million he knows the difference between prophase and I mean, which is better than I can say? Chemistry times there's there's part of than me. And now I'm insecure. I made a list of different times that Edward nags or gaslights her, and the time codes because it happens so frequently. Twenty minutes and he saves her from the car crash. Twenty four minutes, He gaslights her, saying, oh's right next to you. No one's gonna believe what you say. Can't you just thank me and get over it? Fuck off? Thirty minutes. If you were smart, you'd stay away from me. What if I'm not the hero? What if I'm the bad guy? Fifty minutes, He says Bella, what do we eat? A k you? She says, you won't hurt me. At this point, she's fully gaslighted, sher agency is dead for the remainder of the series. Well, she's irrevocably in love with minutes and I've never wanted a humans blood so much in my life. Bella says, I trust you. Edwards says, don't get there. What are you doing? Oh? I still don't know if I can control myself. Bella says, I know you can she's kind of gaslighting him, but she's sixteen. There's God. It's the same disturbing interaction over and over seventy minutes and Bella, I'm not scared of you, Edward. You shouldn't have said that, and then he kidnapped her with the spider monkey, with this sin and then God, and then seventy five minutes and Bella has a scene that doesn't pass the actual test in a very infuriating way with her mom who is waiting to fuck her chowed husband. After he gets out of the batting changes and then he comes out, you know, he comes out of the shadows and she's like, oh, you were here, and he's like, yeah, I've been watching the Sleep for months. And that's when I stopped counting the times he was gaslighting her because it happens so much and this movie is very long. Well, that's an interesting scene because the first time you see Bella wake up and he's stalking her in her bedroom and then she turns dream She's like, that was the first night I dreamt of Edward Culent. So it's played off. It's like, okay, we used the audience think, okay, maybe that was a dream, and then when you see that scene again and he admits to sneaking into her room and watching her sleep four months, you're like, oh, that wasn't a dream. And then and then she's like, all right, time to hook up kiss me. Honestly though, this, uh, I almost get it. There was another when I was very young, there was another vampire book series called Cirque to Freak. You guys remember this now. I'm not familiar with that as an educator. This is a sexy vampire be signed about a vampire named I think his name was Darren, and he was thank you. I wrote the book, but Darren was the object of my affection. I was like a little bit younger, it's like maybe twelve or thirteen, and I didn't know how my vagina informed my thoughts yet. So I was reading the Cirque to Freaks books and it's about this like young boy who was turned into a vampire by a circuit sounder and goes on the road with these freaks and he's he's a road vampire. He's a road vai, like a road comic. But I feel like he really informed my current lifestyle. He rode tests his vampire. But in any case, I had a huge crush on him. And in that book series, there was a point where he had a crush on a girl and he would just like hide around her in various places. And so I had like these weird cabinets. I grew up in a house with no doors, and and instead of closets, we had these weird cabinets built into the walls. And so I would imagine that Darren the vampire would hide in the cabinet to hide. I wanted him to hide. So when I see Edward emerged from behind a curtain, I'm like, I get it. I wanted Darren in my cabinet. In vampire practice, to hide and wait for your prey, right for kids on them, though only when you're in love. Get in my cabinet. It's about how about that scene where Edwards like everything about me draws you in. I'm so handsome and attractive and my voice and my sin over yourself. And then he's like, but that's if I needed it, is if I couldn't outrun you. He's like dashing from tree to tree, hite me off. And then she's like, I don't care, I trust you you. Oh, here's an the fun moment where um, it's a scene where he's like, what's in Jacksonville because he had been leering at her and listening. Sorry, I just watched you pour a lot of water out of your month having trouble. I'm having trouble. I didn't eat for the first time until two minutes before this, and then I had a mis heart. So I think that my I'm physically compromising. Okay, So that was talking her chode friend Mike about going to Jacksonville, and meanwhile Edward is standing in the background listening to everything she's saying and just leering at her. The next scene, Edwards like, what's in Jacksonville? And then she trips a little bit and he goes, she's awkward. Can you at least watch where you're walking? Yeah, Like for the first half of the movie, he's so mean to her. Well, and that also enforces an age old thing that my mom told me was true and that I feel like every parent and maybe still do like they in four is this dangerous? Like if a boy's mean to you, that means he likes you, you know, like if