The Best of 2011

Holy crap!  2011 is almost over!  That means you're going to be overwhelmed with everyone's opinions about the best and worst of the year. 

But we all know my opinion is the only one that matters. 

This year, I didn't put my choices for video games because I didn't start playing any new ones until just the other day.  NHL12 does kick ass though.  So here's the best of everything else I normally think about all day long.

2 Broke Girls

Best movies of 2011:
1. The Muppets
2. Just Go With It
3. Arthur
4. Green Lantern
5. Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows P.2

Best Music of 2011:
1. Alice Cooper - Welcome 2 My Nightmare
2. A Very She & Him Christmas
3. The Muppets Soundtrack
4. Steven Tyler - (It) Feels So Good [single]
5. The Trews - Hope & Ruin

Best TV of 2011:
1. 2 Broke Girls

Miss Lexi Belle

2. Storage Wars
3. Tosh.0
4. How I Met Your Mother
5. The Big Bang Theory

Best Babes of 2011:
1. Lexi Belle
2. Taylor Swift
3. Penny from the Big Bang Theory
4. Brandi from Storage Wars
5. Katy Perry

Behind The Fan Club - watch the whole DVD online!

It's almost Christmas Day!

This year, for all my adoring fans, I've uploaded the entire Behind The Fan Club DVD to YouTube as an early Christmas present.

It's broken up into four parts, for easy viewing.

Part One: Almost Kinda Sorta Famous
Part Two: Hey You, Join My Fan Club
Part Three: The Zany 'Zine Years
Part Four: I Have A Penis...

This DVD was released in 2010 and details the origins of the Ryan Fan Club, as well as Ryan's early creative life, his failures, and his greatest success.

Included is a whack load of lost and rare footage from 1999-2004.

Features interviews with: Brian Crofton, Chris Morris, Joshua L.M. Clements, Johnny San, Laura Palma, Scott Bryan, Adam Pottier, Ryan's wife Dana, and Ryan's mommy and daddy. (Narrated by the Lord of Chaos.)

Making this little documentary was a labour of love that took nearly five months to complete.  There are a lot of good laughs and great memories.  Whether you've been a Ryan-Fan since the beginning or are just new to this fandom, you'll get a kick out of this flick.

Prince Wrote That???

I'm a pretty big Prince fan.  Even when he was the squiggly symbol, I totally dug his music.
As many songs as the man has recorded and produced, people are often shocked by just how many songs he's written for other people.  Prince has written entire albums for other artists, sometimes under an assumed name.  Chances are, you didn't know that all of these songs were written by the purple one.

Nothing Compares 2 U - Sinead O'Connor
It wasn't written for Sinead (originally for a group called The Family), but it's her version that is most famous.  Simple, elegant, haunting, and perfect - you've probably put it on repeat after a bad break up.  If you want to hear Prince's version, you can get get it on The Hits Disc 1.

One Of Us - Joan Osborne
Another massive radio hit, Prince's version from disc three of Emancipation asks, "What if God was one of us/ Just a slave like one of us?"  This is always the one that surprises people at the mall when it's playing and I say, did you know this is actually a Prince song?

Manic Monday - The Bangles
Never actually released in any form, there is a recording of Prince and Appollonia (from Purple Rain) singing this song as a duet, very similar to "Take Me With U".  I don't know why Prince never kept the song, it was really catchy and could be tres funky.

The Waiting Room - No Doubt
So Prince didn't completely write this song for Gwen Stefani and company, but he did help the band write it.  He also played on the track and helped produce it.  You can hear it on their Rocksteady CD.

I Feel For You - Chaka Khan
This one goes all the way back to his royal badness' second album in 1979.  I don't have much to say about this song because it's the only one on the list that didn't improve on the original.

