October 1, 2025 • 30 mins
Remember the first time you picked a side and meant it? Twilight wasn’t just a teen vampire romance—it was a portable universe that made you choose a tribe, memorize the quotes, and plan midnight screenings with friends who laughed at the same lines you did. We revisit that spark and unpack how a “cringe” classic evolved into a cozy, communal ritual that still fills theaters, Discords, and bookshelves.
We get candid about why the story works despite its flaws: first-person POV that pulls you inside a rainy small town, a love triangle built with real parity, and a world so inhabitable fans still visit Forks and sleep in “Bella’s house.” From Team Edward vs. Team Jacob to the billion-dollar merchandising machine, the magic sits at the intersection of relatability, ritual, and memes that aged into nostalgia. Along the way, we map the growth of adjacent fandom cultures—AO3 tagging, “dead dove do not eat” warnings, and the consent language that lets readers explore darker territory without stumbling into it.
We also dive into why some readers drift from certain MF romances, how queer romance reframes power, and what “cozy dark romance” offers that keeps trust intact: punish the villains, protect the bond, deliver catharsis. Expect hot takes on love triangles that actually work, why ship wars supercharge engagement, and how marketing misreads around intimate partner violence can tank a film even when the source material tries to tell the truth. If you’ve ever defended a campy favorite with a grin, or built a playlist for a ship no one can talk you out of, you’re in the right place.
Join our rewatch plans, weigh in on teams, and help steer future breakdowns. Subscribe, leave a review, and share this with the one friend who still knows every line by heart—then tell us in Discord what fandom we should unpack next.
Want the uncut chaos + bonus episodes? Join us inside the cult at Patreon.com/TheBurnedOutMuse. Or find everything else (Discord, socials, freebies) at linktr.ee/theburnedoutmuse.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:13):
Hey everyone, welcome to episode three of the
Feral Fandoms Podcast.
Today we are talking aboutTwilight.
I'm only James, romance author,fandom guru, and educator on all
(00:33):
things righty.
And Shannon here is ShannonAzelle, and she is I'm a author
PA, Mother of Dragons, Breakerof Chains.
SPEAKER_01 (00:45):
That's it.
That's my bio.
Nothing else.
It's right there.
SPEAKER_00 (00:50):
It's right there on our website.
Supporting Mother of Dragons.
Supporting actor.
I'm excited to talk aboutTwilight.
This is usually the time of yearwe start watching Twilight.
We do a rewatch.
SPEAKER_01 (01:03):
Practical magic, all of it.
SPEAKER_00 (01:05):
Yeah.
I was thinking about maybe weshould watch it online together
and then put it on the Patreon.
SPEAKER_01 (01:11):
Or we can do it live.
We can do it live.
SPEAKER_00 (01:13):
Yeah.
We can do live on Patreon now.
So if you guys want to watchpractical magic with us or Hocus
Pocus or hell, even Twilight,let us know and we'll set it up.
Yeah.
We can either do it in theDiscord or we can do it live on
Patreon.
Either one.
I thought that would be funbecause I love watching movies
and watching people react tothem.
It's my favorite thing.
(01:33):
And it's what we do every yearanyway, so we might as well let
people watch it.
SPEAKER_01 (01:37):
Trigger warning if you don't like talking during
the movie.
SPEAKER_00 (01:40):
Oh yeah, no.
We're very MST3K about ourmovies.
Even if they're not supposed tobe funny, we're gonna talk shit.
That's just what we do.
100%.
It's who we are, it's people.
SPEAKER_01 (01:51):
I never read it.
You've never read the book?
I didn't read it.
I was a huge vampire diariesfanatic.
Absolute.
SPEAKER_00 (01:59):
I introduced you to the vampire diaries.
SPEAKER_01 (02:01):
I had a whole journal about how I was in love
with a man that is fictional andI was really processing my
12-year-old emotions with that.
I had to really unpack that too.
SPEAKER_00 (02:10):
It was such a good series.
I was, as far as the vampirediaries goes, I was preaching
the word.
I was preaching the gospel.
I was giving those books toeverybody.
Like, no, you have to read thesebooks.
And then when Twilight came out,I'll tell you what, I learned
about Twilight the weirdest way.
I was on a date.
Which one?
Fuck was it?
SPEAKER_01 (02:30):
How uniform did he wear?
SPEAKER_00 (02:32):
I went through a stage.
He went to the bathroom and Iwas standing in the theater with
a bunch of teenagers, and I waslistening to them gossip about
how excited they were that theTwilight movie was coming out.
They saw me and they were justlike, you know about Twilight,
right?
Do I look like a fuckingteenager?
I do not know about Twilight.
And they just started going onand on about, oh my god, it's
(02:53):
the best thing ever.
And they're just going crazy.
Damn.
Okay.
Shit.
So I'll go to the bookstore andI'll start to read it.
And if I can get through onechapter and I really like it,
I'll buy it and I'll read it.
Because I wasn't really in theYA stuff back then.
I was more into my thrillers andmy Kathy Reich era and my what's
her name?
(03:13):
Freedom McFadden.
That type of book was my thingat the time.
So I opened Twilight and I readchapters just standing in the
aisle.
And so I bought the book.
And the thing about Twilight isthat it's not technically.
I don't want to say wellwritten, but it's not literary.
You know what I mean?
(03:34):
It's not Jane Austen.
SPEAKER_01 (03:35):
I'm not a snob.
I'm in it, I'm in it to have atime.
Like, I don't care.
SPEAKER_00 (03:40):
I always say you don't have to be a good writer
to write a good book.
Correct.
It was there was this feeling ofyou wanted to live in forks, you
wanted to meet these characters,you wanted to be part of that
world, but also you could relateto Bella even though she was
kind of whiny.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Even Elena.
Elena in the show was very whinytoo, the vampire diaries.
(04:02):
But yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (04:03):
We gotta do a vampire diaries a podcast.
Oh, we're definitely doing it.
Unless I don't want to hearanything Elena has to say.
SPEAKER_00 (04:07):
We can have an entire podcast just about the
vampire diaries.
Especially right now.
Jordan's doing her annualrewatch of the Vampire Diaries,
so it's in the background in ourhouse all the time.
But Twilight specifically wasjust this magical sort of I
don't know, it just took overand it got in your head.
And looking back, there's somuch camp and there's so much
(04:32):
like cringe in it.
But at the time it didn't feelthat way.
You know what I mean?
The movie definitely came off alittle cringe.
SPEAKER_01 (04:40):
It didn't have time.
It did at the time at the time Ithought it was cinematic
masterpiece.
SPEAKER_00 (04:46):
Masterpiece.
Yeah.
It makes me laugh that nobodyhates that movie more than Mr.
Cullen himself.
Robert Patton hates that movie.
He doesn't even want you tobring it up.
He'll never get away from theSouth.
Never.
Yeah.
It must suck to have the moviethat made your career be
(05:07):
something that you just wantpeople to forget exists.
SPEAKER_01 (05:10):
Yeah.
Sometimes you gotta be a littlecringe.
People take themselves tooseriously.
Robert, you were a silly littleteenage vampire.
It's all right.
Doesn't care.
Taylor Lautner.
Taylor Lautner's like, hellyeah, I'm a wolf.
Ow.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (05:22):
Taylor Lautner marrying Taylor made me laugh.
Because now there's like Taylor.
Taylor Swift.
SPEAKER_01 (05:28):
Yeah.
Like, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (05:29):
Sir, do you just really love yourself?
SPEAKER_01 (05:31):
I love the sound of my name, and I want to make sure
I have the opportunity to say itin bed.
SPEAKER_00 (05:36):
If I looked like Taylor Lautner, I would probably
be in love with myself too.
He went through a bit of a phasewhere he definitely uggied up a
little.
SPEAKER_01 (05:48):
I think it was hard for him to maintain that muscle
mass for him.