someone's being repeatedly aggressive and rude to you, which and it's usually like with younger kids, but they're like if they if they're being mean to you, it means they like And it's usually boys towards girls, except unless you're hell good, attacky, and then you if you're hell good, attacky, you're fine. Well sure, and yeah, like nagging is a common flirtation technique. However, it's usually like, let's say she trips a little bit a flirtatious way. Yeah, well he'd be like, He's like, oh jeez, at least launch where you're walking. He but he like, don't yell. That's a good rule of thumb. Don't yell at the object of your affection. Again, what's at the center of this is the fact that Edward cannot deal with the fact that he's a vampire. He wants to be a good person, but he has this this label, this identity, and he doesn't know what to do with it, right, But he's not true to that. About forty five minutes into the movie, everything switches and all of a sudden, he's like, all right, let's date. Let's do this. I know that I'm a bad guy, but I want to put you next to this bad guy that I am. Yeah, like that apple scene, right, where he says he's just trying to like that symbolism for something I couldn't tell. He's just trying to get information out of her, and she says, you know, your mood swings are kind of giving me whiplash, like completely acknowledges that he is just so back and forth. And then as soon as they start dating, he develops a personality all of a sudden, and he's like, I'm gonna jump on your truck and and she's like, can you really pretend to be human neighbors? It's funny. So there's just flirting and fun. I like the scene where they try to kiss and he's like, I would I fuck you do that. The sexual aspect of the relationship is so problematic. It gets worse and worse, where he's like, if I do you die, I'm super strong so I could kill you. I want to bite you all this this is what every man is told me that if you'd pass away. But um, but yeah, that's no, that's no good. But the scene where they do hook up and they can and I will say for me, the sparks were flying. Oh there's something there. I was like, that was a good, like story aside a good movie kiss. It's hot. That's a hot kiss, but then you know, but then you remember the horrible story that's taking place. The aftermath of that is really disturbing to me, because they kiss and it's hot. They go from like vertical to horizontal really fast, and you're like, it's getting exactly and then he's like, stop it, and he throws himself off at her, and then she's sort of like in her bed, very in a very vulnerable like she's in her underwear. She's like kind of hunched over it, and she's just like she's awkward, very unco what it's like. It's clear that she feels ashamed because she's like, I'm sorry, he said he told her to stop it. Yeah, and then or I don't like, is it him telling himself to stop it or is it telling her? It's hard to say, but she's like, I'm sorry, and she's put in this position where like she then feels shame for like trying to be sexual. And it made me feel weird not to come to the rescue of Edward Colin. But at least he made his needs known in the moment and stopped a situation he was not prepared to enter for abstinence. What's what's going on there? There's definitely some sort of abstinence thing because they wait for a marriage in the series, don't they Let me see if I remember right, JT. You'll know Kaitlyn, You'll know you guys will she Is she a vampire? Before he can fuck her? Or does he? I think he focks her. Well, she's still mortal on their the night that they get to the island, right, but then it's like there's like restraints, invaulved isn't there, There's like something. Well, she wakes up the next morning and she's black and blue. He like he got really aggressive. They break the beds and then the maid comes in in the morning. He's like, what the yeah, call the police throw on an island. Something disturbing has happened here. I vaguely remember that, and by the time I read it, I knew it was not okay. I'm glad that we at least the first movie there's at least a little bit of wiggle room where there's at least some parts of the movie that might be construed as relatable for someone if they were a teenager or a young adult. In two thousand and eight. As the book go on, you're just like this just spirals out and it gets fucking weird after she wakes up black and blue on is las Man during the honeymoon. Is that really what it's called? Yes? After his mother and then his adopted mother who's younger than he is. Oh yeah, he's so upset with himself for hurting her so badly that the rest of the honeymoon they just like play chess. They aren't allowed to touch, but once when she's a vampire they can find. They have sex all the time. The first month, they move into a house just for fucking because it's so loud, just like the baseball scene, but different funck house. Are you serious? I'm very serious. I don't know if this happens in the movie, but it definitely happens in the book. They fucked so loud they need a house. They the Cullens, have a house on site that's like a mile away. They can't no one could be