For quite some time, we have been threatened with a third installment in the Bridget Jones cinematic franchise. While those fears have thankfully fallen by the wayside, there is the very real threat of the actual, concrete third Bridget Jones book by Helen Fielding. As an avid Kindle user on Amazon, I’ve been trying to ignore the persistent emails about Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, but now that the official book cover (above) has been revealed, I feel like crying in my nonexistent ciggies. Why?
Let’s look at this cover, which obviously features a cute blonde in manner of Renee Zellweger and thusly prepares the viewer nicely for the eventual arrival of an ill-fated movie sequel. Now, I shouldn’t be so harsh, but the second book, Bridget Jones: Edge of Reason, killed me, and it really felt like Fielding wrote that sequel while watching the trailer of the first Bridget Jones movie (which I endlessly loved) on repeat. In the sequel, Fielding simply rehashed the first book when it ended perfectly on the first try. Of course, I cannot blame Fielding for aiming at repeat success, but still, the second book and movie were seriously painful. Now 14 years later, we are going to be blessed (ha!) with a third book and subsequent movie (if the book sells). If you’ll notice, the book cover features Bridget surrounded by a toy giraffe and a teddy bear, so the natural assumption is that she will have a child. Hopefully, she will not give birth to a child that is fathered by Daniel Cleave, right? Here is an excerpt from the publisher:
“You see, this is the trouble with the modern world. If it was the days of letter-writing, I would never even have started to find his address, a pen, a piece of paper, an envelope, a stamp and gone outside at 11.30pm to find a postbox. A text is gone at the brush of a fingertip, like a nuclear bomb or Exocet missile. Dating Rule No 1: Do not text when drunk.“
[From Penguin Random House]
Gah. So Bridget is now into online dating, which presents a huge problem as far as novelty is concerned. You see, every female writer in the world (myself included) thinks that they are the first ones to ever experience the world of online dating. The guy who wants a promise of everlasting love in order to give up that promise of a Russian bride? Check. The dude who wants to meet you for a coffee in between “cleanup sessions” as a slumlord? Check. The bloke who casually mentions on the first date that his ex took out a restraining order? Check. Finally, the a-hole who mentions that his alternate handle is “SexMonkey71”? Check. (All true stories.)
What I’m trying to say here is this — within our online culture, news travels fast, and a published book on the subject of online dating isn’t going to fly, especially as an eventual movie. Poor Bridget.
Photos courtesy of Penguin; movie stills courtesy of AllMoviePhoto
I will still read it and see the movie!! I loved both books, didn’t love te second movie but I have high hope!!! Mark Darcy forever!!!! 🙂
Mark Darcy FOR EVA!!!!
Agree! Will read and see the movie.
Threatened with a third installment? Oh brother lol
Will watch film. Will read book. Cannot wait!!
Am I the only one who doesn’t want to see Bridget dating anyone? It kind of screws up the “happy ever after” of the first book. (I read the second but can’t remember it at all, if that tells you anything.) Just let her be with Mark Darcy, for pete sake.
She will split Mark and Bridget up again. She’ll meet Daniel online, and they’ll set up a date. Insert a tired, unfunny shenanigan (that Bridget should be more mature than to fall into) here. Mark will save the day, and she’ll live happily ever after (until the next installment). She might get pregnant to throw us a curve.
Sorry if any of that actually happens. She is better than Twilight Lady, but she still sorta blows on a great/unique plot line.
I hate sequels to books or movies where a character has to unlearn all that he/she learned in the previous installment just so they can learn the same crap again. Ugh. I think the first Bridget Jones was a fluke and Helen Fielding has been riding that fluke for years.
What happened to Matk Darcy if she’s online dating?
^^^This. ???
Another day, another tale of trying to milk a franchise for every penny. Actually after the Batman story earlier this is #2 for today and it’s still early.
I agree that the first installment was perfect. And lol at your horror stories about online dating, you poor thing.
Who is she online-dating? Didn’t she marry Darcy? I think she’s just drunk-texting Daniel Cleaver. But…a rom-com where the two competing suitors are in their 50s, playing at love like teens? This just lost all touch with reality.
Seriously. It would be more realistic to fast forward and have Bridget and Mark’s kid involved in sexting. Not that I’d be interested.
Probably Colin Firth wasn’t avalaible to do the III movie.
Probably Colin Firth had too much dignity to do the third movie.
@T.Fanty: haha exactly. I love the first movie and usually pretend the second one never happened. But a third movie?? Why why why??
I can do without it.
I didn’t like the first book, never bothered with the second and not even Colin Furth was enough to watch the film.
I only read the first one, which was flat-out hysterical. I could not put the book down. My friend was British and I borrowed it. Anyone who has never read the book should read it. I loved the movie, even though in two hours you can’t capture the whole book. The second movie should not have been made. I hope at their age a third movie isn’t made. Hugh was so hot in the first movie. And I adored Colin in it. Rene did a fantastic job.
