Monday, November 21, 2011

Doug Walker rages over ‘Twilight’’s handling of abortion

| »

Doug Walker from That Guy With the Glasses is known for his hyperbolic characters (you do know of the Nostalgia Critic, right?), but this is the first time I’ve seen him become this enraged over something as his normal self. The subject matter is the new Twilight film, Breaking Dawn: Part 1, and how it attempts – very unwisely – to deal with the topic of abortion in its own supremely incompetent manner. It’s a worthwhile watch despite its length, if only for the admitted entertainment of watching the guy unravel a bit at various points:

My transcript: (click the [+/-] to expand/collapse →) []

In summary: Doug launches into a long, winding and emotional rant, first explaining how he liked the previous Twilight films for being amusingly bad, but that although Breaking Dawn: Part 1 began similarly, it then brought in the matter of abortion in such a clumsy, narrow-minded and stupid way that Doug felt personally offended and disgusted by it.

In the movie, Edward and Bella have sex without any thought about contraception (which Doug was incensed at), and are then shocked when Bella falls pregnant as a result. But worst is when Edward immediately decides that she must have an abortion to get rid of the “thing”/“demon”/“it” inside of her without so much as asking her what she wants, essentially deciding for her.

Doug explains at length that he’s fairly ambivalent about the subject of abortion, not being really for or against it, but that it’s such a hot-button subject that it requires a certain amount of care and intelligence in dealing with – which, he quickly and emphatically (and quite angrily) points out, absolutely disqualifies something as stupid and cheesy as Twilight from having any say on the matter and be taken seriously.

In the end, he says that the movie will probably appeal or be repulsive to the same viewer bases as the others, and that he doesn’t know if he’s alone in having such a strongly negative reaction to it.