I Will See Your Fandom and Raise You A Meh: March 16, 2009

In which I will not watch the Watchmen, and Edward Cullen can bite me.

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The movie Watchmen is finally out, and apparently the Powers That Be will revoke my nerd privileges if I don’t pee myself with joy at the thought. Powers That Be, revoke away; knowing nothing about Watchmen, I hereby declare my indifference. I do pee myself on a regular basis, but that’s just bad bladder control when sneezing.

Actually, I exaggerate — not about the sneeze-pees; those are sadly real — but about my ignorance of Watchmen. I had, frankly, never heard of it before the first movie trailers came out, but I am interested in anything with superheroes and anything by Alan Moore, so I poked around Wikipedia until I had the basic premise down. And, because I am one of those smug purists who must read the book first so she can accurately critique the movie, I got Watchmen out of the library and doggedly plowed through a chapter a night with my husband. It’s… good. It’s better than a lot of comic-book crap, but it’s also not really the mind-blowing experience my fellow nerds had promised me it would be. I know it caused a revolution in its time, but I think I’m just too young to appreciate it; I grew up with bitter superheroes and their fucked-up motives, so the rounding-out of notoriously squeaky-clean superdude types doesn’t seem very new to me. My mind is tickled, but remains unblown.

On the plus side, I am hearing very good things about the quality of the movie adaptation, which is always a plus — I would rather see a movie that faithfully follows a bad book than a movie that improves upon said book, which speaks both to my nitpickiness and my masochism. Honestly, though, the accuracy will be mostly lost on me, since the book was due before I could finish it and is now back at the library, waiting to be delivered to the next person on its hold list, who will no doubt be more grateful and dedicated a geek than I. Nerd status: REVOKED.

The same does not hold true for Twilight; depressingly, I have now read all four books in that godforsaken series, and I am fully prepared to see the glittery garbage that is the first movie. (Is there any phrase in the English language more depressing than “first movie”, with its implications of more horrors to come? It’s like Richard Topcliffe wiping the blood of his writhing Jesuit victim off his hands and chirping, “But wait, THERE’S MORE! When we return, you’ll meet our new and improved IRON MAIDEN! Now with EXTRA FACE-SPIKES!!”) Yes, I read the whole series just so that I could hate it with authority. I have no life, but I do have serious mental issues.

But before you hasten to agree with that assessment, allow me to direct your attention to Exhibit A: TwilightMoms.com. It is the site that I blame for shoving me headlong into the series in the first place, because it is proof that Twilight is not just a teen-girl trend. Far from it — to join the TwilightMoms forums, you must be at least 25 years old and/or married and/or a mom. I saw that, and thought, “… well, there must be a reason that all these grown women like these books. Maybe it’s like Watchmen, and it uses a stereotypically childish form to convey complex ideas and storylines aimed at mature adults?”

Or, you know, not.

Now, don’t get me wrong: I have nothing against crappy books written for thirteen-year-old girls. I could wish that thirteen-year-old girls would get better taste, because when I was their age my favorite book was Northanger Abbey and that right there is proof that kids can handle good writing — not to mention proof that Jane Austen would have laughed her mob cap off at the shitheap that is Twilight — but hey, I was homeschooled by an English teacher who specialized in 19th-century English literature; good taste got beaten into me from Day One. But hey, thirteen-year-olds have generally lousy taste; they pick the wrong boys, they like the wrong bands, they have the wrong posters on their wrong-wallpapered walls. Thirteen-year-olds are morons. If you don’t believe me, look around and count up all the thirteen-year-old girls you voluntarily hang out with on a regular basis. (No, your kids and sisters don’t count.) If you counted zero, I think you see my point. (If you counted “lots!” you might be some kind of pervert. Look into it.) If thirteen-year-olds like Twilight, that is fine, because they will eventually grow out of it.

Or will they?

TwilightMoms say no. TwilightMoms say pick your boy-team carefully, because you will be Team Edward or Team Jacob for life. TwilightMoms say get that unpunctuated Edwards Girl t-shirt in size XL, because you will be wearing it when you’re 42 and pregnant. TwilightMoms say you will be waiting outside your nearest Wal-Mart at 12:01 on the night the movie is released on DVD, and you will not have to fend off curious stares or questions from the other grown women waiting in line because you are all there for yourselves, not for your kids. And even as TwilightMoms sweep sneeringly past the geeks camping out for Watchmen, TwilightMoms are excitedly discussing the next movie, and will Robert Pattinson’s hair be as finger-combingly dreamy as it was in the first movie? WILL IT WILL IT WILL IT?!?

Jesus Glittering Christ. On second thought, I’m throwing over both those goddamn fandoms and rewatching Dark City instead.