within a mile of them because they fucked so loud. That sounds tight, But the road we take to get to the the isolated house is dark, right alright, So some alternatives. I kind of wish that this movie was more about Bella and her gay best friend Jacob. How would the movie have been different if that was the the a story. You know, Edwards just like the b in the background, like who cares about the vampire? Well, Jacobs barely in this movie. Unfortunately, I know I forgot how little he was because I was really like looking forward to look Aunt Taylor Lawtner's wig. How little he wasn't it. He's in that great scene where um Pilla's like, what did your friend mean about the Cullens don't come here? And he's like, oh, you heard that that line of dialogue that was very audible and that everyone was like everyone in the all of her friends to stare for a second. Yeah, He's like, oh you caught that. Yeah, every fon king person caught that. Or another weird scene. I mean, all the scenes between Bellett and Jacob are first of all, less weird than any scene between Belle and Edward, more dynamic than any scene between Bellett and Edward. But also there's always like a weird uncanny valley quality to it, where it's towards the end where Jacob shows up, walks out of the woods or something, and he's like my dad said me the spy on you like say it paid me twenty dollars to talk to you. And then she's just like, well, you better go get that. I was like, this is extremely suspect, vaguely dressed up for problem. He's wearing like a nice button. But he doesn't go in. He goes to a different he doesn't go to this in the reservation. Well, then day isn't he's really earning that twenty dollars. Like, I gotta like the part you went shopping before he came. How far does twenty dollars going forks Washington cheese? So far? For years? Different time? Well, he's like, my dad wants me to tell you to break up and stay away from your boyfriend. And then Edwards shows up and he was like get here, I'll take it from here. Like and just another way that he controls here, doesn't let her talk to any other men. He's just always, oh, let's talk about the scene. Well, Everard does Edward know about? I forgot? Does Eward know about the werewolves? But Jacob doesn't know yet. He's just like, I'm just wearing a wig. Well he knows. I think he knows that he's descended from like the wolf clan. I think he knows. He thinks it's a story though, right, yeah he does, they said, because there's that scene on the beach where he basically says, yeah, it's just a weird Washington thing. You're just like okay, sure, yeah, but like his elders turned into wolves, Like wouldn't he know about that? Because Act one, remember all of his friends, all of his like reservation friends, are like going off and being weird and getting sick. And he's like, I don't know why I'm all alone. I haven't hit all my friends. I want to get sick, like get mono and disappear and then come back. And he realized it was like a secretly it's like maintained as a secret until you start going what a horrible way to conduct, Like, Hey, a crazy thing is going to happen to you, but you can't know about it until it's actually happening to you. I don't. That's how I got my period. No one told you you were going to get your period. I didn't really know what it was. I thought I shopped myself. Anyways, that's sorry for another day. Yeah I did. I was like, that's weird. I thought I would have did you know, really, like your mom didn't tell you we were we were defunded. We didn't get sex fed at my school, and so I thought I shipped myself, And I'm like, can I no longer? I thought that, like my sphincter was un or something. But it turns out this is a woman and worked. Okay, so maybe it's not so unbelievable. I can relate with Jacob the whorwolf. Why got it? Let's talk about the scene where she goes to Port Angels and those creepy dudes follow her and pray on her. So, as I mentioned, she sort of fights back. They're like, hey, pretty lady, where are you going? And she's like, get away from me, don't touch me. Edward shows up saves her, which happens a bunch of times. Don't worry a mentalist of all the times, and he has to save her, but as JT You pointed out, I'm an education puts. He takes her out of that one dangerous situation and then puts her immediately into another dangerous situation because he's driving extremely recklessly. Get a bad boy. He yells at her about how she always puts herself in these dangerous situations as you're so awkward. She's always following and then pulls right out in the middle of traffic. It's like beebe like everyone's just yelling at him. And then the aftermath of that scene is when they like show up at the restaurant, and I love the restaurants. So it's so restaurant, so weird. I love it. So she's like, you gotta give me some answers. She's demanding to know what's going on right, still being she should not have let her friends leave first of all, but that's a that's a novice mistake I could see myself making. I was I was wriends. We're so mad when she disappeared for twelve hours, but then when edwards they're they're like, they're like, we better get