2011 Comic-Con: Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 Panel
The experience of a Twilight panel really begins in line. The Twihards are really big on lining up early and sleeping out overnight. It makes everything really shitty for the rest of us because then we have to line up early with them. Also, Twihards are really embarrassing to watch. Really really embarrassing, mostly because they're not tween girls; they're grown ass women. Shortly after I got in line (about 3 hours before the start time), Elizabeth Reaser, a lovely and talented actress who plays in the films and appeared on the panel, walked past all the Twihards and was recognized by no one. About twenty minutes after that, a pubescent cuteboy with a small role in the films walked by the Twihards, and they went insane, falling over themselves and shoving me out of the way to take pictures with him. He wasn't even on the panel.
The panel started with director Bill Condon hilariously pretending that anything happens in Twilight. Here's a spoiler for you: Nothing happens in Twilight. But I guess directors have to say that their movies are exciting, and Condon elicited squees from the audience by claiming to have "imprinted" on the material immediately. The three leads came out, and Kristen Stewart talked sort of endearingly about shooting the wedding and it being "[her] day." They introduced a lip of "Kristen and Rob on their honeymoon," at which point Stewart yelled, "Edward and Bella!" Good luck trying to keep those separate, dude. That's a distinction too fine for Twihards.
To give us an idea of what to expect from Breaking Dawn, they showed two clips, one the aforementioned honeymoon scene--no sex, just them arriving at the gorgeous house in Brasil, and a nervous Bella's preparations for a swim with a shirtless (but not sparkling) Edward. The second was a shockingly shirted Jacob with the Cullen parents--and later the enemy werewolves--making deals to get Bella the blood she needs to drink to keep her vampire hybrid fetus alive. It is beautifully shot, truly. The cinematographer has done an outstanding job. Stewart says this is the most real movie of the series, which I think is probably right--a young married couple, suddenly pregnant and in conflict about what to do about said pregnancy. Also, according to everyone, the birth scene should be pretty intense. Stewart said they tried to make it as hardcore as they could, and if you know anything about the books, the birth scene is crazy hardcore.
The biggest surprise was how much Stewart talked. She dropped her generally reserved demeanor and was really chatty, talking about Bella's wedding and vampire makeup and the music that her into character and playing the birth and her metamorphosis into a vampire. When all the panel members were asked which of the Twilight Saga was their favorite movie, the other panelists did their job and said Breaking Dawn. She said that she really loved the universally panned original Twilight and praised Catherine Hardwicke's special, weird take. Of course, she also called Bella, perhaps the most passive protagonist in literary history, is "such a fighter" and said she's been fighting really hard the entire series. So, maybe don't listen to anything she says.
The male leads, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner, had wildly divergent approaches to the panel. Lautner is a Hollywood publicist's dream. He is excited to move on into action movies but always likes new challenges and would like all kinds of roles. He couldn't possibly choose between playing Jacob and playing Nathan in his new movie Abduction. He loves the challenge of playing Jacob's transformation in this new movie. Et cetera. Always the perfect answer. Pattinson, however, is kind of awkward and, at times, inappropriate. When a sweet little girl, like a six-year-old, asked if he liked having a baby with Bella, he accused her of using a double entendre and then sort of babbled about liking babies and liking acting with them. When asked if he had more fun playing Cedric or Edward, he rambled for a couple paragraphs, becoming increasingly incoherent, before saying "I don't know what I'm talking about. Edward!" Also, for reasons unknown, two-thirds of his head is a kind of slick classic Hollywood hairstyle, and the final third is shaved. He's not slick or polished, but he seems a little more comfortable with himself than he used to.
And through it all, the Twilight fans were true to themselves. They lost their minds at regular intervals, most notably when shown a clip of Pattinson starting to remove his shirt. I say starting because you can only see about an inch of his back before the cut. One woman who got to ask a question complimented him on his surprisingly toned back. All one inch of it. And a 30 year old woman waited in a long line to have a chance to speak into a microphone and tell Taylor Lautner, "I love you. I really really love you."