The Short Second Life Of Bree Tanner: Part 9
ZeldaQueen: Howdy! I'm trying to get through this so I can focus all of my energies on Miss Holly Potter. Plus, Link's still locked in that particular Sporking Chamber, so I feel kind of bad about leaving him there. So yeah!
Projection Room Voices: Starting Media in 3...2...1...
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Part 9
ZeldaQueen: So Bree is still sorting out everything, because apparently Meyer thinks that we're too stupid to figure it out ourselves. All it does is make Bree look like a total idiot, since I think most preschoolers could figure out what's going on. She realizes that older vampires are more "clearheaded" than younger ones, which is why Diego and Riley are smarter than Kevin. Um...okay, if you say so. She realizes that Riley is the oldest and has the most control and wonders what will happen to them all when he's used them for whatever purpose. And then, we get this.
"I had a strong feeling that I didn’t want to be around for that part. And I suddenly realized something stupendously obvious. It
was the solution that had tickled the edges of my understanding before, when I was tracking the vampire herd to this place with
Diego.
I didn’t have to be around for that part. I didn’t have to be around for one more night."
ZeldaQueen: Yes folks, she finally figured it out. She finally had the simple idea of running away. It finally hit her that something dangerous is going down, and it only took her...three months. And the idea didn't even start to come on until she met her True Wuv Diego. Incidentally, interesting that we never saw any hints that she was starting to want to run away with him.
But idiocy aside, Bree begins to think about how she and Diego could escape and go anywhere they want and never be found again. She gives us more slash material, as she wonders "Was Diego more loyal to Riley after all? Would he
have felt it was his responsibility to stand by Riley? He’d known Riley a lot longer-he’d really only known me a day. Was he closer to Riley than he was to me?" Darling, I think at least one of you is seriously in denial. Best just come to grips with it.
She then figures that she'll ask Diego about his loyalties when he comes back, because surely he is coming back, wondering if their secret club means more to him than their "creator". Incidentally, what's up with Bree's weird naming for stuff? Does being turned into a vampire give one the mindset of a stereotypical pagan priestess or something? She calls Victoria her "creator", the Volturi "dark-cloaks", and the Cullens the "yellow-eyes". Is she a caveman? What?
Bree figures that Riley won't miss them and can easily either make do with nineteen vampires or quickly make some more. Oh, that's nice! You know something potentially dangerous is going down and you're quite alright with someone else being kidnapped to take your place. I guess you also won't even bother to try to warn anyone? Oh, and Diego certainly isn't dead and she'll be asking him if he'll go along with the plan when he gets back.
She wonders if the vampires like Shelly and Steve (whoever the hell they were) did not in fact die and had actually run away to freedom. Again, is this really the first time that thought has entered her head? What a moron! She imagines herself and Diego being safe and unbound by rules. And we get something that's rather disgusting.
"Again, I imagined the whole horde of us on the loose without a curfew. I could see Diego and me moving like ninjas through the shade. But I could also see Raoul, Kevin, and the rest, sparkling disco-ball monsters in the center of a busy downtown street, the bodies piling up, the screaming, the helicopters whirring, the soft, helpless cops with their dinky little bullets that wouldn’t make a dent, the cameras, the panic that would spread so fast as the pictures bounced swiftly around the globe. Vampires wouldn’t be a secret for very long. Even Raoul couldn’t kill people fast enough to keep the story from spreading.
There was a chain of logic here, and I tried to grasp it before I could be distracted again.
One, humans didn’t know about vampires. Two, Riley encouraged us to be inconspicuous, not to attract the notice of humans and educate them otherwise. Three, Diego and I had decided that all vampires must be following that guideline, or else the world would know about us. Four, they must have a reason for doing so, and it wasn’t the little popguns of the human police that motivated them. Yeah, the reason must be pretty important to make all vampires hide all day long in stuffy basements. Maybe reason enough to make Riley and ourcreator lie to us, terrify us about the burning sun. Maybe it was a reason Riley would explain to Diego, and since it was so important and he was so responsible, Diego would promise to keep the secret and they happened to Shelly and Steve was that they’d discovered the shiny skin thing and not run? What if they’d gone to Riley?
