====BOOKS====
Favourite: The Hogarth Shakespeare Collection
I read all the outstanding Shakespeare novels, and each one surprised/mesmerized me in a different way: Shylock is My Name by Howard Jacobson had the roughest jokes and best metafiction; New Boy by Tracey Chevalier was sadness and tragedy from start to finish; The Gap of Time by Jeannette Winterson made sense of The Winter’s Tale and found heartbreak in videogame design; and Macbeth by Jo Nesbo was a grotty crime thriller about addiction and childhood trauma that made me think very differently about MacDuff (of all people!). Now, I’m just waiting on Gillian Flynn’s Hamlet…should it still be in the works…
Disappointment: SLUGFEST: Marvel vs DC
I’m not actually disappointed in the book – it’s an interesting decade-by-decade history about the business-level battles between the publishing titans – but it’s filled with so many snarky asides and comparisons to pop culture in the later chapters that it reads like a couple of long-form blog posts. That’s disappointing.
Surprise: THE MAKING OF KUBRICK’S 2001
Reviews. All the reviews. Articles. All the articles. Clippings and references and photos and fan letters. This is a glorious deep-dive into the critical and cultural impact of 2001…from the industry press to the high school newspapers. Like reading the most exhaustive of Wikipedia entries.
Observations: I only managed to read 11 books this year…and it would have been 7 without a couple of West Coast flights!
=====COMICS====
Favourite: THE FOURTH WORLD OMNIBUS, by Jack Kirby
A volume so big that I had to set it up on a lectern at my desk to read, covering ideas about good vs evil, destiny vs free will, and generational conflict that they could barely be contained between the covers! No wonder DC is still mining this universe for ideas all these years later!
Disappointment: X-Men
The Hickman-led reboot just isn’t for me. Going back to the Claremont well for characters only highlights how good that run really was.
Surprise: GLOW, by Tini Howard, Hannah Templer, and Rebecca Nalty
Compassionate cartoony comedy gold, just like the TV series! I had so much fun reading this series that I’m already
Observations: I built up a huge stockpile of miniseries and new stories this year that I have to work through: Wonder Twins, Female Furies, Lois Lane, Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olson, Legion of Super-Heroes. Not to mention the new trade paperbacks I picked up at Crossover Comics, Montreal Comic-Con, and Kickstarter.
=====GAMES (Physical)====
Favourite: XIA: LEGENDS OF A DRIFT
A sandbox style game of space exploration that seems to cross the best of High Frontier and Roborally and Star Trek Acension into one tile-flipping, ship-upgrading, gravity-well dodging, element-trading mess of fun. I was intrigued as soon as I realized that ship components were laid out like tetrominoes on the ship diagrams…and hooked when I did a blind jump into a sun.
Disappointment: Nothing. Every game was gold this year! (which means I replayed a lot of old favourites)
Surprise: MERCHANTS & MARAUDERS: BROADSIDES
I love, in no particular order: pirates, poker cards, custom decks, two-player games, targeting grids, worker placement, diminishing options, clear endgames. This game has e v e r y t h i n g in a cool bundle – two ships with a custom decks choose their cannons, their shot, and their crew, and manipulate their decks to put the opposing cannons off-target…but there’s only so far they can delay the inevitable.
Observations: Weekly boardgaming at the office has fallen by the wayside, and I’ll try to bring it back in 2020.
====MOVIES (First-Run)====
Favourite: AQUAMAN
A film that crosses the Seven Seas manages to put together ten glorious sequences and setpieces, covering romance, revenge, horror, and parliamentary procedure…while remaining joyful and fun from start to finish.
Disappointment: ZOMBIELAND 2
A weird little movie that has no real reason to exist beyond the opening credits sequence, and the end credits sequence (no spoilers…but it’s amazing). The middle – particularly the casual misogyny – just doesn’t work. There’s no reason to believe that those characters and that world stayed unchanged for 10 years. It’s so…cringey.
Surprise: YESTERDAY
This movie is far better on the screen than it looked on paper – a pub musician named Jack whose dreams of making it big cause him to overlook the love and success he already is suddenly the only musician who remembers the music of the Beatles…and makes a career. What this stroke of fantastical luck doesn’t do is turn him into a jerk – he’s aware that he’s cheating for his success – but it does cost him everything he didn’t know he already had. Or…you could watch the film from Ellie’s perspective, who watches her best friend and unrequited love reach great heights…but she isn’t tragic about it, and moves on with her life. A lovely bit of film magic…with great excuses to reinvent the Beatles’ classics!
Observations: There are so many odd remakes and remixes hitting the theatres. I’m getting the same vibe from the film industry that I’m getting from the comics business…we’re in a strange rut, at times.
====MOVIES (DVD/Stream)====
Favourite: THE OTHER GUYS
I was not expecting the end credits to focus on the mechanics of Ponzi schemes and undeserved Wall Street bailouts during the Great Recession. I just wasn’t. This is a Will Ferrell / Mark Wahlberg comedy – with all the greatness and pitfalls that entails (so much could have been cut!) – after all, but it explains what led to The Big Short getting made a couple of years later.
Disappointment: SOMEONE GREAT
A Netflix original that I should have loved because the actresses are individually amazing, and the flashbacks elegantly tell the tale of a long-term relationship going south…but I just wanted to snatch the e-cigs and whiskey glasses from their hands and tell them to grow up! (I’m old)
Surprise: THE SUN IS ALSO A STAR
I may be old, but a love a new take on young love and fate…especially one that has so many lovely touches about how sudden deep connections can inform the rest of your dreams…right down to the pink tips of your hair.
Observations: Slowly going through the classic 80s movies in my DVD collection with the kids. I still can’t believe that none of them were scared by Alien.
====TV SHOWS ====
Favourite: WATCHMEN S1
This series – which has no reason to exist except that it’s a perfect, self-contained marvel – has all the otherworldly perfection of intricate clockworks and it leaves me in awe. As does the acting of Regina King. As does the work of all the actors, the reinvention of the source material to inescapably reflect our present age of politics and culture. Watch it as many times as you like, and I suspect you’ll find something new to love.
Disappointment: WENTWORTH S6
Got halfway through, but couldn’t finish it. The bulk of the main characters have come and gone, and I can’t muster the energy to follow any more conspiracy, drug dealing, office politics, or other forms of subterfuge.
Surprise: THE PRISONER
Another show that I could watch again and again and always find something new to appreciate. I guess this is a study in how systems maintain their power over the individual, but that’s an oversimplification when episodes feature garden parties, art auctions, rocket ships, and a multiplicity of failed escape plans. A series so of its time that it could afford “All You Need is Love” in its contemporaneous soundtrack, but so timeless that we have yet to figure out how to beat the system at its own game (and I guess that’s the punchline).
Observations: The only way to keep up with all the available TV is to ignore most of the streaming services and focus on one show at a time. I end up rotating between iTunes, Gem, Netflix, Shout Factory, Crave, and Tubi. I don’t think I can take on much more. In fact, I should do away with at least one.