Twilight’s Best Spinoff Would Undo Breaking Dawn’s Gross Ending Twist

If the Twilight saga produced a sequel that centered on Renesmee Cullen’s story, the spinoff could undo the creepy “imprinting” plot of the final installment. The Twilight saga’s movie adaptations were a huge financial success upon their release. However, for a variety of reasons, it is unlikely that Twilight will receive a sequel or reboot any time soon. Twilight’s A-list cast members like Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson are otherwise engaged, the saga’s story was self-contained, and the target demographic of the series have largely aged out of their interest in the series.

However, the Twilight franchise could avoid most of these issues if the series staged a spinoff that focused on Edward and Bella’s daughter Renesmee. Bringing back Renesmee and making her the lead of a new saga would also be a chance for the Twilight saga to undo the infamously weird imprinting plot. At the end of the Twilight saga, Bella’s secondary love interest Jacob Black “imprinted” on her newborn daughter, a strange and under-explained plot device that meant he and the child’s souls were bonded forever. The Twilight saga’s “imprinting” scene implied that Jacob would end up being Renesmee’s love interest when she grew up, but this idea never sat right with a lot of viewers, and a spinoff could undo the infamous twist.

Why Jacob Imprinted On Renesmee In The Twilight Saga’s Ending

From a storytelling perspective, it is easy to understand why Jacob Black imprinted on Renesmee in the final Twilight novel and its movie adaptation. Half of the franchise’s audience wanted Jacob to end up with Bella, not Edward, and explaining that he was always destined to end up with her daughter instead was an odd conciliatory gesture after the character lost the love triangle that was central to the series. This cast Taylor Lautner’s Twilight character in a deeply questionable light, and also set up a worrying future for Renesmee. In the years since the movies were released, both Twilight’s critics and even some fans of the franchise have noted that, even aside from the main problems with the pair, it’s also weird that Edward and Bella’s daughter doesn’t seemingly have any choice in deciding who she spends her life with.

Why Renesmee Would Be The Perfect New Twilight Lead

Aside from Renesmee’s love life set-up, she is otherwise well suited to leading a revival of the Twilight franchise. Renesmee’s unique powers make her a force to be reckoned with in the universe of the series, meaning Renesmee could be a much more active and less passive brand of heroine than her human mother. Where Bella was effectively forced to wait on the sidelines of supernatural conflicts because of her status as an ordinary human (at least, until the final Twilight novel and its movie adaptation), Renesmee doesn’t have this issue. In contrast, she has been uniquely powerful since birth and is fated to grow more powerful than most of her vampire coven, meaning she is a perfect protagonist for a more action-oriented Twilight reboot.

Twilight’s Follow-up Doesn’t Need Jacob

While Renesmee would be a perfect heroine for a potential Twilight reboot, Jacob doesn’t need to be in it – and indeed, removing him and his concerning storyline with Renesmee would benefit the reboot and the franchise. Twilight‘s depiction of Quileute characters garnered criticism back when the books and movies were first released, and these valid critiques have only gained popularity in the years since the popularity of the franchise peaked. Not only that, but Jacob wasn’t all that compelling a character in his own right. His role in the Twilight series was to act as a foil to Edward but, with Bella and Edward together as of the end of the original saga, there is little need for this character to return. Jacob didn’t offer much to the world of Twilight outside of his role as Bella’s potential love interest, and his character never received an origin story as compelling as even minor members of the Cullen family. Thus, a Twilight reboot that focused on Renesmee’s adult life could jettison Jacob without losing much in the way of compelling character development.

Renesmee’s Twilight Spinoff Could Undo “The Imprinting”

If Renesmee was to return in a Twilight spinoff, there is almost no way that the sequel could pair off her and Jacob. While Renesmee was growing at a faster rate than normal humans, this doesn’t cancel out how uncomfortable her dating someone who was an adult when she was born would be to the audience, and the fact that even the Twilight saga’s fans didn’t care for the imprinting subplot means that few would be eager to see the couple onscreen. However, Twilight’s potential reboot could undo the uncomfortable imprinting subplot by briefly bringing back Jacob Black to kill the character off. Much like Twilight’s original script killed Charlie Swan to give Bella a formative loss that would define her character, a reboot starring Renesmee could give Edward and Bella’s child a backstory that involves Jacob’s death, leaning into the familial interpretation of the imprinting instead of the controversial romantic angle.

Why Twilight’s Best Reboot Would Kill Off Jacob

Killing off Jacob would give Renesmee a tragic backstory but, crucially, unlike killing off Charlie, this twist would not leave her struggling to cope in day-to-day life. Making Bella a 17-year-old orphan could have made Twilight’s canceled adaptation darker than the source novels, as the movie would have needed to explore the loss of a parent and its impact on her character. In contrast, if Twilight’s potential sequel were to kill off Jacob, this would leave Renesmee without a love interest and with a compelling score to settle, but wouldn’t fundamentally alter her character arc. As it stands, Renesmee ended the original Twilight saga as a young girl eager to grow up and see the world, unaware of the power she wields and the shady characters who want to take advantage of her skills.

A Twilight spinoff that opens with the enemies of the Cullens killing off Jacob would leave Renesmee distraught, but wouldn’t completely change her character’s story. She would still be young, free, and powerful, but she would also now have a personally resonant reason to enter the dark world of the Volturi and avenge the man who once imprinted on her. Thus, Twilight’s best potential spinoff could avoid the creepy elements of Jacob’s story while still giving Renesmee a compelling saga of her own.