going. So she's like, did you follow me? And he's like, I just feel very protective of you. This is okay, Listen, sometimes someone's gonna stare at you during your math test and you're gonna be like, I'm just being protected. I'm kidding him. But it's so frustrating that she keeps being like, tell me what the funk is going on? And he's just like, I'm protecting you, and then she keeps following her. And this is also the scene where we finally get some answers and he reveals that he can read minds right, and then he can't read her right, and then the reaction, Oh, she's like, is there something wrong with me? You can't read my mind? What's wrong with it? Right? So automatically, I'm the person that's messed up in this situation right where you were just like I'm a mind reader and you're like, I'm I'm sorry. But here's the thing. I don't want to relate to this movie in any way, but as I say, exteen or seventeen year old girl, well you have to put yourself in the yeah, like when I you know, you're very self conscious. You don't have a lot of self esteem at that age usually, So I think it was it was actually kind of like humanizing a bit too. I found it believable that she'd be like, that's wrong with me. Teenagers of either gender are easily manipulated. True, I know this. I was just doing it to a teenager this morning. I mean, well, it's just him being feeling so protective of her and controlling of HER's just one of the many ways he's abusive toward her. And backtracking a little bit to the scene where they're all at the beach that there is a point where it's the friend who isn't Ana Kendrick, Angela, Angela, she so Angela wants to ask Eric Eric, angel wants to ask Eric to the prompt and Bella And this part literally infuriates me because I know how unfair this whole serious is too women. Where Bella says take control. You're a strong and independent woman, and I'm like, where do you get off? You're about to go vampire man. There's a few moments in this movie where it's like, there's Bella's last stand as a as a person with any sort of agency or opinions. Bella initially do that a lot in the beginning when Angela first meets Bella, Angela's like, hey, I work for the newspaper and I'm just so tired of talking about eating disorders. And Bella is like, what about the boys swim team spidos and and she was like, yeah, you're really good at advice. Yeah, honestly, which here this is a controversial opinion because obviously Mike is a chode, but I think she should have just employed the catch all Jamie Loftus solution of just date Mike so that she can fix him. No, just to kill some time and give the vampire time to get the funk out of her way and not ruin her life. Better to have a chowd for a couple of months than be immortal and have a baby that's eating you. Well again, I think she should have dated Jacob. Jacob is her best friend. Jacob. Do you think they had a report? They know they I agree, But do you think he was gay? That first movie? I prayed I don't even believe in God, and I prayed God, he's a great and then Stephanie were ruins him by making him a pedophile. I'm cutting off that wig. What did you say? Oh, he's so handsome. There's a looking Adam. Another fun scene that Bella. She's like, why did you hate me so much? And he's like, I did, but only for making me want you so badly, which is Victim't blame me. Oh my god, what you said? And it's like, if you weren't so so fucking I won, I'm your blood. I'm good again. It's Edward has a problem inside. He's trying to figure out who he is. He hasn't seen that excuse, and he puts it on Bella. It's not definitely not fair. The scene where he makes her say the word vampire, see it vampire, vampire, and then he's not even a good line read no cousin vampire. He grabs her arm and yanks her and literally pulls her through No, no, I trust you, my little spider monkey. And then seconds later he gives the line, so the lion fell in love with the lamb, and that's the like, that's when he decides to fall in love with her. That's it. Oh the scene where they're falling in love and there's fog and Edward Collins flaming the piano, it's actually I remember you're just like ow. The director was like, why not? Female director? To add insult to injury, Catherine Hardwick directed this movie. Woman director, female woman screenwriter, adapted by a book written by a woman. Should be a winner, should be here we are. But yeah, everyone's the wrong woman and they found a bunch of bad ones. Let's talk about act three whenever. This movie ends great. Finally, Bella goes after James to be a martyr, to be like again. Right, of course Edward has to step in and save her. One of many times he saves her, so we've got saves her from the van, saves her from the creepy dudes, and port Angelis, saves her from James. He steps in to save her. There's vampire venom all up in her. So she's lying on the floor. She doesn't do anything. She's supposed to be the protagonist, she's the hero of this story. She doesn't do anything to resolve the conflict. She's rendered completely inactive and totally passive, and she doesn't do anything to determine the outcome of the story, which is not how