July 14, 2020
I watched Little Women (2019) on Netflix recently and it reminded me of how I had this whole Twitter thread while reading the book in 2018. I’ve never watched the other movie adaptations but I quite liked this one and the plot is essentially the same.
Firstly, Beth is the most precious and deserved so much better!!! I feel like Louisa May Alcott just wants to dish out life lessons and a dose of reality even though it’s a fiction book (maybe that’s what makes it a timeless classic). Sometimes bad things happen to good people 😞
And oh ya she cheated my feelings because Beth recovered only to die again wtf.
But most importantly, Jo and Laurie!!!
I feel like it’s impossible not to wish that they end up together while you are reading the book and their scenes together? They just seem right for each other and the chemistry is woooo.
But halfway through I kena spoilers and it wasn’t so fun anymore.
Nevertheless, I’m not a quitter so I continued with the book despite knowing that not only does Laurie not get together with Jo, he ends up with my least favourite character 👿
See, they address each other so affectionately (it happens a lot, by the way, unlike in the movie where Jo says ‘my boy’ only ONCE) and yet we are expected to accept that they are not endgame!!!
Why would you do that??!?!?!?!
Then Laurie declares his undying love but is brutally turned down.
He goes a bit off the rails by gallivanting in Europe (ah, sweet old self-destruction because we all need a coping mechanism) when suddenly…
He decides that he loves Amy aka Jo’s younger sister aka the brattiest and worst sister!!!!? And it just sucks because it seemed like 75% of the book was building up Jo and Laurie, until Jo rejects him and suddenly he decides he loves Amy!!!!?
“Laurie decided that Amy was the only woman in the world who could fill Jo’s place…” HELLOOO why is it even written to sound like Amy is just a replacement for Jo?! At least if the author had spent more time building up Jo and Amy, then I might buy it. But noooo all we get is this.
Like they are just content and satisfied and that’s it. But content and satisfied is not enough!!!
Ok maybe I’m an idealist but I did grow up on romance novels (no idea why I turned into a thriller fanatic)… and I just feel like both Amy and Laurie deserved more than what seemed like a subpar love as compared to the relationship he had with Jo.
And yes I know real love is comfortable and not fireworks all the time but you’ll get what I mean if you read the book!! In the end I only rated it 3/5 stars despite all my emotional investment. Bummer.
But logically, I totally get why Jo and Laurie didn’t end up together and why they would have not worked if they really did get married. They are just too different and they have totally different views/ideals/needs. Probably would have combusted in flames?
Meanwhile, Amy was the one who pushed Laurie out of his rut after he kinda lost it. Even though I never got *that* vibe from them in the book nor do I remember him looking at her the way he looked at Jo in the movie… (of course, you could say it was the good casting)
What I’m trying to say is that sometimes two people might seem like a perfect match on the surface but actually aren’t.
A lot of my friends were shocked and in disbelief when I broke the news, which I can totally understand. I mean, I told my inner circle just to update them but I didn’t really go into detail as to ‘why’ even though that’s what everyone wants to know (I usually just gave a standard one-liner). But I don’t think it matters why and it’s not something I can accurately summarise to people outside the relationship (as the saying goes, there’s three sides to every story).
Even now, I am not writing shitloads or essay after essay like I have done in the past.
I just think everyone’s reactions are interesting. Deborah keeps saying, “I still can’t believe it leh” (believe it, cos it happened 😂). Farah said she “can’t imagine” who was the one who called it quits (not me). And those I asked all seem to think I was the one who wanted it (I wasn’t). Others were like, “I thought you guys were doing well/such a good match!” or something along those lines.
But it’s very easy to feel that way when you are watching from the outside, reading my sappy tweets and watching me gush on Instagram Stories.
Sadness is a lot more subtle, but the signs were there.
This one was from 2019 so I don’t really remember if there was something, however small, that happened to make me able to relate enough to retweet.
Sometimes I undo retweets or delete my tweets after the feeling passes, determined to just stay positive and carry on with no conflict. But some I refuse to delete because these are my beliefs and I stand by them, even now. Also because I need reminders that it isn’t sunshine and rainbows all the time.
This one was bad enough for me to tweet something and not delete it afterwards. Of course, I’m by no means blameless or faultless. And if there’s a first needle, there’s also a second and a third and eventually at some point (pun intended), it has to stop.
Anyway, for all of Jo’s love for literature and flair for writing and wanting to stay true to herself, I am obviously the Laurie in this story 😂 But I’ve learnt to be okay with that too.
