In Which I Make a Triumphant Return and Declare Myself Lord and Master of All I Survey

Maybe I should write something in here. I feel neglectful and ashamed at my lack of productivity towards my worshipful masses. (Hi, Mom!) The pop culture landscape has been rife, RIFE I SAY!, with subjects worthy of venom, bile, and excoriation, and yet I have remained silent, content in my place of "Fuck that, I would rather keep (re)reading Douglas Coupland and David Foster Wallace, while the world falls apart around me." Which, admittedly, is a rather ostrich-esque way of dealing with things. But screw you, I am the master of this particular domain (not in the internet "domain name" sense, but that's just splitting rabbits), and I will say WHAT I want, WHEN I want, and NOBODY, you hear me meatball?, is going to tell me otherwise!
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Sorry, I went all Master Shake for a second, I needed a space to breathe.

BUT ANYWAY, like I said, there's been a lot that has pissed me off, and I would go into exactly what, but then this would become a fount of negativity, and if there's anything that there is too much of on the internet, it's porn. Followed by cat pictures. Then negativity. And I'd like to think that, today, in this rather expansive and (some might say rarely) jolly mood that I am in, I'd like to balance that equation with some positivity. So, without further ado (ok, maybe SOME ado), I will write on what my favorite things of the past Year of Their Lord Two Thousand and Seven are. Bear in mind, this is just one lone (handsome intelligent and awesome) man's opinion, and that it might not necessarily agree with yours. In that case, leave a comment, telling me I'm wrong and why, and then fuck off and start your own blog.* But yes, favorite things, here we go:

Favorite Movie of 2007:
HOT FUZZ
Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg are awesome. That could be the only sentence in this section, and it would still be a perfect encapsulation of why I love this film. They have made two almost perfect films now, Shaun of the Dead and this one, and also produced previously the great BBC series Spaced, and I am now willing to follow them everywhere they go. I mean, jeez, even their contribution to Grindhouse, the fake trailer for a British horror movie Don't!, was genius.

Hot Fuzz was a note-perfect parody of the distinctly American genre of "Buddy Cop" action movies, but set in a distinctly non-American setting: a rural village in England. Skewering every cliche and trope that the genre is known for in its first two-thirds, while also playing as a wonderful mystery with elements of the giallo, the movie then takes an abrupt, Adaptation-esque turn, and BECOMES what it was parodying: a thrill-ride action movie. Except this time, the audience is in on the joke, and what would have seemed ridiculous earlier now makes complete sense in the world that Pegg and Wright have established. As full of laughs as Shaun of the Dead (which I maintain is, along with the first Back to the Future, one of the few perfect screenplays**), it's not only the funniest movie of the year, it's one of the best, period.

honorable mentions: Grindhouse, American Gangster, Knocked Up


Favorite Album of 2007:
Motion City Soundtrack - Even If It Kills Me
I wholly reserve the right to change this at some future date, as I am nothing if not capricious about music. But, as of right now, Motion City Soundtrack's latest entry in their catalog of goodness is the number one on my own personal Billboard chart. While not as rough as their earlier work, and without the apologetic air of "I fucked up" of their last album, the pop sheen production on this album, along with the much more... well, not overtly positive, but less mopey lyrics, I suppose?... makes Justin Pierre and company's latest effort the one I keep coming back to out of the albums that have come out this year.

The themes hit the usual for Pierre: love, loss, love lost, but this time, it ends on a good note. His struggles with his chemical dependencies and mental instability have been well-chronicled, both on the previous records and elsewhere, but his new-found sobriety seems to have coincided with a brighter outlook in his love-life, as the songs "It Had to Be You", "Antonia" and the title track evidence. The stand out track to me, though, is number 4, "Last Night", if only for the bridge section, which contains the lines "My body aches, it heaves it shakes / all somersaults for so-called art. And I still don't know exactly who I am / I never will, amen." No one knows exactly who they are, and it takes a very strong person to admit that. This album is a great accomplishment for the band, and a stand-out for the year in general.

Honorable mentions: Radiohead - In Rainbows, Sundowner - Four One Five Two, Say Anything - In Defense of the Genre


Favorite Book of 2007:
The Gum Thief by Douglas Coupland
Douglas Coupland is a writer I have been following since high school. To give a better picture of that statement: the only other writers who also fall in that category are William Gibson and JRR Tolkien. My reading taste has changed... not drastically, but has... I suppose the phrase would be "been refined" since then. And yet, Coupland remains. He endures. And this year, he put out one of his best novels since Girlfriend in a Coma (which is in my top 5 all-time).***

Honorable mentions: Crooked Little Vein by Warren Ellis, Rant by Chuck Palahniuk, I am America (And So Can You) by Stephen Colbert


Favorite Comic/Graphic work of 2007:
The Nightly News by Jonathan Hickman

This one was the hardest for me to decide, because there was quite a few great things to choose from this year. And it was made even harder by how much OLDER things I read this year, which confused in my head what came out when, and so forth. As it stand, Jonathan Hickman's mini-series from Image, The Nightly News, keeps popping out in my head as the one. The very distinct art style, and very "controversial" subject matter, kept me interested and involved through it's running time.****

Honorable mentions: LoEG: the Black Dossier by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill, Casanova by Matt Fraction and Gabriel Ba/Fabio Moon, Fell by Warren Ellis and Ben Templesmith

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SO. Yes. I will be writing in here more. So, check back... I dunno, a lot. There'll eventually be more posts. And they will be fun. And full of awesome. Much like me!


* Make sure to link to me, and tell me, and then we'll have a circle of disagreement. It'll be AWESOME.

** I'll probably do an entire post on my views on this in the future.

*** More info coming.

**** More info coming.