storytelling works. How do you know so much about storytelling? Oh, it's just because I have a master's degree in screenwriting from Boston University. Alfred Molina is to Jamie as screenwriting degree is to Caitlin. That was one of the questions on my g r E, which I did have to take to go to grad school for his screenwriting. Man, what year did Alfred Molena joined the Royal Shakespeare Company? Seven? Okay, so the protagonist of this that's my security question. The protagonist in this movie, in her most dire moment, is paralyzed. Yeah, right, well that this kind of reminds me to just bring Alfred back into it, Freddie Sorry, um of sort of that one an off moment in Spiderman two at the climactic scene where Mary Jane makes one attempts to hit a blow in the villain and it is just ceremoniously thrown to the side. And that's pretty much what happens to Bella. She she makes the choice to go. She we see her making a choice. Things are bad, but at least you know, you're like, all right, she's making a decision. It's bad, but it's well, it's a stupid as hell choice because she's not equipped to fight these vampires you know who is the other vampires who she's friends with now, But she makes a choice, and that happens so rarely already. So it's like at that point I was like, I know what happens, but that is misleading and that maybe she'll do something. And then she does make like one attempt to go against what was like, what were we calling him the sniffer. She tries to get the sniffer and then he sniff, he's he sniffs her right to the side. She's she's done. He touches her leg and it breaks right and you're just like, well, there goes the protagonist. She's done. So God, it was just so annoying that she is completely ineffective in doing anything to determine It's a moment in the story. It's a big moment for the relationship though, between Bella and Edward. Remember, she's bleeding profusely, and Alice can't control herself. She might like bite off her head at any time, and that's why she did just rip off someone else's Carlyle sends her off to actually do some damage, and that's when Edward learns about himself that he won't eat her because he loves her so much and he doesn't want her to die. But I know it's so romantic. Well, and then the scene after that when she's when Bella is in the hospital, her mom's like, what, you don't want to move to Phoenix again? You want to stay in Forks with hot ass Charlie Swan, Well, okay, and then she leaves. Let's just say as Charlie Swan and then Edward, who had been pretending to be asleep because guess what, he doesn't need to sleep. Great, I bet you get so much done, except you don't because you just go to high school. Exactly. You don't have to go to high school. You could just stay inside. Rob is classically trained as an actor in Sleeping. He's really good. I believed it classically trains Sleeper. Well, okay, so the scene in um the hospital whenever Edward's like, you know what, I don't maybe we shouldn't be together. I'm putting you in too much danger Allah spider Man, but She's like, I can't live without you, baby. We gotta get one last infuriating moment in there where he's like, I've treated you shitty this entire movie, and now I'm saying that maybe we shouldn't be together, and she's just like, no, but I'm irreflacably in love with you, irrevocably there. I mean, there are consequences to being with Edward right, Like, she's literally broken after this fight. Um, she's broken up with her dad. After spending months trying to fix this relationship that she hasn't had since she was four or whatever, she has to lie to him. What she says that was a painful scene to watch. She really breaks his heart with like they both do a really good job. I don't want to end up like mom just stuck here, right, And he's like, I am boring, that's all she's implying. It's like, you're such a drag dad um really quickly on the subject of Catherine Hardwick, because it is extremely difficult and was relatively historic at the time for a female director in two thousand and eight to be given the reins to this massive blockbuster. Her previous directorial history prior to this included a movie I used to love that I would probably not love as much if I revisited now, called Thirteen. It came out in two thousand three before I was thirteen, so I was like, this is what I have to look forward to. And it's like young girls fucking and doing drugs and messing their lives up. But anyways, that was like her big debut and and she graduated out of that started getting bigger Hollywood gigs, gets Twilight does almost every installment, I don't think she does the last one. And then just speaking to women in Hollywood in general, since Twilight this massively for all of its shortcomings, of which there are many. For all of its massive success, she has had very little major release work since then, which I think is a testament she sorry not to correct her man's plain, Um, you are my least favorite man in the one. Uh. New Moon was directed by Chris Wentz, so not not her, but she well maybe she was was directed by David Slade. Breaking Dawn was directed by Bill Condon, so it seems like it was