I also have a better idea of what most people are talking about when they say Team Edward or Team Jacob now.[break]
And although I watched the saga hoping to finally discover whether I could classify myself as Team Edward or Team Jacob, I’ve found out that the only team I feel I belong to is Team Intrigued, if there’s ever such a thing.
Now, of course, I knew the storyline and the whole idea of the movie with a human girl falling for a vampire and being best friends or whatever with the wolf before I actually watched it.
However, I was rather taken aback with the new twist the modern authors and directors introduced to what would previously be called horror into a new form of horror-and-romance genre.
As far as I remember, vampires were supposed to be something scary; likewise with the wolves. They were something that you felt the need to ward off, whether by putting garlic next to you or by securing your houses. They were far from objects of desire.
Stephanie Meyer very clearly challenges this notion and introduces us to a whole new world. She introduces us to a world where vampires like Edward Cullen are suave, debonair, hypnotizing. A world that I personally wish I knew of earlier –and I believe I’m speaking for most girls here.
And hence the intrigue when I watched the movie. Sure, there have been movies such as Dracula, The Hunger that have fed the legends of vampires as desirable, beautiful creatures of the night. But nothing like the Twilight Saga that created such a sensation.
Monstrous creatures that were supposed to be frightening are not at all repulsive anymore. In fact, they definitely don’t seem to personify the word “monster” accurately.
As if Twilight Saga wasn’t enough to reinforce this new concept, the well-known TV series “Vampire Diaries” also depict vampires as utterly alluring.
So much is the rage that when my friends and I meet for group study sessions, we end up very often watching Vampire Diaries episode after episode till finally we run out of time. Of course, all studies come to a halt before dashing vampires.
I wish the effect were only on young, teenage girls. I wish that such illusions only got through to them and they were the only ones daydreaming of these characters.
But unfortunately, age is no barrier to such hopeless romanticization not to seep in. No wonder my aunt started vouching for Jacob the minute he took off his shirt.
Let’s forget about the effect that Damon Salvatore has on her.
I personally wonder if there’s a market for scary creatures anymore. Obviously, with the way the social media has chosen to redefine them as objects of desirability, it’ll be difficult being scared of them now.
“Have you seen the way Jacob looks, shirtless, in the rain?” my twelve-year-old cousin remarked one day. I highly doubt she, and others her age, will grow up fearing such things as werewolves and vampires and ghosts anymore.
On the contrary, all the girls will possibly grow up wanting boyfriends like these “creatures” and all the guys will grow up hating them for getting so much attention from girls.
But can you blame them? These new ideas attached to horror movie characters have made it all the more difficult not to fall in love with them.
Previously, what would’ve been associated with superheroes today have become synonymous with villains, or worse yet, fictitious monsters.
They have the wits, they have the looks, and so not surprisingly, they have the girls too.
In such a distorted world, the only way out I see is to let our creativity get the best of us. The days when vampires and such other creatures were scary are oh so gone now.
It’s a new era for these eternal beings now – in an era that favors more whimsical definitions of them pushing their desirability quotient off the charts.
Ayushma Basnyat is a student of Political Science at Thammasat University who enjoys exploring life and all that it has to offer.
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