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Clappy

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  1. Will pull the others from the blogspot vault at some point (the 2020 best list is being a real pain in the butt that I'm just considering linking it instead), but for now, time to ring out 2021 with the first of the lists.  The worst hit music of 2021.

    This was not a particularly good year to write the worst list.  Not because of the content as a whole this year because to be honest, this was a perfectly fine year.  I mean it wasn’t 2020, but it was a perfectly decent transition year.  But my reasons are quite simple…does music still even matter anymore?

     

     

    I mean with the way the world has been for the last two years, I ask this question with all serious intent.  Because the news of the world just keeps dominating the cultural zeitgeist and topic points to the point that the entertainment that use to distract us from even the worst of yesteryear feels like it is not as existent as it used to be.  Even to me, an entertainment buff like myself, I feel less and less wanting to talk about movies and music as much as I use to.  They feel more like a chore to me more than a great distraction.  And don’t take this as me wanting to stop doing this sort of thing.  Not at all.  I will always be glad to discuss.  But I feel with the way the world is slowly spiraling, that I more or less want to talk about what we can do as a society to turn things around or at least watch in real time every bad mistake that is being made or how incompetent our political system is.  Or how even a life-saving vaccine and wanting to be a decent human being and caring for others has turned into becoming a political statement...yeah its quite easy to get pissed off at the world that we are living in.

    But alas, the more I focus on how fucked up the world is at the moment, the more cynical I’ve become.  And I don’t want to be a cynical old man (I’m not that old I swear).  I want to talk about things that make me happy.  And despite music being one of the last topics on a lot of people’s minds, I’ve got to admit.  This whole niche ecosystem that streaming has made music listening has in fact given us some pretty quality hit music.

    As the world starts to open back up again as we are learning to live with the pandemic that has turned our world upside down, we are slowly starting to see more and more of the big names come out of quarantine with new album releases and new music to bring onto us.  I’m excited for the future of the music industry, even if it is not as big as it once was. 

    I mean for god’s sake we have TWO Christmas songs as some of the 100 biggest hits of 2021.  That’s a sign that for most of this year, nobody cared to release anything truly worth discussing.  I mean the biggest topics of this year were about Olivia Rodrigo’s relationship drama, Morgan Wallen canceling himself right when he was about to be the biggest country music crossover star since Taylor Swift, Lil Nas X trolling conservatives with his clickbait, the power of BTS stans manipulating the charts, and a douche (Kanye) vs a turd sandwich (Drake).  Compare that to 2019 where nearly every number one of that year had some sort of thought provoking controversy attached to it.  I find it fitting that a good portion of this year was a lot of music that charted in 2020 over 2021 because there were barely any album bombs for a decent while.  Don’t look at me.  Blame Billboard’s stupid year end tracking system.

    But of course, we have to start this list season off with the entry that gets me my most annual hits.  The worst list.  And despite what I’ve said about 2021 being overall a decent 6/10 year, this is the first time in three years where I had a lot of solid contenders for the worst list.  So let's not waste any more time and start things off with the dishonorable mentions.

     

    DISHONORABLE MENTIONS:

    Spoiler

    “Without You” – The Kid LAROI

    My apologies to the late Juice WRLD, but his protégé is absolutely awful.  I haven’t had such an immediate detestable reaction to someone’s voice this quick since Simple Plan’s Pierre Bouvier.  And my god what an absolutely punchable first impression this song was.  As the year came to a close, I can’t help but laugh at this more than I do outright hate it.  And at least it spawned some pretty funny TikToks over this song’s most quotable line:

    “So there you go oh, can’t make a wife out of a hoe.”

    You’re right Kid.  Go ahead and preach this truth in the most whiny nasally irritable way possible.  Oh wait.  That’s just because she’s not boning you anymore.  Thank god "Stay" is catchy as hell because he would be so high up on my shit list if it wasn't for that.

     

    “Heat Waves” – Glass Animals

    I still can’t believe this song lasted around like the fucking plague all year and is just now peaking inside the top ten.  I guess there’s a lot more Dream stans out there than I realized.  My bad because I honestly just can't understand who would find this song be worthy of anyone's time.  Thank god pop-rock came back in a huge swing this year because this is the sort of shit that made tired of the current "alternative rock" scene.

     

    “Whoopty” – CJ

    Still as forgettable as the first time I heard it.  I would call it Baby’s First Drill Song, but I don’t even think that is fair to babies.

     

    “Beatbox” – SpotemGottem (featuring Pooh Shiesty…or DaBaby…or NLE Choppa…or Polo G…there are one too many remixes)

    I don’t get what’s so impressive about this beat that required like one million remixes this year.  Some were good, but more often than not, they were just unimpressive.  And that’s even before we get to the original song by the original rapper who is so uncharismatic, so unimpressive, and so forgettable that he still doesn’t have a Wikipedia page as of the time I wrote this.  Most baffling hit of the year.

     

    “Holy” – Justin Bieber (featuring Chance the Rapper)

    We go from most baffling hit of the year to the most boring man of the year featuring the most baffling guest verse of the year.  Some indie darlings just aren’t meant to make the jump to the mainstream and I can’t think of a more drastic drop-off in quality than Chance over the last few years.  Those Acid Rap and Coloring Book days are long gone as now he’s comparing his girl to…Oscar Proud?

     

    “Better Together” – Luke Combs

    Yeah I’m still not completely sold on Luke Combs yet.  To be honest, all these dull and sappy as hell love ballads he released this year really aren’t doing him no favors in my book.  Especially with this piece of shit that sounds like it would have been performed by Lewis Capaldi if given the chance.  Hell I think I would have preferred Lewis Capaldi because at least I would have distinctly remembered it.

     

    “Time Today” – Moneybagg Yo

    It is just “Said Sum” again.  Which hey, I liked “Said Sum” the first time around.  But “Said Sum” is not a song that seriously needed its own cheap knockoff.  Seriously it has the same production more or less, the same beat, the same flow, hell even the same alliteration of a song title.  He even refers to himself as the “Said Sum” rapper.  If you’re not going to give yourself more credit than that, why should I as a listener?  Next.

     

    “If I Didn’t Love You” – Jason Aldean & Carrie Underwood

    Clearly name recognition powered this song into becoming a hit because these two don’t have a believable ounce of chemistry with each other.  Kind of reminds of me Jason Aldean’s duet with another former American Idol winner, Kelly Clarkson, from ten years ago.  And just like with that song, this song is so basic that I would not be surprised to see reality singing show contestants perform this song together for years to follow since it is that lacking in personality and plausibility.