It was.
SPEAKER_00 (05:52):
I guarantee you, whatever they made him do to
gain that muscle mass betweenmovie two and three was not
healthy and not safe in any way,shape, or form.
When you hear people talk about,oh, I can't drink water for 24
hours before I shoot or I lookbloated, that's not normal.
You shouldn't not drink water.
SPEAKER_01 (06:12):
And then a one reason why I think this movie
was so addictive and created thefandom that it did is people
love a team situation.
Team Edward, Team Jacob, andthat created like a fun
atmosphere.
I'm in this, not just in thisfandom, I'm in this, in this
niche thing.
SPEAKER_00 (06:29):
Yep.
Ship wars can make or break amovie.
When it comes to ship wars, youhave to make both sides equally
appealing.
Because if one is the clearwinner, it's not really a love
triangle.
Nobody would choose that guyover this guy.
So you have to make them bothequally appealing, but in
completely different ways.
(06:49):
Yeah.
And that takes talent that youhave to be real careful with.
Also, you gotta roll with thepunches.
Look at the vampire diary.
She ends up with Stefan in thebook, she ends up with Damon in
the book.
Don't get me started.
SPEAKER_01 (07:01):
They butchered it.
But I will say too, a lot ofpeople, because I read more
traditional stuff, they tell youtoo soon who it's gonna be.
Does that make sense?
It's enemies to lovers, butokay, she's with her best friend
growing up, and then it's thegrumpy guy that has to train her
for battle or whatever.
And he's a little bit sarcasticand a little bit mean to her,
and they're calling that enemiesto lovers.
I need him to burn her housedown.
(07:22):
You know what I mean?
Maybe he killed her brother.
You know what I mean?
That's an enemy.
So you want Avatar.
Yes.
You want other Avatar levels ofbad.
I need him to murder people, andnothing redeems it except for
that he's hot and we love him.
That's enemy.
He's a little mean to mesometimes.
SPEAKER_00 (07:38):
That's what I keep telling Mikhaila because she's
writing now.
And she's like, this guy is sucha bad guy.
The only thing he has going forhim is that he's hot.
She's like, I want them to knowthat he's irredeemable.
I was like, if he's hot, he'snot irredeemable.
We're in our dark romance era,babe.
There's no line too far.
I can tell you just from beingin the genre that I am in, there
(08:00):
is no line too far.
Yeah.
They'll never find them again.
Oh, I will bring mads on.
That girl has read books thatare.
Morning Glory Milking Farm?
Listen, when she told me thestory about the shark, the
girl's head in the water withthe shark and the yeah, no.
(08:21):
Mm-mm.
Damn, no, you really do readsome dark shit.
Yeah.
Because I write dark romance,but I write cozy dark romance.
They call it.
So a lot of people.
Some girl told me the other day,I just listen to your books
every single night to sleep.
Yeah.
Lately, she's like, oh no, forabout the last couple years.
But then I watch BuzzfeedUnsolved Supernatural over and
(08:42):
over and over again.
I sleep to it.
So I guess that makes sense.
Once you find your comfort.
SPEAKER_01 (08:46):
You know what's going to happen.
And in your books, they're notkilling off a beloved character
randomly.
You're not No, I only kill badguys.
Yeah, you only kill bad guys.
So they know they're gonna getthat dopamine, the bad guy got
it in the end.
And you're gonna put themthrough it trauma-wise for your
main characters, but you're notgonna hurt the reader.
Some people like their trustbroken.
They really do.
Yeah, I read Troubled IrishTeenagers in Bally Lagan.
(09:10):
Nothing good happens toteenagers in Bally Lagun.
Just gonna put it that way.
SPEAKER_00 (09:15):
There.
That's I wrote the books Iwanted to read because I loved
Dexter, and I like that the badguys always got the worst
possible punishment imaginable.
Because my sense of justice verymuch is in line with my autism,
and that I have zero sympathyfor a certain type of person,
(09:38):
and it doesn't matter how badthe punishment is.
I just go well.
Would startle a therapist.
SPEAKER_01 (09:54):
They're inside thoughts, but I could tell her
because I know that she's alsotorturing fascists in her.
SPEAKER_00 (10:00):
Well, she's torturing people in my books is
my therapy.
It is my catharsis, it is what Ido to get through how shitty
this world is.
SPEAKER_01 (10:10):
That's why people like reading them, is the bad
guy's getting it.
And also there's a backstory foreach individual character that
every reader picks a differentMulvaney in particular.
And they you can see it in thereader group that they're
shipping.
They're like in Twilight, theyhave their guy and they give him
little nicknames, and then wegather that information, and
(10:34):
then Nina does like a standeewith you know what I mean,
something exactly.
SPEAKER_00 (10:39):
It comes from the sense of community.
I think, like we said withfandoms, there's a community
that comes together over acommon passion or whatever.
When it comes to ship wars andstuff, it gets even bigger than
that.
It's fun.
It's fun to be like, no, I'mTeam Edward, or it's fun to say,
no, I'm Team Jacob.
I wouldn't want to be a vampire,I want to be a werewolf.
Like that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_01 (10:59):
And giving them safe spaces to do it to Reddit or
somewhere where someone mightlike not like the books or not
like the authors.
They can go to Patreon andPatreon, Facebook, Discord.
Yeah.
She provides platforms for herreaders to be safe in their love
for her characters.
SPEAKER_00 (11:18):
The reason Stephanie Myers became a billionaire off
of this wasn't just the booksand it wasn't just the movies.
It was the merchandising.
It was being able to sell thelicensing for all of the stuff
that came with it.
Because there's no shortage ofTwilight merch to this day.
I have the Hoa Hoa Hoa calendarthat I bought my
(11:41):
daughter-in-law, and it lives inour dining room, and we change
it every month.
And I bought it last year.
There's no shortage of it.
And now it's become a little bitof a joke.
A lot of means to go back andwe're growing up now.
Where you been, Loca?
Yeah.
Orman, you know.
So yeah.
And that's also some of thestuff.
I read book one, but book four,Breaking Dawn wasn't out yet.
(12:03):
Mick, of course, loved themovie.
She eventually got into thebooks, but at first she loved
it.
My daughter loved the movies,and she was so obsessed with it.
For her 11th birthday, it was ancomplete Twilight theme.
We took seven 11-year-olds, wetook them to the movies, and
they had, I had made like theseTwilight VIP passes that looked
(12:26):
like, you know, little, and theyhad little lanyards and stuff
like that.
And it was fun.
Everybody in the theater wasexcited.
Everybody in the theater wasjust there's an anticipation.
SPEAKER_01 (12:36):
Something and we gather in groups.
There's something so magicalabout it.
SPEAKER_00 (12:40):
It is a positive environment where everybody is
just enjoying themselves.
Yeah.
And I haven't really felt thatsince when you and I went and
saw True Crime Obsessed live.
SPEAKER_01 (12:50):
Yeah, that was fun.
SPEAKER_00 (12:51):
Like we met so many cool people.
The only thing we had in commonwas that we all like true crime.
And this podcast in particular.
SPEAKER_01 (13:00):
And it is a certain group of people that get the
humor of it and theinclusiveness, and they share
our same viewpoints.
SPEAKER_00 (13:07):
They have the vibe.
Exactly.
And that's what this podcast isgoing to be.
It's going to be people whoeither get our vibe or they
don't.
And some people are just for thelove of fuck.
Why am I tuning into this?
Get to the point.
Yeah, please, God.
There is no point.
Please don't one star us.
Just keep going.
Just walk away.
It's fine.
We're used to it.
SPEAKER_01 (13:26):
I don't like criticism.
SPEAKER_00 (13:28):
I have a problem.
I picked the wrong career forsomebody who doesn't like
criticism.
Let me just tell you that.
Oof.
SPEAKER_01 (13:34):
Don't do it.
