- Eclipse commits the same cardinal sin that the original Twilight movie made: the sin of being completely and utterly bland. New Moon had the decency to be a clusterfuck of spectacular failure, but this third instalment manages to dull itself down enough to take the bite out of a vampire war that should, for all intents and purposes, be totally awesome. You build an army of super strength newborn vampires who have absolutely no control of their vampire faculties, only to have the Cullens and Jacob’s pack take them down with absolutely no trouble at all? What an adversary! It’s a good thing we’ve been fearing Victoria this entire time!
- True Blood‘s flashbacks > Twilight‘s flashbacks. Edward really should have brought his piano back for a quick little “Vamp of Savannah” moment.
- Speaking of which, hilarious fleshing out of Jasper’s story. The guy barely talks for two movies and then comes on strong as this intense military strategist because, of course, he was in the Confederate Army and has now developed a Texan accent? WOW! I would totally read a spin-off series of books featuring Jasper during his Civil War days wherein he plays sidekick to Stonewall Jackson and they train newborn vampire infantry together to fight the Yankee invaders from the north.
- I think Edward went to the Nuns of Nonnberg Abbey School of Automobile Sabotage.
- Hey there, Rosalie-was-gang-raped plot point I did not see coming. o_O
- The meadow shots. THE MEADOW SHOTS. The meadow shots need to end, for the love of god.
- Charlie Swan drank considerably less in this movie, so that’s good.
- You know, I was pretty happy that Bella stood up for herself (I guess?) every time Jacob was like “YOU LUV ME, YOU JUST WON’T ADMIT IT” because, dude, fuck off if you think that obnoxiously saying “PICK ME!” every two seconds will make someone love you. I thought the punch in the face was bit of an overreaction but still, I liked that Bella was attempting to assert herself. Until, of course, she was like “I won’t give you the satisfaction of telling you I love you, so I will use the clever words of “kiss me!” instead!” Because… what. Oh, Bella, no means yes! Gentlemen, if you are persistent enough you can wear any lady down and force her into loving you! Ick.
- I would like to expand upon the face punching because it provided, hands down, my favourite lines of the entire movie. The acting in these movies is not great, especially when it comes to just about anything Taylor Lautner has to say, but when Charlie broke up the kerfuffle between Edward and Jacob and demanded to know what was going on, I absolutely died at the delivery of “I kissed Bella… she broke her hand… punching me in the face.” I WAS IN TEARS. TEARS! And although I normally hate Emmett, when Bella said “I punched a werewolf in the face” and he said “That’s badass!” I never loved either of them as much as I did in that moment. SO. GREAT.
- When Charlie told Bella to stop spending so much time with Edward and to spend more time with her friends, I was pretty happy. When he meant Jacob instead of Jessica et al, I was incredibly disappointed. I know he’s clueless, but way to help facilitate the boring love triangle, Chuck. And as far as love triangles go, this one was pretty artlessly inserted into the story, which I think is a major achievement given that the triangle was established last movie and thus already had a basis. Everything Jacob said or did screamed “I am an obstacle to be overcome!” I think this culminated most when for absolutely no reason he had to carry Bella through the forest while shirtless in order to mask her scent from the baby vampire army. Seriously? He has to carry her? If she walks side-by-side with him, this won’t mask her intoxicating vamp-bait aroma? Phenomenal.
- This week on Hilariously Awkward Moments: having a heart-to-heart with the guy trying to steal your girlfriend while he is shirtless and spooning her because you picked the worst campsite on earth and she’s freezing to death. This whole scene… I can’t even. So ridiculous.
- I don’t for one second believe that Jacob “let” Sam be the pack leader or that Jacob was ever in the running for this position.
- Emily shows up with scars that would rival Tom Berenger’s in Platoon and the only thing that gets said about her relationship with Sam is how intense his feelings are for her, how she is “the one” for him, and that once he imprinted on her they were destined to be together? Bella asks Jacob whether he’s imprinted on anyone — she’s spectacularly subtle — and he says “You would know if I had” with more than a little menace in his voice. He follows this up with a “I’d rather see you dead, little girl, than to be with another man” moment, which is always awesome. RUN AWAY, BELLA. You should have trusted your gut instinct when it came to not really wanting to know what imprinting was. (WAIT TILL THE NEXT MOVIE! Or so I hear, having not read the books.)