How Come U Don't Call Me Anymore? - Alicia Keys
This was a lost B-Side from the early 80's, the backing track to "1999", and it's the real proof in just how good of a songwriter Prince really is... or was.  Even his throwaway songs that didn't make it to his own albums could be top ten hits for other artists.  You can hear her version on the LP, "Songs In A Minor".

So there you go.  You're now either a little bit smarter, or you have more information you'll never use.

My Christmas Wish List 2011

I'm not too concerned about gifts.  I'm at that point in my life where wishing for one specific present doesn't matter much, because I can (and do) go right ahead and buy things like season 10 of Smallville on Blu-ray for myself.  So my Christmas wish list is a little more... unique... that's to say you can't just waltz into Toys R Us and put it on your Visa. 

On past "wish lists" I've asked for things that came true.  Last year I asked for a Stanley Cup in Boston (here), and sure enough it came true.  Three years ago (here) I asked for the Ruby-Spears Superman cartoon to be released on DVD, and now it's real.

So here's a few things I'd love to have...

An Uncle Jesse doll
Every year this is at the top of my Christmas Wish List.  You can call it a doll, or an action figure, or just plain crazy if you like... but this thing really does exist.  In fact, you can get Full House dolls of the entire Tanner Family, including Aunt Becky and the twins.  If memory serves me correctly though, there isn't a Joey toy.  I don't know if there were plans to include one and they just cut it out... sorry, couldn't resist.
But seriously, I'd take an Uncle Jesse doll with me everywhere I go.

One-Of-A-Kind Converse All Stars with my face on them
Why not?  After all, I do have thong underwear with my face on them.  My love of Converse All Stars goes back nearly fourteen years now, and to have a pair with my face on them would probably cause a big toe-gasm.

A Clone of a fully alive Bea Arthur
Not for personal use... no, no, this would be to benefit the world as a whole.  Christmas is the time of giving, and what better gift to give than the gift of Dorothy Zbornak.

A Yellow April O'Neil Jumpsuit
Again, not really for me... this little outfit would be a re-gift from me to my lovely wife.  I think she'd look just great in it.  *smiles*

And that, as they say, is that for this year.  I'm not greedy for gifts.  Let's all make the world a happy place.

A Very She & Him Christmas review

For some of us, Christmas is forced to start on November 1st.  By the time the 25th of December rolls around we just wanna open some packages, eat a bird, and go back to bed.  When you work around Christmas for nearly two months you get pretty tired of Christmas music pretty fast.

Except for Hanson's Christmas album, "Snowed In".

So on a whirl I picked up this album, A Very She & Him Christmas, mostly because I have a little crush on Zooey Deschanel and because the album artwork looked like a classic Christmas record from the 1960's.

The Good:  This CD really does feel like a classic Christmas.  It could blend quite nicely with images of Charlie Brown.  At first listen, I closed my eyes and it felt like my parents were in the room with me.  That's not really what I ask for in Christmas music (my usual taste is this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNZ1aZip1oc), so I was pleasantly surprised to get it.  Zooey's voice is almost hypnotic - it's so warm and cozy sounding you'll want to leave milk and cookies for her.
As far as songs go, the classics are here: "I'll Be Home For Christmas", "Silver Bells", and "Blue Christmas".  And they aren't too long either.  I've heard some renditions in the past that take a little pretty Christmas ditty and repeat verses just to make it reach the 3:40 mark of a hit song.  "Sleigh Ride" is just perfect and makes me want to make hot chocolate and snuggle with my lovely wife.
I really liked the packaging, as mentioned before, but when you open it up there's a little Christmas card to you from the group.  It's clever, and until I get a real card from someone (having your own fan club can be lonely sometimes y'know...) I might just hang this one up on my wall.

The Bad:  While their voices blend well together, I don't care so much for M. Ward's vocals on his own.  And while the songs are nice n' short, we could've had a few more.  Sixteen dollars for twelve songs doesn't add up.  I would've loved to hear their rendition of "Christmas (Baby, Please Come Home)".  I also could have done without this version of "Baby, It's Cold Outside" - if only because Zooey's A-Capella-shower-version with Will Ferrel from Elf will always be my favorite.

