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Movie Tuesday: Revenge of the Twihards


twilight.JPGJust like their namesakes did in The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, teams Edward and Jacob joined forces for a long holiday weekend to cast down their competition and posture triumphantly on the field of battle. The new Twilight film bit big at the box office, collecting $82.5 million during the Friday-through-Monday weekend. It’s already pocketed a staggering $175.3 million since its Wednesday release, trending just ever-so-slightly behind the saga’s last chapter, New Moon.

With that kind of payday, you wouldn’t think there’d be moviegoers left over to see anything else. Au contraire, my friend. Avatar: The Last Airbender conjured its way to more than $70.5 million for second place, while Toy Story 3 managed to squeeze another $42.2 million from the box office: The Pixar film earned $301.5 mil in three weeks.

But the big story is still Twilight and its legion of rabid, movie-going fans—perhaps the world’s mightiest army not on a government till. You mess with Twihards at your own peril, as I learned after I posted a less-than-vampire-skin-sparkling review of the film. Lots of angry girls and women promptly wrote Plugged In to tell me how completely clueless I was: Several were particularly put out that I took issue with Jacob’s oft-shirtless presence on screen, including in a driving snowstorm (I called it “abs-solutely silly”—a line since removed), seeing as how Jacob perpetually runs a 108-degree temperature.

Which makes me wonder why, if the body temperature is such an issue, Jake bothers with pants. Particularly those heavy jeans.

Others thought that Bella wasn’t at all hasty in wishing to be undead, or quibbled with the degree to which characters lie to one another (“they just didn’t tell the whole truth,” one said), or my argument that the film gives viewers a slightly distorted view of what love’s all about. Wrote one young reader:

Well, If you married someone that didn't do all they could to keep you safe and protect you like Edward does, then you settled. too many people settle for bad boyfriends/husbands now and say love like in twilight "doesn't exist and is fake" but I know a ton of people who are married and are just as in love as Edward and Bella and treat each other like they do.

Which is great, and maybe even true! Edward does treat Bella just like I’d want my 16-year-old daughter’s hypothetical boyfriend to treat her. Edward is “old school,” as Bella says—big on courtesy and a massive proponent of abstinence before marriage.  He seems like a pretty cool guy, despite the fact he’s technically dead and all. All I’m saying is that we all get morning breath and leave the toilet seat up sometimes: Endless love is possible. Endless bliss … well, that might be a stretch.

Many of the letters I received were pretty polite, others less so. But I really, um, appreciated all the passion and thoughtfulness that went in to each and every one of ’em (though I’m also quite thankful Twihard nation doesn’t know where I live).

Not that I’m taking anything back, mind you. Eclipse has some stuff going for it, but it’s got its problems, too. And I can’t help but wonder … if Jacob ever got a job at, like, Plugged In, will he be allowed to come into work shirtless? I mean, given his high body temperature and all?