SPEAKER_00 (13:34):
No.
I need seven to ten businessmonths to get over one bad
review.
So I don't read my reviews.
SPEAKER_01 (13:40):
We're banning her from Goodreads and Amazon.
SPEAKER_00 (13:42):
And honestly, I don't know a single author who
has the ability to just takecriticism.
Actually, that's not true.
I know one author, a guy, who itdoesn't matter what you say to
him, he's like, you know what?
I'll look into that.
And I'm like, how are you sowell adjusted?
(14:04):
Like, how do we just go book?
SPEAKER_01 (14:07):
Oh, you know what?
You're right.
Criticizing your book is likecriticizing you personally
because it came from your brain.
SPEAKER_00 (14:12):
It's like calling my baby ugly.
SPEAKER_01 (14:13):
Yeah.
I worked really hard on that.
SPEAKER_00 (14:16):
You do it then.
Go ahead.
Write a book.
You do it.
You do it.
Actually, if you're listening tothis, that's the whole reason
I'm doing this.
Oh, yeah.
Write a book, please.
SPEAKER_01 (14:24):
You can do it.
SPEAKER_00 (14:26):
We're behind you.
SPEAKER_01 (14:28):
I support you.
SPEAKER_00 (14:31):
With Twilight, it felt like a ritual.
Like you got a spell cast onyou.
You got sucked into it.
People wanted to go visit Forks,Washington.
You can still stay in Bella'shouse in Forks, Washington.
SPEAKER_01 (14:46):
I watch it as how old I'm getting.
SPEAKER_00 (14:47):
I always thought Charlie Swan.
Listen, if you had given me uhDaddy Cullen and Charlie Swan as
a couple, I would have been allfor it.
Just write that down.
You can write that.
Team Edward, Team Jacob.
No, give me Team Charlie.
Team Charlie.
That man was fine.
And he took it like a trooper.
(15:09):
Let me just tell you, a guy.
He had the most realisticreaction of any man who had all
of that shit shoved in his face.
That's interesting.
All right.
I guess this is where we're now.
Okay.
I'm here for 20 years.
SPEAKER_01 (15:24):
Never noticed.
SPEAKER_00 (15:24):
Yeah.
Not a good copy.
It reminded me of have you everseen The Lost Boys?
I know your mom and I used towatch that movie all the time.
Okay.
So 1980s movie about twobrothers and their mom who move
in with their grandpa in thissmall town in California that is
just absolutely crawling withvampires.
And the one brother gets turnedinto a vampire, and the other
(15:46):
brother is just such greatlines.
You're a vampire.
Wait till I tell mom.
So funny.
The very last line in the movieis they think they're hiding
everything from the grandfather,and he comes in at the last
minute and he saves the day.
And he's like, the one thing Ican't stand about, I think it
was Santa Anna, all the goddamnvampires.
(16:07):
That's where the movie ends.
And the whole time he knew, andthey thought they were hiding it
from him, but he's known thewhole time.
It's one of my favorite jokes.
They did it in Teen Wolf, too,where you think you're hiding
something, and then they justgive the line, and you're just
like, oh, this whole time we'vebeen thinking they were just a
normie, and they've known thewhole time.
That this whole supernaturalthing is existing.
(16:28):
But that's what I love aboutmagical realism is when you can
make people believe that thisworld does exist in your world
right now, it makes it feel waymore real than some.
I don't want to bring up theauthor that I'm thinking of
since it triggers so manypeople.
But she who shall not be named.
(16:51):
Her stuff, there wasn't itwasn't realistic.
It was a fairy tale.
The same rate they wrote thebooks like they were an
omniscient narrator.
They weren't the character, theywere watching it all happen.
Right.
You know, that's how they wrotethe book.
So it read like a fairy tale.
Whereas Stephanie Myers, like LJSmith, when they wrote, they
(17:14):
wrote in character quote infirst person.
Yeah.
So you felt you were thatcharacter.
And part of the reason I don'tread MF romance anymore is
because I don't want to identifywith the female character
because so much romance,straight romance, and I'm sorry
if I'm offending romanceauthors, but there's a lot of
(17:37):
misogyny in straight romance.
I don't want to identify withthe girl who's, oh, I don't care
that you treat me like garbage.
It's fine.
You have trauma.
Whereas strangely, in gayromance, no matter how the power
imbalance shifts, becausethey're both men, they both
(17:57):
start on an equal playing field.
Yeah.
Society-wise, they're bothconsidered equal because they're
both men.
That's true.
Whereas in a male-femalerelationship, even though women
themselves are, nope, we can dobetter than most men.
SPEAKER_01 (18:13):
I don't want to do it.
SPEAKER_00 (18:14):
Society-wise, you still know that men are out
there going, Oh, that's cute.
Isn't she cute?
More than we thought.
SPEAKER_01 (18:23):
You know.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (18:24):
Yeah, way more than we thought.
And it's only getting worse.
So I feel a little bit when Iread straight romance like I'm
betraying my gender.
I don't know.
And a lot of women feel thatway.
That's why a lot of women don'tgo back to reading straight
romance after they find gayromance.
You can just watch two peoplefall in love and you don't have
to relate to them.
You don't have to put yourselfin their shoes.
SPEAKER_01 (18:44):
Well, if you think about that Colleen Hoover movie
flopped, you know?
Well, because she portrayed it.
She wrote the book.
It was what it was.
Right.
And you're allowed to writeabout domestic violence, in my
opinion.
Yeah, of course.
And I don't think sheromanticized it.
But the way that the movie wasadvertised as a rom-comp when
really it was like the uh Itwasn't the of how abuse happens
(19:07):
small and goes big.
Um but they didn't advertise itlike that.
SPEAKER_00 (19:12):
No, because they wanted it to Colleen Hoover and
what's his name?
Baldoni.
I can't remember.
Oh, yeah, that whole thing.
They both wanted it.
Yeah.
They both wanted it to berealistic.
And I think that's what ColleenHoover was going for.
Because you don't leave a lot ofwomen, don't leave their
abusers.
Right.
And also in the movie, she's anadult, but in the books, she's a
(19:35):
teenager.
SPEAKER_01 (19:36):
It goes back and forth.
It goes back and forth.
She has the I read it.
She is the original guy, thehomeless teenager.
The guy she ends up with thefirst one.
It should have been astandalone.
But anyway.
I didn't realize there was morethan one book.
It begins with us, I think, isthe next one.
But I read it ends with usbefore she got canceled for
whatever.
I don't know when she gotcanceled.
But yes, it goes back and forth.
And Ellen is oddly a big part ofit.
(19:58):
That's her conflict.
SPEAKER_00 (19:59):
Like Ellen DeGeneres?
unknown (20:01):
Right?
SPEAKER_01 (20:02):
Oh.
She writes.
SPEAKER_00 (20:03):
Talk about a blast from the past.
SPEAKER_01 (20:05):
And then she meets the hot doctor guy.
And anyway, it ends with him,the original guy from when she
was a teenager.
It ends with us.
SPEAKER_00 (20:12):
Gotcha.
Because she gets away from theguy.
SPEAKER_01 (20:14):
But she has a baby with her abuser.
SPEAKER_00 (20:15):
Well, and I mean that happens.
A lot of women don't evenrealize they're with an abuser
until they get pregnant.
SPEAKER_01 (20:19):
Yeah.
Well, it honestly did show, Idon't know.
It started off small and thenwent big.
But anyway, the movie floppedbecause the way they advertised
it.
SPEAKER_00 (20:27):
Yeah, and that's what happens when you try to be
too relatable.
And I think that's what BlakeLively was going for.
She wanted to be like, heygirls, I'm just like you.
The girl in the movies, justlike you.
It could happen to anybody, butthat's not what she did.
She was so out of touch withwhat the average person thinks
when it comes to domesticviolence.
SPEAKER_01 (20:48):
The outfits.