And, crap, there went the next step in my logical path. The chain dissolved and I started panicking about Diego again."
ZeldaQueen: Mmkay, sorry about such a long block of text there, but I really need to rant it all off.
First of all, notice how Bree's just making out like she and Diego are so much better-suited to being Free Vampires than Raoul and Kevin. Why? Because they're more discrete. They're the ones that would follow the rules, eating people at night and in secret, while everyone else would run around eating people in broad daylight. And they're treated as being the Bad ones, the irresponsible ones who can't be trusted. Now then, what's hypocritical about this statement?
BREE YOU BITCH, YOU'RE ALSO GOING TO BE GOING OUT AND PREYING ON PEOPLE! YOU'RE ALSO CRACKING INNOCENT BYSTANDERS OPEN LIKE COCONUTS AND DRAINING THEIR BLOOD! YOU HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO RIGHT AT ALL TO TAKE THE HIGHER MORAL GROUND ON THIS!
And for that matter, how much do even two vampires drink, especially ones as dumb as Diego and Bree? Even if they stay hidden, how long do you think it would take before someone calls "serial killer" and they get noticed? Oh wait, I was thinking in terms of reality. This is Meyerland, where the world shapes itself to accommodate her Mary Sues.
Second of all, what's she worrying about in that scenario? The massive damage? The loss of life? No! That the vampire community, which she has spent three months in, will be exposed. And her first thought is how they won't be able to kill witnesses quickly enough to keep it quiet. Bitch.
Third of all, I love how she's so stupid that she needs to organize everything into tiny baby steps for her logic. Either Meyer is doing some massive hand-holding or she thinks that by making Bree spell everything out like a middle schooler doing a physics lab, the character will appear more intelligent. Note to Meyer - it doesn't!
Fourth of all, love the human hate there. "Oh, humans suck and they couldn't possibly be any threat to us!" Lady, suck it.
Fifth of all, notice how put-out she seems there? Like, "There had better be a damned good reason why I've got to live in secret instead of killing and eating as I please!"
Lastly, Bree's concern for the potential destruction to be caused or the implications of Riley's deceit? All out the window as soon as she thinks Diego's in trouble. OH NO, NOT DIEGO!
*shakes head* So Bree continues to wonder where Diego is and Raoul comes back, showing he's Evil by laughing at the burning vampire corpse. Bree leans over against Fred for protection and figures that it must nearly be dawn, as Raoul never comes back unless he has to. Kristie comes back and shows that she is Evil by ignoring the vampire corpse. Meyer, you aren't making me feel sorry for anyone here, given that every single one of them (except, perhaps, for Fred) have eaten humans! Given that I and all of my dear viewers would be on the dinner menu, I don't sympathize!
Bree starts to wonder if Riley wanted Diego to prove to him about the sparkling and thus they are waiting for dawn. Good GOD, how stupid is this girl?
So yeah, Riley comes back and OH NO DIEGO ISN'T WITH HIM WHATEVER DOES THAT MEAN??? Riley takes one look at the burning vampire remains and completely wigs out. He starts screaming and throwing stuff around and everyone starts to be all scared. Riley grabs Raoul by the throat and tosses him around and we're told how no one ever saw Raoul be scared before. He then rips off Kevins arm, tears it into three separate pieces, and hits him in the face with them, before screaming and asking "Why are you all so stupid?" Ha ha! Yes, das_mervin called it. This is totally Plan 9 From Outer Space. Meyer, did you ever see that movie? If you're cribbing, don't. Leave those things to the professionals.
