A Ghoul Versus The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1

Previously on the Hunger Games: Catching Fire...

Katniss' life continued to redefine suck. After barely surviving an arena battle to the death where she was hunted like sport, she returned home to her crapsack district to live with her newly developed case of PTSD. Peeta was no help as she broke his heart by revealing she never loved him and faked the whole thing for the cameras, so now she has that hanging over her head as well. The fun didn't stop there though, because President Snow has come to hold her personally responsible for the growing rebellion in his fragile dictatorship.

Utilizing one of the biggest “fuck yous” EVER, he threw her back into the next Hunger Games event so she'd finally be out of his epically white hair. Things didn't quite work out as he planned, because not only did she survive but she was rescued by a band of rebels. Even though he was able to prevent Peeta from escaping with her, this wasn't enough so he had District 12 bombed back into the Stone Age.

The Hunger Games novel, 374 pages. Adapted into a 142 minute film.

Catching Fire novel, 391 pages. Adapted into a 146 minute film.
Mockingjay novel, 390 pages. Adapted into TWO films, the first one being 123 minutes and the second likely to be at least that long.

YEP, even an extremely high quality franchise like the Hunger Games isn't immune to “Split the Final Book Into 2 Movies” syndrome. Harry Potter kicked off this madness back in 2010, and when it proved to be financially successful beyond anyone's dreams, the doors were kicked open for good. Twilight was soon to follow and it added a touch of innovation in the form of making the movies PADDED OUT AS HELL. I suppose one COULD make the case Harry Potter did this as well since the first film is basically an hour of the Power Trio camping, but that's a story for another day. The Hunger Games was next in line to adopt this free money trend, and DAYMN did it ever work as Mockingjay Part 1 became the highest grossing film of 2014, although it JUST lost that title to American Sniper and its 2015 staying power.

A Ghoul Versus The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (Part 2)

Click here for Part 1!

Thanks to Cinna's latest efforts, Katniss and Peeta steal the show once again as their outfits burst into flame and THIS TIME they look hella real. You can tell Lionsgate really took the first film's special effects being ripped apart by the critics personally since they nearly doubled the budget for Catching Fire and does it EVER show. Post-parade, Haymitch introduces them to District's 11 tributes: Chaff and Seeder. Chaff greets Katniss by kissing her straight on the lips, the resulting look on her face being PRICELESS. One almost has to wonder if they told Jennifer Lawrence he was going to do that, or if she's just that great at acting.

We're not done with the hilarious introductions yet though, as one of the District 7 tributes, Johanna Mason, gets on the elevator with the District 12 crew as they're leaving. Johanna is played by Jena Malone, an excellent actress who never seems to get the spotlight she deserves. Johanna talks about how much she hates her stylist, throws some shade at Katniss, and then strips naked in front of everyone. Peeta and Haymitch are ALL SMILES while Katniss determinedly looks the other direction, probably making her hands bleed with how tight her hands must be balled up right now. Have I mentioned how much Jennifer Lawrence rules? I don't think I have. JENNIFER LAWRENCE RULES.

A Ghoul Versus The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (Part 1)

Previously on the Hunger Games...

Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark won the 74^th Annual Hunger Games, won an arena style battle to the death designed by a fascist government to keep all of its citizens in place by constantly reminding them how helpless they are. However, they did so in a defiant manner which drew the ire of President Snow, Chief Fascist and part time Santa Claus. There's no way he's going to let two uppity teenagers upset his balance of power, so get ready for an overly elaborate plan that could have easily been solved by JUST KILLING THEM.

Because really, when you think about it, none of this makes any sense. Snow outright says he doesn't want to kill Katniss because it'll just make her a martyr and inspire many others to take her place, but this is neglecting one key detail. The only districts that seem to have a problem with the Capitol are the outlying ones, the ones filled with dirt poor workers who suffer the most under Panem's jackbooted heels. HOW are they going to revolt? They have no real technology and no real way to get to the Capitol short of WALKING THERE, so there is no way to overthrow Snow that way.

Sure, they could just stop working and producing the supplies the Capitol needs, but they have small numbers and would be no match if Snow send his army of hovercraft and Stormtroopers over there to resolve the stoppage. And on THAT topic, what does a technologically advanced paradise like the Capitol need COAL for anyway? That physical holographic technology of theirs run off coal? In summary, Snow is a fucking idiot and is just begging to be the cause of his own undoing, giving Katniss every weapon she needs to do so.

