I thought I was done with the Twilight series. As usual, I was wrong, because it was either that or those damn dancing penguins.

So now I'm faced with the dilemma of just what to say about it. I could go the easy route and just make fun of Twilight fans for 800 words, but that wouldn't exactly bring anything new to the table, and I fear I would wind up battered to death under a hailstorm of glittery spiral notebooks and dubstep albums.

-- Local show times, theaters, trailer.

Except wait, the kids don't buy physical albums these days, so maybe I'm safe to call all you fans a bunch of dorks who like dumb things! Ha ha ha! Hang on, some fool on my forum just misspelled "Kashyyyyk." This can't go unanswered.

Truth be told, I don't give a damn if a 45-year-old mom is into sparkly teenage love stories. I myself have spent a not-insubstantial chunk of my life thinking about how elves can live so long while having so few children. In fact, Twilight's vampires are a lot like elves, what with the immortality and the haircuts so cartoonishly perfect they'll drive any anime characters in the audience to suicide. So if you like this stuff, enjoy. But when I watched Breaking Dawn — Part 1, I thought it pretty much sucked.

Vampire Robert Pattinson and human Kristen Stewart are getting married. After, they head to a Brazilian island for the honeymoon, where they consummate their vows — leaving the bed broken and Stewart bruised. Pattinson is mortified for hurting her, refusing to have sex again.

But once was enough. Stewart winds up pregnant. It shouldn't be possible; she rapidly begins to waste away. Vampire leader Peter Facinelli determines the strange baby will kill her, but Stewart is determined to have it. Meanwhile, the werewolves, considering it an abomination, besiege the vampire house, determined to destroy this half-vampire menace.

Goodness. So...right. There is so much to talk about here I don't really know where to begin. How about with a spoiler warning? Warning: There will be spoilers! To whom, I'm not sure, because I'm guessing anyone who would care about having Breaking Dawn spoiled for them already knows quite well what happens, and if they forget, they can get a refresher by closing their eyes and reading the tattoos on their inner eyelids.

Also, before I get too wrapped up in the wonder of grown men falling in love at first sight of a newborn baby, I'm going to do my actual job and point out that Breaking Dawn is hardly a movie. I mean, in a technical sense, it is a series of moving images currently being played on a big screen. But there is essentially zero conflict or drama until the pregnancy shows up, which is a long time.

Even then, the drama is bungled. Stewart's decision to keep the her-killing baby is immediate and set in stone — "It's like this miracle or something," she literally says, a line so profound we can now forever shut up as a species, because there is truly nothing left to say. That's Stewart's entire motivation for killing herself.

Meanwhile, the werewolves' motivations for rushing off to murder the unborn whatever-it-is boil down to "Oh, dang guys, shouldn't something happen in this movie? Let's go kill a baby!" All worth it for the supremely satisfying action climax of grown men and women punching terrible CG wolves in the face.

Then again who cares, because Stewart is so personality-free and Pattinson is so thuddingly whiny I'm convinced we should feed all children to werewolves and propagate the species by cloning people we already know are cool. From now on, all men are Teddy Roosevelt and all women are Boudica. It's better this way.

That said, I thought director Bill Condon did some nice things! The supporting cast's wedding speeches show some actual character. The exchange of vows is somewhat artful, as are some of the shots from inside Stewart's veins. And you have to admit it ended.

But if you're not already a fan, I don't see how you would possibly enjoy Breaking Dawn unless you spend the whole time pretending what you are seeing is the result of powerful hallucinogens. There's no dramatic arc, the characters are all crazy people, and a teenage werewolf man falls in love with a baby half-vampire girl, which, instead of resulting in decades of jail time, saves the day for everyone. Whatever floats your boat!

Grade: D+

* Contact Ed Robertson at edwrobertson@gmail.com. His fiction is available on Kindle, Nook, and through Smashwords.