SPEAKER_00 (20:49):
Intimate partner violence.
The outfits were one of theworst fights I ever got into was
over 50 Shades of Gray, which wewill also be breaking down.
And it was because as a nurse, Imade the comment that Christian
Gray checks every box on theintimate partner violence
(21:11):
checklist we have at my job.
And you would have thought thatI said it was the worst book I
ever read.
That's all I said was thatlisten, it's not actual BDSM.
I know, I've been a part of it.
Safe, sane, and consensual isliterally the slogan for the
BDSM community.
(21:32):
Nothing he did was safe, sane,or consensual.
And you get that kind of spadeswhen you read his version of the
book.
When she went and created hispoint of view, I think it was
just called Gray.
It read like Ted Bundy wrote it.
It was so disturbing.
(21:53):
His inner monologue.
She's having a normalconversation and he's picturing
tying her up and torturing her.
This is a criminal mindsepisode.
If he was poor and this washappening in a trailer, we would
be watching it as a criminalminds episode.
They have to be watching.
But I didn't say any of that.
SPEAKER_01 (22:08):
In every book, he's not like a poor abuser.
SPEAKER_00 (22:11):
If we're romanticizing.
SPEAKER_01 (22:13):
I just never stop the moblins romance episode.
The moblins aren't bad.
SPEAKER_00 (22:18):
Oh, but like 365.
I didn't even know 365 existeduntil it became a movie.
But and I get it.
I get wanting that fantasy.
I do.
I write dark romance.
I get wanting to be able to liveout some weird, vicarious
fantasy where you know you canlike all of the dark shit and
just no bad things happen toyou.
(22:38):
Great.
I personally, I just it's justnot my vibe.
But I remember two authors, verybig names, came for me so hard
just from that intimate partnerviolence comment.
They were, you better never getinto the romance field.
You better never write romanceif you can't stand behind your
fellow romance authors.
(23:00):
And I was like, they have aliteral movie.
Do you think E.L.
James is upset that I said that?
She's still at home blotting hertears with hundred-dollar bills.
The bitch is a billionaire.
She doesn't have time to worryabout some random girl on
Facebook who mentioned that hercharacter is an abuser.
She doesn't give a shit.
(23:20):
She started it as TwilightFanfiction.
She didn't expect her book toblow up.
It just did.
Because, again, it scratched anitch for a bunch of vanilla
soccer moms who had never reallygotten a taste of taboo romance.
You know, and I think it openeda lot of doors for a lot of
(23:41):
authors who have a lot of reallydark ideas.
And I'm super happy for all ofthose romance authors who their
careers blew up 100%.
Write anything you want.
I don't believe in censorship atall.
Honestly, but it just wasn't myvibe.
SPEAKER_01 (23:56):
This smut, people calling everything smut,
especially when it's a goodbook.
The clean versus smut romance.
Or they're like, oh, like, whatdo you consider smut?
The whole there's a beginning, amiddle, and end, there's a plot.
But like, what's smutty?
What's smutty about it?
SPEAKER_00 (24:10):
Well, people jokingly say I write gay porn.
I'm like, no.
No, you don't.
I don't write gay porn.
SPEAKER_01 (24:16):
That's honestly people that would just never
venture into a different genrethat doesn't have a direct
reflection of how they livetheir day-to-day life.
And that's sad.
Dragons, but not fucking asentient doorknob.
It's okay, it's sentient.
Okay.
It's a sentient doorknob.
SPEAKER_00 (24:33):
Sented.
It scented to this.
And that's what's so if you toldpeople 10 years ago that there
would be books where women werereading romance between a
centaur and a human.
SPEAKER_01 (24:50):
Morning glory milking candles.
SPEAKER_00 (24:51):
And they were yeah, and they didn't switch into a
human before the you know sexstuff occurred.
The milking occurred.
You would have been people wouldhave been like, no fucking way.
Well, and that's the thing.
We're moving the bar a littlebit further and further every
(25:11):
year.
Ice Ice Burns.
SPEAKER_01 (25:12):
I think Barbara is a pretty common book that people
have read.
Ice something barbarians.
Ice Planet Barbarian.
People have read it.
And it's and I just need to knowwhat's going on over there.
SPEAKER_00 (25:25):
It's a big joke, especially in the Discord.
I always say I would publish mysocial security number before I
published my fan fiction historyon AO3.
Is that oh yeah, no?
AO3 is going strong.
It's it, yeah, no, I'm on thereall the time.
But who I am on AO3 is not who Iam in real life.
(25:45):
So it's not only James LLC on A.
It sure isn't.
My name couldn't be moreanonymous on AO3.
It's definitely not only JamesL.
No, nothing to see here.
No.
But I've had the same AO3account since 2012.
So if anybody was to see myhistory, it would be a wild
(26:06):
ride.
But yeah, that's something I'llask you.
Do you know what the term deaddove do not eat means?
SPEAKER_01 (26:13):
Dead dove do not eat.
SPEAKER_00 (26:15):
There's this whole dark genre where if you're going
to write uh fucked up taboo shitabout people's favorite
characters, people are readingfanfiction because they want to
read about the characters theylove.
Uh but for some reason we alsooccasionally want to read about
(26:37):
the fucked up shit that somerandom person puts them through.
And if it's really bad, and Imean really bad, it could be
anything from cannibalism to uhunderage stuff, and they put
dead dove, do not eat.
Basically meaning this is yourwarning that this is the most
(26:58):
fucked up shit you're going toread.
So if you progress further thanthis line right here, that's on
you.
You did this, not me.
SPEAKER_01 (27:07):
Manacle, there she's publishing that shit.
I can't believe what is it?
Manacle.
It's an extremely, extremelypopular, huge fan fiction of
basically Handmaid's Tale, butHogwarts and Draminy.
The Dramy one.
People cry.
And it's, I mean, I can't readon my phone.
(27:29):
It hurts my eyes.
And obviously, you can't justbuy it, um, because that's
illegal.
SPEAKER_00 (27:35):
I don't read depressing fanfiction.
I it's the same reason I don'tread depressing books.
Like my life feels depressingenough on the day-to-day, just
when I look outside.
I don't want to be sad about thepeople I love.
And honestly, my currentobsession is actually not even
fictional characters.
I am reading fanfiction abouttwo people who exist in real
(27:56):
life and who are an actualcouple in real life, which is
really creepy and weird, but Ido it anyway.
BL?
No, it's not.
Well, it's definitely a gayship, but it is not technically
BL.
But there was this fic goingaround that everybody was raving
about, and they're like, youhave to read it.
And then I started looking intoit, and every person who read it
(28:20):
is sobbing hysterically, justsobbing when they're talking
about it.
They're like, it's the best,it's the best thing I've ever
read in my whole life.
It was so sweet and so sad.
And I'm just like, no.
And so I looked.
I was like, fuck it, I'll look.
The tags, terminal illness.
(28:40):
Nope.
Nope.
Nope.
Nope.
Terminal?
That means there's no hope.
Nope.
No way.
SPEAKER_01 (28:46):
You had to get me to give me any kind of false hope.
That's why I love triggerwarnings.
SPEAKER_00 (28:50):
Yeah, me too.
I'm a big fan of triggerwarnings for sure.
It's necessary.
I'm sorry, we definitely went ona tangent on that one.
No, but we didn't.
SPEAKER_01 (29:00):
We brought it back.
We're talking about fandom.
Because Fifty Shades of Grey isin fact part of the Twilight
Fandom.
And I think we did at least 20minutes on task.
I think we did.
We're on task for the actualpodcast.
SPEAKER_00 (29:12):
Considering what our last podcast was, we're doing
really well.
I give us a gold star because wehaven't brought up politics in
this whole episode.
So until now, I want to talkabout the one that got away.
No, they charge you a dollar aminute.
(29:33):
Oh, yeah.
