BLOGGING BREAKING DAWN, pt. 38: The Kids Don't Stand A Chance

Chapter 32: Company

And now the chapter in which seventeen new characters are introduced. Oh, good! We're on page 607, by the way, so this is definitely the time to meet a huge group of new people. (There is literally a line where Jacob complains that he needs an index to keep track of everyone, and then there's a bewildering footnote that turns out to reference an ACTUAL INDEX in the back of the book. Hey, S. Meyer, maybe you should have picked up on the implicit criticism YOUR OWN CHARACTER IS GIVING YOU!) I'm sure you're super eager to meet all of these vampires who probably don't matter at all, but before we get to that, we've got to deal with the GIGANTIC MORAL FAILURE on the first page of this chapter. Bella's talking about the logistics of having a house full of vampires, which isn't as bad as it could be since nobody sleeps. “Mealtimes were dicey, though,” she says. OH WERE THEY?

Our company cooperated as best they could. They gave Forks and La Push a wide berth, only hunting out of state; Edward was a gracious host, lending out his cars as needed without so much as a wince. The compromise made me very uncomfortable, though I tried to tell myself they'd all be hunting somewhere in the world, regardless.

Very uncomfortable, you say? Yeah, I think it would make me uncomfortable too, if, in order to save my own ass, I tolerated MASS MURDER all around me while lending out my cars and house to MURDERERS. The Cullens could insist that their guests eat animals, couldn't they? Like how some people make you take your shoes off? Carlisle could even provide blood from the hospital, right? I mean, doing ANYTHING to distance yourself A LITTLE from all of the MURDER that is happening in order for you stay alive and immoral (I mean, immortal) forever would be a good idea, wouldn't it? They should at least fucking TRY, shouldn't they? And what the fuck is with giving Forks a “wide berth”? Does S. Meyer feel like humans who don't live in Forks are less important? Is she just trying to assuage her readers who are worried about Mike Newton? The whole thing reads like S. Meyer is trying to get you to think about it just enough, no more no less (it's only two paragraphs that are never mentioned again, after all). Because if you think about it too much Bella is doing a great deal of evil in order to survive, which pretty much invalidates her right to survive at all.

Bella mentions that Jacob has even more problems with it than she does, but he “kept his moth shut and glared at the floor rather than the vampires.” That's too bad Jacob—this could have been your shot at redemption. There's a semi-funny joke about how the vampires are accepting of Jacob like “the way people who are not animal lovers treat the pets of their friends,” but I was still too mad to really appreciate it.

So first we're very briefly introduced to Peter and Charlotte, Jasper's old war buddy and his gal, and we hear that Alice sent them to Forks with no real sense of what was waiting for them and that they took her at her word. Which is a pretty strong endorsement of their friendship, and also a pretty strong suggestion that they all used to have orgies. Alice “made no promise to ever see them again in the future,” which is ominous, but is that something really could have come up in conversation or is it just something Bella asked later? I mean was it:

“Go to my family in Forks,” Alice said. “Trust me.”
“Will we ever see you again in the future?” Peter asked.
“I can't promise that,” Alice said.

Or was it:

“So yeah, Alice said we should come here?” Peter shrugged.
“DID SHE SAY YOU'D EVER SEE HER AGAIN IN THE FUTURE?” I demanded.
“What? No, I mean, she didn't say so specifically or anything. What are you talking about?” Peter shrugged.

You know? Anyway, then it is time for the international vampires to start showing up. Oh, you're telling me S. Meyer is going to introduce a bunch of different ethnic vampires, allotting only a few sentences to describe each? WHAT COULD GO WRONG?

Meet The Irish Coven!

There's Siobhan, a big fat lady (“a woman of immense presence whose huge body was both beautiful and mesmerizing as it moved in smooth undulations.” I'm picturing the monster from Akira with a brogue); Liam, who is not described at all which forces us to assume he is a Leprechaun; and “little Maggie” who can detect lies and has “bouncy red curls” because of course she does. Top of the morning to ye, Irish vamps!

Meet The Sharia Vampires!

There's Amun, who is basically the head cleric, and his wife Kebi who is “obedient” and silent at all times. Vampire Bin Laden and his human shield. Then there's Tia, who isn't described at all (of the seventeen, we get a decent thumbnail sketch of about eight). Then there's Benjamin, who is an Airbender.* “It seemed an unlikely grouping—though the Egyptians all looked so alike, with their midnight hair and olive-toned pallor, that they easily could have passed for a biological family.” Shut the fuck up, Bella.

