A Rant to Start the Year

So... I recently finished reading the Twilight series of books. I'd never even heard of them before the movie, so I guess I'm a little behind the times on the mass "Edward and Bella" hysteria thing, but really that's not a surprise... I saw a trailer for the movie, decided that people leaping from one tree to another looked cool and went to go see a vampire movie in an actual theatre (usually vampire films are saved for the brightest, sunniest, happiest days of summer). In any case. I guess the theatre's descriptive label of "Horror/Romance" should have tipped me off.. It was pretty bad... I mean, it wasn't supposed to be a comedy was it? Distasteful teenage angst aside (self-absorbed teenagers with an over-inflated sense of the importance of their little dramas make me want to spew chunks), the movie was filled with really awkward-funny moments like this one:

I mean, these are supposed to be the cool, beautiful people. He looks like someone who should be riding the short bus. And she looks like she's wondering why the hell she got stuck with him.

In any case. I did read the books. Can't really say why, I have no excuses whatsoever... They suck you in, makes it hard to put them down... Ignoring the total deus ex machina near the end of the last book, there's one thing that really pissed me off about them. Can someone tell me how is it even vaguely acceptable that these vampires go around killing animals like mountain lions and grizzlies? I mean really, these are seriously endangered species in some areas. And does it not mess with the entire ecology of an area to kill off the apex predators? Just how many grizzlies and mountain lions can there possibly be running around on the Olympic Peninsula? Couldn't the vampires just eat deer? What the hell, they'd be doing the entire globe a favour by feeding on humans... After all we are as a species overpopulating the planet and destroying the environment beyond any hope of redemption. A little vampiric population control might actually be in order...