Well, she doesn't want to be abroke mother.
So if you like this, pleaserate, review, subscribe.
It really helps us.
Downloads really help us.
You have us in your ear at alltimes.
You can find us at linktree.
That will take you to ourDiscord, our Patreon, our
(29:54):
website, and where you canlisten to all the back episodes
that will hopefully exist.
Eventually.
So we will talk to you nexttime.
I think we're breaking downsupernatural next.
SPEAKER_01 (30:05):
You'll be surprised.
Be surprised.
SPEAKER_00 (30:08):
And if you have an opinion, go to the Discord and
tell us what you want us tobreak down.
SPEAKER_01 (30:12):
Nice opinions.
SPEAKER_00 (30:14):
Yes, nice opinions, please.
SPEAKER_01 (30:15):
We won't follow you there, I promise.
SPEAKER_00 (30:17):
We won't forget.
We love you.
Bye.
Hey everyone, welcome to episode three of the
Feral Fandoms Podcast.
Today we are talking aboutTwilight.
I'm only James, romance author,fandom guru, and educator on all
(00:33):
things righty.
And Shannon here is ShannonAzelle, and she is I'm a author
PA, Mother of Dragons, Breakerof Chains.
SPEAKER_01 (00:45):
That's it.
That's my bio.
Nothing else.
It's right there.
SPEAKER_00 (00:50):
It's right there on our website.
Supporting Mother of Dragons.
Supporting actor.
I'm excited to talk aboutTwilight.
This is usually the time of yearwe start watching Twilight.
We do a rewatch.
SPEAKER_01 (01:03):
Practical magic, all of it.
SPEAKER_00 (01:05):
Yeah.
I was thinking about maybe weshould watch it online together
and then put it on the Patreon.
SPEAKER_01 (01:11):
Or we can do it live.
We can do it live.
SPEAKER_00 (01:13):
Yeah.
We can do live on Patreon now.
So if you guys want to watchpractical magic with us or Hocus
Pocus or hell, even Twilight,let us know and we'll set it up.
Yeah.
We can either do it in theDiscord or we can do it live on
Patreon.
Either one.
I thought that would be funbecause I love watching movies
and watching people react tothem.
It's my favorite thing.
(01:33):
And it's what we do every yearanyway, so we might as well let
people watch it.
SPEAKER_01 (01:37):
Trigger warning if you don't like talking during
the movie.
SPEAKER_00 (01:40):
Oh yeah, no.
We're very MST3K about ourmovies.
Even if they're not supposed tobe funny, we're gonna talk shit.
That's just what we do.
100%.
It's who we are, it's people.
SPEAKER_01 (01:51):
I never read it.
You've never read the book?
I didn't read it.
I was a huge vampire diariesfanatic.
Absolute.
SPEAKER_00 (01:59):
I introduced you to the vampire diaries.
SPEAKER_01 (02:01):
I had a whole journal about how I was in love
with a man that is fictional andI was really processing my
12-year-old emotions with that.
I had to really unpack that too.
SPEAKER_00 (02:10):
It was such a good series.
I was, as far as the vampirediaries goes, I was preaching
the word.
I was preaching the gospel.
I was giving those books toeverybody.
Like, no, you have to read thesebooks.
And then when Twilight came out,I'll tell you what, I learned
about Twilight the weirdest way.
I was on a date.
Which one?
Fuck was it?
SPEAKER_01 (02:30):
How uniform did he wear?
SPEAKER_00 (02:32):
I went through a stage.
He went to the bathroom and Iwas standing in the theater with
a bunch of teenagers, and I waslistening to them gossip about
how excited they were that theTwilight movie was coming out.
They saw me and they were justlike, you know about Twilight,
right?
Do I look like a fuckingteenager?
I do not know about Twilight.
And they just started going onand on about, oh my god, it's
(02:53):
the best thing ever.
And they're just going crazy.
Damn.
Okay.
Shit.
So I'll go to the bookstore andI'll start to read it.
And if I can get through onechapter and I really like it,
I'll buy it and I'll read it.
Because I wasn't really in theYA stuff back then.
I was more into my thrillers andmy Kathy Reich era and my what's
her name?
(03:13):
Freedom McFadden.
That type of book was my thingat the time.
So I opened Twilight and I readchapters just standing in the
aisle.
And so I bought the book.
And the thing about Twilight isthat it's not technically.
I don't want to say wellwritten, but it's not literary.
You know what I mean?
(03:34):
It's not Jane Austen.
SPEAKER_01 (03:35):
I'm not a snob.
I'm in it, I'm in it to have atime.
Like, I don't care.
SPEAKER_00 (03:40):
I always say you don't have to be a good writer
to write a good book.
Correct.
It was there was this feeling ofyou wanted to live in forks, you
wanted to meet these characters,you wanted to be part of that
world, but also you could relateto Bella even though she was
kind of whiny.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Even Elena.
Elena in the show was very whinytoo, the vampire diaries.
(04:02):
But yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (04:03):
We gotta do a vampire diaries a podcast.
Oh, we're definitely doing it.
Unless I don't want to hearanything Elena has to say.
SPEAKER_00 (04:07):
We can have an entire podcast just about the
vampire diaries.
Especially right now.
Jordan's doing her annualrewatch of the Vampire Diaries,
so it's in the background in ourhouse all the time.
But Twilight specifically wasjust this magical sort of I
don't know, it just took overand it got in your head.
And looking back, there's somuch camp and there's so much
(04:32):
like cringe in it.
But at the time it didn't feelthat way.
You know what I mean?
The movie definitely came off alittle cringe.
SPEAKER_01 (04:40):
It didn't have time.
It did at the time at the time Ithought it was cinematic
masterpiece.
SPEAKER_00 (04:46):
Masterpiece.
Yeah.
It makes me laugh that nobodyhates that movie more than Mr.
Cullen himself.
Robert Patton hates that movie.
He doesn't even want you tobring it up.
He'll never get away from theSouth.
Never.
Yeah.
It must suck to have the moviethat made your career be
(05:07):
something that you just wantpeople to forget exists.
SPEAKER_01 (05:10):
Yeah.
Sometimes you gotta be a littlecringe.
People take themselves tooseriously.
Robert, you were a silly littleteenage vampire.
It's all right.
Doesn't care.
Taylor Lautner.
Taylor Lautner's like, hellyeah, I'm a wolf.
Ow.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (05:22):
Taylor Lautner marrying Taylor made me laugh.
Because now there's like Taylor.
Taylor Swift.
SPEAKER_01 (05:28):
Yeah.
Like, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (05:29):
Sir, do you just really love yourself?
SPEAKER_01 (05:31):
I love the sound of my name, and I want to make sure
I have the opportunity to say itin bed.
SPEAKER_00 (05:36):
If I looked like Taylor Lautner, I would probably
be in love with myself too.
He went through a bit of a phasewhere he definitely uggied up a
little.
SPEAKER_01 (05:48):
I think it was hard for him to maintain that muscle
mass for him.
It was.
SPEAKER_00 (05:52):
I guarantee you, whatever they made him do to
gain that muscle mass betweenmovie two and three was not
healthy and not safe in any way,shape, or form.
When you hear people talk about,oh, I can't drink water for 24
hours before I shoot or I lookbloated, that's not normal.
You shouldn't not drink water.
SPEAKER_01 (06:12):
And then a one reason why I think this movie
was so addictive and created thefandom that it did is people
love a team situation.
Team Edward, Team Jacob, andthat created like a fun
atmosphere.
I'm in this, not just in thisfandom, I'm in this, in this
niche thing.
SPEAKER_00 (06:29):
Yep.
Ship wars can make or break amovie.
When it comes to ship wars, youhave to make both sides equally
appealing.
Because if one is the clearwinner, it's not really a love
triangle.
Nobody would choose that guyover this guy.