A Ghoul Versus The Hunger Games (Part 2)

Click here for Part 1!

Katniss watches the carnage unfold in a daze, as we see kids hacking and stabbing each other to death. It's done with no sound effects and only a muted score, making it all the more harrowing. She finally snaps back to reality and runs into the nearby forest, grabbing a backpack along the way. Twelve tributes die in the opening carnage, each death signaled by a blast from a cannon. With nothing better to do, Katniss ties herself high up in a tree and rests. This is where the movie is at its weakest, as in the book we got several chapters of Katniss trying to come up with a survival plan while she scavenged for food and water. It was very captivating stuff, as it really allowed us to get into her mind state and the desperation she was going through. Here, she just hangs out in a tree.

She gets woken up that night by some voices beneath her, as she sees a gang of career tributes has banded together to take out everyone else. They're comprised of two hulks named Cato and Marvel, two femme fatales named Glimmer and Clove, and... Peeta?! Oh snap! The next day Seneca, who is watching everything unfold via cameras hidden everywhere in the environment, summons up a batch of flames to move Katniss back into competition. She runs afoul of the pack, climbing a nearby tree to escape them. Cato tries to climb after her but lacks her nimbleness, so the group tries to shoot her down with arrows. However they all suck and miss her, leading Katniss to taunt them. Hahah, in the face of insurmountable odds she ain't backing down!

Peeta suggests they set up shop and wait til she's forced to come down, because she can't stay up there forever. The rest agree, and make camp for the night. Morning comes and Katniss finds Rue is in a tree across from her, gesturing at a gigantic wasp nest hanging in the branches above the pack. I'd make a snide comment about how convenient that is, but since we've seen Seneca can conjure things out of thin air to keep the game moving, I'm giving this one a pass. Caesar, doing commentary on the games along with the equally ridiculously dressed Claudius Templesmith, announces those just aren't ANY wasps but tracker jackers, lethal creations whose sting can cause hallucinations in small doses, death in larger ones.

A Ghoul Versus The Hunger Games (Part 1)

"May the odds ever be in your favour."

The Hunger Games kind of turned out to be a multimedia juggernaut, didn't it? Beginning as a red hot trilogy of books written by Suzanne Collins that are among some of the best sellers of all time, it's gone on to become a movie franchise that has grossed nearly two and a half billion dollars worldwide. Hell, even the soundtracks to the movies have ruled the sales charts. It also helped launch the career of Jennifer Lawrence into the stratosphere, to the point where she is arguably THE marquee actor in Hollywood today, male or female.

HOWEVER you can pretty much say nearly the exact same things about the Twilight Saga franchise, which was one of the darkest chapters in cinematic history, so the Hunger Games must just be more overly marketed tween garbage... right? Plot twist, no! The books and the movies are, for the most part, critically acclaimed due to how well written and developed they are. The protagonist of the books, Katniss Everdeen, has been hailed as one of the better strong female characters to come out in a long time, a positive role model who doesn't just sit around and pine for some sparkly chested boy to make her happy. She is basically the Anti-Bella, a character that isn't a vile and manipulative harpy that you want to see get eaten by the Loch Ness Monster. That's what Twilight was about, wasn't it?

I would describe myself as a fairly large fan of the franchise. I absolutely LOVE the books, as I found them to be one of the most realistic portrayals of what would actually happen to a character's psyche that went through a crazy ass, world changing series of violent adventures. Hint: it's not positive. We all have our favourite kind of stories, mine is where you can watch the gradual descent of a character into madness, and do those books ever deliver on that. I don't quite have the movies on that same level of quality, as the removal of Katniss' internal monologue and insight instantly hurts everything going on, BUT for Hollywood blockbuster films I do consider them among the best outside of the Daniel Craig James Bond series.

A Ghoul Versus The Maze Runner

“Who wants to watch a movie about teens in a post-apocalyptic dystopian future taken away from their families and placed into a life or death situation where they divide up into factions? No, this isn't Divergent, they're placed into an arena where they face death. No, this isn't the Hunger Games...”

The Maze Runner was one of the most unexpected hits of 2014: it had very little promotion, featured a cast of unknowns, was made from a first time director, had a miniscule budget, and was based on a series of books that didn't necessarily light the young adult world on fire. Despite all of this, it was able to make TEN TIMES its 34 million dollar budget AND earn critical acclaim in the process. That's quite the accomplishment in this day and age, as that's a LOT of barriers to overcome on your way to box office success.