Incidentally, I want to again point out that this entire tantrum means nothing. I don't feel scared or threatened or think "Wow, a line was crossed". I just think "Okay...so what?" And that's because we're never shown how these things normally go. We're never shown how scary and swaggering Raoul and Kristie are, we're never shown how Riley normally acts towards them, so when Bree says "This is totally not normal!" I just find myself with no basis for comparison. Oh wait, we do know about Riley - that he's an idiot. Because if he had kept them all in shape at the beginning, then there would be no need for this. All I get the image of is the scene from 17 Again, when the principle breaks up the wild party. It's not scary and it's not alarming at all.
And if anyone doesn't know what I mean, then consider the character of Snape. We see him spend most of the books being a cold, sarcastic bastard. He gets angry and loses his temper, but mostly keeps a handle on things. And then, we get the scene in the fifth book when he catches Harry looking into his memories. At that point, he wigs out. He throws stuff at Harry, screams at him, and is completely incoherent. We know the norm for him and this deviates so far from that that readers think "Uh oh, Harry really did it this time". That's what I mean.
So anyway, Riley continues to scream at them and rip body parts off and break stuff. Bree suddenly realizes that Riley is playing with fire, so to speak, and apparently it has for the first time occurred to the newborns that they outnumber him and are starting to organize themselves to fight back. Either Riley cottons on or just happens to stop at that particular moment, and proceeds to give a vampire girl named Sara back her ear that he tore off. She fixes it back on, but we're told that the hair he ripped out can't be fixed. Um...I guess that's significant?
Riley switches to a tone of urgency, telling everyone that THEY'RE ALL GOING TO DIE and that they must grow brains and get their act together to survive. Erm, why not do this from the beginning? Seriously, they could have been clever and pretended that the Cullens were the ones responsible for all of the newborns and whatnot and been like "Yeah, we saved you but you're still in danger, so hide out here and keep training for a few months, okay?" Eh, I'm being logical. Silly me. Anyway, he starts going on about how there's a price to be paid for drinking all of the blood in Seattle and that gets everyone's attention. Bree, meanwhile, focuses more on whether or not Riley will attack again and keeping an eye on the closed door. I guess it's supposed to be that she's getting ready to make an escape if she needs to, but seriously they outnumber him! Riley alone shouldn't be able to take them all, especially given Fred's...erm unique power.
Riley instead calls for leaders and asks for Raoul and Kristie to come forward. They refuse, so he insults them and calls forth Kevin and Jen. I guess Jen's supposed to be Kristie's toady? I don't know, I think we've had two sentences tops about her. They also refuse, so finally Raoul gets all proud and leaps over by Riley's side. Jen keeps looking to Kristie about what to do, and I find it hilarious that this is being used as a negative trait for her, given the behavior of Bella towards Edward. Kristie finally gets over it and stands next to Riley as well. We also are told that she has "sandy" hair. You just couldn't resist, could you Meyer?
Riley tells them that this all took way too long and that none of them have much time left. Bree continues to stare at the door and I guess it's actually supposed to be her waiting for Diego to come back? I dunno. Anyway, Riley tells them all that they have an enemy to fight and the rest of the newborns are apparently as big of self-centered pigs as Bree is, because they too basically go "A-wait...whaaaaat???" at the idea that something could challenge them.
So we're then eased into this lie about how there are vampires that "want [their] blood", which is hilarious if you've read Meyer's explanation of the biology of her vamps and doubly so if you've seen the movie for Eclipse. Riley explains that these weird vampires used to feed freely in Seattle and are now angry that someone else moved in on their turf and that they'll set the newborns on fire and take everything for themselves. This gets Kristie and Raoul and everyone worked up and Riley adds that the weird vampires are clever (hardly) and will exploit the newborn vampires' weakness (lack of unity) to win. Riley explains how they have to look after each other and everyone starts looking at each other like "Oh yeah, I guess that makes sense" and I'm smacking my head against the wall, because why didn't he tell this all to them from the start, when he could get them to accept ideas???
