With Breaking Dawn Part 1 coming out next week, Tess Malone explores slutshaming in the Twilight Series.

"If this is about my soul, take it! I don’t want it!” This is not the average fight that a teenage girl has with her boyfriend about losing her virginity. If your boyfriend is vampire Edward Cullen, though, getting intimate, when a French kiss could lead to a fang kiss and your untimely death, is awkward. An “it’s complicated” relationship status doesn’t even begin to cover it; it’s tough to be Bella Swan.

When the series starts, the only thing impressive about Bella is her extensive flannel shirt collection. After she falls “irrevocably” in love with Edward, suddenly she has a special identity as the “chick who runs with vampires”; as if finding a boyfriend is the only way for a teenage girl to find herself. What Bella should be discovering and accepting is her sexuality, but when getting a mere paper cut can lead your boyfriend’s vampire family into a homicidal frenzy, spilling any virgin blood is out of the question. Bella and Edward are still horny 17-year-olds though (Edward may be dead, but he’s not that dead) and the one time when they try to get it on, Edward yells “Stop!” He praises himself for his sexual restraint “I’m stronger than I thought,” prompting Bella to respond that she “wishes I could say the same.” Effectively, Edward slutshames her for having a libido. This outrageous underwear scene is a microcosm for the entire series where each phase of the moon seems to eclipse Bella’s sexuality and ultimately, agency.

Edward claims his misogyny is to “protect” Bella because she’s his “only reason to stay alive”, thus making it seem like Bella’s sole purpose in life is to love Edward. This creates a paradox when Edward leaves her after the aforementioned deadly dinner party in New Moon.

After spending a few months in a catatonic state, Bella shacks up with another catch, Jacob, the werewolf with anger management issues. The werewolf pack leader’s fiancée is permanently scarred when her boyfriend lost his temper; this is the definition of an abusive relationship. Nevertheless, without Jacob, Bella “can’t stand it”; failing to see the irony that her life is only harder given her paranormal paramours.

Bella’s lovelorn desperation reaches such an extreme that she leaps off a cliff just to hallucinate Edward telling her not to do it; still the patriarchal voice of restraint even when he’s not present. After this seemingly suicidal jaunt, Edward wants to kill himself too, which in its Romeo & Juliet fashion rekindles their relationship. They should’ve kept Shakespeare’s original ending. As his sister Alice scolds Bella, “I’ve never met anyone more prone to life-threatening idiocy”, which explains why she gets back together with Edward in Eclipse.

In Eclipse, the most charming sides of her love interests are exposed. Jacob is a stalker who Bella has to punch in the face to get him to stop kissing her, breaking her hand in the altercation. Edward is more subtly threatening, disabling the engine in Bella’s car so she cannot see Jacob. As if this paranormal pissing contest couldn’t get any worse, Edward forces Bella into the ultimate patriarchal trap – marriage. She tries to barter sex for her hand, but Edward gets the best of her by slutshaming her in his proposal. Bella jokes, “I’m a villain trying to steal your virtue”, but Edward responds that he is more concerned about “her virtue” than his. After they’re married in Breaking Dawn, it’s fine if Edward gives Bella bruises during sex and impregnates her with a cannibalistic baby, but before Bella would have been a fallen woman.

How did Mormon Stephenie Meyer manage to write about virginal vampires when they’re considered to be metaphors for sex? Even more puzzling, how is such a Victorian series successful in the 21st Century? Oh yes, it's because Hollywood is stuck back in the dark ages.