The Twilight Saga

Including

Twilight

New Moon

Eclipse

Breaking Dawn 1

Breaking Dawn 2

I finally dove in, only a decade later. I really had no knowledge of the details of this story. Of course, it is a vampire, a werewolf and a human in a teen love triangle. But beyond that, I stayed remarkably ignorant of the story when it was launched, both in book and film versions. So with nothing but time, I jumped in. I will say, that like any multi-episode story, there are ups and downs, and I was sad to see the traditional mid-story weakening (book 2 of a trilogy is almost always "just a transition"). The first two are sort of brilliant in keeping the story fresh. First Twilight offers a full focus on the girl and the vampire. Then in New Moon, the vampire is basically relegated and we get a full focus on the girl and the werewolf. So everything still seems fresh. Then 3 and 4 are clearly interstitial, transition to lead up to the finish. Yes, some important facts are introduced, but not full movie (and I would guess not full book) importance. Then in the finale, we end strong. Bringing in the diversity of vampires was great and the expected battle and resolution using a dream sequence plot mechanism which, while reliable and maybe rote, was in this case also very effective. So well done. If I were to rank each individual episode, it would be 3, 3, 2, 2, and 3 stars. Overall:

3 stars (out of 5)