     

    “On Me” – Lil Baby

    I still haven’t come around on Lil Baby yet, although I’m getting closer and closer with each passing year.  But even when I do, I can still tell when one of his songs isn’t even trying.  Lil Baby has been on the record saying he made this song because he was bored while in lockdown and I can tell.  This definitely sounds like someone who is bored and has nothing better to do.  And while I wish I could like it for representing the exact sentiments I’ve felt for most of this year, I still wouldn’t like it because Lil Baby sounds like such an unlikeable little shit on this.

     

    “Fancy Like” – Walker Hayes

    This was honestly close to making my list at first, but then I decided I couldn’t give this song any sort of grief.  Because that’s exactly what it wants.  It wants you to look at it in disgust and horror.  Bask in its painful tackiness.  Hell you could say that it celebrates making everyone cringe at its product placement and cornball lines.  Then it hit me.  I don’t hate this.  I’m just fascinated something this terrible actually exists.  I expect this to make many and I mean MANY worst lists so everyone can go ahead and jump at this easy target.  I don’t blame you for doing so, it’s pretty fucking bad.  Meanwhile, I’ll just continue to sit here and marvel at this lame, yet fascinating bad song.

     

    Now that we got that out of the way, there is one more thing I would like to make clear before I start this list season off.  Both my best and worst lists this year are going to be Top Elevens.  Why eleven?  Because I like to go one step further.  Let's just say I have some 2020 backwash that I've already talked about a plenty that I want to make these lists as authentic as possible.  I do actually have some more to say about these songs that are two years old now each so trust me when I say that it won't be tired material.  Got it?  Good.  Now let's go crazy.  We're counting down.

     

     

     THE TOP ELEVEN WORST HIT SONGS OF 2021

     

    Spoiler

    I really didn’t want to start this worst list off by talking about a song that I actually liked at one point.  I mean I still do think it’s a good song after it being around for a good two years or so, but I never want to hear it ever again.  Overplay has practically killed a lot of interest I once had in it.  The fact that this is now one of the biggest country crossover hits of all-time is also astonishing.  Blame the pandemic for making the music industry move at a snail’s pace for a while too.

    I am of course, talking about “I Hope” if you haven’t figured it out by now.  A revenge fantasy song from Gabby (Coney) Barrett that I’ve called good, hell excellent even.  So why am I talking about this song on the worst list?  Well…

     

    11. “I Hope” – Gabby Barrett (featuring Charlie Puth)

     

    In case you’ve been living under a rock for the last two years (which if so, I wish I would have joined you), we are living in the era of remix chart manipulation.  Lil Nas X opened the floodgates of this new era of remixing with “Old Town Road” and its five or six remixes over two years prior becoming the longest reigning number one song of all-time.  And now the rest of the music industry has caught on and we are getting more and more unnecessary remixes.  Granted not all of them have been bad.  Hell some have been very good.  But more often than not, we get these forced out collaborations solely with the purpose to get a quick and easy number one hit or to prolong a charting song’s lifespan.  It’s inorganic and honestly further proving how broken Billboard’s system really is when an artists’ stan following will mass purchase every remix.

    With all the remixes floating out there, I told myself that I would only count a remix on my worst list if Billboard credits the remix over the original.  And last year, this was one of the few remixes that made Billboard’s year end list.  I hated this remix from the very first moment I heard it, but out of the respect that I had for the original being a good song, I just couldn’t find it in me to place it anywhere near the worst list.  And even talking in hindsight, I still don’t think this would have made the actual list; probably would have been in my dishonorable mentions.

    So why am I talking about it this year?  Because that remix has given it such a longer lifespan to the point that the radio absolutely adores this remix.  Yes I still listen to the radio in 2021 against my better judgment.  I don’t want to pay any more in roaming charges to listen to Apple Music in my car.  And the more I hear it, the more everything bad about this remix stands out.  This is by far the worst I’ve ever heard Charlie Puth; and that goes back to his 2015/2016 dentist office music that he used to make.  He sounds absolutely insufferable singing this.  And he completely misses the point of the original by a country mile.

    What made Charlie Puth good in 2017/2018 was taking a heel turn and becoming a bit of a dick instead of trying to play Mr. Nice Guy like he was the years prior.  Which would have made him the perfect fit for this song and given it some needed depth.  But instead, he sings alongside Gabby Barrett and keeps adding more spite that’s not needed and it just doesn’t work.  It’s just such a completely baffling creative decision and I don’t know who thought that was a good idea even the slightest.

    This is one of the worst remixes I’ve heard in my years of talking music and the fact that this was still one of the biggest songs of any year for a second year in a row just goes to show how little new content we actually got.  That and Billboard should not be tracking from early November to early November.

     

    Spoiler

    I can’t believe I had that much to say about the fucking remix to “I Hope”.  I told myself that I was going to try and cut back on some of my long winded rants.  So I hope you don’t mind me taking a bit of a breather and just go for an easy target from some schmuck who I doubt will have a second hit.

     

    10. “Good Time” – Niko Moon

     

    This is your friendly reminder that “bro-country” is far from dead.  It just evolved from being laughably dated to uninterestingly dull and lifeless.  So this guy’s name is Niko and Vinz…I mean Niko Moon….this is not a real name.  He’s the poor man’s Sam Hunt.  And apparently he has ties to some short-lived EDM country group formed by Zack Brown.  Country and EDM…those two don’t go together.  And honestly that’s everything I know that is even remotely interesting about Niko Moon.

    Do I even need to point out the obvious if you listen to this song?  For a song called “Good Time” this isn’t even remotely fun…or entertaining…or catchy…or interesting.  It just fucking sucks the air out of the room mixed in with some incredibly dated trap snares and hi-hats.  But you know what I hate most about this?  This layer of smugness and self-righteous attitude.  Bro, are you even listening to your own song?  You sound as bored of these outdated clichés as your listening audience does. 

    Like I mentioned in my dishonorable mentions, I wanted to place “Fancy Like” on this list.  But at the end of the day, at least that other schmuck who I also doubt will have another hit (or at least as big as “Fancy Like”) put forth some effort into it.  Even with all the cringe cross-marketing and lame virality, I’ll remember it.  I forget how this half-baked bargain bin reject of a country song goes every time I hear it.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    Let’s dive back into the world of TikTok as we talk about yet another schmuck who I doubt will get a second hit.

     

    9. “Track Star” – Mooski

     

    Wow.  What an absolutely stupid metaphor.  Any further insight on how this girl makes you feel or any more amazingly lame track and field puns or are you just going to paint this girl out to be a flake and that you’re doing absolutely nothing wrong because you’re awesome and….yep definitely the latter.

