Well, everyone’s going to be doing these lists within the next few days. May as well join in a little early, if only to think about something other than the huge food-baby I’m currently carrying.
This will apply only to media, so I’m just counting films and books for the sake of brevity. Gonna limit them to about 3 or 4 things so this post doesn’t wind up getting too long. I’m going to do a follow up post of all the stuff I got up to in 2015, why I’m feeling proud of myself for getting through this year even when it seemed everything was going to be miserable and awful. Also, I’ll do another post on Things To Look Forward To in 2016, since I’m filled with final-week-of-the-year zeal and it’ll be nice to get back into monthly blogging again, to keep myself positive.
So, without any further ago, away we go!
Film
BEST
Mad Max: Fury Road – This is far and away my favourite movie of the year. I hadn’t seen any of the Mad Max trilogy beforehand, but the trailer looked so damn good that I just had to watch it when it came out in May. The amazing cinematography and fast-paced, frenetic action, coupled with Junkie XL’s soundtrack was such a better experience than Avengers: Age of Ultron, which I saw the week prior. But yeah. Fury Road was absolutely fantastic, and I’ve just bought it on Amazon. Sure makes up for the tiny screen I had to watch it on during my flight back from Japan.
Chappie – I remember my brother telling me he was driving to work, listening to BBC Radio 1, and Fearne Cotton had a new record to play. “Now, these guys are from South Africa. Their sound is a little bit weird, but… seriously, bear with it, it’s amazing.” …Three Die Antwoord albums later… yeah, I like Ninja and Yo-Landi Vi$$er as a super guilty pleasure. I love that they were such good actors in Chappie too, and their songs showed up in this film. (Though they’re not credited on the poster or the DVD. Strange.) Chappie is the story of a police robot who has an experimental human-style consciousness installed into him… but he’s kidnapped by Ninja’s gang and ‘taught’ to act bad, since Chappie essentially has the mind of an infant and needs to be taught right from wrong. Aside from some wonky plot decisions, it’s a fun, fantastic ride from start to finish.
Far From The Madding Crowd – Two of the big summer blockbusters I really had my hopes on this year actually turned out to be damp squibs. (The aforementioned Age of Ultron and *sigh* Jurassic World.) Anyway, the independent British film starring Carey Mulligan as classic #girlboss Bathsheba Everdene was actually one of the better movies I saw this year. I studied Far From The Madding Crowd when I was in high school, and it is a damn sight better than Tess of the d’Urbervilles. Thankfully, FFTMC stuck with me far more than… say…. Cider With Rosie or anything else I studied for high school English. Carey Mulligan is a star turn in absolutely any film she turns her hand to, and this film just felt like having a nice cup of tea. Just a nice, cosy, well-written and well-acted period drama, the kind I watch with my mother on rainy days.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens – Not my favourite of the Star Wars movies, but I just saw this last Saturday and it was great. Rey and BB-8. Finn and Poe. (<3) Kylo Ren being an emo who throws hissy fits. (The emo Kylo Ren Twitter feed is hilarious, btw.) Maz Kanata, Han Solo, Chewie… Oh man, it was nice to dip back into the Star Wars universe again. I’ve seen the older films again recently and they hold up amazingly well. I’ve got absolutely no fears for Episode VIII, even though I did see the odd article on the Internet floating around like “bluh bluh J.J. Abrams will ruin this like he did to Star Trek, lol lens flares” and “HAVE WE FORGOTTEN EPISODES I-III!?” (The latter argument is so out of proportion, the prequels aren’t amazing, but they certainly are not the worst films ever made.)
WORST
Jurassic World – Nothing like what I was expecting, and super boring for the most part. Indominus Rex wasn’t really an exciting addition, and although I loved Chris Pratt and his velociraptor squad, the writing seriously ruined the rest of the film. The kids were bland and lacked any form of personality, just the same old cynical jerk of a teenager and his happy-go-lucky baby brother, plus the added drama of their parents splitting up on top of being sent off to stay at an amazing theme park with their aunt. Who, by the way, was rather insultingly portrayed as the sort of childless, self-interested career woman that Hollywood should have dumped back in the 1990s or even further back than that.
Jupiter Ascending – I listen to a podcast called How Did This Get Made? and I laughed right along with the hosts when they discussed Jupiter Ascending back in June. (Did you all know that the script was 600 pages long? And that this film is potentially the death knell for the Wachowskis working with Warner Bros., whose patience has run thin after they’ve continually failed to make them the Matrix money they originally became famous for?) I saw this with a friend of mine, and I assured her that, y’know, Tumblr had been raving about the movie being really enjoyable and schlocky and… oh god did Mila Kunis really whisper “I love dogs” to herself upon Channing Tatum’s revelation that he’s got more dog DNA than human DNA due to alien gene splicing? Was that Oscar winner Eddie Redmayne delivering a line in such a hysterically over the top way that I still get the giggles when I think about it to this day? (You know the one. “I CREATE… LIFE!!! and i destroy it.”) That afternoon, when @Shawty_Pap and I walked back to McDonalds and tried to recount that mess of a plot… We had a hilarious time, even if we were totally baffled by what we had just seen.
