Slightly better, but then, stab wounds are better than gunshots

Rating: 3/10 (7 April 2010)

Why is the new trend to have Vampires and Werewolves fight? I don't recall Dracula and the Wolfman getting into the ring together. Which is too bad, because that would have been HILARIOUS.
Instead we have a movie with virtually every male character trying to get Bella to swoon for them now that Vampire Ed has left. Yes, his family apparently stopped putting lead in the water, and people are starting to realize that he and his family are a little off (THEY'RE VAMPIRES) so they move away and don't tell Bella where they're going. So we get a long montage of Bella in full emo mode, stopping just short of cutting herself, until she decides to replace Ed with one of the other guys who is drooling over her. Yes, that's the moral girls, your life's worth is completely dependent on whatever man you are with. Great lesson.
In New Moon's defense, they get the weepy melodrama over with fairly quickly and get on to a story that isn't... well, it isn't awful. Local native Americans don't want vampires on their land, a couple of the bad vampires are snooping around, the native Americans turn into werewolves to fight them off, Vampires tasty, yum yum.
But once that's resolved, we're laboriously dragged back into the world of emo vampires as Alice shows up having had a vision of Bella's death, and apparently word slipped to Vampire Ed that Bella is supposedly dead and what does this macho, powerful, badass vampire do? He decides to kill himself rather than live without her. Just think about this, what if Sarah Conner had killed herself after Kyle Reese bought it? What if young Bruce Wayne had killed himself after his parents were murdered? These are tough as nails characters that rose above their traumatic event and became badass. Edward Cullen isn't badass. He is bad, and he is an ass, but he's not both. So instead of a fully raged, ticked off, super-powered immortal showing up to beat werewolf tail, we get whiny Vampire Ed who goes to some old fruity LARPing vampire elders asking them to kill him. What, kid, too much of a puss to aim the stake correctly? I'll help!
They refuse, so he decides to try and reveal the presence of vampires so they'll have no choice but to kill him. Bella stops him just in time, but the LARPers don't want Bella spilling the secret of their existence, so Alice says she'll turn Bella into a vampire... AND THEY JUST LEAVE!! Urkel could fight these vampires and win! "She can't reveal our existence. Make her a vampire."
"Okay."
"... So, you'll be getting to that..."
"Later."
"Okay, sure."
They go back to rainy Washington, there's a brief little testosterone battle between Vampire Ed and Werewolf boy, but seeing as how neither one of them has any, um... fangs, the whole thing just ends and I'm still bored. Is it as bad as the first one? No. This one has some concept of pacing and dramatic tension. Is it bad? OH GLORIOUS VLAD, YES!! It's awful! But hell, if they keep at it, eventually one of these might be bearable. I can tell the kids have been taking acting classes, but next time around it'd be nice if they PAID ATTENTION IN THEM!!