    That’s the thing about these TikTok one-offs.  For your song to really crossover and gain success, you really need to have one hell of a ten to thirty seconds to keep you invested.  Yet somehow, this song was able to get its biggest gains from not streaming or sales, but the radio.  Here’s the thing about the radio though.  With so many people still out of work due to the pandemic from iHeartRadio and its subsidiaries, stations are willing to grasp at any sort of TikTok clout that they can get to find out what songs to make famous.  And low and behold, this song got a remix from Chris Brown of all fucking people at just the right time to capitalize and make this a legitimate hit.

    And I’m not saying that there aren’t people out there who are impressed by Mooski (absolutely stupid rap name ftr) wailing about how this girl leaves when things get bad.  There is always an audience for that.  Probably part of the reason that this was the biggest year for R&B in close to twenty years.

    But for the love of god, this guy is such a dick.  I mean all you have to do is listen to the rest of the song outside of those five to ten seconds and you can start to see the signs as to what all the melodrama is about.  Gasp, how dare she blast him on social media.  She’s only…just as reasonable as everyone else.  And for the record, if you’re going to spend the entire song bragging mostly about how much better you are, you’re really not that much better than airing your drama out on social media you egotistical fuck. 

    Honestly, I’m starting to question if we are supposed to relate to the girl that’s running away from this douchebag.  The fact that he associated himself with Chris Brown makes too much sense. 

     

    Spoiler

    8. “Put Your Records On” – Ritt Momney

     

    This guy put as much effort into this cover song as he put into his stage name.  I'm not wasting any more time on this trash.  Go listen to the original.  Next.

     

     

    Spoiler

     

    It is surreal to me that EuroVision is now popular enough to gain major traction stateside.  Which I’m all for.  I’ve been a casual viewer for the last six years now.  But even then, I was surprised to see the series has gotten big enough to have a full length Will Ferrell comedy film last year.  And I was even more surprised to see that MANY European crossover acts get actual hits stateside.  Not all of them are good though.

     

    7. “Arcade” – Duncan Laurence

     

    Basic.  Painfully basic.

    You guys remember that indie rock car commercial boom of the last few years?  I’m genuinely surprised this song isn’t attached to some sort of product yet, unless it is and I’m just that out of touch with modern day commercialism.  I mean they got FLETCHER for the remix so there's a good chance this is attached to some sort of product out there.  

    I also hate how it is yet another vaguely generic ballad about some girl breaking this guy’s heart.  But most of all, I just hate this guy’s voice.  What is with America’s fascination with bringing in European pop exports singing in the most nauseating grating tone about heartbreak like they are the first ones to experience it?  Why are we still doing this?  And before we go any further, no.  You’re not going to see Maneskin’s cover of Beggin’ make the list.  I actually love the lead singer’s voice.  It’s unique.  And it’s a perfectly good cover, despite Maneskin’s deep cuts being so much better.

    Let’s leave Duncan Laurence back at the arcade…that takes pennies?  Has this guy even ever been to an arcade?  The fuck is this?

     

    Spoiler

    These worst lists take so much effort out of me to write, so let's just sit back and pick on an easy target for a bit.  Low hanging fruit is low hanging.  Thanks Justin Bieber.

     

    6. “Lonely” – Justin Bieber & benny blanco

     

    Look I started off this year by saying that he is the worst popstar and that second place is not even close.  Then he dropped that multi-week number one smash this year, Justice, as damage control from his previous album, Changes; which I’ve been on the record for saying that is by far one of the worst albums I’ve ever listened to.  While Justice is still bad, Justin still got five smash hits off that album so it looks like he’s still sticking around for a while longer.  The fact that he appears on the year end six times on this list proves that he is still a superstar in the music industry.  And by those accords, I agree….to an extent.

    He’s still a superstar because the radio refuses to rotate his songs out.  Bieber is still racking up hits because he has evolved into the next phase of his career; making radio friendly safe music.  Bieber is starting to take the Adam Levine route of making soulless hollow garbage that will not provoke a reaction out of anyone.  The only difference being that Justin Bieber still has a crap ton of young female fans.  Adam Levine still has fans too…soccer moms.  And the older Justin Bieber gets, the more those young female fans will either realize that he sucks and move on or become soccer moms themselves.  So you know what, I concede.  Justin Bieber is just going to stick around whether we like him or not since he now has a new formula for continued success.

    But lord do I wish that said new formula was a little less…whatever this is.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQOO2xGQ1Pc&t=58s

    Someone please put that dying mountain goat out of its misery.  I’ll give Bieber this.  That awkward yelping at least makes me remember this song in comparison to the rest of the generic garbage he’s put out.  But that’s not what put this song on the list.  It’s yet his consistent effort to constantly remind everyone of his douchebag years nearly ten years ago.  We get it.  You regret being an unlikeable piece of shit.  But it’s 2021.  You’ve made three albums now about how you regret your past.  FIND A DIFFERENT SUBJECT ALREADY FOR CHRIST’S SAKE.

     

    Spoiler

     

    Remember this song?  Who am I kidding of course you do.  The song that put One Direction on the map and made them one of the biggest pop acts of the 2010s.  Jesus who thought I would ever be nostalgic for an era that isn’t even ten years old yet.

    Look I’m not going to mince words, I do not like this song even the slightest bit.  It is unflattering garbage that makes my skin crawl.  But in the end, you can only get so mad at teenage boys trying to make girls swoon.  Now if this was sung by a bunch of 40 something year old men…

     

     

    5. “Just The Way” – Parmalee & Blanco Brown

     

    The moment I first heard this I immediately made that correlation to “What Makes You Beautiful”.  I mean it’s all there.  The backhanded compliments.  Pointing out all of said imperfections so non-discretely that I couldn’t picture any girl swooning.  Except that this isn’t Teen Magazine heartthrobs like Harry Styles or Zayn.  It’s sung by a bunch of boomers who claim that they love the way GOD made you.  Where’s Steve Buscemi with the “how do you do fellow kids” when you need it.

    I mean is it fair of me to ask why the hell either of these acts needed a second hit?  Parmalee has been around when even I listened to only country music in the early 2000’s.  They only got lucky with their first legitimate hit ten years ago by catching onto the bro-country trend when it was just picking up steam and here they are doing the same trend-hopping trick once again by cashing in on the boyfriend country boom.  Meanwhile, Blanco Brown got his only hit by trying to reverse engineer the massive success of “Old Town Road” two years ago and only rode that success so far because Nashville wasn’t remotely threatened by his stupid TikTok lite dance.  That should have made my worst list in hindsight but I left it off there because you couldn’t help but feel sorry for the guy knowing that’s how he was going to be remembered by.  Nashville’s bottom bitch because they don’t want to support Lil Nas X.

