Waterloo’s Fifty Favorite Films of the 2000s
December 31st, 2009
While it’s easy to reflect back, for a website that deals almost exclusively with TV shows, what the last decade did with episodic material, more people are going to remember the movies they watched, the franchises they followed, and the 2000s were huge in that regard, from the Lord of the Rings films to the Spider-Man and X-Men trilogies (still expanding, actually), just to name some of the most popular, Harry Potter and the Pirates of the Caribbean, too. There was a lot of innovation going on, too, and a lot of surprises. My list isn’t going to reflect everything you might expect to find, but in that regard it’s another reminder of just how rich the decade really was.
Waterloo’s Ten Favorite TV Shows of the 2000s
December 30th, 2009
Now that the first decade of the millennium is coming to a close, it’s a great time to reflect back on the TV shows that helped make it so memorable. Lower Decks (which began as the original Section 31.com) may have its origins in the 1990s, but the 2000s were its unquestionable most interesting. I’ve been privileged to be here throughout them, and to be writing for the site for most of it in some capacity. Long-time visitors will know that it used to focus exclusively on the Star Trek franchise, but began branching out once Lower Decks itself was incorporated. Many a spirited discussion has occurred at the Observation Lounge message board over the years, and I’ve enjoyed writing a regular series of reviews since the relaunch in the fall of 2008. The following contains my own version of the ten best shows from the decade.
HYGOTS Supplemental – The QB51-100
December 29th, 2009
Later this week I’m going to unveil the top fifty comics I read in 2009, but darned if that wasn’t quite enough to cover everything I thought was noteworthy or at least worth talking about. Now of course, previously for Paperback Reader.com I wrote an exhaustive weekly chronicle of every comic book I read, which was how the QB50 was born (QB standing for ‘Quarter Bin,’ which eventually turned into the excitingly-named ‘Weekly,’ in honor both of my frightening habits and ‘52’), but here at Lower Decks, I’ve only sporadically covered this part of my life. This will be the second year the QBs are covered here (the fourth overall, just so you don’t think you’ve been ignoring some grand tradition), and the first I’ve managed to fill out a more-or-less top hundred. These are the unofficial QBs, mind you. Some of it is very good, some I’m not exactly endorsing so much as warning you about…
HYGOTS No. 63
December 24th, 2009
One of the great buried treasures in all of Star Trek has been hiding in plain site for decades now. It’s ‘The Animated Series,’ of course, which ran from 1973-1974. Unofficially a part of the canon, it was briefly the only tether fans had when times were at their darkest, the original series having been cancelled after three seasons and the very real prospect that it would remain only a thing of nostalgia. Clearly things didn’t turn out that way, and ‘The Animated Series’ might just be the reason why.
Avatar review
December 20th, 2009
Okay, so let’s get past the obvious things everyone else seems to be saying in their reviews: this is James Cameron’s first movie since ‘Titanic,’ once again he spent a lot of money, and all of it went to creating revolutionary new special effects. Despite all that, you could see ‘Avatar’ for complete different reasons. I’ve read a review that compares it negatively to this summer’s ‘District 9,’ but however wrong that is, it’s a good place to start with a more accurate reaction and characterization of the experience you can expect to get.
HYGOTS No. 62
December 18th, 2009
Hey, so by the impossible coincidence that my sister ends up choosing this column to discover that I write a lot of crap for the Internet, I’m going to spoil one of her Christmas gifts right now: Hey, Danielle, I got you ‘Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.’ (It’s the recent DVD version, which was part of a series of releases Paramount did for some of the more recent converts to the franchise, including new slimcases for set releases of the six original Kirk films, a special collection of just the ‘Wrath of Khan’/‘Search for Spock’/‘Voyage Home’ trilogy, and the four ‘Next Generation’ flicks, and then separate editions for ‘Khan,’ ‘Voyage Home,’ ‘The Undiscovered Country,’ and ‘First Contact.) I got you ‘Khan’ because it’s generally considered the best of the original Kirk films, and because you loved ‘Star Trek’ (2009) so much, I thought you’d like a peak at that sort of thing.
(Okay, the rest of this column is for anyone. It’s still about the original ten Star Trek films, which is funny, because I’ve already written ‘The Motion Picture’ in #23, ‘The Final Frontier’ in #24, and ‘Khan’ in a Supplemental back in July, but what can I say? I’m gregarious. Um, with the keyboard.)
HYGOTS No. 61
December 12th, 2009
Considering that this was the first year in a very long that people really felt okay respecting Star Trek, I wouldn’t want to end it talking about anything else. I’ve already talked it quite a lot this year, whether in anticipation of the new film, reacting to it, trying to give my idea of primer material, or celebrating the tenth anniversary of my personal favorite series’ conclusion, I’ve been all over the map, but I have yet to properly address the Star Trek that made me a fan, what was at one time considered its own risky little revamp attempt, ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation.’
Fringe 2×10 “Grey Matters” review
December 12th, 2009
The following contains spoilers through the episode “Grey Matters,” originally broadcast 12/10/09.
Okay, so this is the first time I’ve missed ‘Fringe’ completely in its first two seasons. For the record, the missing ones from these reviews are 2×8 “August” (the Observer episode) and 2×9 “Snakehead” (no idea). There was a slight uptake in the ratings after “August,” so that’s a good thing. Regardless of what “Snakehead” did, “Grey Matters” was another don’t-miss episode, dealing directly both with the season arc and long-standing character arcs.
HYGOTS No. 60
December 4th, 2009
Star Wars came into my life in all the ways it doesn’t seem like it should anymore. I was a child when I first saw the original trilogy, and I kept watching it as I grew up. I never seemed to grow tired of it. Then George Lucas released some revised editions in theaters, and then he released a new trilogy, and just as everyone started saying, all the adults, that maybe the whole Star Wars thing was over, I realized I still cared deeply for it.
Heroes 4×11 “The Fifth Stage” review
December 1st, 2009
The following contains spoilers through the episode “The Fifth Stage,” originally broadcast 11/30/09.
It may be time for fans of ‘Heroes’ to reach the fifth stage of grief themselves, because it’s not very likely that the show will be returning for a fifth season. Then again, at this point, you either really want to be watching the show, or you just plain aren’t, and it’s funny, because even with so few viewers, it still outclasses the number of fans some of the cult classics of recent years have managed to lure throughout their runs. With a show like ‘Heroes,’ they’re vocal when they’re at their biggest, when they’re building the hype, not necessarily when they’re trying to be constant cheerleaders. You might say the best fans aren’t the ones who’ve stopped watching, but rather the ones who still are, who don’t need constant reassurance that they’ve caught on to something. In that way, even as a declining failure, ‘Heroes’ is still a greater success than you might have been led to believe, fully three seasons past its apparent peak. “The Fifth Stage,” meanwhile, continues to prove that it has far from given up the fight.
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