Miscellaneous, WGOM

The Best of [everything] … or at least most mentioned

33 Comments

Fun aggregation: essentially, "The Best of [everything] - 2015" ranked according to number of mentions on critic's year-end best-of lists. You could probably go further with it, ranking according to average placement on lists, but for CoC purposes, this is more than enough info:

Top Threes

Movies:
Carol - 82% of lists
Spotlight - 77%
Inside Out - 73%
Mad Max: Fury Road - 73%

Television Shows:
Master of None - 83% of lists
Fargo - 83%
Mr. Robot - 75%
Mad Men - 75%

Books:
Between the World and Me - 80% of lists
A Little Life - 60%
The Story of the Lost Child - 60%

Albums:
Kendrick Lamar, To Pimp A Butterfly - 100% of lists
Vince Staples, Summertime ’06 - 63%
Carly Rae Jepsen, Emotion - 63%

And just for fun, because we at the WGOM are so hip, tied for fourth place are few the Citizenry crowed about this year:

Courtney Barnett, Sometimes I Sit and Think and Sometimes I Just Sit - 58%
Joanna Newsom, Divers - 58%

33 thoughts on “The Best of [everything] … or at least most mentioned”

    1. Was trying to be helpful while sharing some Arts & Entertainment items that started as a comment but seemed a better stand alone post.

      Also SelectShow

      1. Aye - Mad Max was excellent and I'm excited to see The Martian.

        A few others on basically the rest of my "To Watch" list: The Revenant, Sicario, Star Wars VII,* The Hateful Eight, Creed, Mr. Holmes and Bridge of Spies. I'd also like to catch the newest Mission: Impossible flick.

        *finally going to see it on Friday evening...finally.

        1. Caveat: I haven't seen Inside Out, Antman, MI:Rogue Nation, and others yet, but they're on my library reserve list. While I liked Age of Ultron, Kingsman, and SW:VII, I'd rank them under the two I mentioned.

          1. Sicario is certainly worth seeing. Disturbing as hell, but worth seeing. Benicio del Toro is fantastic in it.

  3. I don't watch much television programming, but have seen a few episodes of Season 1 of The Leftovers. It's based on a very interesting premise: how to live in society after the unexpected/unexplained disappearance of 2% of the world's population, ~140M people, and the acting is pretty stellar.

      1. Oh, how I love Leftovers. That's up there with Fargo for my current favorite shows. To me, Leftovers is just such a perfect mix of weird confusing events and what seem like realistic ways people would deal with this sort of event. I kind of like being confused like that. There are at least 5-6 episodes in each season that caused my wife and I to both just say "What!?" at the end.

      2. Leftovers S1 had parts I liked and parts I hated. They got rid of a lot the stuff I hated about the first season and S2 which just wrapped up was outstanding. My top10 for this year would be
        1. Americans
        2. Mr. Robot
        3. Fargo
        4. Leftovers
        5. Game of Thrones
        6. Justified
        7. Parks & Rec
        8. Always Sunny in Phily
        9. Better Call Saul
        10. Rectify

        Mad Men was close, but only had 7 episodes and I thought the first 2-3 were pretty sub par.

        1. Good list. I would say Justified, Fargo, and Better Call Saul were my top three of the year. (Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Blackish, and Parks & Rec were my top three comedies.)

        2. I'm curious, which parts of season 1 of Leftovers did you hate? I'm going to guess...

          Actual Spoiler SelectShow

        3. With the caveats that I haven't started The Americans yet, have one episode of Fargo S2 left, and am two seasons behind on Justified, here's my TV list for the year:

          1. Mr. Robot S1
          2. BoJack Horseman S2
          3. Master of None S1
          4. Review S2
          5. Yuri Kuma Arashi
          6. Fargo S2
          7. Himouto! Umaru-chan
          8. iZombie S1 + 2
          9. Orphan Black S3
          10. Last Week Tonight with John Oliver

    1. Looking forward to listening to it. Between those mentioned on the linked post and our new music "Best Of" here, I will be spending a lot of time catching up in Jan, Feb & Mar.

      1. I've tried that a few times, but then I'm always catching up, and listening to Radiohead or something.
        If you zone out for a few months listening to Current 93 or Aaron Dilloway, or boning up on the songs and flight calls of Alaska birds, you've just got to realize that your chance of keeping current in those months has passed you by and is lost forever.
        Move on, man, and stop trying to live in a past you weren't even there for. There are probably some good Anime series on Netflix that could probably watch instead, anyways.
        Are your kids going to think you're uncool because you dropped the thread of modern music somewhere in your 30s because you started grabbing at some other, smaller threads? Maybe, but at least you're following your own muse rather than an amalgamation of others' muses.
        If you had stayed current, would they just find something else that will brand you as uncool? Indubitably.
        Is your use of "indubitably" that something else? Quite likely.
        Do you care? Not really. I'll probably chance upon the best stuff by accident anyways.
        Plus, what exactly was on others lists that I only found that way and would not have found any other way? I dunno... Dilloway.
        Do you remember where you first heard "indubitably"? It was a breakfast cereal commercial about an animal-shaped cereal.

        'Spoiler' SelectShow

        1. I disagree. I like finding things that I like. If there are a ton of well-informed people that like a particular thing, there's a decent chance that I'll also like it. I'd rather hear things that I like than not hear things that I like.

          Cool and whatnot have never entered into the equation.

        3. "Oh, indubitably!"
          Looney Tunes cartoon characters The Goofy Gophers - Mac and Tosh

          RE: the rest of your screed ... I'll write more later.

  5. Best Album: Mister Asylum by Highly Suspect. Close second Royal Blood's self titled. Highly Suspect just blew me away the last half of the year.
    Best movie (that I've seen): Whiplash. Sure, it came out last year, but I saw it this year.
    Best TV Show: Broadchurch. I just really dug the chemistry between the two main characters.
    Best Book: The Martian.
    Best Board Game: Queen's Architect. It's my niche favorite. Codenames a close second.
    Best song: Lydia - Highly Suspect

  7. I was going to throw this under the Movie Discussion thread, but that's getting a little stale.

    The recent movie release of Macbeth is quite excellent. Very intense, beautifully filmed, well acted (although enunciation could be better). If you like The Bard generally and fond of Macbeth specifically (I've probably seen 20 performances/movies) I highly suggest it. Playing at St. Anthony Main for you MSP-STP folks.

    Other Best of 2015 for me.

    Best Album -- Sleater-Kinney, No Cities to Love
    Best Song -- All Our Songs, Built to Spill
    Best Play -- Midsummer's Night Dream at Park Square Theater
    Best Concert -- Bobby Bare Jr. Turf Club
    Best New Restaurant -- Kyatchi
    Best TV Show -- House of Cards S.3
    Best New Trail -- Browns Creek Trail to Stillwater

    1. I've got so many old trails to get to, I don't know if I'd ever be able to say a "Best New Trail".
      Maybe a "Best New (to Me) Trail", in which case I'd mention the one public trail at Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve in East Bethel: "Fish Lake Nature Trail". I might want to go there today, actually.

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