    And once again, I was wrong.  I don’t feel sorry for either of these two acts if they are just going to coast off trends for the rest of their careers.  Get this Chase Rice levels of wannabe country music trash out of my ears and into the gutter of irrelevance where they both came from.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    4. “You’re Mines Still” – Yung Bleu (featuring Drake)

     

    Really?  We’re doing this again?  We’re going to make yet another emo rap song that samples “Shape of My Heart” by Sting?  It hasn’t even been two years yet since the passing of Juice WRLD that a lot of the industry is still in mourning.  You’re going to have the audacity to sample a song that Juice WRLD sampled and made it his most recognized song?  And even worse, you’re going to make it about the same subject matter?  This reeks of hack marketing for this song to lead to increased streaming and more radio spins.  And if that wasn’t obvious enough, it also has the coveted Drake feature to prove that.

    Which lets talk about that Drake feature.  Drake has done a ton of features for a bunch of no names; rest in peace to BlocBoy JB’s career.  Sure there are a few exceptions to this, like I was absolutely wrong about Lil Baby’s career trajectory.  But more often than not, I feel like Drake spreads the cosign wealth around to remind people how much worse off we can be without him.  That’s not the case here.  Drake is absolutely god awful here.  Drake does his usual jealous possessive boyfriend bullshit, but he sounds so passive aggressive to the point that he just comes off as a massive dick.

    And despite that, I’m still unsure as to if he’s better or worse than Yung Blah.  I know that’s not how his name is spelled, but it might as well be because his warble mouth singing makes Post Malone sound like a choir of angels when he does it.  And when you can make out what he’s saying, he also sounds like a fucking asshole.  The delusional entitlement of this guy is infuriating.  She can’t live her life without me because she’s so blind, as Yung Blech so eloquently states is pretentiousness straight out of his ass.  Like he makes himself out to be this wise sage that she is clearly missing out on, even though he straight up says in the song that he played her multiple times and he often ignored her.  If she actually does leave her new man for this asshat, it’s clearly due to Stockholm Syndrome because I can’t even begin to contemplate what draws this girl back to him.

    This is just an UGLY song all caps.  And so be it, I don’t hate this song for being ugly.  But when you can’t write either of these guys out to be redeeming in the slightest bit, then I’m sorry, I would just tell both of these guys to go fuck themselves.  They clearly would.

     

    Spoiler

     

    Sigh…I don’t hate this act.  I actually have A LOT of respect for them.  They hold a unique place in the music landscape of being one of the few country acts who can genuinely pull off country-pop hybrid music.  Hell my first wedding dance was to their big hit, “Speechless”.  And I still love it despite all of its corny clichés.  That’s what true love is.  Corny cliches and still tolerating them fifty years later *wink*.  Facts for a successful 

    But something in me just snapped this year and all the venom and vitriol that many others gave these two over the last couple years was completely warranted.

     

    3. “Glad You Exist” – Dan + Shay

     

    I mean doesn’t that title just say it all?  I’m glad that you exist girl.  Who the fuck even says that?  What happened to telling a girl you left them speechless?  Or hell even I want you all to myself or I’d spend 10,000 hours?  At least those were compliments.  I’m just glad that you exist is such a fucking backhanded compliment to the point that it makes me quiver with genuine rage.

    But honestly, it isn’t just that…phrase…that makes me hate this.  The WHOLE song is adolescent as hell.  Like I’m pretty sure the only group of girls who would find this flattering are the preteens that Dan + Shay seems perfectly complacent targeting because they are more or less, the boy bandification of country music.

    Hell that might be an insult to preteens.  This is inoffensive dentist office music.  You know the type of music that is so perfectly complacent being targeted to waiting room lobbies while you’re waiting for them to call your name to get your bi-yearly teeth cleaning.  And then this song comes on and you sit there thinking, “oh yeah, that was a hit awhile ago” because what else do you have better to do or think about?  I mean you’ve got nothing to do except sit there awkwardly staring at your phone or reading five month old magazines that desperately need to be changed out because the Milwaukee Bucks won the NBA championship six months ago.  It’s the start of a new NBA season.  Why are we still talking about the last?  And who the fuck cares about which out of his league celebrity Pete Davidson is dating then when he’s dating Kim Kardashian now.  Unless he’s not.  Let me Google search my phone…

    ….oh wait, what was I talking about?  Oh yeah.  This song blows.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    You know it is time to hit the pop music retirement home when acts that are close to half your age start getting chart success.  And no artist further proved that to me this year than the biggest one of this year, Olivia Rodrigo.  But at the very least, I definitely understand why she became such a superstar this year.  She conveys her emotions very well and while all her songs are not aimed to resonate with me, an over the age of 30 year old male; I admire her enough to give her the good ole two thumbs up.  She’s going to rule this decade, mark my words.

    See?  Even older males like me can give teenagers their due that they can write good music.  They are also capable of writing bad music too.  And then there’s this.

     

    2. “You Broke Me First” – Tate McRae

     

    A song so limp and lifeless that doesn’t get a reaction out of me, you, or damn near anyone.  But the more I hear this, the more its failure to elicit any sort of strong feelings straight up pisses me off.  I think the only thing this song has going for it is that it displays less emotion than it does music.  Because my god, this song barely exists.  It’s a rough draft entry pulled out of some teenage girl’s diary with barely any sort of musical accompaniment.  It’s actively sucking in ways that aren’t humanely possible.

    Then of course, let’s talk about the artist she is clearly emulating.  Fun fact, but Tate McRae actually has written music with Billie Eilish before her huge breakout hit.  What’s missing though is the actual commitment to making good music.  Billie actually writes lyrics that fit in with the choices she makes with her musical accompaniment and production.  She commits to her craft.

    What I get from listening to Tate McRae is that I want to be taken seriously as a popstar but I can’t convey any sort of emotions through my vocal reflections.  Listening to Tate McRae’s soulless drone pop is the exact sort of failed transition to pop stardom I felt from Julia Michaels and Rachel Platten before her.  Granted Tate is much younger than both of them so maybe just maybe she might be able to win me over after this terrible first impression, but my god do I absolutely hate how immature this song is.

    Especially that chorus.  I think Tate McRae has the impression that “you broke me first” is a much more cutting line than it actually is.  Maybe if that was a line in a verse, I would think that’s fairly clever.  But the entire hook of your song?  Why would you do that?!?!?! 