all men after this first one. Wait a second, Okay, So yeah they didn't. It was a success. It was a huge success. It was a huge success. Oh okay, So she sorry, I was misreading that. Yeah, she dropped out of the New Moon sequel. She was offered the New Moon sequel but ended up not being able to do it because of a scheduling thing, which is like, Katherine, make it work, got it. It seems as though the screenwriter, Melissa Rosenberg, did work on Slash right most of the sequels, so she returned for the others. It's bizarre because yeah, if you look at Katherine Harberg's filmography since then, she didn't direct another movie for three years after the first Twilight and has only directed three movies total in the past ten years, so I'm ready for her comeback. You know, right. She directed Lord of Dogtown, the skateboard movie for gran outline. Yeah skip that one. I didn't see that. She also directed The Nativity Story that also, you know, let's not rule up the fact that maybe she's not a great director, but also crummy male directors getty second chances. Katherine Hardwick has not been as fortunate, and it just feels worth mentioning. I can't speak to the quality of her work because you know, Lord, every movie that I'm thinking of that she's directed kind of sucks. I have a day dream where this story isn't about Edward and Bella. It's about Bella and Charlie and a comeback story where a young daughter learns to love her dad again. And sure there's a vampire in the background, but at the end of the day, Charlie really loves his daughter. You know, Charlie is so bad at his job. He's a police officer and crime is running rampant. There are other worldly creatures and most of the time he's at a diner ordering food for Bella. He's like, she'll have this is not a jump Oh yeah, that's true, which like, what is this? He cal Hockley's orders her. You like, lamb right, sweepy, that's all right, it's about time, you know. Yeah, he does make some questionable choices with his career as the town police officer. He's the chief of not even just like a random officer. He's the chief. So they're animal tax happening all around town and he arms Bella with some mace you know, the vampire stopper mace um. At one point after the field trip where Bella has a horrible time with Edward, she comes home and he's already on his second beer at lunch, and she immediately starts cleaning up after him. She does. Yeah, so that's why I wanted that to be the focus of the story. I understand why Bella's mom left him, because he does seem to be a bad at his job and be an alcohol However, both parents are really horrible and like, it's so amazing that Bella is alive. Hey, listen, if Robert Pattinson is raw dogging, hey, you're like, I wasn't raised right. There's a fun scene where they're like talking about going to prom and Bella is like, but I can't dance and Edward says, I can always make you very romantic. And another moment where she's not like the others was where he makes some sort of numbers joke and then she's like, I don't need to know what the square root of pie is. I'm like, oh she is, she's a smart cookie, and he's swoon and he's like, you know, or when she knows women in stem you are, and then when she knows the name of a composer and she's like, oh, yeah, he's really good, and then he's like, you know that is and then he's like, I have to take out my fog machine. I need to play your piano right now. Well, that's one of my big problems with this movie, just in a narrative sense, is that we don't really ever know why they like each other are except for the fact that they're attracted to each other. But they're like, but he's you're right, They're just both so devoid of personality that like it's confusing why they like each other, Like what are they compatible about? Nothing? Well, Edward can't you know. He hears everyone's thoughts all the time, and people are gross. Right, It's like sex, sex sex cats, right, and like that should be annoying, right, So, like he comes across young Bella and like, I get why it would be enticing, but he paints this picture of like, this is fate, this is destiny. We have to be together right now, I have to stalk you. And that's just not how it should have been. Well, like, if he finds her intriguing that he doesn't have to listen to her thoughts all the time, I'm fine, I guess I get that. But then he demands to know what she's thinking all the time. He's like, you're the only person I can't read, so you need to tell me what you're thinking all the time. And then she's like and unfortunately, she's probably like, um, sex and cats. Unfortunately you have a blind spot. But I am a person and thinking about sex and pats as well. But she's not. She's thinking about numbers and I don't want to dance. I'm I'm awkward. One thing I do want to point out, which does not redeem this movie in any way, but I do like that there's pretty equal gender balance in terms of about half the characters are women whose names we know and have at least some role in the story. Because a problem we come up with on the podcast a lot is that there are hardly any women in this whatever story we're talking about. And it's