Frustrations of the Twilight...Thing (Part 1)

I have problems with Twilight.  Anyone who has talked to me the past few years knows this and knows my reasoning.  But it has built up too much to just let it simmer, I have to let it out.  I do have some concessions I have to make about the whole thing.  First off I give Stephanie Meyer great credit in striking a chord with the general public in creating such a successful franchise.  The money she has pulled in is unreal and I can't deny it.  I also have to say that a bit of me is jealous that she has been so successful, like any disgruntled guy out there.  But now onto the fun part, the dissecting of the whole series. (I have read/listened to every book more than once and seen both movies)

First off, how did Meyer pull off a series in which the main character can create such large amounts of disgust.  Bella is your normal teenage girl.  She is insecure, undecided, and distant from everyone in her life.  But this isn't the biggest problem I have with the character.  My biggest problem is her reactions towards Edward.  She instantly becomes obsessed with him.  From the first encounter, when he hasn't "fed," don't get me started on their "vegetarianism," when he was completely rude to her, she still wanted to know what he was about.  Who he was, how pretty he was, how mysterious he was, etc...  When they started dating however it becomes even worse.  She cannot be away from him.  If Edward so much as thinks about leaving she latches on as if she is a vampire not allowing him to leave.  And that isn't the worst part.  Her descriptions of him are excruciatingly painful.  To Bella, Edward is perfect.  To how his skin is like polished marble, or his lips are rock hard but soft, or how his eyes are so beautiful when amber, or how his hair is perfectly tossed around, sorry go the movie involved.  Anyway, you get the picture and boy is it disgustingly pathetic.

Now with Bella complete I have to talk about the vampires as a whole in this universe.  Now I have no problems with taking some liberties with vampire rules.  Ok so they can go out into the sun but they are severely weakened, Bram Stoker's Dracula, sure they can drink animal blood and still survive, there is a ruling order among vampires, werewolves and vampires don't get along, all things I can deal with.  But SPARKLES!?!?!?  The worst cop-out to allow vampires to goto school or be seen in public.  Recently there has been a trend to glorify vampires, Underworld and Kate Beckinsale :) or Blade, or Brad Pitt in Interview with the Vampire, but to give them something has silly as sparkles.  Sparkles should only be on High School homemade banners and Dance Recital faces, not vampires.  Completely discredits any type of bad-assery that a vampire can have.  I mean how can you fight something you couldn't stop laughing at?

Since this one is already lengthy I am going to leave it as is and write Part 2 later this or next week.  Maybe I'll even get some quotes in there, but I don't want to dig through the books so probably not.