    “You Broke Me First” is if someone made the “No U” meme into a pop song.  And really isn’t that all the attention this song actually deserves?

     

    Spoiler

     

    Any of you still hate this song?  I mean I don’t blame you.  Absolutely one of the pinnacle pieces when it comes to pointing out how absolutely dumb and dated “bro-country” was at its worst.  I didn’t hate it.  I actually sort of respected how well this remix worked, even if the song itself was unbearably meat-headed.

    With that said, I’ll take 100 “Cruise (Remixes)” if that means we never get a song like this ever again.

     

    1. “Lil Bit” – Nelly & Florida Georgia Line

     

     

    Like I said, at least “Cruise” worked.  What this…what EVEN is this!?  Is it country?  Is it rap?  Is it a hybrid of the two ala “Old Town Road”?  It’s none of these.  It’s audio white noise.  The worst type of music.

    Years ago I mentioned how country music has such a one-sided relationship with rap music and while that obviously still rings true today, there has always been one huge exception to this rule and that is Nelly.  For some reason, Nelly is one of the few rappers who is happy to reciprocate right back on a consistent basis.  Yeah sure you’ve got your one-off flukes like that awful Kane Brown song with Swae Lee and Khalid or that awful Kane Brown song with Blackbear or that awful Kane Brown song with H.E.R.  But let’s be clear, none of these artists have consistently collaborated with Nashville outside of pop music trying to make Kane Brown crossover.

    Nelly has shamelessly sold himself out to Nashville more times than I can count.  I mean his last album was ALL country music.  I get wanting to pay homage to your roots, which is his explanation for his “love” of country music, but these song titles…”Grits & Glamour”?  “Ms. Drive Me Crazy”?  And he even has a SECOND collaboration with the liberal side of Florida Georgia Line called “Country Boy Do”.  Nelly can say that he wants to pay tribute to his love of country music, but his love for it comes off as hollow at best.

    I was tempted to just make this whole entry about how much Nelly does not work in the genre of country music but then there is Florida Georgia Line.  Who despite all the personal turmoil they have been going through in the past year with their conflicting political differences almost ending the duo for good, still managed to survive and continue to suck at making music.  It doesn't matter what genres these asshats hop themselves into.  Whether its country, pop, rap, hell you should listen to their adult contemporary singles if you want a real good laugh; let's just face the facts.  They suck.  They continue to suck.  And I'm getting as sick of seeing these two continue to still be around as much as I am Maroon 5.  Yes we've gotten to that point ladies and gentlemen.

    I guess I should probably talk about the song itself.  I mean what exactly is there to talk about it?  Except for that absolutely shameless plug for Ciroc, nearly every lyric from this was taken from some other song.  There is absolutely nothing original here that I haven’t heard 500 times before. Hell part of me wonders if 50 Cent, being the petty man that he is, should sue since nearly half the chorus is just these jackasses saying “just a lil bit”.  If I were Nelly, Florida, and Georgia, I’d lawyer up.

    This is seriously one of the most unoriginal, laziest excuses for a song that I’ve ever heard.  This is the Direct to DVD sequel no one asked for of popular music and just like with the Mulan 2's and The Lion King 1 1/2's of the world, it should stay forgotten in the Wal-Mart 99 cent bargain bin where it belongs.

     

    Best List coming soon.  Thanks for reading SBC fam.  Love you guys!

    • Like 2
  2. Straight from the Blogspot Vault, here's my 2020 Worst List:

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    2020.  Do I need to go any further?

     

     

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    When my children ask me what year was the worst to live through, I’ll tell them 2020.  While I had two personal highs this year in terms of buying my first house and meeting my nephew, the cultural zeitgeist was just too hard to ignore.  The entire world hitting a screeching halt with a pandemic that killed millions, massive protests over social injustice that led to civil unrest, the ever-looming threats of another world war, the political divide becoming all the more toxic.  And that was only the first five months of the year.  I didn't even get to an overactive hurricane season, the election, and murder hornets.

    I’ve already let my thoughts slip through about my many MANY insights as to the events this year brought onto us and I really don’t want to sound like a broken record at this point.  Because there is far too much negativity in this world.  One of my friends once told me that reading this blog is like handing out a dose of serotonin to her life.  And that’s what my intentions are with this blog.  To bring some positivity and entertainment towards this dark timeline we are in.  And that’s what I constantly aimed to do throughout this year.  Give people reading a much needed break from the reality we are currently sitting through. 

    And honestly?  I have a lot of things to say about music this year.

     

    So much so that I’m considering expanding a top ten best hit songs list for the year that was 2020.  2020 may have been one of the worst years of all-time, but the one thing it had going right was the hit music of the year was some of the best we’ve gotten this century.  I’m not sure if this was the direction that music was heading towards before the pandemic threw a wrench in everybody’s plans but I enjoyed so many of the minor trends that were coming whether it be the sub-trends of 80s inspired synthpop, a 2000’s nostalgia boom, emo rappers bringing rock music back, trap music starting to sound more introspective…I could go on about how many sub-genres worked this year for me that were becoming mainstream.

    But for as much as I loved the trends that were, and still are to an extent, emerging; reality set in.  The pandemic threw a lot out the window for this year.  To the point that music became one of the last topics that mattered to people in the general public.  If you are reading this and are as big of a music nerd like me, you’ll know that when it came to the metrics, this was one of the weaker point differential years in popular music this year.  You all want to know why this year set a new record for most number one hits in a single year?  Because it was very easy to obtain.  A few weeks ago in early November during one of the weeks where “Mood” by 24KGoldn & iann dior was at number one, it had the same number of points as “Heartless” by The Weeknd the year prior when that was number seventeen that charting year of 2019.  You guys see my point?

    And quite honestly, there is a lot to explain for the three main metrics.  Streaming as a whole is down by twenty percent this year over last.  The radio, an already declining format of telling what’s popular in the music industry, are even further behind at understanding what’s popular due to most of their chart analysts being out of work due to the pandemic.  And sales, another declining format, had to get creative with how to adapt due to the economy also being down thanks to the climate we are living in.  So yeah, in a year where the music that we did get was still pretty great in a sense, music was one of the last things that mattered because there were more important topics at hand to focus on.

    Look I can sit here and ramble on about the music trends of this year because I didn’t even get to some of the important ones like viral trends and stan armies getting more control of these number one races, but alas, I know why you are all here and I don’t want to delay this any further.  I know which content gets more views, so like tradition states, let’s start it off by talking about some of the worst music this year had to offer.  And while we may have gotten some damn great music this year, we got our fair share of bad music as well.  Other music critics may compare the great stuff with some of the best pop music decades like the 80s and the late 90s.  However, when it comes to the bad music, I think a good comparison is 2018 where we either got a fair share of hits from problematic people, a lot of pop music on autopilot, or finding myself questioning who some of these hits are even for.

