I’m watching the Steeler game which, in the snow, looks like someone shook a snow globe and shoved a football game into it. While it’s half time, I thought I’d don my ever-so-no-flattering referee jersey and lay out a few penalties. Really, vertical stripes? With breasts? NOT a good fashion choice.
But anyway. 15 yard penalty and a royal spanking to TMZ.com for the idea that Fabio is looking good for “the seven women and one man out there still buying romance novels.” Yeah. Seven million.
And an additional roughing the kicker call against TMZ for being completely and obviously jealous. Come on now. Hair aside, that man looks damn good for 49.
[Thanks to CharmedKim and to KatieBabs for the link.]
And IO9, once again, lands on the penalty list. Five yards for delay of game for the following comment in their Twilight review:
That Twilight the movie makes such little effort to convince with the quasi-vamp mythology shows that it understands its target audience – but also that, ultimately, it doesn’t care enough about those who haven’t read the books to offer up anything more than a Harlequin Romance bodice-ripper dressed up for a superhero audience.
Bodice ripper Harlequin? That’s like my saying that fantasy and scifi are the same, and both are equally stupid. Bad, IO9, Bad.
Oh, major foul.
Geez, people. Get a clue…the reason people see so many of them is because they sell! A fact I thank God for regularly.
Grrr…WTF? That blows. When is romance going to stop being the red-headed stepchild of literature and gain the respect it deserves? So irritating.
Stupid question from a new convert—what defines a Harlequin romance (besides being published by Harlequin, obviously), and what is the actual definition of a bodice ripper? Since every time I’ve heard it used, it seems to be used incorrectly.
I am watching the cricket and we’re loosing! 🙁
Have tried watching football a few times-but is just beyond me and they have so many clothes on!
The TMZ thing I understand since watching a show they did this week that had an interview with Paul Anka….. except the children who work in the editing room didn’t know who he was. Even Harvey Levin was shaking his head at that stupidity.
Doesn’t it seem that many of the Meyers/Twilight reviews are starting to sound a little mean-spirited? Maybe it’s not that the books or the movie are the end of civilization but that there isn’t much else going on in the tween-world right now.
Sometimes I’m reluctant to admit that I read romance, because of the stereotype (and my own horrible, horrible early experiences with some titles).
But I am a kajillion times more likely to admit to being a romance fan than – for whatever reason – claim to be a Twilight fan.
Hm. Possible thought: Despite the saying, people judge books by their covers. The covers to the Twilight series? Awesometastic. Given the lovely snark on this site, I doubt I need to finish this line of thought.
Interesting take on Twilight, considering how much of it is Meyer’s constant exhortations to NOT HAVE SEX, OMG. The New York Times review I read today picked up on that and claimed it made Edward boring. But you can’t have a bodice-ripper and no sex at the same time, can you?
That being said, I do find the association irritating.
Roger Ebert gave a really nice review about Twilight
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081119/REVIEWS/811199997/1001
I saw Twilight last night (or, maybe more accurately, this morning) and, nope, not a single bodice ripped.
It was a perfectly pleasant way to spend a couple hours although, not having read the books, I could’ve used a bit more exposition. I suppose that might have annoyed the more informed, though.
I have a crush on Roger Ebert now. His review style is disjointed and each paragraph almost stands by itself in a narrative sense, but I was very charmed by his review.
GAAAH. That makes me so mad. Back in my academia days, sf was the genre that got no respect, and I was constantly running to its defense and spouting Sturgeon’s Law. Now I’m involved in a multi-genre critique group, and I can’t tell you how many comments I’ve gotten from sf writers that “all romance is crap.” The hypocrisy, IT BURNS.
OMG! Did anyone read the comments on the TMZ message board? I was LMAO about the reference to one of the staffers at TMZ (at least on the TV version) who is definitely a Fabio-wannabe. Priceless!! :::grin:::
Also, eons ago, on E! They did Fabio’s THS (True Hollywood Story) and holy moly! When he was about 20-ish, he had dark short hair (as he should) and he was smokin’ hot!! The long blonde haired Fabio does less than nothing for me. :::shrugs:::
spam-alot word : farm54 . . . . . seriously? I couldn’t farm1 😉
Io9 has an extremely low signal to noise ratio. For every post that is actually interesting and well-written (Jeff Vandermeer’s posts on SF art are usually pretty good), there are nine of the “Top 10 sluttiest superheroes” or “Why YA books suck” or “Real life space exploration – not as cool as in the movies and ripe for snark” type. Plus, as is de rigeur in the SF community, they make fun of anything containing romance or – god beware – sex. What makes, this particularly sad is that Io9 is almost entirely run by women, who you’d think would be above male fanboys’ adolescent embarrassment about sex. But I suspect that they adopted the male SF fans’ sneer at romance, because they want to fit in.
Anti-spam word: myself79
Myself in ‘79 loved SF. Myself in 2008 no longer does, because of too many clashes with idiots like those on that blog.
@ Erin,
Correct me if I’m wrong, legions of the awesome, but in my understanding, a Harlequin, particularly in this context, would be the sweeter, shorter, more contemporary romance subgenre, and in an earlier context, pretty free of hawt sex. Maybe a meaningful kiss or two, a feel-up if you’re lucky. 😉 Of course, now you have the Blaze line (among others) and lots of action, but in days of yore, Harlequin had a lot of behind-closed-doors, leave it to the reader’s imagination…
The term ‘bodice-ripper’ devolves to the purple-y prose of some 80’s (into the 90s) historical romances, whose domineering, alpha heroes ripped the clothes off the heaving alabaster breasts of winsome and dewy-eyed virgin heroines—and the covers of said historicals which have rightfully been snarked at here many times over. And no, not ALL historicals fit that mold, but it was a common trope at the time.
Just my viewpoint. 🙂
-Anthea
Thanks Anthea!
UGH. A lot of the comments at the IO9 post are making me roll my eyes, because let’s face it, pretty much every vampire book since Dracula has been about sex and desire. Even that Stephen King novel with the vampires (what is it? Salem’s Lot?) is about sex and desire.
If all those people are separating the desire from the vampires, then they’re missing a lot of subtext, and at times, just text.