MMV: The Year That Almost Wasn't

Okay, we are slowly pulling away from the year that was 2005. I'm only going to talk about very specific items so the list is not incomplete. Here it goes:

Best Villain: Chancellor/Emperor Palpatine (Star Wars: Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith)
The last of the Star Wars films was good, but this snake made it great. Whether he is cutting down Jedi or getting his facist groove on, the guy owns the flick. A tip of the hat to Ian McDiarmid for making this SW fan root for the bad guy again.

Best Reason Not To Get Any Work Done On A Tuesday Night: My Name is Earl, The Office and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
This three-headed monster rules the wasteland that is television. Earl and the Office gives me a little more faith that somewhere out there, smart people are still able to make good TV. SVU has been better in years past, but it's still a must view. Best Cop Show Ever.

Best Song (tie): Rental Car by Beck (off of Guero)/ DARE by the Gorillaz (off of Demon Days)
There are several tasty treats on both of these releases, but these are the two that kept making me hit REPEAT on the CD player. Beck's vehicle is a trippy hot rod with a hard rock chasis and the Gorillaz tune evokes a post-apocalyptic dance hall. In the vernacular of my youth: Awesome.

Best Update of an Old Favorite: Doctor Who (2005)
It's about time: the good Doctor is smart and bad ass, his sidekick is hot and not annoying, the special effects are good and the stories rock. Just watch it, damn it.

Best Toy: Darth Tater
The thought of mashing together an intergalactic terror with Mr. Potato Head made most SW diehards yell "NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Fear not, it rules.

Best Creepy Movie: War of the Worlds (2005)
In this era of real world terror, the Joe Six-Pack worldview of this oft-told tale is haunting. Yeah, I said haunting.

Best Surprise In A Film: Serenity
If you haven't seen is yet, I will not spoil it for, as some Moronic Von Jackasses have. It's very good movie, a worthy companion to the Firefly lore. As far as getting a sequel, let's just take a nice long look at the Star Trek franchise and see what a bad idea that would be.

Best Character Name (tie): Euro Trish (Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends)/ Big Drayton (And The Sky Turned White...)
Yeah, yeah. ATSTW is something I made, but 'F' it, it's my list and I like the name.

Best DVD Extra: Reimagining the Lost Spider Pit Sequence from King Kong 1933 (King Kong DVD)
I'm sure that the '05 model of Kong will raise the roof and all of that, but seeing Peter Jackson and his minions recreate a lost piece of film history was a nice reminder that creative and talented people do get a chance to work on things that they love and get away with it.

In the shadow of death and uncertianty, there were some more things that made 2005 not suck so much:
Dave Attell came to Iowa City, the Grant Wood exhibit at the Cedar Rapids Musem of Art, The 40 Year Old Virgin, Wedding Crashers, Wallace and Grommit, The Adventures of Prince Achmed, the Superman Returns Trailer, Batman Begins, Viking Legos, Star Wars: Clone Wars Vol.2, having a reading at Prairie Lights, meeting Gene Colan and Walt Simonson, King Kong Escapes on DVD, seeing the restored Godzilla and of course, being a part of the CLP crew.

So, that's it. Goodbye '05.