    But enough preamble, let's get those dishonorable mentions out of the way before tackling on that main course:

    Spoiler

    DISHONORABLE MENTIONS:

     

    “Trampoline” – SHAED

    I get that this was an easier year to make the year end list than previous years due to a bigger lack of actual singles this year.  But come on now.  Nobody actually cared about this song this year.  Or any year really.

     

    “Sum 2 Prove” – Lil Baby & “We Paid” – Lil Baby & 42 Dugg

    So I guess we are going to keep Lil Baby around, aren’t we?  This was a monstrous year for him.  And while he finally won me over this year, I still don’t get the appeal for the most part.  I’m making progress there.  Especially when he gets huge with monotonous bores like these here.  Which I forget how they go every time I hear them.  And no I’m not going to go in depth about either of them.  They both suck in utterly boring ways.

     

    “Suicidal” – YNW Melly (featuring Juice WRLD)

    Isn’t this guy on death row or something?  How is his label still pushing out new music?  Pushing aside Melly’s controversial personal life, this is just a less catchy version of XXXTentacion’s “SAD!”  And isn’t that what we all needed?  Another smash hit guilt tripping women into thinking you’re going to kill yourself if you don’t get with them?  Fuck this guy.  This was going to make the list proper but the Juice WRLD remix that ended up being the one that was credited saved it.  At least Juice WRLD had the sort of personality to make this sort of song work by leaning into the full emo aspect of the situation.

     

    “hot girl bummer” – blackbear

    The position of this song may surprise some of you.  It kind of surprised me too.  But in this day and age where I struggle to figure out who certain songs are aimed for, I’ll give this song this.  At the very least, I understand what this is going for.  It’s bold.  It’s brash.  It belongs in the trash.  But I absolutely get its target audience.  Douchebags.  The same douchebag white boys that blasted nu-metal in the 2000s.  This is basically a modern day nu-metal song.  Except with toxically masculine. 

    Make no mistake though.  Even without this being on the list proper, blackbear is fucking awful.

     

    “Nobody But You” – Blake Shelton (featuring Gwen Stefani)

    You know for a couple who started off as a showmance, Blake and Gwen are one of the most insufferably dull entertainment industry couples right now.  They just do not go well together.  Even when I was watching The Voice, these two just felt more like brother and sister than a believable couple.  Just no believable chemistry whatsoever.  Pretty much applies all my thoughts to this dull uninteresting song.  For a song called “Nobody But You”, I barely hear Gwen on this.  Blake’s voice just overpowers Gwen’s that she is basically of no presence.

     

    “Savage Love (Laxed-Siren Beat)” – Jawsh 685 & Jason DeRulo

    Wonder what Jason DeRulo will cash-in on next to stay relevant after the TikTok clout eventually wears out?

     

    “One Margarita” – Luke Bryan

    Now that Luke Bryan has finally ran the bro-country well completely dry, time to move on to the next stage of his career.  Ripping off Kenny Chesney.  And isn’t that just what we need?  Another person ripping off Jimmy Buffet?  Although this song goes above and beyond that by also catering to the anti-quarantine crowds in the middle of a pandemic.  And because Luke Bryan is willing to do anything to rack up hits at this stage of his career, he actively promoted it as such.  Honestly wanted to put this on the list proper solely for that reason, but last thing I want to do is let politics heavily influence a song list.  Still, fuck this guy and anti-quarantine crowds as a whole.

     

    “Someone You Loved” – Lewis Capaldi

    I still hate this a lot.  But god bless did Lewis Capaldi put himself out there.  He at least tried to sound distinct in a music climate where so much sounds the same.

     

    “THE SCOTTS” – Travis Scott & Kid Cudi

    Honestly would be on the worst list proper if it wasn’t for that outro.  Producer Mike Dean deserves a lot of credit for making even the most worthless of Travis Scott singles salvageable with his outros as of late.  That still doesn’t make Travis Scott’s output this year all the more worthless.  Every single Travis forced out in 2020 all sounded like AstroWorld rejects.  But none pissed me off more with their worthlessness as much as The Scotts.  I couldn’t tell you a single memorable second of this song except for that outro.  It goes in one ear out the other every time.  Wasn’t this supposed to lead to some sort of collaboration album between these two?  Has it already been pushed to the backburner for some more commercial tie-ins disguised as number one singles?  I really hope that next album does Travis some good because he is getting dangerously close to being labelled a sellout very soon.

     

    Okay now that that's out of the way, let's do a proper goodbye to these last 10,000 hours and hope for a better 10,000 more.  We're counting down!

     

     

    THE TOP TEN WORST HIT SONGS OF 2020

     

     

    Spoiler

    Well let’s start this list off proper by talking about the platform for music in 2020.

     


     

    I don’t know if TikTok is going to stick around for the long haul or if it will get replaced by another app in the coming years.  Or if the Trump administration will prevent this app from ever getting another buyer because of their stupid beliefs that China is using it to overpower our government. 

    2020 was the year of many negatives, but TikTok was absolutely a positive in 2020.  It helped take our mind off of everything going on in the world.  And a good majority of the hits on this year’s year-end list had some sort of challenge tied in via social media influencers from TikTok.  These influencers would pick a new song or two every couple weeks, make some sort of dance to go along with it, then the dance would go viral.  And I do have to admit.  A lot of these dances were actually pretty creative.

    Others were not….

    ...and then there was this.

     

    10. “Party Girl” – StaySolidRocky

     

    Look I get that we are in a new era of music where songs don’t really go over the three minute mark anymore just to keep people’s short attention spans occupied.  But I don’t understand how anyone can stay interested in this slog.  It’s barely over two minutes long and a lot of that feels like overlong silence.

    Not only that but this guy just flat out sucks.  He has no charisma, no flow, no personality.  He’s just a dull guy who sounds like he is concern trolling this girl who is addicted to meth and guns.  Or maybe he’s seriously worried about this girl.  I can’t tell.  He puts forth the same monotonous bored tone throughout the entire song that it is hard to tell if he really gives two shits.

    This is the first time in a long time that a song feels so low quality in effort and talent that it doesn’t even feel like it should be allowed to chart.  So clearly it got popular off the Tik Tok dance:

     

     

     

    I stand corrected there too.  That is just moving your arms and back forth and doing the handphone gesture.  Aside from the latter, howis that any different than any other Tik Tok dance?  Whoever influenced this dance clearly didn’t get paid nearly enough.  This song is so low effort that it deserves this low effort of a dance.

