The thirteenth anniversary of “Twilight” is on November 21st, so why not celebrate the franchise in its entirety?
In 2008, a cultural reset was released. Starting off as a book in 2005, Stephanie Meyer detailed the wonderful love story between a vampire and a human. The following books came out in 2006, 2007, and 2008. Known as Twilight, the vampire-romance movie captured the attention of millions. Grossing over $400 million worldwide, Twilight’s franchise movies, New Moon, Eclipse, Breaking Dawn Part 1 and Breaking Dawn Part 2, went on to earn $700 million, $698 million, $712 million, and $829 million respectively between the years of 2008 and 2012 (altogether making $3.4 billion dollars). What other franchise has done that? The Twilight franchise is iconic, and here are the reasons why:
Plot
Twilight focuses on the main character, Bella, and her two love interests, Edward and Jacob. The most captivating component is the split between fans: Team Edward or Team Jacob. This kept fans interested, and the choice kept the storyline spicy. Also, no other franchise had more attractive love interests. Besides the casting, these scenes in each movie, although not in any particular order, made the franchise incredibly memorable:
Twilight focuses on the main character, Bella, and her two love interests, Edward and Jacob. The most captivating component is the split between fans: Team Edward or Team Jacob. This kept fans interested, and the choice kept the storyline spicy. Also, no other franchise had more attractive love interests. Besides the casting, these scenes in each movie, although not in any particular order, made the franchise incredibly memorable:
- Twilight: The baseball scene capturing the Cullen family playing baseball with Bella during a thunderstorm.
- Twilight: Bella confronting Edward in the woods about what he is.
- Twilight: Bella begins researching vampire myths and beliefs.
- Twilight: Bella meeting Edward’s family for the first time and the montage of their time together at his house, including Edward playing the piano.
- Twilight: Edward watching Bella sleep at night (so romantic).
- Twilight: Edward sucking the venom out of Bella’s blood while a song he sings plays in the background.
- New Moon: Bella staring out of the window for months after Edward leaves.
- New Moon: Bella running through a crowd of people to find Edward.
- New Moon: Bella jumping off of a cliff in the hopes that she’ll see a vision of Edward.
- Eclipse: Victoria running through the woods to escape capture.
- Eclipse: Edward proposing to Bella.
- Eclipse: Edward and Jacob’s heated encounter over Bella.
- Eclipse: Jasper and Rosalie’s backstories.
- Eclipse: The fight scene between the Cullens and werewolves versus the Victoria and the newborns.
- Breaking Dawn Part 1: Edward and Bella’s wedding.
- Breaking Dawn Part 1: Bella giving birth to Renesmee.
- Breaking Dawn Part 1: The entirety of the honeymoon scenes.
- Breaking Dawn Part 2: Bella’s transformation into a vampire.
- Breaking Dawn Part 2: Bella going off on Jacob for imprinting on Renesmee.
- Breaking Dawn Part 2: The fight scene between the Cullen family and friends versus the Volturi.
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Cinematography
One of the most iconic things about the Twilight film itself is the blue filter on the whole movie. The first Twilight movie is the only film in the franchise with the blue filter, while the rest have warmer filter-tones to them. The blue tint makes the film extremely aesthetically pleasing. When the blue filter is taken off, we can see how the impact of the first Twilight movie is lessened and actually quite unpleasant. The blue tone enhances the Forks, WA setting and weather and overall pale tones of the main characters. This contrasts with the warm filter in New Moon because that movie focuses on the relationship between Bella and Jacob, the werewolf love interest, while Twilight focused on Bella and Edward. The blue tones fit the vampires' coldness and exclusiveness while the warmer, orange/brown tones fit the werewolves' fur complexion and body temperature–making them the opposite of the vampires. |
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Soundtrack
Movies are nothing without the music that accompanies them. Twilight’s legendary soundtrack for each movie adds to the experience of the franchise. The best songs, in my opinion, from Twilight are:
Breaking Dawn Part 1’s best songs:
Spotify users have created Twilight themed playlists with twilight-esque songs or songs from the movie. Some of my favorites are:
Movies are nothing without the music that accompanies them. Twilight’s legendary soundtrack for each movie adds to the experience of the franchise. The best songs, in my opinion, from Twilight are:
- “Supermassive Black Hole” - Muse
- “Decode” - Paramore
- “Bella’s Lullaby”
- “Clair de Lune”
- “Let Me Sign” - Robert Pattinson
- “Possibility” - Lykke Li
- “Roslyn” - Bon Iver & St. Vincent
- “Slow Life” - Grizzly Bear
Breaking Dawn Part 1’s best songs:
- “It Will Rain” - Bruno Mars
- “Turning Page” - Sleeping At Last
- “A Thousand Years” - Christina Perri
- “Flightless Bird, American Mouth” - Iron & Wine
- “Requiem on Water” - Imperial Mammoth
Spotify users have created Twilight themed playlists with twilight-esque songs or songs from the movie. Some of my favorites are:
- “Holocene” - Bon Iver
- “Eyes on Fire” - Blue Foundation
- “Dream, Ivory” - Dream,Ivory
- “K.” - Cigarettes After Sex
- “Hearing Damage” - Thom Yorke
- “Space Song” - Beach House
- “Hearing” - Sleeping At Last
- “Apocalypse” - Cigarettes After Sex
- “Sweet” - Cigarettes After Sex
- “Full Moon” - The Black Ghosts
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Fan base
The fans of a franchise make it what it is. Twilight memorabilia is sold so frequently. Stores like Hot Topic, EBay, Amazon, Etsy, Walmart, and more sell Twilight-themed or inspired items because they know how big the fan base is. From a business standpoint, selling Twilight merchandise would gain a large amount of money. Fans don't stop at wanting memorabilia. There are tons of social media pages dedicated to Twilight. A popular page on Twitter, @twilightreborn, has 126.3K followers. The Twilight Saga page itself, @Twilight, has 1.2M followers, all accumulated since 2009. There are pages on tiktok dedicated to edits of twilight scenes like @twilight_forever_edits, @emilyinvelaris, and @kiaacullen. The best part about the fan base is the way they know the movie inside and out. Many fans from different countries have provided video evidence of participating in a “Twilight movie marathon” at movie theaters near them with other Twilight fans of that area. The Twilight franchise bonds women as sports bonds men. |
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Relevance
During that time, no one else was creating vampire movies. When the movie came out, it was in a lane of its own. Because of this, I believe it was a cultural reset. Movies after Twilight that tried to imitate its impact did not meet the bar. Twilight appealed greatly to its target audience of teenage girls. It's also one of the best, if not the all-time best, novel-to-movie adaptation. The movie’s enormous popularity granted the main actors, Kristin Stewart and Robert Pattinson, immediate career progression. They would grow to become one of pop culture's most influential actors. Although the storyline takes place in a made-up world, its mysterious and romantical theme makes it not only a classic but a comfort movie for so many people. |
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It can not be debated whether Twilight is iconic or not. Not only does the movie basically speak for itself, but I’ve also pointed out the key factors that make it so revolutionary. I’m forever grateful to Stephanie Meyer's wonderful creation of this story.
Symone conway