I remember laughing my ass off back in highschool, could not put it down, then the second one I don’t even remember, it was alright I guess. I didn’t like Renee much as Bridget, I always have this casting problem with iconic female characters, they end up completely different in my mind and when I see them on-screen it rarely matches. Fielding should be making prequels so they could cast J Law for instance, or something cougar-related, but online-dating is as relevant as y2k 😉
I like the first book okay and think it all should’ve stopped there. The second book and movie were dreadful and this does not look any better.
Helen Fielding modernized Pride and Prejudice and should have just stuck with that interpretation and left it alone, but instead she has written these awful sequels.
FYI Bedhead, on the Bridget Jones movie DVD there are excerpts from Bridget’s life after she gets together with Mark Darcy and I knew about ten years ago that the plan was for Bridget to get pregnant. I also know who got her pregnant but won’t say that here. Frankly if that is what this book is about (insert deity here) help us since this book is going to turn off fans and tick off those who loathed The Edge of Reason.
Yah, she definitely modernized Pride and Prejudice with her first one. I always thought the second was a retelling of Persuasion. Anyone get that? Think she will go with another Austen inspired plot?
No.
First book was great fun, but in the second book I lost sympathy for the main character completely. Won’t be reading another one.
They need to get younger love interests for Bridget. Both Firth and Grant are too old now.
The first Bridget Jones movie is one of my all-time favorites–in fact, my daughter and I watch it at least once a year in the past decade since she was 12 yrs old) and have so many of the lines memorized and will quote them randomly (“I seriously believe that you should rethink the length of your sideburns.”). Loved, loved, loved that movie.
Then the second BJ movie came out. We were both so excited and couldn’t wait to see it. Ughhh. Not good, no matter how adorable Colin Firth is as Mark Darcy. My daughter and I both decided that we are going to just pretend that there was only one Bridget Jones movie, the first one. I tried to scrape out all the memory of the second movie and will definitely not be seeing the third one.
I wish sometimes authors/movie execs/people in the business would just realize that sometimes when you have something that is so deliciously good, it’s better to leave people with wanting more (but not getting) more. But I guess they want to milk it for every cent they can get from it. It’s unfortunate.
I loved the first book and movie. The second book was meh and the movie was awful.
The part that annoyed me most was Hollywood’s interpretation of the books and Bridget’s body. I thought the point of the book was that Bridget was a cute woman (or why else would Mark and Daniel be fighting over her) but she wasn’t model thin. In order to be so, she needed to lose maybe 10 pounds, as many, many attractive women might, and she was obsessed with it and very hard on herself about it, when she was actually fine just the way she was. But Hollywood interpreted her self-talk as reality and made Renee Z gain about 40 pounds for the role, then did everything possible to make her look frumpy and unattractive, so you wondered why two gorgeous men would be interested in her, and the movie made no sense. I guess they just couldn’t fathom that a woman can be beautiful even if her body doesn’t conform to their standards.
OMG! I thought I was the ONLY one that thought that! I thought it was weird too! It made no sense to me honestly. She seemed like she was just average sized, but not near the weight renee zellweger gained for the role.
This always bugged me too! Bridget’s weight in the books is around 9 stone, which is around 126 pounds. That’s not fat in any way. Renee looked fabulous in the first movie, (lovely figure in her bunny suit!) and lovely collarbones, glowing skin. In the second movie she looked like a hobo.
Right? They made her look so frumpy. It drove me nuts! To them, 126 pounds IS fat – that’s the problem!
I don’t know if anyone else remembers this but Helen fielding Had written some newspaper columns that were supposed to end up being the third book. In those she had a fight with Mark Darcy slept with Daniel and then wasn’t sure who the father of the baby was.
Yep that was the ending I heard about too. Ugh if they do that no one is reading that freaking book let alone watching the movie.
Will watch the movie, just to see Firth as Darcy. There, I said it.
Me too. Although no one else can be Bridget except Renee Zellweger. Just…no.
I don’t get the timeline… Bridget was in her early 30’s, wasn’t she? Princess Dianas death is mentioned in the 2nd book. So Bridget would be in her late 40’s now, right? So what about the baby references on the cover? Will Brdiget be a late mom? Looking online for a potential father?
I thought I read an extract somewhere, ages and ages ago, that she’d had a baby with Daniel Clever and Mark Darcy was trying to get back with her but she wasn’t interested or something…
I loved the first book; an excellent example of a well-written ‘chick-lit’ book. Second book was OK.
I really can’t be bothered with it any more though – I don’t care what Bridget does any more!
No, we didn’t need the second
Will watch, not worth a read. I always feel better about my own life after some Bridget jones.. Lol