It's based on the first book of the Maze Runner trilogy, written by James Dashner. Once again I have no idea what they're about, as I am so behind in reading it has officially become pathetic. Wes Ball, the films' director, earned the gig on the strength of a CGI film called Ruin he submitted to 20^th Century Fox, who was impressed and offered him Maze Runner since it shared a similar premise. This was after Fox's original choice, Catherine Hardwicke of Twilight fame, dropped out to pursue other projects. That's a shame, I REALLY would have loved to see her spin the camera around the maze runners every five minutes in-between takes of everyone walking in pointless slow motion. Ball promised fans he'd be loyal to the books, but honestly who DOESN'T vow that anymore? A quick search of fan reviews online seem to confirm that he kept his promise, but I won't be able to judge that for a very long time. Just wait until I get to the Harry Potter series though, those are going to be some twenty page reviews where I'll nitpick EVERYTHING TO DEATH!

Keep your hand on the same wall the entire time as we get ready to enter a maze and presumably run at some point, because it's now time for A Ghoul Versus The Maze Runner!

A Ghoul Versus The Divergent Series: Divergent (Part 2)

Click here for Part 1!

After this ends, they talk about fears and the movie FINALLY remembers its intended audience so Tris asks Four what his tattoo is of, seeing as how we've only ever seen a tiny part of it poking out of the back of his shirt. Four takes off said shirt to display his ink, but more importantly shows us his chiseled physique so all the women in the theaters can finally hoot and holler because you know they SO did. That's enough build up so he finally kisses Tris, who is more than happy to kiss back but says she doesn't want to go any further because she wants to take things slow. As far as young adult romances go this is a pretty typical one, as it's based way more off of physical attraction than anything else. Until the last couple, almost every conversation they've had has involved talking about beating up people. Maybe that's a huge turn on for Tris though, who knows? Also a young woman falling in love with her older battle instructor, where have I seen THAT before?

The next morning Four takes Tris outside to show her the Erudite loading many large crates into the Dauntless base containing supplies and computers. He also shows her a vial of serum they've been delivering as well, which is a neuro-chemical of some sort that'll turn whoever is injected with it into a mindless slave that'll follow instructions. Really? THAT'S what we're going with? That sounds like the plot from a 1950s science fiction movie. But I guess it's nice to get another hint of a plot at almost one hour forty minutes, so cheers for that. And just like before Tris doesn't have a chance to process this revelation, because an announcement over the speakers announces it's time for the final test.

A Ghoul Versus The Divergent Series: Divergent (Part 1)

“What Makes You Different, Makes You Dangerous... THAT'S a great message for tween girls!”

After the past few months of reviewing horror movies of wildly varying quality, I thought it was time I get back to the other major focus of this blog: young adult fantasy movies. With the Hunger Games saga nearly done for, it seems clear Divergent is primed to take its place as the Next Big Thing. All of the elements are there: a much beloved book series with legions of rabid fans, a superstar actress in the making in the form of Shailene Woodley, resident hunk Theo James, and a production value that seems to treat the property with respect.

The movies are based on the Divergent trilogy, written by Veronica Roth. I haven't read them yet, but I know they concern a rebellious teen girl rising up to fight the power in a standard post-apocalyptic dystopian future where people are divided into different groups. That is, of course, a very broad summary as I've read they focus on character issues and societal aspect much more than anything else, but that hasn't stopped with it being CONSTANTLY compared to the Hunger Games. A quick online search will yield just as many articles saying how it's a Hunger Games ripoff to ones saying it totally isn't.

The film rights to the novels were bought by Summit Entertainment, who was VERY eager to strike gold again after their Twilight Saga films made them a couple of bucks. They had a rather lackluster 2013, as their previous attempts at recapturing the young adult market with Warm Bodies and Ender's Game didn't exactly set the box office on fire. They recruited writer/director Neil Burger to helm the first film, a wise choice as he's yet to make a bad movie in his career. You mileage may vary on that, but I've personally enjoyed everything of his I've seen, ESPECIALLY the amazing 2006 film the Illusionist. How good was that movie? He got a good performance out of JESSICA BIEL in it.

