That Twilight: Breaking Dawn Plot Hole With Bella Actually Makes Perfect Sense

Summary:

• After turning into a vampire, Bella Swan heavily relies on the Cullens’ help to act like a human, which may seem weird since she was alive a day ago.
• In Twilight, vampires are a different biological species whose natural state is perfect stillness, so they have to remember to blink and fidget to look alive.
• Also, newborn vampires lose a lot of their mortal memories and have to deal with the sensory overload, making Bella’s confusion understandable.

After having been in the company of vampires for a few years before turning herself — and remaining a human throughout all those years — Bella suddenly forgot how to be a human immediately after turning into a vampire. Some call it a plot hole; others call it pretense; but it was neither Bella’s nor Stephenie Meyer’s fault.

Bella couldn’t act like a living creature simply because she wasn’t one anymore, and in the Twilight universe, humans and vampires are biologically very different.

Vampires Have Different Instincts Than Humans

After being turned into a vampire, Bella pretty much changed her species. She didn’t have the same needs, urges, instincts, and even perception as before. She didn’t need to blink, breathe, fidget, and many other things that are natural for humans. Her behavior looked unnatural for all humans because it was merely subconscious.

Vampires’ natural state is perfect stillness, which looks creepy and gives off the Uncanny Valley vibes. That’s why her fellow vampires, the Cullens, had to teach Bella to act like a human from scratch: all of a sudden, she had to consciously make all the little movements that were natural for her before. She had to literally remember to blink, breathe, touch her hair, tap her leg, and do other “human” things.

Vampires’ Mortal Memories Instantly Fade Away

Apart from that, turning into a vampire has another side effect in Twilight. Memories from their mortal days largely fade from newborn vampires’ minds: Edward, for one, barely remembered anything from his old life. Bella, too, dealt with a partial memory loss, as she remembered the core concepts but failed to understand their context.

Throw an entirely new perception of the world on top of that, and you’ll get the picture: Charlie was “tagged” as her father in Bella’s brain but she barely remembered why she loved him or how they lived together; instead, she felt a mortal in him, a living blood vessel and ultimately her ulterior in the supernatural food chain.

So yes, Bella Swan had every reason to be confused after turning into a vampire, and she very much needed the help from the Cullens to act like a human again.