So you have to make them bothequally appealing, but in
completely different ways.
(06:49):
Yeah.
And that takes talent that youhave to be real careful with.
Also, you gotta roll with thepunches.
Look at the vampire diary.
She ends up with Stefan in thebook, she ends up with Damon in
the book.
Don't get me started.
SPEAKER_01 (07:01):
They butchered it.
But I will say too, a lot ofpeople, because I read more
traditional stuff, they tell youtoo soon who it's gonna be.
Does that make sense?
It's enemies to lovers, butokay, she's with her best friend
growing up, and then it's thegrumpy guy that has to train her
for battle or whatever.
And he's a little bit sarcasticand a little bit mean to her,
and they're calling that enemiesto lovers.
I need him to burn her housedown.
(07:22):
You know what I mean?
Maybe he killed her brother.
You know what I mean?
That's an enemy.
So you want Avatar.
Yes.
You want other Avatar levels ofbad.
I need him to murder people, andnothing redeems it except for
that he's hot and we love him.
That's enemy.
He's a little mean to mesometimes.
SPEAKER_00 (07:38):
That's what I keep telling Mikhaila because she's
writing now.
And she's like, this guy is sucha bad guy.
The only thing he has going forhim is that he's hot.
She's like, I want them to knowthat he's irredeemable.
I was like, if he's hot, he'snot irredeemable.
We're in our dark romance era,babe.
There's no line too far.
I can tell you just from beingin the genre that I am in, there
(08:00):
is no line too far.
Yeah.
They'll never find them again.
Oh, I will bring mads on.
That girl has read books thatare.
Morning Glory Milking Farm?
Listen, when she told me thestory about the shark, the
girl's head in the water withthe shark and the yeah, no.
(08:21):
Mm-mm.
Damn, no, you really do readsome dark shit.
Yeah.
Because I write dark romance,but I write cozy dark romance.
They call it.
So a lot of people.
Some girl told me the other day,I just listen to your books
every single night to sleep.
Yeah.
Lately, she's like, oh no, forabout the last couple years.
But then I watch BuzzfeedUnsolved Supernatural over and
(08:42):
over and over again.
I sleep to it.
So I guess that makes sense.
Once you find your comfort.
SPEAKER_01 (08:46):
You know what's going to happen.
And in your books, they're notkilling off a beloved character
randomly.
You're not No, I only kill badguys.
Yeah, you only kill bad guys.
So they know they're gonna getthat dopamine, the bad guy got
it in the end.
And you're gonna put themthrough it trauma-wise for your
main characters, but you're notgonna hurt the reader.
Some people like their trustbroken.
They really do.
Yeah, I read Troubled IrishTeenagers in Bally Lagan.
(09:10):
Nothing good happens toteenagers in Bally Lagun.
Just gonna put it that way.
SPEAKER_00 (09:15):
There.
That's I wrote the books Iwanted to read because I loved
Dexter, and I like that the badguys always got the worst
possible punishment imaginable.
Because my sense of justice verymuch is in line with my autism,
and that I have zero sympathyfor a certain type of person,
(09:38):
and it doesn't matter how badthe punishment is.
I just go well.
Would startle a therapist.
SPEAKER_01 (09:54):
They're inside thoughts, but I could tell her
because I know that she's alsotorturing fascists in her.
SPEAKER_00 (10:00):
Well, she's torturing people in my books is
my therapy.
It is my catharsis, it is what Ido to get through how shitty
this world is.
SPEAKER_01 (10:10):
That's why people like reading them, is the bad
guy's getting it.
And also there's a backstory foreach individual character that
every reader picks a differentMulvaney in particular.
And they you can see it in thereader group that they're
shipping.
They're like in Twilight, theyhave their guy and they give him
little nicknames, and then wegather that information, and
(10:34):
then Nina does like a standeewith you know what I mean,
something exactly.
SPEAKER_00 (10:39):
It comes from the sense of community.
I think, like we said withfandoms, there's a community
that comes together over acommon passion or whatever.
When it comes to ship wars andstuff, it gets even bigger than
that.
It's fun.
It's fun to be like, no, I'mTeam Edward, or it's fun to say,
no, I'm Team Jacob.
I wouldn't want to be a vampire,I want to be a werewolf.
Like that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_01 (10:59):
And giving them safe spaces to do it to Reddit or
somewhere where someone mightlike not like the books or not
like the authors.
They can go to Patreon andPatreon, Facebook, Discord.
Yeah.
She provides platforms for herreaders to be safe in their love
for her characters.
SPEAKER_00 (11:18):
The reason Stephanie Myers became a billionaire off
of this wasn't just the booksand it wasn't just the movies.
It was the merchandising.
It was being able to sell thelicensing for all of the stuff
that came with it.
Because there's no shortage ofTwilight merch to this day.
I have the Hoa Hoa Hoa calendarthat I bought my
(11:41):
daughter-in-law, and it lives inour dining room, and we change
it every month.
And I bought it last year.
There's no shortage of it.
And now it's become a little bitof a joke.
A lot of means to go back andwe're growing up now.
Where you been, Loca?
Yeah.
Orman, you know.
So yeah.
And that's also some of thestuff.
I read book one, but book four,Breaking Dawn wasn't out yet.
(12:03):
Mick, of course, loved themovie.
She eventually got into thebooks, but at first she loved
it.
My daughter loved the movies,and she was so obsessed with it.
For her 11th birthday, it was ancomplete Twilight theme.
We took seven 11-year-olds, wetook them to the movies, and
they had, I had made like theseTwilight VIP passes that looked
(12:26):
like, you know, little, and theyhad little lanyards and stuff
like that.
And it was fun.
Everybody in the theater wasexcited.
Everybody in the theater wasjust there's an anticipation.
SPEAKER_01 (12:36):
Something and we gather in groups.
There's something so magicalabout it.
SPEAKER_00 (12:40):
It is a positive environment where everybody is
just enjoying themselves.
Yeah.
And I haven't really felt thatsince when you and I went and
saw True Crime Obsessed live.
SPEAKER_01 (12:50):
Yeah, that was fun.
SPEAKER_00 (12:51):
Like we met so many cool people.
The only thing we had in commonwas that we all like true crime.
And this podcast in particular.
SPEAKER_01 (13:00):
And it is a certain group of people that get the
humor of it and theinclusiveness, and they share
our same viewpoints.
SPEAKER_00 (13:07):
They have the vibe.
Exactly.
And that's what this podcast isgoing to be.
It's going to be people whoeither get our vibe or they
don't.
And some people are just for thelove of fuck.
Why am I tuning into this?
Get to the point.
Yeah, please, God.
There is no point.
Please don't one star us.
Just keep going.
Just walk away.
It's fine.
We're used to it.
SPEAKER_01 (13:26):
I don't like criticism.
SPEAKER_00 (13:28):
I have a problem.
I picked the wrong career forsomebody who doesn't like
criticism.
Let me just tell you that.
Oof.
SPEAKER_01 (13:34):
Don't do it.
SPEAKER_00 (13:34):
No.
I need seven to ten businessmonths to get over one bad
review.
So I don't read my reviews.
SPEAKER_01 (13:40):
We're banning her from Goodreads and Amazon.
SPEAKER_00 (13:42):
And honestly, I don't know a single author who
has the ability to just takecriticism.
Actually, that's not true.
I know one author, a guy, who itdoesn't matter what you say to
him, he's like, you know what?
I'll look into that.
And I'm like, how are you sowell adjusted?
(14:04):
Like, how do we just go book?
SPEAKER_01 (14:07):
Oh, you know what?
You're right.
Criticizing your book is likecriticizing you personally
because it came from your brain.
SPEAKER_00 (14:12):
It's like calling my baby ugly.
SPEAKER_01 (14:13):
Yeah.
I worked really hard on that.
SPEAKER_00 (14:16):
You do it then.
Go ahead.
