Wednesday, June 15, 2011

BLOGGING BREAKING DAWN, pt. 42: Ante Up

When we last left our heroes we were back in the clearing, waiting for the fight to start. This clearing feels like it should be more thematically important than it is, right? The Cullens played baseball there in book 1, fought the newborns there in book 3, and now whatever this is is about to happen there. So what does the clearing like, represent? Does it have anything to do with the meadow where Edward and Bella used to hang out? Are these open nature-spaces related? What ever happened to that meadow? I suspect it's probably useless to ask these sort of broad, thematic, reader-guide-in-the-back-of-a-paperback questions about these books; they have no real answers because all the depth and shading is accidental. It's like S. Meyer tried to write Twilight in accordance with Dogme 95.

Bella decides to wear the big diamond that Aro gave her to the battle as a show of good faith. Fuck, if it turns out that diamond is some kind of super magic McGuffin I'm going to be pissed. Like if Aro sends a death spell at Bella and it reflects off the diamond and kills him? Hahaha. THE DIAMOND IS A HORCRUX! What would be shitty about that is if it happens, it won't be a total Deus Ex Machina. It will be an event that was (at least moderately) presaged earlier in the book.* We did hear about that necklace once, after all. If Bella's after car plays a role too, then, well, fuck, I don't know if I will be happy or not. That might be the only way I will be satisfied: If Bella's fucking after car runs over Jane and Alice gets out and takes off a racing helmet and Bella hops in the passenger seat and they drive off into the sunset.

(*Earlier in the book, not earlier in the series. Nothing was presaged in earlier books at all.)

Yeah, I've just had a horrible realization. The big drawback (I mean, drawback indicates there was a positive side to it all, and there wasn't, but whatever) to the messy accumulation of plot details in the second half of this book is that one of those details will probably be important. Something about J Jenks or Garrett or that guy Allastair or that vase Alice broke is going to be the key to resolution. That's like minimum-level effort, as a book writer, so of course, S. Meyer is going to do that. There is no way it could be anything well earned because, well, nothing has or could possibly be well earned from here. Peace will come in the form of a deus-ex-fiftypagesago. (Or, oh god, it will just be something from fucking nowhere.)

“If there's a gun on the wall in the first act, someone needs to shoot it ten pages later. Then in the third act, five new characters bring five new guns.”-S. Meyer

Chapter 36: Bloodlust

“They came with pageantry, with a kind of beauty,” Bella says. (“Yeah, I come like that too.”-Alice Cullen) They come “in a rigid, formal formation.” They float along “in perfect synchronicity from the trees.” They're a “dark, unbroken shape.” OK WE GET IT. This entrance goes on for another fucking page, and Bella counts 32 emotionless black shapes drifting toward them lazily.

“The redcoats are coming, the redcoats are coming,” Garrett muttered mysteriously to himself and then chuckled once. He slid one step closer to Kate.

What? Is this an American Revolution allegory now? When did THAT happen? Again: which one is King George, Garrett? Also: “muttered mysteriously”? Does Bella like, not get the reference? This is pretty basic US History, girl. (Does S. Meyer think that's an obscure reference? Hahahah.)

And then a whole bunch of other vampires come in. WHAA? The Volturi, it turns out, brought their own witnesses: an angry “horde” gathers at the edge of the clearing. Okay, fine. What's another fifty or sixty vampires? Fuck it! Let's bring in a million more! Bella realizes that this means there is no way to survive the fight and there's no way Jacob and Renesmee will be able to flee even if Demetri is killed. Uh, if you say so! I mean, I don't see why, seeing as how you didn't know how many Volturi were coming until ten seconds ago, but WHATEVER. ("Oh, there are fifty? I was expecting forty. We're fucked.")

What I am hearing is that there are two possible outcomes now: fighting (and losing and dying) OR avoiding a fight completely (and living). And neither outcome requires that whole J Jenks diversion we just endured. SO WHY DID IT HAPPEN? What the hell was all of that even for? I'm going to publish my own version of Breaking Dawn containing only the parts that have bearing on the plot. Even with all the explicit Alice and Jasper sex scenes added in, it will be 400 pages shorter.

Edward does a brain scan of the Volturi and confirms the widely held suspicion that the Volturi are on a “destroy and acquire” mission. Well, of course; no one ever guesses wrong. Then a bunch of new wolves come out of the woods. There are sixteen of them now. Sure, why not? Why not add A MILLION MORE? Nobody other than Bella even reacts. (S. Meyer is trying to build some kind of Tolkienian battle scene, so she thinks we care about like, number of troops and arms and shit, apparently. Hit point levels? Can we get some HP in here?) Bella realizes some of the wolves are very young, and are going to die, and is suddenly filled with a murderous rage. Everything turns red—she's hulking out!—and she actually smiles as she growls. So this is that moment from Book 3's preface, then. Is something badass going to happen? That certainly seemed like what was promised. But nope!

“Chagrin” gets used, quite appropriately, multiple times in this chapter—for the first time when Aro looks over the Cullen's group and doesn't see Alice there. Remember when I argued that Aro was a meta-textual twi-hard? We all wish Alice were here, Aro. Carlisle steps forward and greets him in a friendly fashion; Aro is like, “weird that you're being so friendly since you've raised Dumbledore's Army to kill me.” And Carlisle is like “just touch my hand and you'll know homie don't play that way.” And then Caius breaks in and S. Meyer gets as much dialog she can out of the notion that Renesmee is being mistaken for an immortal baby. This is basically how it goes:

“You have an immortal baby!” Caius said.
“Actually what we have is a--” Carlisle started.
“An evil killer infant imbued with eternal life!” Caius said.
“If you just hear me out you will understand that she--”
“Is an 8 pound 4 ounce cuddly ball of death!”


And so on. Actually it's dumber. Carlisle manages to get a full explanation out and Caius just says “Artifice!” and brings out Irina. Okay. Irina is all dazed like they pumped her full of valium, and when she can't focus Caius slaps her across the face.

It couldn't have hurt, but there was something terribly degrading about the action. It was like watching someone kick a dog.

I like how Bella empathizes and calls Irina a dog in the same breath. So I have been listening to How Did This Get Made? which is a great podcast hosted by Paul Scheer in which he and his panelists try to “make sense of the movies that make no sense” (Battlefield Earth, The Last Airbender, Fast Five, etc). One sticking point for them is movies set in the future in which characters still use modern English idioms. Why, in the year 3000, would someone say “Hey guys”? Similarly, why would the isolated, invulnerable Volturi use a slap in the face to show impatience? It's a small complaint, but just because we have so many huge, macro problems with the end of this book (so many, in fact, that I am having trouble keeping track of them all) doesn't mean the little problems aren't also everywhere, all the time.

4 comments:

Kim said...

If I remember right, she makes a lot of weird not really funny joking references to Garret being alive for the Revolutionary War. Like we're supposed to be surprised he's that old or something? Did she forget Carlisle is like 500 years old and the Volturi are even older?

ZL said...

Yeah, it's like she thinks the American Revolution happened a thousand years ago. WAIT, is that what Mormons believe? They might! We should check!

Kim said...

Maybe they're like those people who believe the world is only 3000 years old or something so 250 years ago is a big chunk of that.

Unknown said...

Wait, so the world ISN'T 3000 years old? I think Bella wore the diamond in case Aro killed the rest of the Cullens he'd see it and spare her. Or maybe it's pointless just like J Jenks.

SM was just threw a bunch of nonsense together because she was told novels had to be long and epics needed to be longer. What better way to make a short story seem like an epic than just filling pages with nonessential garbage?