     

     

    People are going to look back at this TikTok era chalk full of one hit wonders years from now and StaySolidRocky is a good Exhibit A as to how this app basically handed out a career to anybody.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    You know I’ve always wondered how likely it was that millennials have taken to classic songs from being used in films they’ve watched growing up.  I’m definitely including myself in that category, no question.

     

    I for one, discovered Frankie Valli’s “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” from Heath Ledger’s rendition of it from 90’s teenage film classic “10 Things I Hate About You”.  And that song has been used time and time again in many movies like “Son of the Mask”, “Sharp Objects”, and “Bad Times at the El Royale”.  Ironically, the latter two came out two years ago and now one of the biggest hits in America right now is a dream pop remix of it.  What a coincidence.

     

     

    9. “ily (I love you baby)” – Surf Mesa (featuring Emilee)

     

    This song becoming a hit at all just baffles me.  I thought we left the dance music remixes of classic songs back in the 1990’s?  Where they belonged.

    Not only does this song remind me about how lazy that trend was nearly thirty years ago, it also reminds me of 2013 when some already forgotten about EDM artist remixed Lana Del Rey’s “Summertime Sadness”.  And while that one eventually grew on me, it just made me appreciate the original Lana song all the more.  And my god does Frankie Valli belting the chorus to “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” just hit every single time.  No wonder these no names only focus on the chorus of that song.

    Look I get that EDM was one of the many trends that took back off again this year, but say what you will about the Roses remix or the many songs Regard charted this year.  At least they have some sort of bop towards it.  I could be listening thirty seconds into the song or two minutes in and I wouldn’t be able to tell how far into the song they are. 

    This is just limp and lifeless and no thanks, I’ll vibe with the original.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    This is a worst list.  Make no mistake.  I genuinely hate all these songs.  But at least this next one I can find some sort of nostalgic entertaining levels of terrible with.

     

    8. “My Oh My” – Camila Cabello (featuring DaBaby)

     

    This has been a bad album cycle for Camila Cabello.  From the backlash of being one of the most insufferably fake celebrity couples in recent memory to her second solo album performing terribly and most notably, her racist past coming back to cancel her; it’s amazing that any one of her songs made the year end Hot 100 for this year.  Fairly high.  Just goes to show that anyone can still get a hit as long as they suck up to either radio’s increasingly narrow definition of pop music or shelving out playlist payola to force this one to hit status.

    But good lord is this song so hilariously bad.  This is basically a rip-off of “Havana” except unintentionally hilarious.  And in a year where this worst list is basically full of songs that I don’t understand how anyone can find them any good, this at least made me nostalgic for when bad music used to be entertaining levels of terrible.  I don’t buy for a single second that Camila Cabello wants to be “the bad girl”.  If anything, she sounds like a little kid playing grown up with her mother’s clothing.  And why does this bad boy sound like he came out of the 1950’s?  An older guy?  How scandalous.  With a “bad reputation”? Sure Karen, they all do.  A black leather jacket?  What sort of bad boy still wears a black leather jacket in 2020?

    Senorita Song Shawn Mendes Leather Jacket - Films Jackets

     

    Is the bad boy supposed to be Shawn Mendes?  Goodie two-shoes incredibly unthreatening nice guy Shawn Mendes?  ….I’m laughing in real life while I’m typing this.  Holy shit…

    Oh and DaBaby is here because he’s shelving out Ludacris style guest verses for popstars like it is still the early 2010’s.  I don’t think his verse is bad, but it’s just there.  Like sprinkles are on desserts.  Do they necessarily add anything to them?  No.  It’s just a brief distraction from the rest of the ice cream or cake.  And DaBaby is just a brief distraction from how horrible everything else is on this song.

    This song just feels crowbarred into existence because Camila needed a hit off this album to keep her around.  I sure hope that payola was worth it because with how easily this faded out of existence after its brief moment, it shows nobody is interested in what Camila is selling.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

     

    I know it’s easy to forget that this came out over a year ago, but since 2020 has felt like twelve years in itself, yes it’s been over a year since “Old Town Road”.  A song so genuinely great that it left me hoping that we get more songs like this.  Songs that blend genres and defy what we expect from popular music.  What I’m saying is we need more “Old Town Road’s” and less….well, whatever the hell this is.

     

    7. “Be Like That” – Kane Brown, Swae Lee, & Khalid

     

    I don’t like Kane Brown.  I’ve tried and tried to get the appeal of this guy, but all those early comparisons to a country Justin Bieber keeps getting more and more accurate with each passing single.  He’s had one song I genuinely liked a few years ago called “What Ifs” that was charming enough to give him some goodwill, but every song since then has been blander and less interesting than the next.  I genuinely don’t like this guy as a performer.  He brings nothing to the table and whatever decent vocals he does have are wasted on watered down shlock.

    It is only fitting that his first actual pop song is with two of the biggest wastes of potential in popular music right now.  For someone who has had some of the biggest pop song hooks of the last three years, I’ve wondered why Swae Lee is not as big as he should be.  But he keeps releasing middle of the road crap that is not interesting in the slightest bit.  And then you have Khalid, who is the polar opposite and just keeps releasing the same song twenty times and refuses to take a break.  It’s fitting that his biggest hit has stalled out his momentum because “Talk” keeps proving to be a sellout of his artistic integrity every time I hear it and only gets worse and worse.  And I hear it almost every day at work.

    In case you’ve noticed, I’ve barely talked about this song.  It’s not worth mentioning.  It is yet another song about having mixed feelings in a relationship.  About being in your head and not overthinking things.  One of the most overused topics in pop music.  You know what, it’s fitting that these guys together making a dull uninteresting country/rap/pop song about relationships and overthinking things in your head.  Because they basically made the 2020’s version of “Over and Over Again”:

     

    Isn’t that what we needed?  A reminder that this slog of a song existed?  Lil Nas X, please come save combining genres before these three ruin it some more.

     

    Spoiler

    Amongst my Discord friends, I mentioned at the beginning of this year that this song is okay.  But after relistening to this song with a fresh set of ears for the first time in like nine months, I was wrong.  This is flat out awful.

     

    6. “RITMO” – Black Eyed Peas & J. Balvin

     

    Let’s be honest, how many of you still remember this sleeper hit from the left in the past once again Black Eyed Peas from the already forgotten biggest domestic box office earner of 2020, Bad Boys For Life.  Can’t wait to share that little trivia tidbit years from now that the most financially successful film of 2020 was this corny cashgrab reminding us that Will Smith is getting old, man.

