Jack Reacher

If you don't mind male power fantasies - and given the current popularity of superhero movies enough of us don't - this Tom Cruise vehicle is going to entertain you for its 2+ hours, after which you probably won't ever think of it again.

#4

Podcast

This American Life (Ira Glass)

How to describe This American Life? It's a radio show on WBEZ Chicago. There's a theme to each episode, and a variety of stories on that theme. It's mostly true stories of everyday people, though not always.Sometimes there are fictional short stories on the theme. You can read more about it at thisamericanlife.org, where I found this brief description. The show is incredibly well produced and in a world where we either hear about school shootings, fiscal cliffs, natural desasters and wars on the one hand or about Honey Boo Boo's shoes, Kim Kardashian's boobs or Kate Middleton's hat on the other, it reassures my faith in humanity to hear these extraordinary stories about ordinary life. And there's really not much more I can say about it other than go and listen to it.

TV Show

 Breaking Bad (Vince Gilligan)

Breaking Bad is the story of Walter White's transformation - as series creator Vince Gilligan puts it - from Mr. Chips to Scarface. Diagnosed with cancer, chemistry teacher White (Bryan Cranston) begins to cook meth to cover his medical expenses to provide for his family. As his cancer goes into remission White is well on his way to becoming a criminal overlord. He has found something he excels at (cooking meth) and he is not willing to give it up even if it dooms everyone around him.

The eight episodes aired in 2012 constitute the first half of the fifth and final season of the show. With Giancarlo Esposito's Gus Fring meeting the glorious explodo in the season four finale, Walt is looking to inherit an empire and most of the season deals with the issues that arise. The first episode, though, opens with Walt alone in a diner celebrating his 52nd birthday (therefore, it takes place a year in the future) with guns in his trunk and a fake ID in his pocket. Seems like the endgame the whole series is moving toward. At the end of episode eight, the police, namely Walt's brother-in-law Hank, finally have a clue who this blue meth cookin' Heisenberg dude really is. This can only end badly.

It's hard to describe what makes this show so good. Clearly it's performances by Cranston and Aaron Paul, both Emmy winners for their roles on the show by now. It's beautifully shot and extremely well written, and you get an arc for the protagonist that you don't usually see on TV. Unless something unexpected happens it's not Walter White's redemption but his damnation that we're watching and the show is making us care about the fate of what turns out to be a human monster.

If you're not watching already mabe you should wait and watch the whole thing when it is finished. I, for one, can't wait to see how this turns out.

Book

Inherent Vice (Thomas Pynchon)

Thomas Pynchon published his first novel, the critically much acclaimed V., in 1963, after which the literary world's most notorious recluse spent much time in California. In his most recent novel, 2009's Inherent Vice, he returns to the California of the late 60's. It features much of the usual trappings of a Pynchon novel including a detective protagonist, a mysterious organization, the counterculture and the Man, too many characters to keep straight, lots of them with silly names, and humor that is sometimes easy to miss while one is busy decoding the language it is buried in.

Of Pynchon's seven novels The Crying of Lot 49, Vineland, and now Inherent Vice can be considered easy reads compared to his more sprawling efforts. While the latter have received the most critical acclaim and the most academic attention and Lot 49 is often used as an introduction to Pynchon because of its brevity, Vineland and Inherent Vice may be the most accessible. They are all, however, recognizably by the same author and they are all roughly about the same things. If I had to sum it up in one simple sentence I'd say Pynchon writes about the struggle for freedom and the temptation to give in to the forces of control. If you like him and his idiosyncratic style of constructing both sentences and plots - and having read all of his novels and his short stories I clearly do - you will enjoy Inherent Vice, even though it offers essentially nothing new.

Movie

The Avengers (Joss Whedon)
 

I can trace my involvement with the Avengers franchise to my early childhood. I'm sure I read my first Avengers comics while still in elementary school. When I started reading original issues instead of the  German reprints in the mid-80's, the Avengers were among the titles I had sent to my house from a comic book store in Munich. My love for the franchise has never really waned, unlike that for many other characters. And then they put it in the hands of Joss Whedon, creator of such nerd greatness as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly and Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. How could I not like this? 

Turns out I wasn't the only one that liked it. People liked it to the tune of 1.5 billion dollars. Of course, that movie was the culmination of years of build-up in the Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor movies. We've seen super hero groups on the big screen before, but this was different from The Fantastic Four and the X-Men. This was done by someone who had an idea how to capture the essence of these characters in their interactions without being on the nose, someone who can write funny dialogue, and someone who knows which buttons to push when. As a fan of both Whedon and the Avengers, I couldn't be happier.

