# Twilight: biggest Mary Sue ever? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 15, 2008, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912 "2008-11-15T22:22:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Rubystreak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2008, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/61 "2008-11-17T04:23:08Z")
> [@eleanorigby](#): > > And younger kids have taken Harry Potter et al to be ideals–but some of them prefer Draco or even Voldemort. This is OT, but I’ve never heard of a kid who prefers Voldemort to Harry. Or Draco. Some of them might sympathize more with Ron or Hermione than Harry, but that’s been the extent of it. > [@](#): > > These are all good things. I applaud you. But I don’t like to have books deemed too X for teens. That’s a slippery slope and not good long term. I don’t think I saw anyone in this thread at any point say the books were too X for teens or suggest that that anyone should be prevented from reading it. A lot of people are saying the books are crap and rather revolting from an adult perspective. The kids read them, you read them, you talk about it. > [@](#): > > I was concerned that your feelings weren’t limited to the Dope. I’d rather the kids were allowed to read the books and then made to think about them, then for them to be denied the reading of them at all. My feelings aren’t limited to the Dope. When I discuss the books with my students, I tell them what I think and why. We discuss it. Many of them have similar perspectives on things and can see the story for what it is and enjoy it on that basis, as I do. But deny them reading? No one suggested that at all. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2008, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/62 "2008-11-17T07:06:25Z")
I suppose I’d better read one. I’m curious how they play for a female reader who doesn’t go for romance novels or men, and doesn’t feel like an outcast. I like YA fiction, though. ---
**Author:** ![simply\_cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8c91f0/32.png) [@simply\_cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simply_cats)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2008, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/63 "2008-11-17T18:04:13Z")
I’m an adult, have taught high school and middle school, and I love the series. Is it great literature? No. But it was fun, there were a couple of places where I love the author. The biggest score for me is that it had kids _reading_. That in itself is enough to have me carrying the flag. ---
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2008, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/64 "2008-11-17T20:59:08Z")
What **Rubystreak** said upthread. I read the first two and a half because my sister threatened to quiz me on them if I didn’t (yes, even at 33 and 34, we still do stuff like this), and I enjoyed the story but HATED Bella. She was so needy and so willing to discard her family over this guy she’d just met. Irritating as all get out. Plus, I know she’s supposed to be a klutz, but the author went really over the top in that respect. My sister loves the books because, with a full-time job, she’s also commuting to her MBA every third week and is really stressed. She needs an escape, and this is a good outlet for her. ---
**Author:** ![moonstarssun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b9bd4f/32.png) [@moonstarssun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/moonstarssun)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/65 "2008-11-18T02:39:24Z")
My mom loooooves these books and gave me the first two for my b’day. I’m about 1/2 way through _Twilight_. The book is…interesting. I like vampire stories, so it has held my attention despite the clumsy writing. But I don’t see what Bella sees in Edward other than prettiness, and I see zero chemistry between them. And honestly, I think Bella’s kind of a bitch. She does nice things for people but then thinks nasty thoughts about them and treats them like shit when they’re nice to her. I’ve had to wonder about her future plans. I mean, obviously she’s smart and could go on to college and a career. What I’ve read here tells me she opts for young marriage and baby. That, as much as the creepy relationship, is disturbing to me. ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/66 "2008-11-18T03:05:31Z")
Hey, why have a career when you can spend eternity frolicking on your own island and doing whatever you want, since you are rich? Vampires are apparently in the habit of getting multiple degrees and studying or creating art all night long, so marriage won’t hamper her education any. I’m not sure I’d describe it as ‘opting’ for a baby. I haven’t read it, but this is what I know. Don’t read it if you want to be surprised. After much angst, Bella and Edward get married, thinking that a vampire and human cannot have a baby together. Bella IIRC wants to experience human sex before becoming a vampire, or something, can’t remember. So, surprise, she gets pregnant and the baby is a bizarro semi-vampire that takes only a couple of months to gestate, good thing too as it’s killing her. In what sounds like an incredibly creepy and disgusting episode, she gives birth, dies, and gets changed to vampire approximately simulateously. The baby is superintelligent and Jacob promptly imprints upon her (SKEEVY!!). Now that Bella’s a vampire and they have a superbaby and even Jacob is happy, everything is perfect and they go happily skipping off to Elysian fields of eternal vampire joy. And there’s a battle or something. ---
**Author:** ![Rubystreak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/67 "2008-11-18T03:09:20Z")
I wanted to open a thread about Bella’s baby but had no idea how to title and spoiler it appropriately so… How many times has this cliche cropped up: the super-hybrid-magic-baby who gestates and grows up at an accelerated rate? The ones that come to mind immediately are V, The 4400, Angel, and Twilight. Any I’ve forgotten? ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/68 "2008-11-18T04:35:18Z")
Other examples: Battlestar Galactica. Not at an accelerated rate, but the baby Hera has an ultra-super-duper immune system ---
**Author:** ![Rubystreak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/69 "2008-11-18T04:50:36Z")
RickJay, I’m thinking specifically of the accelerated kind, not just the super kind, if you know what I mean. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/70 "2008-11-18T05:01:32Z")
> [@Rubystreak](#): > > RickJay, I’m thinking specifically of the accelerated kind, not just the super kind, if you know what I mean. Space: 1999 - the season one episode “Alpha Child” comes to mind. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/71 "2008-11-18T05:04:48Z")
