TDNCY

I’m a little embarrassed to say this, but I’ve been reading Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight books off and on.  Now, this is ok, because I counteract this ridiculously feminine act by doing things that are EXTRA manly, like drinking bad beer, or lifting weights or making crude comments about females.  This is how I justify reading these books.

Besides the writing being deplorable [I mean, it's REALLY, REALLY bad.  Think Goosebumps meets a third grader's romance novel.  And I'm probably not being fair to Goosebumps.  Apologies, R.L Stine.], the themes and characters in book offer NOTHING in terms of quality lessons to the youth of the world. Bella, our mopey, melodramatic protagonist does NOTHING but sit around and complain about being a teenager and how she can’t do anything without the man in her life, a vampire named Edward [whose actions probably constitute "stalking" in 45 states].  Forget the fact that she knows nothing about him [but OMG HE GLITTERZ!!!].  No, she loves him a lot passionately irrevocably [Cool! Stephanie Meyer found the "thesaurus" key in Word!]  So she sits around and waits for him to save the day.  ALL THE TIME.  This is a girl that almost dies WALKING DOWN HER ICY DRIVEWAY.  Don’t worry, young girls and leaders of tomorrow!  Whenever you find yourself in harm’s way, just sit around and complain!  No doubt, some glittery undead hunk will come save you!

Bella probably set the women’s movement back 50 years with her pathetic actions.  Great job, you daft bitch.  I will punch you in the face if you ever come out of that book and become real.  You SUCK, in every essence of the word.

But this got me thinking.  What other lessons has pop culture tried to teach us that are just plain WRONG?  That the movie totally missed on?

1. “Shrek” – This is the obvious choice to me when I first started thinking about this. Why?  Because Fiona is a babe.  I mean, come on.  Check her out. THIS CHICK ROCKS.  And yet, at the end of the movie, she chooses to end up an ogre.  AN OGRE!  WHAT IS WRONG WITH HER? This bugs the hell out of me.  It is basically telling a young, impressionable group of children that it is not just ok, but A GOOD CHOICE, to be ugly.  If there is one thing I have  learned in my 27 years of life, it is that IT IS NOT OK TO BE UGLY.  EVER.  I shudder when I think of all the cute little kids that are bashing their heads into cement so that they can choose to be ugly like Fiona.  Don’t do it, little kids!  Stay cute!  “Shrek” really missed this one.  The obvious ending was to have Fiona say “Shrek, we can be BFF. And little king man, leave me alone. I’m going to go find a Mark-like fictional cartoon character to be with.”  Everyone wins in this case and it teaches kids that you can be totally hot and end up with a good single guy like me, not an ugly ogre who lives in a God-forsaken swamp with an annoying talking donkey as a best friend.

2. “The Lion King” – Timon and Pumbaa have it right.  When life gives you lemons, you can make lemonade.  And if life gives you a big pile of coal, just bail dude.  HAKUNA MATATA, yo!  No worries!  Simba runs away to live the life! He lives in a beautiful jungle and lays around doing nothing.  He’s on a permanent vacation!  It’s the best! As Joel Hahn would tell you, “JUST LIVING THE DREAM, SON!”  And yet, some dumb baboon comes and convinces him he has to come back, risk his life and try to save his old home.  Well, I call bull.  If life gets difficult, you should run away and never return.  Scar gave GREAT advice!  And Simba followed it!  And Timon and Pumbaa furthered Simba’s emotional development…only to have it crushed by some ridiculous, misplaced sense of destiny thanks to some babbling baboon who is a freakin’ lunatic.  Destiny doesn’t exist.  Hedonism does.  Slack off and love it should have been the message here.  Instead, you have all these impressionable youth thinking it is ok to risk your life for something that has no direct influence on you anymore.  Disney really dropped the ball on this one.  All hail, Timon and Pumbaa!  Two characters Disney actually got right.

3. “Mulan” – So what exactly is the lesson here?  That it is ok to cross-dress and deceive people?  Not at all!  Can you imagine all of the poor little Chinese girls growing up thinking they can hang with the entire Hun army?!  YOU CAN’T, KIDS!  If you think you can individually take down an entire swarm of pissed off, angry Huns by simply dressing up like a boy and running the other way when everyone is retreating you will end up dead, NOT a hero!  What kind of role model is Mulan?  She lies, deceives, betrays her family and makes embarrassingly awful decisions.  But that’s ok, so long as you can have some stone-turned-real dragon that sounds like that annoying donkey from “Shrek” to help your lucky ass out.  And you think after all that, your superior is going to want to marry you?  He’ll be so embarrassed about everything he would probably just honor kill himself.  NOTHING IN THIS MOVIE WILL HAPPEN IF YOU TRY TO DO THESE THINGS.  Disney drops the ball again.  Bah!

This dude was one HELL of a lucky cricket.  I’ll tell you that much.

4. “Avatar” – So all I got out of this movie was that it is cool to be a furry.  Was that your message, James Cameron?  That it is ok to be a furry?  BECAUSE IT IS NEVER OK TO BE A FURRY.  What’s next?  Are we going to have some epic about a human straight up marrying a cat?  Who cares, as long as there are some explosives with a great score in the background.  Oh!  And make it in 3D.  And make some cool creatures that spin around in circles and create a beautiful glow.  By the end of the movie, people will completely forget that the main point of your billion dollar movie is that being a furry is really cool.  I look forward to reading about all of the impressionable youth who try to marry their dog in the next decade.

5. “High School Musical” – Oh, you poor kids in elementary school who think that high school is girls that look like Vanessa Hudgens, boys that look like Zac Efron and everyone sings in the hallway together.  How disappointed you will be when you finally get there.  I can’t wait until some freshman breaks into a musical number on his first day of high school.  Your ass is getting shoved in a locker, kid.  Maybe just a swirlee if you’re lucky.  But either way, you’re getting pounded.

All high school kids look like this!  And they all jump in unison all the time!  Yeah, high school, yeah!

Discuss amongst yourselves…more later this week…