Needless to say this is not a cinematic masterpiece, this is not Citizen Kane. This was an example of a summer blockbuster done extremely well while delivering something new that people had been anticipating for a while. It will be hard for Whedon to even reach that kind of success again, let alone top it. However, if either Spider-Man or Wolverine (or possibly both) show up in the sequel (and I've recently read the possibility exists) my nerd brain may have a nerdgasm and this vale of tears may be transformed into one unending nerdvana. And this is why I loved The Avengers: it was both the successful climax of a development years in the making and also the opening act of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which allows me to consider the Bendis era Avengers line-up as a big screen possibility.

#5

Podcast

Tie: The B.S. Report (Bill Simmons) and The Nerdist (Chris Hardwick)

It seems like I'm already trying to cheat on the first entry out of the gate, doesn't it? I mean, a tie? All this blather about Top 5's and you cant't whittle it down to 5? Bear with me.

The B.S. Report and The Nerdist are essentially the same show, one for nerds, the other ostensibly for jocks, or more like wanna-be jocks. They both created their own small, but well-respected media empires (grantland.com, nerdist.com) by sticking with their passions and being funny, interesting and - most important of all - relatable to the common fan. 

Their podcasts often sound like conversations between friends that you happen to listen in on (and often they are just that), but they also features celebrities of the highest caliber. Simmons' highest profile guest undoubtedly was the States sports-fan-in-chief President Obama, while Hardwick's most famous interviewee was probably Tom Hanks. As is typical for sports fans and nerds alike, they are both extremely emotionally invested in their respective subjects, but they never lose their sense of humor over it. There's very little negativity in either of these shows, both going for laughs as their primary source of entertainment.

If you consider yourself a sports fan whose interests are not restricted to a particular sport or team or are interested in all things nerdy, these podcasts will most likely make you laugh and may even point you towards things you didn't know you would enjoy.


TV Show

Mad Men (Matthew Weiner)

Perennial Emmy contender and critical darling Mad Men aired its 5th season in 2012. If conventional genre fare where a doctor treats a patient, a cop or PI catches a criminal, or a lawyer defends or convicts someone is what you want out of your hour of TV entertainment (and as you will see, I'm a fan of well-done genre), the stories of the advertising executives of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce are not for you. This is not for binge watching on a rainy Sunday afternoon. An episode of Mad Men is like a good piece of literature, that you must digest, that you can return to for a second time which will be as rewarding or more as the first. It is what's nowadays usually called a slow burn. There is no obvious and easy gratification of what we have been taught to expect as consumers of TV. There is no spectacle, only the lives of these men and women in the changing climate of the 60's. If you are not interested in seeing these characters struggle with themselves and their changing world, then this is not for you. If this is for you, then you have found a rare gem.

Book

The Hunger Games (Suzanne Collins)

I rediscovered my love for genre fiction in 2012, primarily by reading books I had previously seen on TV or in the movie theater. I finally picked up George R.R. Martin's A Game of Thrones, but it was the much slimmer and faster paced Hunger Games that made my list. Like most readers, I think I like the first installment of the trilogy best. The story of young Katniss Everdeen hurtles along at breakneck speed as she first volunteers for the annual Hunger Games, a gladiatorial spectacle that allows only one survivor, to save her sister and then through cunning, strength and luck manages to survive and save fellow contestant Peeta Mellark in the process. Sure, you sometimes wish to find out a little more about this post-nuclear war US, but the story allows for no lengthy world building as every chapter ends in a cliff-hanger and just pulls you along as it races towards the finish line. This is not a ponderous piece of epic fantasy, that explores even the remotest corners of a whole world. This is a piece of YA literature and the love triangle is therefore unavoidable but it embeds this quintessentially adolescent trope in a particularly brutal context that doesn't afford its protagonists the time or luxury to wallow in the delicious misery of heartbreak. I was thoroughly entertained.

Movie

The Silver Linings Playbook (David O. Russell)

The David O. Russell film starring Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence is based on Matthew Quick's novel of the same name, which I have not read, so unlike The Hunger Games, where I had seen the movie before I read the novels, I came to this film with only my experience with the romantic comedy genre to inform my viewing. What makes this film work beyond Cooper's and Lawrence's engaging performance is that it is not purely a romantic comedy, it's a look at how two people come to terms with and deal with their in these cases serious issues. Pat has just been released from an 8-month stay in a mental hospital and is determined to win back his wife, Tiffany is dealing with the death of her husband and is determined to compete in a local dance contest. Their paths cross and the inevitable hi-jinks ensue, but their story is intertwined mainly with the craziness surrounding Pat's family in a manner that nicely camouflages the rom com plot. Of course, the audience is aware of Tiffany's interest and eventually Pat catches on, too, but the film ends up more of a look at how we live with our obsessions, depressions and our less serious everyday ticks and quirks. If the film creates the impression that 'all we need is love (bah-bada-badaah)' to cure serious mental illness, then that I think is more due to the conditioning that the audience of the rom com genre undergoes rather than anything inherent in the film. Cooper's and Lawrence's characters are not magically cured, they will face their problems together. Or at least that's how I chose to view it.