A Ghoul Versus The Mortal Instruments: City Of Bones (Part 2)

Click here for Part 1!

Jace also shows Clary a portal they use to teleport around. Whoa, I was just joking about teleporters earlier. Clary wants to enter it to find her mother, but he warns her it takes a lifetime of training to learn how to use it without ending up in Limbo. Clary will take this advice to heart and not try to use the portal until she's spent years practicing. Wink wink.  He now wants to celebrate Clary's birthday, taking her to an arboretum in one of the upper turrets of the castle. In a scene ripped straight out of every Disney movie, they have a touching moment set to Demi Lovato's ultra cheesy “Heart By Heart”.

They kiss as it starts RAINING. OH MY GOD. I hope they go to Paris next so they can share a milkshake at a cafe and then go rolling around in a grassy field. The rain was actually just sprinklers, but my point remains.  They head back to Clary's room, where they kiss outside her door. However all the fun is ruined when Simon opens the door. Jace is mad because he thinks Clary and Simon are sleeping together, and Simon is mad because she was kissing Jace. Clary tells Simon they were jut kissing, and this gets Jace even madder. We get this absolute gem from him:

“How swiftly you dismiss our love.”

A Ghoul Versus The Mortal Instruments: City Of Bones (Part 1)

"How is being dressed like a hooker going to help me find my mom?"

Harry Potter was an unprecedented success in Hollywood. Sure, there have many book-to-movie adaptions before but this was the first one to do it for an entire franchise with each movie breaking box office records.  It spawned seemingly millions of knockoff books that in turn all spawned seemingly millions of knock off movies, but none of them could get past the first film. This all changed with Twilight, which definitely replaced Harry Potter as the Next Big Thing.

Whereas Harry Potter was (originally) for children, Twilight was for the highly coveted Young Adult audience and their mountains of disposable income. Top that off with their nonstop passion to be on top of what's cool, and there suddenly existed an extremely fertile breeding ground for imitators that could be successful.

Not to say that a lot of the books that followed were written as Twilight knockoffs, but there is no way these books would have gotten picked up to be published unless companies sensed they could market them as a franchise like Twilight had become. Before it took years for a book series to become huge, now all they have to do is slap a “the next Twilight!” sticker on it and BAM! Instant millions of sales. They have it down to a science now.

A Ghoul Versus Beautiful Creatures (Part 2)

Click here for Part 1!

Oh, Emma's not done just yet though. It turns out Lena's Claiming is going to happen on the most powerful solstice in 5000 years, which will make her more powerful than anyone and finally lead the Casters out of hiding, free from the oppression of the Muggles. Voldemort longs for a day when Casters can be their true selves without having to- wait, which movie is this? Oh, Beautiful Creatures? Okay, I was WONDERING when Voldemort got his nose to grow back.

Thelma or Louise arrives at the school, getting out of her car to reveal quite possibly the most ridiculous dress ever seen outside of a cosplay convention. Where do you even BUY a dress like that?  She walks up to Ethan and kisses him on the mouth, introducing herself as Lena's cousin Ridley. She is played by Emmy Rossum, an actress I'm not familiar with but I hear KILLS IT on the Showtime television show Shameless.

Ridley takes Ethan back to Ravenwood Manor to meet the rest of the family for a gathering they're having, as we see her kiss has bewitched Ethan so he can only do what she says. Macon is quite displeased to see Ridley but invites her to dinner nonetheless. The rest of the family starts showing up and they're all bizarre and/or goofy. The tone the movie has been working real hard to build is going right out the window in this scene, as it's just violently silly and out of place with everything they've done so far.

A Ghoul Versus Beautiful Creatures (Part 1)

“Slap my ass and call me Sally!” - EMMA FREAKING THOMPSON.

Beautiful Creatures is yet another movie based off a Young Adult book series, and yet another one that bombed despite the books having a rather large fanbase just like previous movies I've already looked at such as The Mortal Instruments: City Of Bones or Vampire Academy.

 

So how is it movies like these consistently bomb whereas ones like The Hunger Games or The Fault In Our Stars make ALL the money? People often like to point out it's due to how loyal the movies are to the books, the more they change it the more it's going to drive fans away which is true to a point BUT the aforementioned titles haven't made nearly two billion dollars JUST BECAUSE of the book fans. Others like to say that they didn't advertise the movies enough, because a huge marketing campaign can make ANY movie a blockbuster. Yeah, no. After Earth disproved that theory, as it had $100 million spent on advertising, which is more than they SPENT making the first Hunger Games movie.