The Room – Okay, technically I first watched this film back in… 2011 or so? I inflicted it on a friend in 2013 (what can I say, I bond with people over bad movies ^^; ), and we decided to attend the Bristol Bad Film Club’s screening of The Room this year. The Room just absolutely defies explanation. One of my favourite books this year was in fact Greg Sestero and Tom Bissell’s The Disaster Artist, if only because it helped explain some of the more baffling decisions in the film’s writing, and it turns out that behind the scenes, working with Tommy Wiseau is about as frustrating and hilarious as you’d expect. (Frustrating because, y’know, Tommy would show up four hours later and then be super demanding to his actors, going as far as throwing a water bottle at one of his actresses, instigating a mass walkout. Hilarious, because… seriously, Tommy Wiseau is an enigma that cannot be explained and perhaps one of the most bizarre people to have ever walked the face of this planet.)
Books
BEST
The Last Leaves Falling – Sarah Benwell’s début absolutely broke my heart. Enough said.
Damsel to the Rescue – This was written by a friend from GoodReads (Kaia Sønderby) who seriously knows her stuff when it comes to fantasy, and has a hilarious razor sharp wit. I knew I was in great hands when I downloaded Damsel to the Rescue, a story set in a universe where girls are pushed into rescuing princes who can’t seem to stop getting themselves into trouble. Poor Terri simply wants to tend her garden and be among her books, but with her inheritance hanging in the balance, she has to don heroes’ garb, get a magical stave and set out with her best friend and their horses to go on an adventure. Along the way, she meets up with several friends and discovers there are much darker forces lurking in the shadows, forces that might bring the kingdoms to their knees. Seriously, if you’re looking for some fun, light-hearted fantasy, I can’t recommend this highly enough. Especially if you’re tiring of grimdark fantasy that seems to just follows a checklist of tropes and tries to outdo itself in terms of violence and general nastiness.
Beneath the Surface: Killer Whales, SeaWorld, and the Truth Beyond Blackfish – Perhaps the most informative book I’ve read, during a year in which I read a lot of non-fiction. I hate to sound like I’m preaching to the converted here, but if you haven’t seen Blackfish, then this book will absolutely set you against Sea World for life. I’ve read testimonies by Sea World employees stating that all these former workers who are telling their stories are liars looking for their 15 minutes of fame, but seriously. You cannot have so many hellish stories coming out of a big company without at least there being some grain of truth to them. Hargrove knows his stuff, and he’s seen pretty much everything awful that Sea World had to offer throughout the ’80s, ’90s and 2000s, studying up on killer whales and the other cetaceans in the park and just how unnatural this behaviour was for them… it’s shocking and heartbreaking, and if you love animals I cannot recommend it highly enough.
WORST
HOO BOY. I didn’t read nearly as many terrible YA novels this year, but I know what’s going straight to the top of my list!
Reawakened – Yes, who knew a Colleen Houck book would be absolutely dreadful? Woefully plotted and poorly researched (and no, saving images to a Pinterest board does not mean you’ve done historical research), I finished this book on a train journey and was so annoyed with it by the end that I… let my Kemeticist friend Gem read it, and she’s similarly infuriated by the book’s existence. Maybe one day we could do a feature on the blog about how awful it is in terms of portraying Ancient Egyptian mythology or even the history. Or even modern day workings. I highly doubt that hypnotism can get you through the layers of international security in airports, and how Houck can only ever seem to write countries as pretty backdrops, rather than living, breathing cultures. Easily the worst book I read in 2015. Seriously.
Seeker – Ah, yes, a novel that had publishing-savvy Jodie Reamer, famed for Twilight and The Fault in Our Stars at its helm. Marketed as a brand new chapter in YA, fusing science fiction and fantasy in ways that hadn’t been seen before and… yawn. Seeker was dull, uninspired, and quite frankly insultingly stereotypical when it wasn’t being racist. (Seriously, if you’re an Asian character in this book, expect to be typified as being ‘full of honour’.) My friend Ceilidh on Bibliodaze was pretty shocked when I told her about how stereotypical Dayton’s depiction of Scotland is. Highland estates! Talk of druids, standing stones, ancient rites and rituals! That’s the problem with building a world that’s both traditional fantasy and futuristic sci-fi. Just pick one or the other, and you wind up with a mishmash that makes no sense. Like this book!
Talon – Yeah, no surprises that I wouldn’t like this one. I lost interest in Kagawa’s Iron Fey series after just one book, and even though I love me some dragons, Kagawa couldn’t even pull that off correctly. Talon is tiresomely predictable and has absolutely nothing new to offer to the genre. Avoid.
…And that’s all she wrote! Hope you enjoyed reading this! 🙂
Have yourselves a merry Christmas (if you celebrate it), or a joyous winter holiday/yuletide season. Here’s to 2016 and better books and films!
And these are they. My final moments. They say a warrior must always be mindful of death, but I never imagined that it would find me like this…
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Days of Future Passed 