Top 5 lists

I went into this year planning to watch 50 movies I hadn't seen before and to read 12 books. I finished 18 books and saw 54 movies. I watch numerous TV shows on a regular basis and listen to podcasts daily. I wouldn't say that I only watch, read or listen to the same type of thing over and over again, but there are certain genres I avoid, like for example horror movies or reality TV.

Making year-end lists is somewhat of a staple of critics in the entertainment industry, but most of them are Top 10. I feel if you don't reduce it to a small enough number the selection doesn't mean anything. And if it's good enough for Nick Hornby, John Cusack and Jack Black, it's good enough for me.


When you actually try to make a list like that you realize a.) how hard it is and b.) that you need some criteria to help you make the decisions. I didn't want to make this an exercise in cultural criticism. I don't feel qualified to judge the technical skill involved in making the objects and I also don't think that's the criterion I would want to use. These are not best-of lists, they're not Desert Island Top 5's, which should take compatibility and rewatchability into account, they're not End of Human Civilization Top 5's, where you try to preserve something important, they are my favorite books, movies, etc. of 2012. In the end, I I decided to rank them by how much I enjoyed them and how much I was emotionally invested in them, which is not exactly the same thing.


The plan is to count down from 5 to 1 and release all number 5's, 4's, etc. at the same time and to write a short paragraph on what it was I enjoyed about them and why your life would be much improved with them in it. Because I really only have your best interests at heart.

Opening salvo

Some theoretical thoughts among the following, so tread carefully or avoid altogether if that's not your cup of tea. 
 

Where is the fringe and what lurks there?

Not too long ago, people smarter than me wrote about the state and seeming fate of geek culture. Geek culture once was the epitome of the fringe, a place where you were alone with your obsession and sometimes the shame this obsession engendered. And that's exactly the way geeks and nerds wanted it. While being on the fringe may have made you an outcast, it also made you special, a member of a select inner circle with its own rituals and codes. Never mind that no-one wanted to be initiated into this not-so secret society of the socially awkward.

Now, of course, the geek have inherited the earth. The IT revolution is the work of geeks. Role-playing, once the province of nerds armed with dice, pencil & paper, and tomes of arcance tables and instructions on how to conjure up whole worlds, has gone big business with the advent of processing power capable of making the imagination superfluous for all but those who create the games. And while comic books may still be considered kid's stuff by most, you can't seem to publish a comic book without selling a movie option. Comic books, for better or for worse, supply the material for a significant part of the big-budget productions each year.

However, the blurring of the fringe goes well beyond the mainstreaming - some might say co-optation - of traditional geek territory. The simultaneous differentiation and integration that is one of the primary traits of complexification and globalization constructs a world where the formerly outlandish has become if not the norm then at least so widespread that it is hard to say what the mainstream is anymore. There is something for every taste and if you set your mind to it you can find it. Consequently, where there once were a few small communities of outcasts - or connoisseurs, depending on your perspective, obviously - meeting to perform their strange rites largely in annonymity, now everyone with an obscure hobby has a platform - like this one - from which to announce their existence and activities to the world. The result is a plethora of voices that is nonetheless navigable, thank Google. In principle, it is as easy to look for the complete works of Joss Whedon as it is for those of William Shakespeare.

To repeat my question from the beginning, where, then, is the fringe here? I suppose it is appropriate in a time of search engines to define the fringe in terms of statistics. The fringe is where a search term doesn't return you hits in the 7 figure range and up. The fringe is where a picture search doesn't show you exactly who and what you want to see. The fringe is that last piece of actual or virtual real estate that hasn't been colonized to the extent that it would take you the rest of your life to see and read everything that's been posted about it. The fringe may be a vast stretch of cyberspace - and many would say that cyberspace is the fringe's natural habitat - but its individual components are the tiny refuges of those who are not interested in the scores from last weekends' Bundesliga matches or who got kicked off American Idol.

What lurks there? Who knows. Let's go find out!

Mission Statement

This is my blog and I will say whatever damn well pleases me.

Having said that, I want to focus on the fringe, on what's non-mainstream, not only because my tastes tend towards the obscure anyway but also because the mainstream, being what it is, is being exhaustively covered already.

Ironically, most of the early entries here will be my Top 5 lists (movies, books, TV shows, podcasts) of 2012 and I don't think you will see too many esoteric items there. We'll see.

I'm not making any promises. I hope some of you are, if nothing else, at least a little entertained.