Okay I admit it. Like all the other crazy ladies out there , I too am a die hard for the Twilight vampire Edward Cullen, precisely the personification of a patient, loving, strong, chivalrous man, vampire, werewolf or otherwise. Pretend what I may. He’s mysterious, he’s classy and he is handsome. A couple of thousand years old vampire like Bram Stoker’s Dracula would be an actual warrior in shining armour, though modern aesthetics would not permit him to get into the same garb. He’d have got the medieval historical charm on him that goes like- “Thy will is my command, m’ lady.” (No, no men, quoting Shakespeare doesn’t work!)The other day my Twilight crazy friend quipped- “I’d date someone who’s exactly like Edward!”
I realized the tragedy. He has successfully put younger modern mortal guys out of business. Not that his age of 109 years, is improving dating prospects for older men. It takes a pale porcelain skin that glows in the sunlight (Bappi Lahiri’s gold etched body is a sham!), a subnormal body temperature (He’s cool and he’s hot), agelessness (Girls, get out your Ponds White Beauty), immortality, superhuman abilities and strength, a couple of fangs with an eternal blood thirst, ultra sexy looks and still managing to tell a very human, constipated looking girl you love, that you actually despise yourself.
Pattinson himself had never been the subject of such tremendous fan hysteria, even through his supporting role in Harry Potter (“Oh, Daniel Radcliffe!” Sigh), until Twilight happened. At least to my knowledge, not many girls cared a dime. Nor have been other strikingly handsome men like Brad Pitt, Orlando Bloom, and Taylor Lautner until they portrayed characters of such mystique as Hercules, Legolas, and Jacob Black. It’s not the hero anymore, it’s the superhero who matters (That reminds me, IPL team Chennai “Super” Kings would have made better grammatical sense without the “Super”. Ah, what does it matter!). Add popular folklore and mythology, and voila, the deadly irresistible macho male is ready for females to pounce on.
Where there’re vampires there’re werewolves. (“Jacob Black is so hot” my friend coos again. “Well, that’s good then, he and Edward would make a good thermocouple.” “Oh cut it out, they’re not gay.” I was intrigued by this perverted interpretation of what once was thermodynamics.) The same mystique factor again. While it’s fantastic to imagine, I doubt whether a real wolf, or a werewolf, would not send them all scurrying. (“I’m scared to death of dogs.” My friend admits. “Of course, it’s only logical that you should fear the canine!” I smile maliciously)
Our desis have taken the cue only too well. The superhero craze has hit the Indian market late but hard with films like Krrish, Drona, Love Story 2020 and many others coming up. The Bollywood sweetheart of mushy blockbuster romances like DDLJ, K2H2 (That’s not Potassium hydrate) and K3G has taken the mania further to a distinctly Egyptian sounding “Ra-One”. (“Is it the prequel to Osiris-two or a cyber slang Ravana?” I ask innocently. My friend doesn’t respond. She just stares.)
Not long back we even had a Twilight-based soap being aired on a popular channel. The desi Edward was a major turn on for our Indian girls who could proudly identify with the plot. At least girls in Tamil Nadu could gladly and safely dare to fill in Bella’s part. (For those who don’t know, Bella in Tamil means…er…the phallus). It was a novel venture by a K-addicted someone who has a dubious reputation for saas-bahu (mother in law and daughter in law) mega serials. I almost thought that this pishaach daanav (vampires have mythical legends in Sanskrit literature too) would bring his human girlfriend to his bloodsucking mother (Bloodsucking isn’t it? No wonder she’s a monster-in-law) and his family business obsessed father (“A blood bank maybe?” My friend offered.) who would critically disapprove of the prospective bahu- “Tumne ek insaan se pyaar karke, khoon peete darindo ki sadiyon se chali aa rahi parampara ko mitti me mila diya!” (“By loving a human you’ve disgraced the timeless traditions of the vampire clan” in a more dramatic “Kkkrazzy” way).The world purports India to be the land of superstition, magic and miracles, but the truth is only more complex. We simply have an intuition for what works and we tap it. We have djinns, kaateris, pishaachs and rakshasas in our mythology. We fear them, we respect them, and we worship a thousand gods not barring the fearsome Kaali maata but we do not obsess ourselves with the urban legend that werewolves and vampires are wholly real and get all excited, happy or dreamy about it. We do not pretend to be Goths, Punks and Raves who crave for extended fangs and an eternal blood thirst just because Twilight and Vampire Diaries sound so cool. We want to stay human even if our troubles here demand more superhuman abilities than developed nations do. We do not imagine aliens, supernatural creatures, UFOS, meteors, asteroids or any other outlandish likelihood in the whole of universe conspiring towards bringing down New Delhi (They’d all fry their noses with the stench at Nizamuddin railway station). We are us; mortally entertaining, mortally superhuman (There were some serious theories regarding our winning the 2011 cricket World Cup as “Superstar” Rajinikanth was present there), mortally evil (Mogambo khush hua!), and mortally good enough for our star-obsessed girls. Just like Harry Potter Kolkata Aaye (someone played Rowling- Rowling), Mahashaktimaan (The Matrix dubbed in Hindi) and Maut ka Saudaagar (Deathly Hallows) may only comically entertain us; Twilight can never be a reality here.
