Supernatural dramas are a pop culture favorite, but one of the most iconic franchises is the Twilight series, the saga of Bella Swan and Edward Cullen. Despite blood-sucking, danger, and differing worlds, the two came together and fell in love. While people are fairly divisive on how good the series is, that doesn't change how pinnacle the books and movies have become to current media. Twilight is mentioned constantly in memes, forums, on TV, and more.
Though the entire story is told in Bella's perspective, the series is just as much about her tortured vampire love interest, Edward Cullen. Lonely and sad for a century, he's finally found love in the only girl he can't read instantly, and she falls for the first guy who speaks to her on a more artistic level. Unfortunately for both of them, their species don't exactly match up.
Because of his age, Edward has a lot more history behind him than Bella does. Furthermore, because of his vampirism, his body is pretty strange and he's able to do things that most high schoolers can't. He begins the series a mystery, but over four books and five movies, fans and Bella learn a lot more about the brooding vampire. Not all of it is as beautiful as his hair, though.
With that said, here are the 25 Strange Things About Edward's Anatomy In Twilight.
He's The Fastest Cullen Alive
All vampires have super speed, being able to run must faster than any prey could ever run away. Of the seven Cullens, though, Edward is the fastest. This makes him a very apt fighter whenever the coven comes in confrontation with others, or when Bella needs protecting from danger.
His speed and telepathy make him a fantastic scout, able to identify most any threats coming towards the family. It also makes him a little unique among his people, because he's still highly proficient at a basic vampire skill. However, it does cause trouble when it lets him run away from his troubles so easily.
He Has Predatory Night Vision
Edward is a vampire and, ultimately, vampire are predators. No matter how much he and Bella love one another, that fact does not change. He always thirsts for her blood and she is always in potential danger. These problems plague the couple all throughout high school.
Meanwhile, there is more that comes with being a predator. One of those things is his night vision. This skill makes it easier for Edward to see everything around him, travel under the cover of darkness, and use stealth to his advantage. If the Cullens weren't strict vegetarians, this nocturnal sight would help make him a fearsome hunter.
His Lungs Are Functionless
One of Eclipse's most intimidating scenes happens when all of the newborn vampires rise up from the water, having walked across the bottom. Though the physics of that can get a little iffy, the reason they can do it is bizarre and fascinating: they don't have to breathe.
Edward explains it to to Bella that they still breathe to better mimic humans, but it isn't necessary. A lot of their natural functions as humans have become obsolete. Also, it makes it much easier to be a stealthy hunter if they can't even hear your breathing. While almost everything vampiric is an adaptation to hunt, this is by far one of the strangest and most unsettling.
He Never Slept With Anyone Before He Was Changed
A busy son of a wealthy man, Edward had little time for romance. He spent all of his hours studying, practicing music, or spending time with his mother. Youthful romance was further impossible when he became dreadfully ill and nearly passed on from the flu pandemic in 1918. Vampirism then cemented the young man's isolation.
Carlisle tried to find romantic partners for Edward, but he remained uninterested in any women presented. This only changed once he met Bella Swan, the human whose blood made him ravenous and whose mind remained a mystery. Because of all his time alone, at over a hundred years old, Edward hadn't slept with anyone until their wedding night. It's strange, to say the least.
He Has Long-Distance Telepathic Abilities
Edward's only truly unique ability is his talent for reading minds. Some vampires, when they are good at something as a human, carry over that ability into immortality and it turns into a power.
His abilities are even more unique, though. Not only can he read all minds in a certain radius, but he also can follow a mind for a long distance if he focuses on it. He followed Alice's mind until she got out of town with Bella during the events of Twilight. Initially, the power was maddening, but now he can tune out the voices to be a background buzz.
He Was Depressed For A Very Long Time
Carlisle always struggled with the fact that his first-born vampiric son was always a terribly gloomy and unhappy person. After losing his mother, he never was quite the same. He struggled to find companionship and solace in his new family or any new relationships. Though he was a vital member of the Cullens, he remained the loner of the group.
Even once he fell in love with Bella, though, Edward continued being self-loathing and fatalistic. The first time he thought she'd passed on he tried to take his own life. Regardless of their love, Edward is a dangerously depressed person and has probably been that way for a long time.
He Sparkles In The Sun
One of the most iconic features of the Twilight vampires is their reaction to the sun. Instead of bursting into flames, like most lore, these vampires begin to sparkle like glittering diamonds. The scene where Edward takes Bella to see this phenomenon is one of the most memorable scenes of the books and movies.
Edward's sparkling skin makes the sun less dangerous, but it makes for a noticeable red flag. Even though it won't end their lives, all modern vampires avoid sun because of it. It's easily one of the most bizarre and unforgettable traits that Twilight's bloodsuckers have.
He Has Perfect Piano Fingers
When Edward was a young boy, he spent a lot of his time in music lessons and dedicating himself to the piano. However, once he was turned into a vampire, that changed his career trajectory a bit.
Though Edward never became a famed musician, he still spends quite a lot of time playing and creating music. One of the most romantic things he does for Bella involves writing her an entire song and playing it for her. Over the course of a century, his fingers have grown more accustomed to the piano than any normal human's ever could.
He Has Dangerously Attractive Features
While he was no slouch when human, Edward had become significantly more attractive once he became a vampire. That's because all vampires are meant to be as enticing as possible to lure in prey. The Cullens don't use this against humans, but more carnivorous vampires certainly do.
His looks are so enticing that girls at school still moon over him, despite his standoffish behavior and isolationism. Few have ever even spoken to him, but they're interested enough in his appearance not to care. If he wanted to spend time with them, alone, many would say yes. That's an effective adaptation for a human-eater.