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ZeldaQueen: And this is all so stupid, I do believe I'll stop here!
Onward to: Part 10
Back To: Part 8
Back to: Table of Contents
Projection Room Voices: Starting Media in 3...2...1...
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Part 9
ZeldaQueen: So Bree is still sorting out everything, because apparently Meyer thinks that we're too stupid to figure it out ourselves. All it does is make Bree look like a total idiot, since I think most preschoolers could figure out what's going on. She realizes that older vampires are more "clearheaded" than younger ones, which is why Diego and Riley are smarter than Kevin. Um...okay, if you say so. She realizes that Riley is the oldest and has the most control and wonders what will happen to them all when he's used them for whatever purpose. And then, we get this.
"I had a strong feeling that I didn’t want to be around for that part. And I suddenly realized something stupendously obvious. It
was the solution that had tickled the edges of my understanding before, when I was tracking the vampire herd to this place with
Diego.
I didn’t have to be around for that part. I didn’t have to be around for one more night."
ZeldaQueen: Yes folks, she finally figured it out. She finally had the simple idea of running away. It finally hit her that something dangerous is going down, and it only took her...three months. And the idea didn't even start to come on until she met her True Wuv Diego. Incidentally, interesting that we never saw any hints that she was starting to want to run away with him.
But idiocy aside, Bree begins to think about how she and Diego could escape and go anywhere they want and never be found again. She gives us more slash material, as she wonders "Was Diego more loyal to Riley after all? Would he
have felt it was his responsibility to stand by Riley? He’d known Riley a lot longer-he’d really only known me a day. Was he closer to Riley than he was to me?" Darling, I think at least one of you is seriously in denial. Best just come to grips with it.
She then figures that she'll ask Diego about his loyalties when he comes back, because surely he is coming back, wondering if their secret club means more to him than their "creator". Incidentally, what's up with Bree's weird naming for stuff? Does being turned into a vampire give one the mindset of a stereotypical pagan priestess or something? She calls Victoria her "creator", the Volturi "dark-cloaks", and the Cullens the "yellow-eyes". Is she a caveman? What?
Bree figures that Riley won't miss them and can easily either make do with nineteen vampires or quickly make some more. Oh, that's nice! You know something potentially dangerous is going down and you're quite alright with someone else being kidnapped to take your place. I guess you also won't even bother to try to warn anyone? Oh, and Diego certainly isn't dead and she'll be asking him if he'll go along with the plan when he gets back.
She wonders if the vampires like Shelly and Steve (whoever the hell they were) did not in fact die and had actually run away to freedom. Again, is this really the first time that thought has entered her head? What a moron! She imagines herself and Diego being safe and unbound by rules. And we get something that's rather disgusting.
"Again, I imagined the whole horde of us on the loose without a curfew. I could see Diego and me moving like ninjas through the shade. But I could also see Raoul, Kevin, and the rest, sparkling disco-ball monsters in the center of a busy downtown street, the bodies piling up, the screaming, the helicopters whirring, the soft, helpless cops with their dinky little bullets that wouldn’t make a dent, the cameras, the panic that would spread so fast as the pictures bounced swiftly around the globe. Vampires wouldn’t be a secret for very long. Even Raoul couldn’t kill people fast enough to keep the story from spreading.
There was a chain of logic here, and I tried to grasp it before I could be distracted again.
One, humans didn’t know about vampires. Two, Riley encouraged us to be inconspicuous, not to attract the notice of humans and educate them otherwise. Three, Diego and I had decided that all vampires must be following that guideline, or else the world would know about us. Four, they must have a reason for doing so, and it wasn’t the little popguns of the human police that motivated them. Yeah, the reason must be pretty important to make all vampires hide all day long in stuffy basements. Maybe reason enough to make Riley and ourcreator lie to us, terrify us about the burning sun. Maybe it was a reason Riley would explain to Diego, and since it was so important and he was so responsible, Diego would promise to keep the secret and they happened to Shelly and Steve was that they’d discovered the shiny skin thing and not run? What if they’d gone to Riley?