> [@Rubystreak](#): > > RickJay, I’m thinking specifically of the accelerated kind, not just the super kind, if you know what I mean. Connor wasn’t accelerated in utero, was he? Darla was pregnant most of a season, although she didn’t come find Angel until she was about ready to pop. He was raised in another dimension and came back all growed up fast to the audience, but lived a normal rate life to himself and those around him. The only think super about him was apparently his Goddess-producing sperm. (Ick.) (What was that Buffy-hijack Law?) ---
**Author:** ![Rubystreak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 5:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/72 "2008-11-18T05:27:50Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > Connor wasn’t accelerated in utero, was he? Darla was pregnant most of a season, although she didn’t come find Angel until she was about ready to pop. He was raised in another dimension and came back all growed up fast to the audience, but lived a normal rate life to himself and those around him. The only think super about him was apparently his Goddess-producing sperm. (Ick.) I was thinking of Jasmine. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/73 "2008-11-18T06:14:23Z")
> [@Rubystreak](#): > > I was thinking of Jasmine. Ah, okay. I was thinking you were thinking of (\*Twilight \*spoiler by affiliation: ) babies born to vampires. Jasmine was Fallen Cordelia’s “baby,” not a vampire’s, like Connor was. ---
**Author:** ![kushiel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bbce88/32.png) [@kushiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kushiel)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/74 "2008-11-18T18:13:31Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Just to nitpick, Bella is only a Mary Sue if she is a deliberate insertion of the **author’s persona** into the story. Mary Sues are usually without significant flaws - which, by description, is apparently not true of Bella (and what a hilarious, vampire-story-cliche name that is.) Bella isn’t really a Mary Sue; she’s flawed, and in any case doesn’t really sound anything like the author, who doesn’t appear to have ever been a loser. > > That READERS identify with a character is not really one of the defining characteristics of a Mary Sue. > > As to the book, I picked it up in the store, read about four pages, and was laughing my ass off. And it wasn’t meant to be funny. Just to nitpick, a Mary Sue is a perfect female character, what you’re referring to is a self-insert. Most self-inserts are Mary Sues, but not all Mary Sues are self-inserts. Although I do believe Bella is a Mary Sue self-insert. ---
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/75 "2008-11-18T19:10:14Z")
> [@moonstarssun](#): > > The book is…interesting. I like vampire stories, so it has held my attention despite the clumsy writing. But I don’t see what Bella sees in Edward other than prettiness, and I see zero chemistry between them. And honestly, I think Bella’s kind of a bitch. She does nice things for people but then thinks nasty thoughts about them and treats them like shit when they’re nice to her. This is the exact problem I have. Sometimes I want to slap her. And she’s so freaking single-minded. Her boyfriend has one idea - wants her to enjoy her human life, yada yada yada - and she doesn’t care. It’s like even her boyfriend’s wishes don’t mean jack, much less her family’s. With respect to the baby, eh, if she does become a vampire, it won’t matter one way or the other whether she goes to college now or 100 years from now, but still… She’s got no problem causing her parents mental anguish as long as she can stay with this guy she’s known about a year. Urgh. I knew I shouldn’t have read part of this book last night. I think I should put my Kindle down and step away slowly. ---
**Author:** ![Duke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e8c25b/32.png) [@Duke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/76 "2008-11-18T19:27:06Z")
Another example of “super-baby” syndrome: _Demon Seed_, an awful Dean Koontz book made into an even more awful movie. The father of the baby is a supercomputer! “I have prepared a nutritionally exquisite breakfast for you”! God, why did I watch that movie? ICK! ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/77 "2008-11-18T19:57:56Z")
First, the biggest Mary Sue ever has to be the doctor in _Uhura’s Song_. If you’ve never read the book, you wouldn’t understand. Second, I was extremely turned off by the creepy in Twilight. Bella is so desperately stupid and needy and Edward so desperately creepy and needy and they both mix together for a sandwich cookie of need with a creepy, stupid filling. When she is cornered by him in the parking lot and realizes that she can’t physically escape him? That’s nasty. But it is something that crops up in romance novels, maybe not as much now as it used to be. I don’t know if there are any new Rosemary Rogers getting published. Urg. ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/78 "2008-11-18T20:18:22Z")
I should make a Twilight bookbag. Someone would want that, I bet. (It might even sell better than the one with Saberhagen’s _Brother Assassin_ on it; I love that one.) Anyone want to send me a dust cover? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2008, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/79 "2008-11-18T22:30:37Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > Second, I was extremely turned off by the creepy in Twilight. Bella is so desperately stupid and needy and Edward so desperately creepy and needy and they both mix together for a sandwich cookie of need with a creepy, stupid filling. When she is cornered by him in the parking lot and realizes that she can’t physically escape him? That’s nasty. This is the best description of a couple of characters that I’ve read in a long time. Of course, now I need a sandwich cookie. With creepy, stupid filling. Mmmmm… ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2008, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912/80 "2008-11-19T00:02:50Z")
**Rubystreak** , the TV show _Xena: Warrior Princess_ did the quick-grow baby in its third season (1997-1998 – long enough ago that I figure this is no spoiler to anyone who cares). Xena’s common-law sidekick Gabrielle (Renee O’Connor) became pregnant in a _Rosemary’s Baby_ style scenario and gave birth after one episode. The child was a full-grown adult by the end of the season. Renee O’Connor wasn’t actually pregnant or anything, someone just thought this was a good idea for the show. (It wasn’t.) A few seasons later the show had to resort to the “magic baby” device again because star Lucy Lawless actually DID become pregnant. But that magic baby naturally had to gestate for the usual period of time. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twilight-biggest-mary-sue-ever/472912.md?page=5)