nice that Bella has some female friends. She's got Jess, she's got Angela, she's got Alice. They like develop more of a friendship in the later movies and books, and she has a relationship with her mom. So it's nice to see that there are some like female bonds. They have thoughts, they all have opinions, they all have conflicts. Except for Victoria the vampire. I think she's just trying to eat people. But everyone else, well she gets made at the very very end because she's that prom watching as vampires do. She's no the blonde one. Is that Rosalie. She's a star. Oh Nicky Reid. Uh, it's one of those directors and now you know, bringing back the cast, get the gang back together. But Victoria is one of the evil vampires ladies, the one the last person you see in the movie for some reason, because well she was with she was dating James, whose head gets ripped off, kissed and she's mad. She's like, you've ripped off my friend's head. If for I loved this hip for so she has a personal vendetta against Bella now, which becomes the story. It was real. It wasn't just like a teenage romance where they just like sort of like the way each other looked like they like they were together for a while. They were as vampires do. Does anyone have any final thoughts about the Have you gotten three or seven pages of notes? So? Yeah, overprepared because I'm a type a educator. I think I loved this movie ten years ago because I didn't know what it meant to be a feminist, and I didn't know what it meant to love myself or love another person. And now I am sort of a feminist and I myself yeah, I mean I have some t shirts what the Future is Female? Check me out on Twitter. Um. But now I have a good sense of what it means to be in a stable, normal, respectful relationship. And I can look back and say, this was a fun movie to pre Game two before I went out to the club. But I don't think that it's a very positive film, and I don't I wouldn't recommend it to any of my students, thank you. I think that that is a sentiment that a lot of us can relate to. Yeah, we're like ten years ago, it was a not a simpler time. It was a it was a more lectris time. And the further you go back, the worse it gets. So we're doing better now. We're in a better place as a culture. Moana came out, and since then things have been on well, the up and up, except then the but then Transformers came out of game. I mean, I don't know if we're in a better place as a culture, but we as individuals are in better places killing Donald Trumps president. So you know that's not too good. No, it's not too good at all. We as a culture don't like that. But my taste has gotten even more exquisite if you could believe it from ten years ago. So Spider Man two is still in my top five and has been for over ten years. Check out a Spiderman Homecoming. I really enjoyed it. Oh, I haven't seen it yet. I want to say, I want to describe it as irrevocably, but that one irrevocably a movie I've seen. It's true. You can't go and see it. Take it back. There's a lot of female characters. For how bad this movie is. Two women, true, like you were just saying, which is and I hadn't even thought of it. It probably is about half and half in terms of male versus female characters, which doesn't happen a lot in movies, but also said just as bad that all the female characters are just well. There are many more opportunities for the movie to pass the Bechdel test than we see in the average movie. What was Your Reads? I think it does, but only very, very minimally, and often in a conversation where they then shift the focus to a man, right, so like it's we're talking to line exchanges. At one point, Bella and Angela and Jess are talking about their prom dresses, right, and then the subtext is it's about the boys and how the boys will react to the dresses. Yeah, right, So still technically passes. But there's one scene in the kitchen in the Vampire House between Alice and Bella. She says, hi, I'm Alice, Bella says hi, and then Alice says, you do smell good. And then as May is like, are you hungry? And Bella is like yes, right, and and then you're like a weird dramatic unnecessary she just ate and all right, and then Rosalie is like she breaks the glass right, and I'm just like, calm down. She's really upset to be To be fair, a family of one year old vampires are trying to quart a seventeen year old so they make an Italian meal. And then Twilight is a movie that forever changes the Bechtel test. It's like, how does the Bechtel test change when women can be food? You know, I'm into I'm into this line of thing. I don't think it passes because they're always talking to food, not to people, not to other women. It's like, you're not be Where were you on that? What if women can also be eaten? Right? It's like two meals talking to each other. That doesn't pass the Bechtel test. I would say the scene where Bella and just meet each other in the gym after she's just spiked of volleyball at chowed Mike's head passes because Jessica goes, I'm Jessica, by the way here from Arizona, right. Bella was like yeah, and use aren't people from Arizona supposed to be like really tan? And Bella is like, maybe that's