His Blood Makes Him Immortal
In vampire lore, there are many different ways to turn a human into a vampire. In Twilight, though, the rules are simple and explicit: if a vampire bites a human and they don't perish, they become a vampire. Like a snake, vampires have venom in their fangs, and once it's in a human bloodstream, they begin to turn.
Despite Edward's ailments when he and Carlisle met, the second Carlisle bit him he began to turn. It took a couple days, but quickly he turned from fragile human into immortal vampire. The power of the venom running through Edward's veins is fairly powerful, and it even brought Bella back from the brink.
He Has A Statuesque Physique
Vampires are all beautiful. That is a definitive truth of Stephenie Meyer's supernatural world. However, their beauty is not the only way the creatures are statuesque.
When Bella first met Edward, she described the paleness of his skin like marble. She hardly knew how accurate that was. Not only is his skin pale, but Edward's body is also hard as a rock and just as cool. It isn't just like looking at a majestic statue; at times, it must feel like it, too. This statuesque feature of the Cullens add another layer to their other-worldliness, but also only makes their bodies even stranger.
He's Mysteriously Fertile
When Edward was seventeen, he became an immortal vampire. Over a hundred years later, he finally falls in love, gets married, and sleeps with his first and only love, Bella Swan. Their story ends with a happily ever after. That is, until Bella miraculously becomes pregnant with their human/vampire hybrid love child.
The books have very clearly stated that the vampires' blood have stopped moving, so it's illogical that any of this happened. While there are endless forums debating how this cam about, this is one solid truth: despite his body stopping at seventeen, Edward is able to father a child, however bizarre it may be.
He Has A Powerful Healing Factor
Though the Twilight series centers around a romance, they do have a fair amount of action. Between James' coven, the Newborn Army, and the Volturi standoff, there have been some serious dangers put in the Cullens' way. Conveniently for them, vampires have strong healing abilities and recover much faster than any human ever would.
As Edward gets in direct scuffles with James and Victoria while protecting Bella, it's pretty important that it doesn't take much for his wounds to heal. It also helps since he doesn't have to end up at a hospital, where some of his body's other odd features might raise some very confusing questions.
He Attracts Women Of All Species
Though vampires are attractive to entice human prey, Edward's handsome features don't just attract humans - he also has had other female vampires interested in him. Most notably, Tanya of the Denali clan. She is a leader of the coven and, despite being centuries older than him or even Carlisle, she found herself attracted to the young vampire.
The only known species completely uninterested in the dashing Edward Cullen seem to be the shape-shifteres, for understandable reasons. After all, most all of them are male and the only female, Leah, doesn't have any interests in romance. That doesn't take away from his surprising universal appeal, though.
He Can Only Drink Blood
Human food can sometimes be a shaky subject in vampire lore. Some vampires hate it, some think it tastes bland, and some can even like it. For the vampires in Twilight, though, human food is particularly uncomfortable.
Once Bella discovered what Edward truly was, she asked a lot of questions. Food, naturally, came up. Edward explained that for vampires, food tastes disgusting. It's like if a human ate dirt. In theory it's doable, but not nutritious or at all desirable. This fact makes the Cullens stand out even more in a high school of mortals. No matter how hard he or his siblings try, these kinds of unavoidable truths make blending in impossible.
He's An Unnecessary Petrol-Head
Edward is the fastest vampire in the local area, so his adoration of cars is confusing, at best. For someone who can run faster than a car, why would it matter? Vehicles can be used to blend in, but the fun of them comes from the speed.
Perhaps non-car people can never understand the feelings of a petrol-head, but it seems like one of Edward's stranger obsessions when he has a cooler, vampire substitute. His love for cars comes in handy for Bella, though, who likes things that go fast, too, and she doesn't have vampire superpowers to help her do it.
He Nearly Perished From The Flu
Edward was a young man on the cusp of becoming a man when the flu struck his hometown of Chicago. It took his father and then slowly destroyed him and his mother. Right before she passed, she begged Carlisle to save her boy in a way only he could. Carlisle took that to mean turning him. He whisked the young man away and began the change.
If it wasn't for Carlisle swift action, Edward would have perished within hours. He was very ill and, like all of the people he knew, doomed by the cramped city and lack of complex medicine. Turning into a vampire cured him and gave him a second chance at life.
He Has Freezing Skin
Vampires exist in a state between life and afterlife, where they are animated and conscious but many human functions have stopped. They now drink blood and they are very, very cold. From the moment she met him, Bella was aware of how his body seemed to radiate a colder aura. When she touched him, though, she found it went even deeper: he was freezing to the touch.
Bella always found solace in his arms, but his body temperature posed a problem whenever she needed warmth. It was one of the smallest, yet most painful, examples of why they couldn't work long-term as a human and vampire. His body, even without the teeth, could endanger her.
He's Strong Enough To Crush Cars
Bella knew from how he acted and looked that Edward was different, but she wasn't aware of how different until a car almost hit her. Instinctively, Edward jumped in front of her to save her and pushed the car away. While she could rationalize him moving so quickly, she couldn't ignore the giant dent he managed to make in the car using only his hand.
Similarly, Emmett can pick up a whole tree and the whole family can't play baseball unless it's storming because their swings sound like thunder. That's some serious super-strength, and it's strange and fascinating all at once.
He Has Vampire Magnetism
Edward and his siblings are known as the most attractive students at school. However, most kids at school don't know the half of it. Beyond being ageless and beautiful, the vampires also have a hypnotic, magnetic side of them that draws people to them. Bella sometimes even gets dazed or loses track of her mind when she's around Edward.
While the tactic is super effective for enticing human prey, it can make dating one a little awkward. All of the times Bella gets lost in his handsomeness is a prime example. Because of that, their conversations often go sharply astray.