- Also, I really hated the “You have to consider the idea that I might be better for her than you are” moment. Pro tip: neither of you get to decide who is better for Bella and the fact that you’re even having this conversation is making a very good argument for it being neither of you. I think… I think these guys are making me be on Team Bella. I’m not going to commit to that just yet, but I think I hate them more than I hate her.
- Really sexy moments with your girlfriend while in her bed: “In a few decades, everyone you know will be dead.” Edward Cullen, mood killer.
- Not sure what Leah Clearwater’s role was supposed to be, other than Feisty Girl Werewolf. I wish they had done more with her because it felt like they wanted to make a big deal of her but then she didn’t end up having much more to do than her brother or the other random pack members who, like Jacob, are unnecessarily shirtless. (To be clear for those who might find have found this to be a selling point: lady werewolves aren’t shirtless in human form, sorry.)
- The Volturi are really boring when they leave Tony Blair at home.
- What did Esme do to deserve nearly zero lines?
- The best part of this movie was the trailer for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows they played before it.
The Twilight Saga: Eclipse
A little less conversation, a little more action, please.
IMDB Plot Synopsis As a string of mysterious killings grips Seattle, Bella, whose high school graduation is fast approaching, is forced to choose between her love for vampire Edward and her friendship with werewolf Jacob.
This one got a higher rating than New Moon? That’s kinda surprising. I thought this one was filled with lots more ridiculous, yet hilarious moments. The vampires came out of the water, Curse of the Black Pearl style. That’s the moment I think I lost it.
I don’t think its their acting skills, I think its the writing. That fist punching thing was aaaaawesome, but he always seemed to fall a little flat with non-comedy. And if you read the book you’d know it went through the first half in like no time.
The review kind of made my morning though, lol.
I liked the vampires-in-the-water thing because at least it was an attempt to be super creepy, given that the Cullens are super boring vampires bent on giving their kind a bad name.
I definitely found this one less funny than New Moon (and by less funny I clearly mean “cringe-inducing”), which in combination with no offending me nearly half as much mostly accounts for the higher rating.
“I think Edward went to the Nuns of Nonnberg Abbey School of Automobile Sabotage.”
BWahahaha! I really did snort out loud, so much so that the spouse looked over to see if I was ok.
Love the use of a the Rubber Soul line to describe the creepiness of the option of relationships in this movie.
I may yet have to rent the first two and see this one in the theater dammit.
The depressing thing is that Jacob almost literally said that line from “Run For Your Life”. Usually I’m prone to exaggeration in my paraphrasing, but that one was pretty spot on.
This was my first Twilight movie, but, um, are all of them shot from within a Thomas Kinkade painting?
Shit, Gabe, did you ever have the misfortune of seeing that Thomas Kinkade movie that came out maybe two years ago? I think it starred one of those guys from Supernatural.
Also, that guy is my least favourite painter of ALL TIME.
Haven’t seen that one yet, but I read a few reviews. Peter O’Toole is in it. It sounds HILARIOUS.
Ack, you’re right, I totally forgot he was in that. He’s too old to be making poor movie choices like that; what if he had died immediately after and that was the last role he ever played? Unforgivable.
Question, what is a bechdel test? I keep meaning to ask, lol. Review FTW, btw, complete awesomeness.
how does one pass a bechdel test?
The Bechdel Test is a quick test to see how female characters fare in a film by meeting three criteria: 1) it has to have at least two women in it, who 2) who talk to each other, about 3) something besides a man. Not all films that pass (and most don’t) are necessarily pro-woman, though; this movie passes because the girls talk about Jessica’s graduation speech, but I wouldn’t classify Twilight as awesomely feminist.
You are hilarious.
I laughed through the entire movie. Could not contain myself. I’m Team No One. They all acted like total douchebags. Edward is whipped, Jacob is a sad sack and Bella is a manipulative ass.
Taylor Lautner. Jaw clenching = dramatic acting.