(*Edward informs us that he can move the “elements”—earth, wind, water, and fire. Okay, but those aren't really elements. Call me when he can move noble gases around, am I right? Edward also really likes Benjamin because he has “a very clear sense of right and wrong.” So he must not be a Muslim, right S. Meyer?)

Meet The Dour British Vampire!

“Alistair was a misanthropic English vampire,” Bella says. SHOW DON'T TELL. So what's his deal? I'm assuming he has difficulty being a vampire because his teeth are so bad and because his sense of humor is so reliant on men wearing dresses, yeah? As it turns out he's a bit of an anti-Volturi conspiracy theorist; we've already discussed how difficult it is to gauge how seriously we're supposed to take the Volturi threat, and Alistair only makes it more difficult. He walks around the Cullen house ranting about how he's probably on a Volturi death list just for knowing Carlisle, that “of course, they'll know I was here.” His paranoia makes even reasonable suspicion about the Volturi seem implausible. Like a 9/11 Truther at a libertarian meeting, he's ruining it for everyone else.

Meet The New Hot Guy!

Garrett is a solo adventurer—with a ponytail! S. Meyer really has a grip on what made guys sexy in 1993—who walks around getting the attention of all the available vampire pussy with his rugged good looks and his “down for whatever” personality. (“I imagined that we could have presented him with any challenge and he would have accepted, just to test himself,” Bella says. How about we challenge him to write a novel in which he doesn't just come right out and SAY what each character is like?) Especially Kate, who trains Bella to use her shield in literally the only part of this chapter that isn't wandering past-perfect exposition. Garrett joins their training session and asks Kate to use her power to shock him so he can see what it's like. They banter, she knocks him over, he loves it. Kinky! More of these two will be fine, S. Meyer.

Meet The Amazonian Lesbians! Wait, what?

So this is interesting. Zafrina and Senna, two of the Amazonian women we heard about earlier, show up. Bella never tells us if they are mates or not, but there are minor indications that they are!

Senna was always near Zafrina, never speaking, but it wasn't the same as Amun and Kebi. Kebi's manner seemed obedient; Senna and Zafrina were more like two limbs of one organism—Zafrina just happened to be the mouth piece.

So they're compared to another actual romantic couple. Hmmm! One isn't obedient to the other, they are equals (this would be praise coming from anyone other than S. Meyer, but we can't be sure). Hmmmm! Plus, there's a third member, who they are “uncomfortable” being without (I'd think three girls would be more difficult to manage...) but Alice apparently took her instead. HMMMMM! (Damn! I know Alice is off doing something for the Cullens, but wouldn't it be awesome if she was using this Volturi thing to just TAKE EVERYTHING she'd ever wanted? What if she'd made it all up and the Volturi never even showed? Oh god, I am writing such a better story in my head!)

So I guess I sort of take back Twilight not having any gay characters? But of course, the (maybe) lesbians are the tough Amazon women. It was either that or they would have hailed from San Francisco-this chapter is full of blunt objects. Then again, Edward is “thrilled” to have the Amazons around, and it's hard to imagine he'd be okay with homos. Any opinion on this?

Meet The Romanian Vampires!

Vladimir and Estragon—I mean, Stefan—show up itching for a fight with the Volturi. By then, Carlisle et al. are back, and it turns out Alice didn't send these dudes; they came on their own. “Word travels,” one of them explains. Uh, how? (“Stefan has the power to hear things through the grape vine really well.”) Anyway, they say they don't care if the Cullens broke the law or not, they're on their side no matter what. They're “mysteriously delighted” by the presence of the werewolves. Then they pull some dice out of their track suits and start betting. They seem like OK guys.

Meet The Black Vampires!

Tyrone and Vamp Master Jay show up, and Tyrone is like “where the white bitches at?” and VMJ is like “you guys got a Pop Eye's around here?”

Meet The Asian Vampires!

When they show up, they crash their car into the Cullens house then immediately get out and start snapping photos of everyone. “This is great,” Edward says. “Aiko has the power to do math tests really well. We'll know the Volturi's exact numbers.”

Okay, I made those last two sets up, but can we pretend Vamp Master Jay and Tyrone are real for the rest of the book?

Anyway, that's everybody, I think. I hope they all die.