And, crap, there went the next step in my logical path. The chain dissolved and I started panicking about Diego again."
ZeldaQueen: Mmkay, sorry about such a long block of text there, but I really need to rant it all off.
First of all, notice how Bree's just making out like she and Diego are so much better-suited to being Free Vampires than Raoul and Kevin. Why? Because they're more discrete. They're the ones that would follow the rules, eating people at night and in secret, while everyone else would run around eating people in broad daylight. And they're treated as being the Bad ones, the irresponsible ones who can't be trusted. Now then, what's hypocritical about this statement?
BREE YOU BITCH, YOU'RE ALSO GOING TO BE GOING OUT AND PREYING ON PEOPLE! YOU'RE ALSO CRACKING INNOCENT BYSTANDERS OPEN LIKE COCONUTS AND DRAINING THEIR BLOOD! YOU HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO RIGHT AT ALL TO TAKE THE HIGHER MORAL GROUND ON THIS!
And for that matter, how much do even two vampires drink, especially ones as dumb as Diego and Bree? Even if they stay hidden, how long do you think it would take before someone calls "serial killer" and they get noticed? Oh wait, I was thinking in terms of reality. This is Meyerland, where the world shapes itself to accommodate her Mary Sues.
Second of all, what's she worrying about in that scenario? The massive damage? The loss of life? No! That the vampire community, which she has spent three months in, will be exposed. And her first thought is how they won't be able to kill witnesses quickly enough to keep it quiet. Bitch.
Third of all, I love how she's so stupid that she needs to organize everything into tiny baby steps for her logic. Either Meyer is doing some massive hand-holding or she thinks that by making Bree spell everything out like a middle schooler doing a physics lab, the character will appear more intelligent. Note to Meyer - it doesn't!
Fourth of all, love the human hate there. "Oh, humans suck and they couldn't possibly be any threat to us!" Lady, suck it.
Fifth of all, notice how put-out she seems there? Like, "There had better be a damned good reason why I've got to live in secret instead of killing and eating as I please!"
Lastly, Bree's concern for the potential destruction to be caused or the implications of Riley's deceit? All out the window as soon as she thinks Diego's in trouble. OH NO, NOT DIEGO!
*shakes head* So Bree continues to wonder where Diego is and Raoul comes back, showing he's Evil by laughing at the burning vampire corpse. Bree leans over against Fred for protection and figures that it must nearly be dawn, as Raoul never comes back unless he has to. Kristie comes back and shows that she is Evil by ignoring the vampire corpse. Meyer, you aren't making me feel sorry for anyone here, given that every single one of them (except, perhaps, for Fred) have eaten humans! Given that I and all of my dear viewers would be on the dinner menu, I don't sympathize!
Bree starts to wonder if Riley wanted Diego to prove to him about the sparkling and thus they are waiting for dawn. Good GOD, how stupid is this girl?
So yeah, Riley comes back and OH NO DIEGO ISN'T WITH HIM WHATEVER DOES THAT MEAN??? Riley takes one look at the burning vampire remains and completely wigs out. He starts screaming and throwing stuff around and everyone starts to be all scared. Riley grabs Raoul by the throat and tosses him around and we're told how no one ever saw Raoul be scared before. He then rips off Kevins arm, tears it into three separate pieces, and hits him in the face with them, before screaming and asking "Why are you all so stupid?" Ha ha! Yes, das_mervin called it. This is totally Plan 9 From Outer Space. Meyer, did you ever see that movie? If you're cribbing, don't. Leave those things to the professionals.