In my opinion it comes down to one simple thing: quality. It's not ALWAYS an indicator of success, but it sure as hell doesn't hurt. People aren't as stupid as Hollywood likes to paint them, they see a trailer for these films and can often tell they're just a cash grab to capitalize off The Twilight Saga's falling star. Does Beautiful Creatures fall into the same category, or was this a labour of love that couldn't find its audience? Let's find out with A Ghoul Versus Beautiful Creatures!

A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2

Previously on The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1...

Director Rob Condon opened the Gates of Hell to give us this abomination of all that is good and holy in the world: Renesmee. Also, what can laughingly be called the narrative of Twilight started smoking meth and doing bath salts while shooting up with Edward's favourite drug, heroin. It only gets worse from here folks. Let's rip the head off The Twilight Saga once and for all as it's time for A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2!

The movie opens with a LOT of landscape footage porn as we all anxiously await Bella to start narrating another emo poem she wrote in the sixth grade. And wait. And wait... Jesus, did I throw in Prometheus by mistake? We cut to a lot of closeups of Bella's face and eyes as she... looks around. THRILLING!  Edward starts talking to her- BULLSHIT! Where is my endless boring narration by Bella “I Live Up My Own Ass” Swan?! We're not even five minutes in yet and I'm already pissed off. I wanted to see a TWILIGHT movie, not whatever the hell this is.

A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1

Previously on The Twilight Saga: Eclipse...

The people who helped this film earn almost $700 million dollars set the human race back at least three decades, but I'm going to say five for good measure. No, you want a summary? Alright here it is: remember at the end of New Moon when Bella chose Edward over Jacob? Well, she didn't SUPERCHOOSE Edward because she spent the entirety of Eclipse doing it again. The end. They mixed in a whole bunch of boring nonsense about Bella marrying Edward so he'll make her a zzzZZZzzz... I fell asleep just thinking about it.

To their credit, they DID resolve the epic Victoria saga that was a whopping THREE FILMS IN THE MAKING. Oh you remember the legendary Victoria saga, don't you? Who can forget her memorable debut in the first movie where she was on screen for about five minutes and said I think three lines? How about the second movie, where she ran from some werewolves for a quick music video? This was so worth the well crafted payoff of the last movie, where she put in nearly TEN MINUTES of screen time before getting her head torn off. Hmm... doesn't sound as compelling when you actually type it all out.

A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (Part 2)

Click here for Part 1!

Back to Seattle to see some more newborn vampire destruction. This time we see the Volturi- and no, Aro isn't here so it sucks- watching them. And that's the scene. I should note Dakota Fanning looks SO BORED, and boy do I feel her pain.  We go to the Forks High School Graduation, where Jessica is giving the valedictorian speech. Wait, JESSICA? The character who's been portrayed as an absolute rambling airhead for the past three movies? As opposed to Angela, who has always been super intelligent and very eloquent?

The post-graduation party is held at the Cullens', which gets crashed by Jacob and his friends. Bella immediately asks him to leave, y'know, cos of all the date rape stuff but he apologizes because he didn't REALLY mean to do it so it's all okay! And just to show that he's really really sorry, he gives her a bracelet he made which she gushes over because it so SHINY AND PRETTY! All is instantly forgiven!  I really hope all you ladies are taking notes, a guy can touch you against your will all he wants but as long as he says he was sorry and gives you a gift, it's all TOTALLY OKAY. Thanks Stephenie Meyer!

A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (Part 1)

Previously on The Twilight Saga: New Moon...

Edward worried that if he kept seeing his beloved Bella it would lead to her death, so he ditched her. Being totally codependent upon a man to even function, Bella went into a coma for three months before remembering there are other men she could totally be using to boost her self esteem so she targeted Jacob Black and started leading him on HARDCORE.

However it turns out Jacob is a werewolf in one of the CLUMSIEST allegories for homosexuality ever tackled in the history of fiction, as... actually nothing. What WAS the point of introducing the werewolves? It's not like it added ANYTHING to the Bella/Jacob dynamic at this point, as Edward was out of the picture. Huh.  Oh, anyway Bella was full on looney tunes at this point and started hallucinating visions of Edward whenever she risked her life... it just struck me how INCREDIBLY stupid these movies are when you break them down like this.

