‘After We Collided’ is a book that has been able to bring out the emotion in telling the story of two young adults trying to navigate the world of love with their insecurities. Tessa and Hardin’s story resonates with many people because it tells a story that feels real, and unlike glorified romance, ‘After We Collided’ showed what love far from perfection looks like.
Historical Context
Love and Pain
When in love, people expect to feel only emotions of thrill, joy, and warmth. However, the story of ‘After We Collided’ showed the side of love we ignore, pain. Love can be beautiful, but there is also pain in love as it is an emotion that balances the feeling of joy and happiness.
For the characters Tessa and Hardin, their life only knew pain and betrayal; Hardin felt pain because his father abandoned him and his mother after she was molested; this pain grew up in him to become rage that spewed out hate and resentment towards everyone around him. Tessa lived a life where an authoritarian mother controlled her life; this made her realize resentment towards her mother embedded deep within her.
Tessa and Hardin were both filled with emotions of pain and abandonment yet, they found solace and love in their love. The realistic depiction of how pain affects love is something ‘After We Collided’ made sense of and though the story may be unpleasant to people who believe in fantasizing about love, it is one of the most realistic romance novels.
The Definition of Love
The definition of love is something most romance novels have tried to show. With many stories focusing on the good side, most have omitted the darker, more ignored aspect of love. The deliberate attempt of romance novels only fantasize about love has made its definition one-sided. However, ‘After We Collided’ addressed both the good and terrible aspects of love and showed us what love should be from an unbiased perspective. ‘After We Collided’ defines love as beautiful yet dangerous, tolerating yet hurtful, kind yet brutal.
Contemporary Young Adult Romance
With every day that passes by, the young adult book genre keeps getting wider, and as more young people indulge in reading novels, be it romance or others, their view of the world gets wider. ‘After We Collided’ is a book that shows the broad spectrum of romance from the good to the bad to the worst. With its depiction of love, most people will better understand why people remain in relationships that come off as toxic and why people fall in love with people who feel bad for them. The novel explains why love is blind.
Cultural Context
Are we to expect perfection in love? Should we try hard to fantasize about love in a way that omits everything unwanted? No. In today’s world, people center love on fantasy and not realism. Yes, love is blind, but it also comes with its downsides. ‘After We Collided’ shows those downsides because the novel characters were far from perfect. In love, we should never expect perfection; this is something ‘After We Collided’ explains. It shows that perfection does not exist in love and that sometimes understanding the person you love is all one needs. We are all with our fears and worries, insecurities and problems, but that is what makes us human; Anna Todd’s depiction of Hardin showed that.
Hardin is a person who was far from perfect, he had a cold attitude, was always on edge, and hated his father, yet when he fell in love with Tessa, he tried to change. In the world today, we define love based on what we feel for another person, yet we sometimes fail to consider understanding the problems the other person struggles with; this is what ‘After We Collided‘ centers around, as shown in the quote below.
There are few people whom I really love, and still fewer of whom I think well. The more I see of the world, the more am I dissatisfied with it; and every day confirms my belief of the inconsistency.
Adaptation
‘After We Collided’ was made into a film in 2020 as a sequel to ‘After.’ The film debuted in 16 countries, grossing over 10 million dollars in the first week. In the week of its release, it became the number one most rented film on both Google Play and Apple TV. ‘After We Collided’ did fairly well at the box office, making 48 million dollars. However, the film did not do well among critics as they gave the film an average rating of 14%.
FAQs
Does ‘After We Collided’ end well?
‘After We Collided’ ends with Tessa recognizing a homeless man as her father. So, the novel does not end well.
Was ‘After We Collided‘ a movie success?
Upon its release, ‘After We Collided’ did not rate well among critics, with the rating for the film at a low of just 14%.
Is ‘After We Collided‘ interesting to watch?
‘After We Collided’ as a movie was bland and not too interesting.
