I have a very hard time accepting how grown up Dakota Fanning is looking these days.  She’ll be 16 in February and she’s a junior in a private high school in L.A.  Just, wow.

She appears in the December issue of Teen Vogue and talks about starring in the Twilight sequel, New Moon.  It seems that she’s a big fan of the books and co-star Kristen Stewart.  Let’s just hope Kristen keeps Dakota away from the bong.  She’s one of the few non-Lindsays left in Hollywood and it would be nice to see her progress more down a Jodie Foster-ish path than a Mackenzie Phillips-ish path.

Dakota Fanning took a break from filming movies about angsty vampires covered in sparkles to hang out with angsty teenagers covered in sparkles at her high school’s homecoming football game last night.

Fanning is a cheerleader for Campbell Hall Episcopal School in North Hollywood where she was crowned Homecoming Princess during halftime last night. She didn’t get the Queen’s crown, but she’s only a sophomore. Give it a few years.

You can see pics of the crowning here. I couldn’t post them because we don’t have a contract with the company that owns them and I don’t want to get sued. Instead, I posted the above video montage of Dakota Fanning cheerleading pics, because it’s Halloween and this video creeps me the fuck out. You can practically taste the essence of “creepy stalker of underage girls” emanating from it. Tastes like grape soda laced with sleeping pills.

Everyone’s all excited about these pics X17 snapped of Dakota Fanning on a “date” with “17-year-old” Freddie Highmore (from Finding Neverland and Willy Wonka). Let me tell you: Freddie Highmore looks like he needs to get high more.

While I’m excited to see Dakota dating, this is the last person I want her to be with. This looks like a child — and a well-behaved one, at that. This is not who I need you to be dating, Dakota. This does nothing for me. Either get with a Jonas brother (hey, I hear Joe’s single) or have your publicist get Jon Gosselin’s number. Because this shit? Is boring.

Kirsten Stewart looking like Joan Jett? Dakota Fanning looking like Taylor Momsen? Seventies jeans???

How can you not love it?

And Joan Jett actually is in some of these photos.

You know what? This is exactly what needed to happen to Dakota. She’s in LA filming Runaways with the coolest girl in school, Kristen Stewart, and the two seem to have gotten awfully chummy during this time. I’ve been waiting for years for this perfect little child to release that dark, dirty, tabloid-friendly side that I know she has deep inside her. I think K-Stew’s gonna be the one to release the dragon — Puff, the Magic Dragon, if ya catch my drift.

And yet, I’m torn. There’s a part of me that hopes — and kind of believes — that it’s just a matter of time before Dakota’s getting pulled out of clubs with her eyes half-open, and there’s a part of me that still feels really protective of the little girl she used to be, and hopes she can transition from child actor to adult actor without having to do more with lines than read them.

Anyhoo. These pics are super cute.

Yes. There is something greater than pics of the ridiculous Joan Jett haircut Kristen’s sporting for her new flick, Runaways. And it’s these photos of Dakota Fanning, her costar, arriving at rehearsals.

LOOK HOW BADASS DAKOTA IS NOW!

Seriously, though, no. I don’t think a look like this will ever work on Dakota. She’s forever eight years old in my mind, and no number of pretentious interviews or rape scenes is going to change that for me. Put on a nice ruffled dress and run off to your tea party, Dakota. Leave the badass-ing to Kristen. She’s really, really good at it.

I didn’t think it were possible for me to love Dakota Fanning any more than I already do, but it’s happened.

These pics of Dakota at prom have been circulating the Internet. And as if it weren’t already cool enough that Dakota Fanning went to prom, you might notice that the dress looks a little familiar. It should. It’s the same dress she wore to the premiere of Coraline.

Oh, Dakota. Is no one safe from this crumbling economy?