The first (real) trailer for the Twilight sequel New Moon debuted at the MTV Movie Awards last night, and while it appears to be receiving less attention and buzz than the Bruno/Eminem stunt, it is stirring a bit (just a bit) of noise on the Interweb today. Though I admit to not being very familiar with the franchise, I think it’s a well done spot considering the film is still shooting. I especially like the parallel action of the junkie-like lunging of the rude birthday party guest and the shapeshifting leap attack from Taylor Lautner’s werewolf character. Those in the Twilight world are apparently very quick to their feet when it comes to both cravings and savings.

Still, probably my least favorite thing ever is a CGI werewolf, whether its in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Cursed, Van Helsing or any other lycanthropic films I purposefully avoided and forgot about. The one in the New Moon trailer, however, is relatively decent-looking. But could that just be because it looks adorable?

Obviously the majority of my bloggery peers are responding with ignorance and disinterest, but surely there are a few non-Twilight-obsessed movie sites excited about this sequel. Let’s take a look after the jump:

• S.T. VanAirsdale at Movieline sees improvement in the directorial change:
  

  Summit Entertainment didn’t have to do much here to stir interest; any moving image of R-Patz and Stewart would likely have been enough to clog middle schools around the country with more arrhythmic hearts than a cardiac ward. But you can’t deny the improved texture of director Chris Weitz’s images compared to Twilight’s barely-there compositions, and even Lautner’s mid-air species change has a fun, semi-shocking suddenness to it.

• Scott Mendelson at The Huffington Post has an issue with the directorial replacement but likes the morphing effects:
  

  The biggest shock in this trailer is that the film lacks the distinctive blue/grey palette of the first film. While the colors are much brighter and richer, the film lacks the distinctive ‘art-film haze’ of Twilight. New director means new visual style I suppose, but I prefer consistancy [sic] when I can get it with franchises…That last shot is a doozy, an impressive transformation scene that basically promises fans that ‘yes, this time we have an ample special effects budget’. It’s not photo-real, but it is a nice bit of cheesy movie magic that is surprisingly effective.

• Ben Childs at the Guardian Film Blog explains why this CGI werewolf may look better (and worse) than others:
  

  Weitz, if the first trailer for New Moon is indicative, has found a novel way to bypass those complicated, CGI-heavy lycanthrope transformation scenes: instead of showing a man changing slowly into a wolf, he shows a man leaping into the air and landing as a wolf, omitting the actual transformation bit completely. Clever, huh?…And the wolf, once it does land, looks slightly less terrifying than an angry chihuahua.

• Meredith Woerner at i09 also sees the werewolf as anything but terrifying:
  

  Look at the wittle baby face of dah wittle wolf baby, who’s a big bad werewolf? Not scary at all. I see Twilight is continuing it’s trend of making scary things either cute or super sexy and it won’t stop until it’s adorable-ized the werewolves. Give me the days of mutated wolf-people of yesterday!

• Sean at Film Junk ponders an apparent rule about vampire fiction:
  

  I’m afraid I can’t offer much insight, but it does seem weird to me that you can’t have vampires without eventually bringing werewolves into the picture.

• Mark at I Watch Stuff provides a hilarious recap of the trailer without giving away the must-see werewolf money shot:
  

  …when Bella experiences the most dramatic paper cut scene ever committed to film, one that leads to Yacht Club Vampire attacking her, Edward…knows what he must do: abandon her in the forest, home of the Rastafarian vampires who wear colored contacts so that you’ll know they’re bad guys. Who will save her birthday now?

• Dan Hopper at Best Week Ever thinks his recap is straightforward enough to be used for your cable service’s TV guide:
  

  Kristen Stewart’s friend has a birthday party with a cake, then Kristen gets a papercut and goes “ow, papercut” then a vampire tries to eat the blood from her papercut and Robert Pattinson’s like “eat some piano!” but then he’s like “I’m sorry, I gotta go, you can chill in this vampire jungle” then a vampire’s like “I vant to suck your bloooodddd!!” then a shirtless guy’s like “I’m shirtless but now holy sh*t I’m a wolf!”

• Vince Mancini at Film Drunk offers yet another recap with added subtext goodness:
  

  she gets a paper cut (…from a cake?), and the vampires can’t control themselves at the scent of her blood.  Get it? The blood is like a metaphor for the sweet Mormon poon that all the guys want.  But they can’t control themselves around it, and that’s why you have to do it in the butt until you’re married…before long a vampire less moral than Edward, ie a black guy, comes and tries to eat her, because as every Mormon knows, black people are made of mud and thus not to be trusted…some half naked savage TURNS INTO A WOLF and saves her.  Holy sh*t, when did the abstinence parable turn into a three wolf shirt?  This might be awesome after all.

• Cole Abaius at Film School Rejects wonders if the trailer is too spoilery:
  

  …specifically the way it tells the entire opening sequence and follows up by showing Jacob as a werewolf.

  Not that I think any of this stuff is a well-kept secret, but if this is just the teaser, I imagine we’ll have the entire movie fleshed out with just as much bad CGI by the final trailer.

• Dustin Rowles at Pajiba shares a bunch of Tweets from Twilight fans, plus one Tweet from a familiar film blogger:
  

  Wonder why I’m terrified for our future? Last night, the new trailer for the Twilight sequel, New Moon debuted during the MTV Movie Awards. And within minutes, Twitter was atwitter with twats like this:

  @srasunshine OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG! HOLY MOTHA LICKA! NEW MOON IS GOING TO BE SO EPIC! I CRIED DURING THE TRAILER!

  And my favorite, from Cinematical’s Erik Davis: @ErikDavis If you’re watching the MTV movie awards you should rip out your eyes and stuff them into dynamite and stuff that in your ass and light match

Now, here’s the trailer followed by a video showing what actual fans think of it: