You know, I was going to do a sort of “year in review” post
about 2013 when I realized that… not a lot happened of note this year. I
suppose that’s a conceded statement since others may have had an amazing or
terrible year, but from where I’m sitting, it was sort of ho-hum.
Some political stuff happened here in the US. I don’t
really like to get involved in politics on this blog, though. People are too
divided over that stuff, to a fearful extent. I want this blog to be a happy
yet cynical place.
Some video game systems came out that I have no interest in.
Being a self-proclaimed ‘old school gamer’ I got a Wii U for Christmas in 2012…
in that regard I should never bet on race horses. I was hoping that a new Smash
Bros. game would have been released this past year, but instead I am being
assured that one will be out in 2014… which it better if the Wii U wants to
stay afloat.
Some good albums came out this year. The Arcade Fire finally released their
follow-up to “The Suburbs” with “Reflektor.” It’s different, but I like
it. Korn released their first album, “Paradigm Shift” in almost a decade with
their original lead guitarist Brian “Head” Welch. I really missed his guitar
work, which made what would have been an okay at best album into a pretty good
one. MGMT released a weird but
intriguing album. Alice in Chains
gave us a new album. I like their newer sound. Not better than their old stuff
with Layne, but great for what it is. Nine
Inch Nails continued to evolve into a strange hellish reflection of 80’s
New Wave, which I love. Queens of the
Stone Age FINALLY put out a new record that is awesome, but feels too
short. There are some other releases that I’m forgetting, but those were some
of the stand-outs.
After the epic movie year of 2012 with the Avengers tearing up the box office and
the Christopher Nolan “Dark Knight”
trilogy’s conclusion, this past year felt kind of average. Iron Man 3 was… alright. Thor
2 was awesome. Man of Steel was
nothing if not controversial and conflicting, though I did enjoy it. This year
saw a lot of sequels. Some were really good, like Despicable Me 2 and Hunger Games:
Catching Fire. Others were decent, like Red
2, Star Trek: Into Darkness and Fast
6. There were ones that were okay, such as Kick Ass 2, GI Joe: Retaliation and Machete
Kills. And then there was the steaming pile of shit that was Die Hard 5. We had a couple of great
comedies come out, strangely both of them fixated on the end of the world. I
think The World’s End was better than
This is the End, simply because it
had more heart. That’s not to say the latter was bad, it was ridiculously
funny, but amounted to little more than a stoner comedy… which to be fair (and
to it’s credit) it was never striving for anything more.
On the television side of things, the biggest story was the
end of Breaking Bad, which was one of
the only shows I’ve ever seen that, despite the hype and expectations, managed
to give a truly satisfying (and dare I say perfect?) ending. Great show… probably
the greatest show I've ever seen except for maybe The Wire.
Beyond that, this season hasn’t been phenomenal for new
shows. The Goldbergs is probably the
best new comedy. Masters of Sex is
easily the best new drama. Agents of
SHIELD turned out to be boring and disappointing. And sadly I have not yet
gotten around to seeing the Karl Urban sci-fi show Almost Human, though it looks good. Granted it could be Karl Urban
sitting at a table for an hour eating soup and I would be inclined to check it
out at least once. When it comes to returning shows, let’s see… Boardwalk Empire continues to kill off
my favorite characters. Game of Thrones
killed off most of it’s heroic characters in a single traumatic episode. Shameless
may have killed off Jimmy… that remains to be seen. Don Draper’s life kind of fell apart on Mad Men. Falling Skies made me wish there were better written shows in the
summer.
So, stuff to look forward to in what is now this year (it
turned 2014 eight minutes ago as I’ve been writing this). There’s the
aforementioned Smash Bros. game. Um, Captain
America: The Winter Soldier looks bad ass. Guardians of the Galaxy and Big Hero 6 seem promising. X-Men: Days of Future Past looks like a train-wreck. Amazing Spider-man 2 seems to be heading
that way. I have high hopes for Chris Nolan’s new film Interstellar. I hope that’s as awesome as Inception and pretty much all his other movies. I’m also looking
forward to the new Terry Gilliam film Zero
Theorem, starring Christoph Waltz! Both those men working together… how
could it be bad? As for music, I have no idea. I keep hoping for new Modest Mouse, but I’ve been hoping for
that for the past 3 years. They want me to suffer! Beyond that, who knows? New
Heroclix, action figures and Legos are always nice. I’ll just have to have a
wait and see attitude.
In closing, I will note one big thing to happen in 2013. The
“Little Toaster” learned to walk. That’s pretty cool. Unfortunately, it results
in him getting into everything and making the house look like a hurricane hit
it!
 |
| Oh, and he's Yoda now. |
So, have a Happy New Year everyone and Stay Strange in 2014!
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