Write a book.
You do it.
You do it.
Actually, if you're listening tothis, that's the whole reason
I'm doing this.
Oh, yeah.
Write a book, please.
SPEAKER_01 (14:24):
You can do it.
SPEAKER_00 (14:26):
We're behind you.
SPEAKER_01 (14:28):
I support you.
SPEAKER_00 (14:31):
With Twilight, it felt like a ritual.
Like you got a spell cast onyou.
You got sucked into it.
People wanted to go visit Forks,Washington.
You can still stay in Bella'shouse in Forks, Washington.
SPEAKER_01 (14:46):
I watch it as how old I'm getting.
SPEAKER_00 (14:47):
I always thought Charlie Swan.
Listen, if you had given me uhDaddy Cullen and Charlie Swan as
a couple, I would have been allfor it.
Just write that down.
You can write that.
Team Edward, Team Jacob.
No, give me Team Charlie.
Team Charlie.
That man was fine.
And he took it like a trooper.
(15:09):
Let me just tell you, a guy.
He had the most realisticreaction of any man who had all
of that shit shoved in his face.
That's interesting.
All right.
I guess this is where we're now.
Okay.
I'm here for 20 years.
SPEAKER_01 (15:24):
Never noticed.
SPEAKER_00 (15:24):
Yeah.
Not a good copy.
It reminded me of have you everseen The Lost Boys?
I know your mom and I used towatch that movie all the time.
Okay.
So 1980s movie about twobrothers and their mom who move
in with their grandpa in thissmall town in California that is
just absolutely crawling withvampires.
And the one brother gets turnedinto a vampire, and the other
(15:46):
brother is just such greatlines.
You're a vampire.
Wait till I tell mom.
So funny.
The very last line in the movieis they think they're hiding
everything from the grandfather,and he comes in at the last
minute and he saves the day.
And he's like, the one thing Ican't stand about, I think it
was Santa Anna, all the goddamnvampires.
(16:07):
That's where the movie ends.
And the whole time he knew, andthey thought they were hiding it
from him, but he's known thewhole time.
It's one of my favorite jokes.
They did it in Teen Wolf, too,where you think you're hiding
something, and then they justgive the line, and you're just
like, oh, this whole time we'vebeen thinking they were just a
normie, and they've known thewhole time.
That this whole supernaturalthing is existing.
(16:28):
But that's what I love aboutmagical realism is when you can
make people believe that thisworld does exist in your world
right now, it makes it feel waymore real than some.
I don't want to bring up theauthor that I'm thinking of
since it triggers so manypeople.
But she who shall not be named.
(16:51):
Her stuff, there wasn't itwasn't realistic.
It was a fairy tale.
The same rate they wrote thebooks like they were an
omniscient narrator.
They weren't the character, theywere watching it all happen.
Right.
You know, that's how they wrotethe book.
So it read like a fairy tale.
Whereas Stephanie Myers, like LJSmith, when they wrote, they
(17:14):
wrote in character quote infirst person.
Yeah.
So you felt you were thatcharacter.
And part of the reason I don'tread MF romance anymore is
because I don't want to identifywith the female character
because so much romance,straight romance, and I'm sorry
if I'm offending romanceauthors, but there's a lot of
(17:37):
misogyny in straight romance.
I don't want to identify withthe girl who's, oh, I don't care
that you treat me like garbage.
It's fine.
You have trauma.
Whereas strangely, in gayromance, no matter how the power
imbalance shifts, becausethey're both men, they both
(17:57):
start on an equal playing field.
Yeah.
Society-wise, they're bothconsidered equal because they're
both men.
That's true.
Whereas in a male-femalerelationship, even though women
themselves are, nope, we can dobetter than most men.
SPEAKER_01 (18:13):
I don't want to do it.
SPEAKER_00 (18:14):
Society-wise, you still know that men are out
there going, Oh, that's cute.
Isn't she cute?
More than we thought.
SPEAKER_01 (18:23):
You know.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (18:24):
Yeah, way more than we thought.
And it's only getting worse.
So I feel a little bit when Iread straight romance like I'm
betraying my gender.
I don't know.
And a lot of women feel thatway.
That's why a lot of women don'tgo back to reading straight
romance after they find gayromance.
You can just watch two peoplefall in love and you don't have
to relate to them.
You don't have to put yourselfin their shoes.
SPEAKER_01 (18:44):
Well, if you think about that Colleen Hoover movie
flopped, you know?
Well, because she portrayed it.
She wrote the book.
It was what it was.
Right.
And you're allowed to writeabout domestic violence, in my
opinion.
Yeah, of course.
And I don't think sheromanticized it.
But the way that the movie wasadvertised as a rom-comp when
really it was like the uh Itwasn't the of how abuse happens
(19:07):
small and goes big.
Um but they didn't advertise itlike that.
SPEAKER_00 (19:12):
No, because they wanted it to Colleen Hoover and
what's his name?
Baldoni.
I can't remember.
Oh, yeah, that whole thing.
They both wanted it.
Yeah.
They both wanted it to berealistic.
And I think that's what ColleenHoover was going for.
Because you don't leave a lot ofwomen, don't leave their
abusers.
Right.
And also in the movie, she's anadult, but in the books, she's a
(19:35):
teenager.
SPEAKER_01 (19:36):
It goes back and forth.
It goes back and forth.
She has the I read it.
She is the original guy, thehomeless teenager.
The guy she ends up with thefirst one.
It should have been astandalone.
But anyway.
I didn't realize there was morethan one book.
It begins with us, I think, isthe next one.
But I read it ends with usbefore she got canceled for
whatever.
I don't know when she gotcanceled.
But yes, it goes back and forth.
And Ellen is oddly a big part ofit.
(19:58):
That's her conflict.
SPEAKER_00 (19:59):
Like Ellen DeGeneres?
unknown (20:01):
Right?
SPEAKER_01 (20:02):
Oh.
She writes.
SPEAKER_00 (20:03):
Talk about a blast from the past.
SPEAKER_01 (20:05):
And then she meets the hot doctor guy.
And anyway, it ends with him,the original guy from when she
was a teenager.
It ends with us.
SPEAKER_00 (20:12):
Gotcha.
Because she gets away from theguy.
SPEAKER_01 (20:14):
But she has a baby with her abuser.
SPEAKER_00 (20:15):
Well, and I mean that happens.
A lot of women don't evenrealize they're with an abuser
until they get pregnant.
SPEAKER_01 (20:19):
Yeah.
Well, it honestly did show, Idon't know.
It started off small and thenwent big.
But anyway, the movie floppedbecause the way they advertised
it.
SPEAKER_00 (20:27):
Yeah, and that's what happens when you try to be
too relatable.
And I think that's what BlakeLively was going for.
She wanted to be like, heygirls, I'm just like you.
The girl in the movies, justlike you.
It could happen to anybody, butthat's not what she did.
She was so out of touch withwhat the average person thinks
when it comes to domesticviolence.
SPEAKER_01 (20:48):
The outfits.
SPEAKER_00 (20:49):
Intimate partner violence.
The outfits were one of theworst fights I ever got into was
over 50 Shades of Gray, which wewill also be breaking down.
And it was because as a nurse, Imade the comment that Christian
Gray checks every box on theintimate partner violence
(21:11):
checklist we have at my job.
And you would have thought thatI said it was the worst book I
ever read.
That's all I said was thatlisten, it's not actual BDSM.
I know, I've been a part of it.
Safe, sane, and consensual isliterally the slogan for the
BDSM community.
(21:32):
Nothing he did was safe, sane,or consensual.
And you get that kind of spadeswhen you read his version of the
book.
When she went and created hispoint of view, I think it was
just called Gray.
It read like Ted Bundy wrote it.
It was so disturbing.
(21:53):
His inner monologue.
She's having a normalconversation and he's picturing
tying her up and torturing her.
