so I guess I should take some time to write about a few things from this year that I enjoyed
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (Nintendo (like you really need to know that, I just want to properly credit the right parties (and keep the headers consistent)))
Something incredible, but to explain what I found so appealing about it is difficult. In hindsight, it’s not a very sticky game, at least by my metrics. There’s a lot of gameplay and systems that come together in ingenious ways, but things beyond that feel faint or nonexistent. The narrative is thin, the characters somewhat vague, but in a game so massive, where so many stories are being told by the player and the world, it’s hard to make them stand out in any true detail.
But what I truly felt was the vibe: a world rendered in bright, cel-shaded pastel that still felt melancholy and mournful. The driving forces of the narrative might not have much, but the world you inhabit, with all of its rolling hills and snowy mountain peaks and vast underground and skies to explore, that has weight and history and power. I eventually forced myself to finish it because I didn’t want to play it for another 100 hours—not because I wasn’t enjoying myself, but I wanted to see it through and eventually move on to other things.
I will say: using the language of the UI/UX to convey meaning was a subtle but genius move. Watching “SAVE PRINCESS ZELDA” get checked off was an incredibly satisfying and emotional moment.
Number Go Up by Zeke Faux
Read this crypto book. It is a succinct history of our current weird moment regarding cryptocurrency, full of wild characters, financial malfeasance, and surprisingly high stakes. An extremely readable breakdown and takedown of an insane industry.
Palo Alto by Malcolm Harris
My other non-fiction pick this year, this one a massive epic of a place that, by the end of the book, almost seems to radiate pure evil. Author Malcolm Harris traces nearly every major innovation in capitalism, from the railroads to tech firms to weapons manufacturers and finance capital, in lines that constantly circle back through Palo Alto. Much weightier of a read than the last pick, but one worth picking up and seeing through to the end. So much of our world is tied up in places like these, it’s worth untangling out their history and figuring out what the hell we can do about them.
Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End by Kanehito Yamada and Tsukasa Abe
A fantasy manga that initially struck me with its oddly staid tone, until I reread it and realized that it was just sadness and mourning that Frieren, and by extension the work itself, has trouble expressing. It is a subtle thing, and one I didn’t catch before, leading me to bounce off it a bit even though I had purchased six volumes.
But I don’t read that much of something that I hate. So I gave it another shot after I began seeing the anime adaptation pop up constantly on my tumblr dash.
And I was rewarded. Kanehito and Abe keep their distance from the subject and the emotions until it comes time to dive deep, and find a way to make it land with a gut punch. It’s a neat little rhythmic trick, and one that paid off the deeper I went into the story. Frieren turns from an unemotional weirdo to a sad and lonely woman who has no ability to connect, and learning, perhaps a bit too late, that life isn’t worth living if there’s nothing to hold on to. I think it’s lilting and silly and strangely off in that endearing only shonen manga can manage (the in-depth technical descriptions of magic evoke a sort of Sanderson-ian goofiness that nevertheless pays off each time).
Scott Pilgrim Takes Off (Bryan Lee O'Malley, BenDavid Grabinski, and Abel Góngora)
What if Scott himself was the problem, but everyone also had their own problems, and got the space to work them out?
If the comics were about growing up, this story is about getting older, and realizing that you have things you need to confront before you lose the chance to do so. O’Malley could have given us the same shit and I would have eaten it up, but he instead chose to engage with their own source material in a way that most authors do not, and managed to pull off a trick so wild that I was glued to the screen every episode. Excellent animation, too. Voice acting? An unfortunate fact: some actors take to it very well (see: Chris Evans & Brandon Routh doing their own spin on Will Arnett Batman), while others don’t make the jump as well (I thought Mary Elizabeth Winstead was a bit too restrained as Ramona, even considering her character in the books and film).
But—excellent stuff. A brilliant update and rëexamination (is that where the diacritic goes according to the New Yorker style guide (i do not care enough to check(the reason this looks like this is because i’m typing directly into the interface))) to a comic I love dearly.
Oppenheimer (dir. Christopher Nolan)
The Test was one of the most affecting scenes I have ever witnessed in a film. The rest of the movie is pretty great, too. Cillian Murphy acting well above his 5’7 height.
But I do think this film is a useful examination of patriotism and culpability, with the choice of focusing on JRO’s subjective experience more or less completely to be an inspired choice, really driving home the monstrous nature of the actions taken by him and the U.S. War machine in general.
Killers of the Flower Moon (dir. Martin Scorcese)
American history is a grand tragedy, and within it less visible but no less painful tragedies lie. A massive film, bare-knuckled in its brutality but sensitive in its portrayals, layered and nuanced and angry and hopeful and a bunch of other words that stand in for the fact that I can’t truly articulate what I found so compelling about this massive movie.
Backpack Hero (Jaspel)
A game that plays to my obsessions: endlessly organizing things JUST RIGHT, and roguelikes. A very satisfying and addictive gameplay loop, one that hooked me almost as effectively as Hades (the only reason I haven’t played 100 hours since its release is the fact that I have a job). I like the presentation, I like the different ways each hero plays, and I like how easy it is to get sucked in and play a few runs.
Fall Out Boy, So Much (For) Stardust
I am #1 Latter-Day Fall Out Boy Hater, one that will contend that Folié A Deux was their last good album (and maybe on my more controversial days, their career best), but even I have to admit when I have been bested. Far from the overstuffed maximalism that defined their post-reunion output, this one is shockingly restrained and focused, paring down things back to what works best: a four-piece that fucking RIPS through rock songs. It’s got hooks, it’s got riffs, it’s got Patrick Stump singing the shit out of those Pete Wentz lyrics—I’m gonna give this one a year to place it correctly in the canon, but it’s definitely going above Infinity on High.
Jessie Ware, That! Feels Good!
Look, I’m a 37-year-old adult, and I have sex (only with BVMW, don’t get any weird ideas, you freaks (he said, weirdly defensive)). I get off. I have very strident ideas about pleasure and enjoyment and physical gratification. I’m a massage therapist, I’m very in tune with bodies and their needs, in ways carnal and conventional.
I don’t want a grown and sexy album. I want a grown and horny album.
Wow! I got it!
But seriously: yes, wow. I love it. A long distance away from the sleek femme fatale of “Running”, but that voice, it gets me. And I love intricate disco arrangements to nerd out over, all of those little details that make me want to turn the volume up on my headphones (which you will know isn’t a great idea because I have severe hearing loss and have been told SEVERAL TIMES that I need to preserve the hearing I still have (as of writing I will be going to an Explosions in the Sky concert and I’m worried I’m going to die in that pit)).
wow! we did it! we talked about all media released in the year 2023! there was nothing besides these things!
Love You, Take Care, Stay Safe.
Happy Holidays.
May the new year be better than the old one.