Incidentally, I want to again point out that this entire tantrum means nothing. I don't feel scared or threatened or think "Wow, a line was crossed". I just think "Okay...so what?" And that's because we're never shown how these things normally go. We're never shown how scary and swaggering Raoul and Kristie are, we're never shown how Riley normally acts towards them, so when Bree says "This is totally not normal!" I just find myself with no basis for comparison. Oh wait, we do know about Riley - that he's an idiot. Because if he had kept them all in shape at the beginning, then there would be no need for this. All I get the image of is the scene from 17 Again, when the principle breaks up the wild party. It's not scary and it's not alarming at all.
And if anyone doesn't know what I mean, then consider the character of Snape. We see him spend most of the books being a cold, sarcastic bastard. He gets angry and loses his temper, but mostly keeps a handle on things. And then, we get the scene in the fifth book when he catches Harry looking into his memories. At that point, he wigs out. He throws stuff at Harry, screams at him, and is completely incoherent. We know the norm for him and this deviates so far from that that readers think "Uh oh, Harry really did it this time". That's what I mean.
So anyway, Riley continues to scream at them and rip body parts off and break stuff. Bree suddenly realizes that Riley is playing with fire, so to speak, and apparently it has for the first time occurred to the newborns that they outnumber him and are starting to organize themselves to fight back. Either Riley cottons on or just happens to stop at that particular moment, and proceeds to give a vampire girl named Sara back her ear that he tore off. She fixes it back on, but we're told that the hair he ripped out can't be fixed. Um...I guess that's significant?
Riley switches to a tone of urgency, telling everyone that THEY'RE ALL GOING TO DIE and that they must grow brains and get their act together to survive. Erm, why not do this from the beginning? Seriously, they could have been clever and pretended that the Cullens were the ones responsible for all of the newborns and whatnot and been like "Yeah, we saved you but you're still in danger, so hide out here and keep training for a few months, okay?" Eh, I'm being logical. Silly me. Anyway, he starts going on about how there's a price to be paid for drinking all of the blood in Seattle and that gets everyone's attention. Bree, meanwhile, focuses more on whether or not Riley will attack again and keeping an eye on the closed door. I guess it's supposed to be that she's getting ready to make an escape if she needs to, but seriously they outnumber him! Riley alone shouldn't be able to take them all, especially given Fred's...erm unique power.
Riley instead calls for leaders and asks for Raoul and Kristie to come forward. They refuse, so he insults them and calls forth Kevin and Jen. I guess Jen's supposed to be Kristie's toady? I don't know, I think we've had two sentences tops about her. They also refuse, so finally Raoul gets all proud and leaps over by Riley's side. Jen keeps looking to Kristie about what to do, and I find it hilarious that this is being used as a negative trait for her, given the behavior of Bella towards Edward. Kristie finally gets over it and stands next to Riley as well. We also are told that she has "sandy" hair. You just couldn't resist, could you Meyer?
Riley tells them that this all took way too long and that none of them have much time left. Bree continues to stare at the door and I guess it's actually supposed to be her waiting for Diego to come back? I dunno. Anyway, Riley tells them all that they have an enemy to fight and the rest of the newborns are apparently as big of self-centered pigs as Bree is, because they too basically go "A-wait...whaaaaat???" at the idea that something could challenge them.
So we're then eased into this lie about how there are vampires that "want [their] blood", which is hilarious if you've read Meyer's explanation of the biology of her vamps and doubly so if you've seen the movie for Eclipse. Riley explains that these weird vampires used to feed freely in Seattle and are now angry that someone else moved in on their turf and that they'll set the newborns on fire and take everything for themselves. This gets Kristie and Raoul and everyone worked up and Riley adds that the weird vampires are clever (hardly) and will exploit the newborn vampires' weakness (lack of unity) to win. Riley explains how they have to look after each other and everyone starts looking at each other like "Oh yeah, I guess that makes sense" and I'm smacking my head against the wall, because why didn't he tell this all to them from the start, when he could get them to accept ideas???
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ZeldaQueen: And this is all so stupid, I do believe I'll stop here!
Onward to: Part 10
Back To: Part 8
Back to: Table of Contents