The Twilight Saga and Mormonism
This whole series seems to be infused with Mormonism, which is understandable considering the author. Edward is described physically as Joseph Smith; Carlisle is in many ways portrayed as God; even Rosalie Hale is quite obviously a reference to Smith's first wife, Emma Hale. Similarly, the morals in the story are largely Mormon: No sex before marriage, when it happens no attempts are made at birth-control. Free choice only exists so a person can choose to be virtuous by choosing to suffer, which Bella and the Cullens do continuously throughout; Bella by moving to Forks and taking on all kinds of domestic chores afterwards, the Cullens by abstaining from human blood which weakens them and causes them to always be longing for it.
When Bella becomes a vampire, she does it by dying - and being reborn as a Saint, finally equal to her angel Edward. The sparkle-in-sunlight effect is comparable to a body-sized halo, such as saints are seen to have in certain paintings. Of course, once one is a vampire one is practically omnipotent - there is nothing you can't do - like a God.
Meyer herself has admitted to being influenced by Mormonism in her writings, although she denies intending it as propaganda.
However, when Bella sees Edward's "phase" of murdering people in his vampire youth as "natural", it is more reminiscent of Meyer's views on youthful mistakes - like giving Jacob a free pass on his sexual assaults and pedophilia - than of anything an actual person who isn't a sociopath would say.
How becoming a vampire affects you
The LiveJournal site Das Sporking has a rather interesting analysis of how going from human to vampire changes a person and enhances their core personality traits - just not the way Meyer intended. Check it out here
, starting about half-way down the page.But to summarize: Turning into a vampire seems to solidify and intensify your beliefs to the point that you treat them as reality no matter what the actual reality is, and your wants turn into needs and you feel entitled to them no matter what. Also due to the first point you are unable to reconsider them in any way. Also it enhances more than your core personality traits – it has this effect on everything you are.
Why The Series Is So Widely Loathed
(This is going to crib heavily from Lindsay Ellis.) While Twilight was critically panned and undeniably flawed, much media is, but Twilight is unique in the level of hate it gets. While it may be cliched and unrealistic, there are many wildly successful and critically disdained works that are (the Transformers Film Series comes to mind.)So what's the difference? Transformers is based on male Wish-Fulfillment- getting hot girls, seeing robots beat each other to pulp, etc. By contrast Twilight is based around female Wish-Fulfillment- being rescued by a super-rich, super-handsome, super-powerful sparkly vampire. As such,it is widely seen as making Bella seem passive and the narrative sexist- when ultimately, the misogyny may be (almost certainly unintentionally) with the person criticising it for being sexist, You Bastard!.
Why The Series Is So Widely Loathed, Part II
Credit to Cinema Therapy for much of this.Many have called out the creepiness of the assorted romantic relationships in Twilight, calling Edward an abusive, controlling stalker and Jacob at best a Dogged Nice Guy who gradually loses the "nice" part. But Cinema Therapy's series on the series goes into deeper detail, showing how these relationships are horrible on every single level, and that arguably the best way to experience Twilight is as how-to manual for the exact opposite of what a healthy relationship should look like. Edward constantly decides he knows what's best for Bella despite her wishes, she selfishly manipulates Jacob's emotions to keep him close while admitting she's being selfish, Jacob finally gets fed up and leaves only to come back deciding he wants her no matter what she wants, both Edward and Jacob insist that they know what Bella really wants despite her insistence to the contrary, and Bella herself waffles between "I'll decide what I want and make objectively bad choices" and "I am just a prize to be won." And at every turn, the story insists these toxic behaviors are super sweet and romantic and this is the ideal relationship.
To again compare to the Transformers Film Series, there's really not much messaging there, and what there is is generally bog-standard Hollywood action movie stuff. Be strong and brave, you're better than you think you are, etc. There are some problematic bits (Skids and Mudflap in the second film, and it's unintentional message that "men go to college, women just look pretty"), but they're wrapped up in such outlandishness it's hard to take them seriously (SF Debris states that unintentional message in the second film must be unintentional, because the alternative is that anything in that film was thought out). While Twilight has fantastical elements in its vampires and werewolves, those elements can be (and have been) stripped away, at which point all you're left with is The Definitive Toxic Relationship Handbook.
In that light, the level of hate Twilight gets makes more sense. There's less harmful Wish-Fulfillment out there, for both men and women. That's not saying none of the hate the series gets is because of basically the Girl-Show Ghetto, but that you can both be open to and supportive of women having their own Wish-Fulfillment fiction, and even enjoy that fiction, while still vehemently hating Twilight for really bad messaging.
