The year is winding down and we’ll have more of the Best Lists through the weekend. Be sure to comment about the things that you liked best in 2010!
Movies: Monsters, Toy Story 3
Television: True Blood, Mad Men, Modern Family
Books: Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy, The Reapers Are the Angels by Alden Bell, Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games trilogy
Music: Broken Bells, Let It Fall by The Quiet
Comic Books: Nemesis by Mark Millar and Steve McNiven
Video Games: Red Dead Redemption, Angry Birds
DVD/Blu-ray Releases: Apocalypse Now (Three-Disc Full Disclosure Edition), Back to the Future 25th Anniversary trilogy
Viral Video: Ducks blown off their feet by the wind
Music Video: I think the last music video I saw was 2 years ago, so I have absolutely no idea.
Favorite web sites: Forces of Geek, Mental Floss, Dlisted
Celebrity crush: Henry Cavill
Biggest disappointment of 2010? There is still no Arrested Development movie!
What accomplishment were you most proud of in 2010? Taking a trip to London by myself after a decade.
What are you most looking forward to geeking out over in 2011? Sucker Punch, Cowboys and Aliens, and if the Verizon iPhone finally gets released.
Movie: Rare Exports
Television: The ending to LOST
Book: Under The Dome, by Stephen King
Comic Book: Glamazonia, The Uncanny Super Tranny by Justin Hall
Favorite web sites: Forces of Geek, I spend too much time on Facebook
Celebrity crushes: A toss up between Betty White and Joel McHale
Biggest disappointment of 2010? Tron Legacy
What accomplishment were you most proud of in 2010? The birth of my third son, Hudson Cole
What are you most looking forward to geeking out over in 2011? Captain America, The First Avenger
Movies: The Social Network, True Grit, The Illusionist and the Paintball episode of Community which was my favorite action film of the year.
Television series: Big Bang Theory, 30 Rock, Community, Raising Hope, Dexter and The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret
Books: Apollo’s Angels, the Mayor’s Tongue (I think that was 2010). It was exiting to be able to pre-order Brian Sendelbach’s Underpants Jungle this year.
Music: Wow! That is a tough one. I know I have a lot of music because it took 14 hours to sync my new iPod Touch Christmas Eve/day; I think there were 5000 songs. Were any of them from 2010? I guess Adam Green’s Minor Love and Taylor Swift’s Speak Now.
Comic Books: Jonathan Hickman’s Fantastic Four and S.H.I.E.LD.; I loved the Box Man, Thunderbolts, Sweet Tooth, Thor the Mighty Avenger, The Muppet Show, Hawkeye and Mockingbird, Bulletproof Coffin, Tales Designed to Thrizzle, Action Comics, Set to Sea, Return of The Dapper Men. I am happy they are trying to fix Batman and so far have not fallen flat on their faces so I am going to tentatively say Batman Inc.
Video Game: Pong?
DVD/Blu-ray Release: What’s a DVD?
Viral Video: I did everything I could to make Professor Weirdo a viral video and failed; I think Michael Kuperman is the only person who watched on my recommendation. It is the best kitchen magic show ever. That is a tough category for me because checking out YouTube to the degree where I could be hip to the viral is just too much time spent where I could be out living my life.
Music Video: I honestly do not think I saw a 2010 music video. I guess that S&M video Betty White did for SNL.
Favorite web site: Forces of Geek, of course.
Celebrity crush: There is sort of a Betty or Veronica girl fight going on when I close my eyes at night between Britta Perry and Annie Edison.
Biggest disappointments of 2010? Tossup between Avatar, the new season of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (minus the boat and who got Dee pregnant episodes), Inception and realizing that all it would take to get half of the US to join an extremist group was elect a black president. Actually, the death of the casual conversation is my biggest disappointment. Remember when you could stand around with friends and talk, joke and argue without some dick fact checking everything you said on a phone. I am so glad iPhones and Blackberries did not exist in the world of Big Fish. Man, would that have been a short, bitchy film. Just because you can does not mean you should.
What are you most looking forward to geeking out over in 2011? Just that this crap decade will finally be over. I would like to think that pop culture would have another golden age but we are entering an era where communication is instant, and voyeurism is now the social norm and people tell you what they are having for a snack on Facebook and Twitter, and I see most people who are at the helm of pop culture twittering 500 times a day when they could be writing, drawing, acting, filming, recording, loving, fucking or just going for a walk by the river. I can’t say the future is grim bot in 2012 we will look back at 2010 like we were cavemen and if we could see ourselves two years from now we will look at ourselves like cavemen trying to comprehend fire. Hey, someone probably bitched that the invention of the wheel would make life too fast and easy, and they ran him over. I guess if I had to bank on a sure thing, I would look forward to Frank Miller doing something so dumb that you think you must be having some gay dream about him. And my Gumby comic being out there for the
public to judge with hatred, joy and scorn. So long, stink decade! And killing the first person to tell me it was great stream of consciousness’—I plotted this one! Sort of.
