5 Characters That Should Get A Gender Swapped Adaptation (And 1 That Really Shouldn't)

Twilight the novel and Twilight the movie may not be all that exciting (even if the benefit of hindsight has revealed that they may not in fact have been the Worst Thing Ever as many expressed at the time). Twilight the phenomenon, however, is fascinating.

After all, what other twenty-first century novel has inspired a pornographic fan fiction that is itself a billion dollar movie franchise which even extends to a Jane Fonda, Diane Keaton dramedy about older women reading said pornographic fan fiction of the original novel?

Twilight writer Stephenie Meyer's doubling down on her most famous creation endlessly to rewrite the same novel from different perspectives (what if it's the same but from Edward's point of view? what if it's the same but Edward's a girl vampire?) has sort of turned Twilight into a weird Borgesian art piece, repeatedly commenting on itself and its own internal contradictions.

Meyer's Life And Death: Twilight Reimagined, in which Edward is recast as thirsty female vamp Edythe Cullen struggling to resist mangenue Beaufort Swan, claims to be simply the same story but with the genders reversed. Perhaps unintentionally, though, in Meyer's myriad small edits to make the story "fit" with a woman in the role of romantic aggressor and a man as passive receiver there lies a potential stealth commentary on the gender politics of the original.

Assuming a reasonable level of creative freedom it would be intriguing to see a director (maybe even original helmer Catherine Hardwicke) tackle Life And Death as a commentary on the earlier film and what it represents. Of course you may end up with an unmarketable art movie that does for Twilight what Gus Van Sant's Psycho did for Hitchcock, an almost identical remake with a few tweaks. But it would still be interesting to see.

Who Should Play Them?

Ideally, for the full effect of an art movie gender commentary on the original, you would want to see Kristen Stewart as Edythe and Robert Pattinson as Beaufort. Having not had a brilliant relationship with the franchise and its fans for some time, the actors are finally coming round to a more accepting view of the roles that made their names. Something a bit out of the ordinary like this could be just what it takes to get them back in.

Certainly Stewart, who has grown since the first movie from an awkward teen constantly chewing on her bottom lip into a confident queer icon with serious acting chops, would now be a better fit for the immortal vamp part anyway.