Alright, alright. Due to a misunderstanding ripped out of a 1970s sitcom Edward thinks Bella is dead and is going to kill himself by pissing off the unofficial lords of the vampires. Bella intervenes, the vampires agreeing to spare the Cullens if Bella becomes a vampire. Edward only agrees to make Bella a vampire if she'll marry him.

A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: New Moon (Part 2)

Click here for Part 1!

Jacob brushes this off though, and runs off to join up with Sam and the rest of the Shirtless. Later Bella decides to go for a hike in the woods, because that turned out SO well last time. Hey this time's even better, as she runs into Laurent! He's not quite the helpful person he was last time, as he's here as a favour to Victoria to see if she's still under Cullen protection. He decides to just kill her himself since there isn't a Cullen in sight. Well, a REAL Cullen that is as Hallucination Edward pops back up to advise Bella how to deal with the vampire.

It doesn't work, Laurent about to kill Edward when a group of GIGANTIC and OH SO FAKE LOOKING CGI wolves appear and chase him away. Bella escapes, heading back home. Jacobs soon shows up, and this is almost exactly like the first movie. Edward/Jacob tells Bella they can't be friends, but then next scene goes to talk to her. Sigh.

A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: New Moon (Part 1)

Previously on The Twilight Saga: Twilight...

Human mannequin Bella Swan falls in lust with psychopathic vampire Edward Cullen. She wants him to make her a vampire so they can be together forever, but he refuses because she's a psycho hose beast that makes HIM look tame by comparison. Also, they kill a rival vampire named James and his girlfriend Victoria vows revenge. Wow, it took them two hours to tell that story.

Like I said in the last review, the first Twilight was a huge smash and the second it was done Summit Entertainment got to work on turning the second book of the series into their next blockbuster film. Director of the first film Catherine Hardwicke had to drop out due to “timing conflicts”, so they brought in Chris Weitz to helm the project. A baffling choice, as Chris Weitz was fresh off the HORRIBLE book adaption of The Golden Compass, something I can never understate how WRONG it was. A review might be forthcoming, but then that'd require having to watch that again so I'm torn.

But it didn't seem to matter as New Moon ended up being an even BIGGER hit than Twilight and nearly DOUBLED its worldwide gross at a jaw-dropping $700 million dollars. That means this one HAS to be good, right? The answer shall be revealed as it's for A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: New Moon!

A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: Twilight (Part 2)

Click here for Part 1!

In fifty years when Stephenie Meyer reveals she wrote this whole series just to troll people and secretly make fun of anyone who said they loved it, I'm going to nod approvingly. I've talked a lot in the past about Hollywood romances NOT being based off any kind of love but instead just physical lust masquerading as love. You can go through every movie in the HISTORY of film and not find a better example than Twilight.

+Bella sees Edward and gets all quivery in the knees because he is TOTES HAWT

+Edward treats Bella like complete shit but keeps talking to her because she is TOTES HAWT
+Edward saves Bella's life but keeps treating her like shit. She's okay with that because he's TOTES HAWT
+Edward warns Bella to stay away from him but keeps talking to her because she is TOTES HAWT
+Edward saves Bella's life again and warns her to stay away from him again. She's okay with that because he's TOTES HAWT
+Edward is still TOTES HAWT
+Bella is still TOTES HAWT
=THEY'RE IN LOVE!

A Ghoul Versus The Twilight Saga: Twilight (Part 1)

"Uh-oh, you knew this one was coming..."

The Twilight Saga! What more can you say? Critically reviled... porn for teenage girls... the death of cinema... pretty much every negative label you think of to put on a film, these movies have worn it. But they've also grossed over a THREE BILLION DOLLARS worldwide, so obviously a FEW people must like them.

Author Stephenie Meyer finished writing the first Twilight novel in 2003, and it was immediately the subject of a bidding war between numerous publishing companies. Everyone involved could sense the story was special, and had the potential to compete with the juggernaut that was Harry Potter (the fifth novel of that series had come out a few months prior) to become the Next Big Thing.

A little known fact is that during the book's journey to getting published, its film rights were bought by MTV in 2004. MTV being, well MTV, planned to radically change the movie to the point where Bella was doing to be a flashy track star who loved rap. Which actually sounds just about right given the quality of their products... COUGH COUGH Teen Wolf COUGH COUGH.