Movies: Inception, Megamind, Despicable Me, Prince of Persia, The Social Network, Nude Nuns With Big Guns
Television: Terriers, Spartacus, Doctor Who, Justified
Books: Ghosts of Manhattan, Boneshaker
Music: The Glee Soundtrack (Yeah – I said it)
Comic Books: Parker: The Outfit, The Rocketeer: The Complete Collection
DVD/Blu-ray Release: Starcrash
Favorite web sites: www.crunchyroll.com, www.hulu.com, www.veetle.com
Celebrity crushes: Christina Hendricks, Anne Hathaway, Gemma Arterton, Freida Pinto, Cheryl Cole, Karen Gillan
Biggest disappointments of 2010? Dollhouse, the cancellation of Terriers, the idiocy of high priced comics, Mark Millar’s new comics, Skyline, Harry Potter
What accomplishment were you most proud of in 2010? Pulp 2.0 released two books this year, Brother Blood and Radio Western Adventures. I also published a lost Lester Dent short story, signed a deal to re-release The Miracle Squad and Twilight Avenger series and made lots of new “partners in pulp”.
What are you most looking forward to geeking out over in 2011? Green Lantern, Frankenstein Lives Again!, some new figures from GoHero.com
Smurfologist, Former FOG! Editor/Columnist Panels Per Second
2010 — I hope — was a step on the march to the greatness of 2011. There was a lot of good material out there that held the promise of so much more. Somebody grab Baby New Year by those jug ears of his and say “Hey, the ground work’s been laid… don’t suck.”
Television series:
Sherlock: Hands down the best interpretation of the Sherlock Holmes universe to rear its head in decades. Stephen Moffat owns this franchise at this point. RDJ and Jude Law should be carrying Benjamin Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman’s luggage into 221B Baker Street and avoiding Mrs. Hudson as much as they can on the way out.
Doctor Who: Again, Stephen Moffat showing us what he’s had up his sleeve for another of his favorite properties. This guy is throwing his A-Game out there and the talent he’s got behind him (Matt Smith, Karen Gillan and especially Alex Kingston) are willing and able accomplices for one hell of an entertaining ride. Hopefully everyone can keep it up for Who Season 6 and Sherlock Season 2.
Walking Dead: ‘Nuff Said.
Books:
You Couldn’t Ignore Me if You Tried by Susannah Gorah. Good but not great, and long over due, account of the cultural impact of John Hughes’ cinematic work. Unfortunate to say, but I hope better stuff is in the pipeline now that we can distance ourselves from his death and really look at his oeuvre.
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. The title said it all. It wasn’t necessarily all down hill from there, but the title was worth the buy and the read. If you don’t own it already at least but it for the covers.
Music:
Contra by Vampire Weekend. Paul Simon’s Graceland two decades later. “Horchata” was the perfect winter track in January, and is again with the end of year snow I’ve been shoveling the past couple of days.
Lonely Avenue by Ben Folds and Nick Hornby. Not as earth shaking as Folds’ collaboration with Shatner but what a heart-wrenching-ly gorgeous album. Even the rhythmic interpretation of Levi Johnston’s myspace page is evocative… but “Belinda” and “Picture Window” are up there with “Brick.”
Viral Video: “Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury.”
Biggest disappointments of 2010? Tie: “Inception” and “Iron Man 2.”
Like Dark Knight, unfortunately Inception was not the best film ever made — as much as every one told me it was prior to my seeing it. Was it great? Absolutely. Is Memento still better? …I’m sorry, have I told you about my condition?
Iron Man 2. Set in “Queens” for the most part. Being from the actual Queens, NY that’s the best part about it for me. That and Mickey Rourke with those laser whips in Monte Carlo. Otherwise… I understand why Favreau signed his resignation papers.
What accomplishment were you most proud of in 2010?
Personally? I had a good, albeit brief run at FOG! Good stuff there for a great site. I also acted in an episode of Forensic Files – as not one but two victims of a homosexual serial killer – and I wrote a book that will be on the shelves in 2011 in time for a certain film about little blue leprechauns.
What are you most looking forward to geeking out over in 2011?
I’m hoping that The Smurfs get their proper due in this next year. The animated series is celebrating its 30th Anniversary and for the first time some significant biographical information about their creator, Peyo, is going to be published by Abrams in the shadow of the film. The original comics were and are still groundbreaking in their beautiful simplicity, and I hope more readers pick up their new editions that are currently being published by Papercutz.
The Smurf King is a pinnacle of political cartooning and children’s entertainment… and when you consider that a couple of drunk Belgians wrote and drew it 50 years ago it makes the accomplishment sweeter than an Imperial pint of Blue Moon with a couple of oranges floating at the surface. I also hope the internet can put aside its hate for the film and share in some of the little blue love. NOBODY has a bad story about The Smurfs property – and actually if you do, give me a shout at threeappleshigh.net
THOR! I hope Branagh finally puts the Frankenstein nay-saying to rest. He can please a crowd if you let him.