why they kicked me out que uproarious laughter from everybody, like we love me girl, She's funny. Yeah. I mean this movie as a movie that they're you know, books written on how bad it is to women, does pass the Bechdel test if you can believe it. But as we often acknowledge, the Bechdel test is not like the end all be all. It is literally syndicator. Right, Yeah, let's start here and then so Twilight, for all of its shortcomings, gets to step one. But that's as far as it stops. Right there. With that, let's rate the movie our nipple scale. To our listeners who are not familiar with the nipple scale, Let's start with the Twilight episode. Go back and listen to Thelma and Louise come on or mo wanna come on, and then revisit this episode. Go listen to Gli No, do not endorse that No Julie is a good episode. Hey, I give it one nipple because we're rating it based on its portrayal of women. One nipple because I do like that there's a pretty equal gender balance in terms of male versus female characters, pretty equal across the board, and I like that you do see Bella often standing up for herself again. It doesn't really matter because she ends up in this abusive relationship, but you do, at least, on many many occasions, see her and be like, no, don't touch me, No I want answers, No, stop gaslighting me. I know what I saw, like, bye bye bye. Two thirds away into the movie, it's she's done for, but we do the dying breaths of what was once a somewhat confidence in the work. She is awkward, but someone who can at least ask, you know, not afraid of confrontation, not afraid of asking a question that is reasonable to a man. Sure, yes, So that's why it gets one star and not zero stars stars. Oh my god, I'm so sorry. Okay, one nipple, one nipple for Caitlin, one nipple for me would have gotten a zero nipple rating. But it has a tiny little thing going for it. Isn't there a thing where you like, give the nipple to someone, Yeah, we will. We describe the nipple. My nipple belongs to Jacob, whose nipple we see in New Moon. He's like, I'm riding on a motorcycle. I gotta take my shirt off, and you see his nipple and it's a good Nipple highly endorsed that nipple, so Team Jacob, Team Jacob agree. I'm gonna give it one and a half nipples because technically, with R. Rubric it does pass the bactial test, which I was honestly very surprised that it does technically more than once there are a lot of female characters and then almost exclusively wasted potential. But this is to be clear, the one and a half is for this movie only, not in any way for the whole series, which gets negative nipples because it actively removes more and more agency from its female characters as the series goes on, begins to kill them off, etcetera. But for this movie alone, I'll give it one and a half because, like you were saying, we see Bella not be totally gaslighted that at the beginning, we see her fight as she goes down, uh and descends into the worst years of her life, which presumably lasts forever. Uh. It's I give one and a half, and I'm going to give one to that fucking Jacksonville batting cage showed Phil, and then I'll give half of one to Angela because she was the closest we got to anything. She was a strong independent woman. She asked. She asked Eric and he said, yes, they go to prom together. They sure do good for her. Go angela half a nipple for you. Um, I interesting premise. I mean it didn't really deliver, But I think this would have been a great movie if it were about Bella and her dad or Bella and her gay best friend Jacob. It was not about those things. So I'm gonna give it one What can it be about Bella and her mom? Why can it be about a female in Florida? That doesn't have to happen when you're rewriting the story. Okay, so we're rewriting. Okay, I'm still giving it one and a half nipples. And that is because in the trailer to New Moon, there was a lot of controversy about edwards left nipple. If you guys haven't read about Nipplegate, people really went to town Twitter about Edwards. Maybe funked up body, Maybe he wasn't as perfect as everyone thought. I actually kind of remember that one and a half nipples for Rob Pattinson's left nipple. Thank you, dear God, Hey JT, my dear friend. Yes, thanks for being here, thank you for having me We've had a swell time. This is really different from my day job, which is an educator. Right, do you want some followers? Where can people find you? On Twitter at JT in the Cloud. I say funny things about culture and video games and education and feminism. Hey, you can follow the Bechtel Cast on many different platforms for instance, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Bechtel Cast some variation on it. Fucking banger in Out. You'll find it. We have a live show kind of in New York in September. UM. We'll be posting more about that. Probably by the time this comes out. You'll be able to buy tickets. That's exciting. Check our various media places. Find out a place to buy things. To that thing and we'll see you at that thing, and we're gonna have a big old fun time. We're gonna chillax, chillax. We're gonna be lamping in New York City. Push baby, Okay, bye bye. Say it.