People making fun of Bella swan and Edward specifically for not showing facial expressions, having facial twitches, doing lip biting, stuttering, clinging to each other, being extremely reserved… mmm… it’s giving ableism.
The idea that a character isn’t a character because they don’t show emotion, whether through their face or through their voice, is very much ableism. Characters are allowed to look and be cold and standoffish. There are people like that in real life. Not everyone needs to show facial expressions or express themselves dramatically, and to expect them to do so is very much ableism.
Not to mention, pushing all of the problematic shit aside, I find myself relating to bella on a specific level as an autistic person, because we’re both extremely reserved and don’t like hanging around other people, but when we like someone we’re very clingy, we both have blank faces (because why do I need to fake my expressions? If I don’t feel something, I don’t feel it), we both stutter A LOT, and we both have very limited interests. AND WE ARE BOTH CLUMSY AS HELL!!! THE MOST AUTISTIC TRAIT OF THEM ALL!!!
Not to mention, her suddenly going from this calm, and almost emotionless character to becoming extremely angry when that Jacob thing happened in Breaking Dawn Part 2 is a very very VERY common trait for some autistic people.
We can express ourselves in ways that seem very overly dramatic and even exaggerated, and cartoonish to allistic people. I’ve done it many times. It’s a thing. And people laughed because they thought I was joking… every time I express myself even a little bit, people find it amusing. As if I’m just faking it.
So yeah… BELLA SWAN IS AUTISTIC!!!!!
(This doesn’t mean I suddenly like the characters. I still hate them very much, and I still don’t like the story. I’m just very passionate about calling out ableism, and begging people to realize that neurodivergent people exist.)