The Verdict: Are the 12 songs worth the price?  That's really up to you to decide.  But this is a Christmas album that's pure and honest.  You can feel that Deschanel and Ward are enjoying playing these songs, which makes it very real as a listener.  We may live in a world where Christmas has gone commercial, but this record takes us back to simpler times.

The New 52's Superman

Well, I decided to wait a couple months before passing any kind of judgement on DC Comics' "New 52" relaunch. I'm focusing on three of their titles here - Action Comics, Superman, and Supergirl - because they were really the only comics I was reading ten years ago when I was collecting comics. 

It wouldn't be fair for me to comment on and compare the new Batman to the old Batman when I wasn't reading it before anyway.  In all actuality, it's not really fair to try and compare the New 52 to the classic DC Universe anyway.  DC Comics never asked us to compare, but to instead focus on the New 52 as a chance to jump on or, in my case, come back to the characters.

Part of me wants to believe this was DC's solution to finally getting rid of Superman's red trunks.

"How do we get rid of Superman's underwear?"
"Let's just relaunch the entire company and get rid of all underwear..."
"Brilliant!"

I decided not to review Action Comics #1 on the day it came out, because one singular story isn't enough to judge an entire series on.  Comic books these days don't constrain themselves to single-issue stories anyway.  Most series rely on the sub-plot to carry from book to book so they can publish a collected edition later.  It's smart.  It's crafty.  And it's why I stopped collecting comic books individually all those years ago and chose to buy Trade Paperback editions instead.  I'm not interested in making a profit from these adventures.

And now we're three months in, and what do I have to say for the New 52?

So far, so good.

Comic book fanboys (you know who you are) tend to get really caught up in the splash of things.  When the first images of the new costume designs appeared online, some fans were in an uproar.  Comic book fans are not like any other kind of fan.  That's not a bad thing though.  They are incredibly invested in their favorite characters, and are passionate about every little detail.

"Why the hell does Superman look like he's wearing armor?  Why would he need to wear that?"

I think the new Superman costume is pretty cool.  But, it depends on who is drawing it.  The image above is by Jesus Merino.  This new costume looks good in his style.  The covers to the Superman series are by comic legend George Perez (who also writes the book) but the costume just doesn't look right by him. 
This new Superman series has been great so far.  I have really enjoyed the fact that in the first three issues, Superman has yet to combat a familiar menace.  That's proof to me the Man of Steel isn't being re-hashed with the same adventures over again.

Over in Action Comics we're seeing a younger Last Son of Krypton in his early adventures.  Having a Superman in a T-shirt and jeans got the most media buzz of anything in the New 52.  I like what writer Grant Morrisson has done so far to show us the parallels between these early adventures and Superman's classic 1938 exploits.  This "new" Superman is actually more like Siegel and Shuster's original vision than we've seen in a long time.  But I hope Morrisson doesn't get too carried away with the nostalgia effect.  The biggest problem with Superman in the last 20 years has been all the history surrounding the character.  How many times have we seen a new interpretation on the image of Superman holding a car over his head to pay tribute to Action #1?

Really though, I'm not worried about Kal-El here.  I think he's in good hands.  And the stories so far have been really entertaining.

Supergirl also received a makeover... not that it hasn't happened a million times in the last thirty years or so.  Is she Kryptonian, an angel, a purple-ish putty thing, or a robot this time?  Her stories have been really quick-paced, and literally nothing happened in the first book, so I'm glad to see in issue #3 a story is starting to develop.  It's actually the title I was most excited for with the relaunch.

All in all, I've been pleased with the New 52 from DC Comics.  If their goal by doing this was to get people reading comics again, then they've succeeded because I haven't subscribed to a monthly comic since 2001. 

And if their other goal was to eliminate all undwear from the universe, then I can do my part by going commando.