This is a criminal mindsepisode.
If he was poor and this washappening in a trailer, we would
be watching it as a criminalminds episode.
They have to be watching.
But I didn't say any of that.
SPEAKER_01 (22:08):
In every book, he's not like a poor abuser.
SPEAKER_00 (22:11):
If we're romanticizing.
SPEAKER_01 (22:13):
I just never stop the moblins romance episode.
The moblins aren't bad.
SPEAKER_00 (22:18):
Oh, but like 365.
I didn't even know 365 existeduntil it became a movie.
But and I get it.
I get wanting that fantasy.
I do.
I write dark romance.
I get wanting to be able to liveout some weird, vicarious
fantasy where you know you canlike all of the dark shit and
just no bad things happen toyou.
(22:38):
Great.
I personally, I just it's justnot my vibe.
But I remember two authors, verybig names, came for me so hard
just from that intimate partnerviolence comment.
They were, you better never getinto the romance field.
You better never write romanceif you can't stand behind your
fellow romance authors.
(23:00):
And I was like, they have aliteral movie.
Do you think E.L.
James is upset that I said that?
She's still at home blotting hertears with hundred-dollar bills.
The bitch is a billionaire.
She doesn't have time to worryabout some random girl on
Facebook who mentioned that hercharacter is an abuser.
She doesn't give a shit.
(23:20):
She started it as TwilightFanfiction.
She didn't expect her book toblow up.
It just did.
Because, again, it scratched anitch for a bunch of vanilla
soccer moms who had never reallygotten a taste of taboo romance.
You know, and I think it openeda lot of doors for a lot of
(23:41):
authors who have a lot of reallydark ideas.
And I'm super happy for all ofthose romance authors who their
careers blew up 100%.
Write anything you want.
I don't believe in censorship atall.
Honestly, but it just wasn't myvibe.
SPEAKER_01 (23:56):
This smut, people calling everything smut,
especially when it's a goodbook.
The clean versus smut romance.
Or they're like, oh, like, whatdo you consider smut?
The whole there's a beginning, amiddle, and end, there's a plot.
But like, what's smutty?
What's smutty about it?
SPEAKER_00 (24:10):
Well, people jokingly say I write gay porn.
I'm like, no.
No, you don't.
I don't write gay porn.
SPEAKER_01 (24:16):
That's honestly people that would just never
venture into a different genrethat doesn't have a direct
reflection of how they livetheir day-to-day life.
And that's sad.
Dragons, but not fucking asentient doorknob.
It's okay, it's sentient.
Okay.
It's a sentient doorknob.
SPEAKER_00 (24:33):
Sented.
It scented to this.
And that's what's so if you toldpeople 10 years ago that there
would be books where women werereading romance between a
centaur and a human.
SPEAKER_01 (24:50):
Morning glory milking candles.
SPEAKER_00 (24:51):
And they were yeah, and they didn't switch into a
human before the you know sexstuff occurred.
The milking occurred.
You would have been people wouldhave been like, no fucking way.
Well, and that's the thing.
We're moving the bar a littlebit further and further every
(25:11):
year.
Ice Ice Burns.
SPEAKER_01 (25:12):
I think Barbara is a pretty common book that people
have read.
Ice something barbarians.
Ice Planet Barbarian.
People have read it.
And it's and I just need to knowwhat's going on over there.
SPEAKER_00 (25:25):
It's a big joke, especially in the Discord.
I always say I would publish mysocial security number before I
published my fan fiction historyon AO3.
Is that oh yeah, no?
AO3 is going strong.
It's it, yeah, no, I'm on thereall the time.
But who I am on AO3 is not who Iam in real life.
(25:45):
So it's not only James LLC on A.
It sure isn't.
My name couldn't be moreanonymous on AO3.
It's definitely not only JamesL.
No, nothing to see here.
No.
But I've had the same AO3account since 2012.
So if anybody was to see myhistory, it would be a wild
(26:06):
ride.
But yeah, that's something I'llask you.
Do you know what the term deaddove do not eat means?
SPEAKER_01 (26:13):
Dead dove do not eat.
SPEAKER_00 (26:15):
There's this whole dark genre where if you're going
to write uh fucked up taboo shitabout people's favorite
characters, people are readingfanfiction because they want to
read about the characters theylove.
Uh but for some reason we alsooccasionally want to read about
(26:37):
the fucked up shit that somerandom person puts them through.
And if it's really bad, and Imean really bad, it could be
anything from cannibalism to uhunderage stuff, and they put
dead dove, do not eat.
Basically meaning this is yourwarning that this is the most
(26:58):
fucked up shit you're going toread.
So if you progress further thanthis line right here, that's on
you.
You did this, not me.
SPEAKER_01 (27:07):
Manacle, there she's publishing that shit.
I can't believe what is it?
Manacle.
It's an extremely, extremelypopular, huge fan fiction of
basically Handmaid's Tale, butHogwarts and Draminy.
The Dramy one.
People cry.
And it's, I mean, I can't readon my phone.
(27:29):
It hurts my eyes.
And obviously, you can't justbuy it, um, because that's
illegal.
SPEAKER_00 (27:35):
I don't read depressing fanfiction.
I it's the same reason I don'tread depressing books.
Like my life feels depressingenough on the day-to-day, just
when I look outside.
I don't want to be sad about thepeople I love.
And honestly, my currentobsession is actually not even
fictional characters.
I am reading fanfiction abouttwo people who exist in real
(27:56):
life and who are an actualcouple in real life, which is
really creepy and weird, but Ido it anyway.
BL?
No, it's not.
Well, it's definitely a gayship, but it is not technically
BL.
But there was this fic goingaround that everybody was raving
about, and they're like, youhave to read it.
And then I started looking intoit, and every person who read it
(28:20):
is sobbing hysterically, justsobbing when they're talking
about it.
They're like, it's the best,it's the best thing I've ever
read in my whole life.
It was so sweet and so sad.
And I'm just like, no.
And so I looked.
I was like, fuck it, I'll look.
The tags, terminal illness.
(28:40):
Nope.
Nope.
Nope.
Nope.
Terminal?
That means there's no hope.
Nope.
No way.
SPEAKER_01 (28:46):
You had to get me to give me any kind of false hope.
That's why I love triggerwarnings.
SPEAKER_00 (28:50):
Yeah, me too.
I'm a big fan of triggerwarnings for sure.
It's necessary.
I'm sorry, we definitely went ona tangent on that one.
No, but we didn't.
SPEAKER_01 (29:00):
We brought it back.
We're talking about fandom.
Because Fifty Shades of Grey isin fact part of the Twilight
Fandom.
And I think we did at least 20minutes on task.
I think we did.
We're on task for the actualpodcast.
SPEAKER_00 (29:12):
Considering what our last podcast was, we're doing
really well.
I give us a gold star because wehaven't brought up politics in
this whole episode.
So until now, I want to talkabout the one that got away.
No, they charge you a dollar aminute.
(29:33):
Oh, yeah.
Well, she doesn't want to be abroke mother.
So if you like this, pleaserate, review, subscribe.
It really helps us.
Downloads really help us.
You have us in your ear at alltimes.
You can find us at linktree.
That will take you to ourDiscord, our Patreon, our
(29:54):
website, and where you canlisten to all the back episodes
that will hopefully exist.
Eventually.
So we will talk to you nexttime.
I think we're breaking downsupernatural next.
SPEAKER_01 (30:05):
You'll be surprised.
Be surprised.
SPEAKER_00 (30:08):
And if you have an opinion, go to the Discord and
tell us what you want us tobreak down.
SPEAKER_01 (30:12):
Nice opinions.
SPEAKER_00 (30:14):
Yes, nice opinions, please.
SPEAKER_01 (30:15):
We won't follow you there, I promise.
SPEAKER_00 (30:17):
We won't forget.
We love you.
Bye.
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