    Honestly the one thing I defended earlier this year and sort of still defend now is the sample of “Rhythm of the Night” by….Corona (god maybe the Black Eyed Peas return to relevance was a sign of things to come).  The one thing that will.i.am still has after all these years away from success is the knack for an insanely catchy earworm that won’t leave your fucking head.  And my god, even in 2020, he still has that going for him.  But everything else is so fucking bad.

    “Rhythm of the Night” isn’t the only song being sampled.  It also samples 2015 hit “You Know You Like It” by DJ Snake & AlunaGeorge.  I honestly don’t really have any thoughts on that song except DJ Snake used to be such a good producer.  Whatever happened to him?  Anyway, will.i.am beats the melody from that song into the fucking ground and it becomes one of the most annoying sounds from any song this year.  That thumping gets old with each passing listen.

    But of course, that’s only the cherry on top of this trainwreck.  Clearly the time away from the spotlight has not improved any of the Black Eyed Peas skills.  Because they ruined club pop music, they are now trying to ruin reggaeton with their incredibly poor Spanglish.  I’m so sorry to Pitbull’s messy translations from the early 2010’s.  Nothing will ever be as insulting as listening to will.i.am saying:

    PUTA!  I learned that shit down in Mexico!

    Congratulations.  You know basic Spanish you culture vulture.  And that’s just the beginning of the insulting amounts of using reggaeton as a clutch for success.  A lot of these lyrics are just using Spanish as a clutch to cover up the fact that this could have been mistaken for a 2010’s Black Eyed Peas song.  This isn’t progressing their career.  It’s just furthering regression.

    Oh and J. Balvin is on this too.  It’s funny that I brought up Pitbull earlier because J. Balvin has basically taken a similar career path.  Whoring out features just for an easy couple bucks.  A J. Balvin feature means absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things.  It means you are whoring out your genre just to get your name added as a featuring credit.  Was it worth whatever The Black Eyed Peas paid you to rap a line about Hakuna Matata with Timon and Pumba?  What the hell does ANY of this have to do with Bad Boys 3?!

    Are The Black Eyed Peas an overhated group?  Possibly.  But with all of these 2000’s nostalgia acts becoming things again, the last thing we needed was The Black Eyed Peas coming back with easy cash-ins when their careers died because of it in the first place.

     

    Spoiler

    5. “If The World Was Ending” – JP Saxe (featuring Julia Michaels)

     

    Talk about a song title capitalizing off the cultural zeitgeist.

    I’ll be honest.  I was actively avoiding this song for the longest time.  Mostly due to my track record with Julia Michaels and how I think she is one of the most hollow and vapid singer-songwriters working today.  Some people are not meant to make the transition to pop singers and Julia Michaels is one of them.  She is just an empty vessel where music is supposed to come from.  At least the pop singer she is most tied to Selena Gomez can manage a good song every now and then.  I don’t know of a single Julia Michaels song I would even come close to finding tolerable.  She just makes singing sound like a violent procedure.

    And yet this song is somehow even more dull and limp than I initially feared.  These two go together like hot sauce and whipped cream.  JP Saxe is just as much of a non-presence as his featured guest.  At least I could tell you that stars wanted Julia Michaels to write for them.  When five of your top eight songs on your Spotify/Apple Music are different versions of this one song….well let’s just say good luck getting that second hit.

    But the biggest disappointment of all is the producer, Finneas.  I refuse to believe Billie Eilish’s older brother produced this shit.  It sounds like coffee house piano music.  It makes his production for Selena Gomez’s “Lose You To Love Me” sound like a five star Broadway show tune.  At least that song sounds like it’s supposed to be theatrical.  For a song called “If The World Was Ending”, this sounds like a lounge act on a cruise ship.  WHERE’S THE TENSION?!  WHERE’S THE PASSION!? 

    Can the meteor come and make songs like this extinct?  Absolutely worthless song.

     

    Spoiler

     

    2020.  Once again, another huge year for Post Malone even though he didn’t even drop anything this year.  But as seasons changed, “Circles” never truly left the Top 20 due to high amounts of radio volume as Nielsen’s charting system was basically broken the entire year.  And due to such, “Circles” is one of the top ten biggest hits of all-time.  So yeah, this was technically another huge year for Post Malone. 

    As Posty’s reign of success continues into the 2020’s, it was only a matter of time until the copycats started to come out in full force.  And while not all of them were necessarily bad, it has become increasingly obvious that there is more to the Post Malone formula than I have ever given him credit for in the past.  Isn’t it funny how that works sometimes?  All it takes is one truly awful carbon copy to make you realize how much more talented the original really is.

     

    4. “Falling” – Trevor Daniel

     

    How the fuck did we let this guy chart with this song for nearly a whole year?  This guy with his warbling bitchfit about the same topic all these new guys ever manage to write about anymore?  He’s not even good at warbling.  He doesn’t even sound like he gives a shit about his heartbreak.  It just sounds like a mild inconvenience instead of absolutely devastating.  God damn.  At least Post Malone wails like it is killing him inside.  At least Juice WRLD, may he rest in peace, was expressive with his emotions and sounded like he meant every word he was saying.  Trevor Daniel just sounds bored as fuck.

    I don’t really have too much to say because Trevor Daniel doesn’t say anything new that I haven’t heard five hundred times before.  All I know is that only in this empty void of a year for actual hit singles was the only reason that this almost cracked the Top 20 of the actual year end list.  That’s the only explanation I have as to why anyone would remotely care about this nothing of a song.  Let’s move on.  I’m falling asleep.

     

    Spoiler

     

    Say what you want to about this trainwreck, but at least it manages to hold my attention.

     

     

    3. “Intentions” – Justin Bieber (featuring Quavo)

     

    It’s safe to say Justin Bieber is not worth keeping around anymore.  He adds nothing to the table except his name which still somehow means something in the year 2020, where the quality of his output is easily the worst he’s ever put out.  Yes even worse than in 2009 where Justin Bieber sucks jokes were the easiest way to get you credibility amongst your peers.

    I’d rather listen to 2009 Justin Bieber than the Justin Bieber we have now.  I’m not taking back what I said.  The Justin Bieber of 2009 at least was fun to hate.  The Justin Bieber we have now is insufferably dull.  All of his output this year was just some of most nondescript uninteresting white noise I’ve heard from a popstar in quite some time.  Justin Bieber has the personality of a wet piece of toast.

    And “Intentions” is one of the best examples in recent memory of how dull and uninteresting Justin Bieber is as a performer.  I mean my god, didn’t this guy use to be “cool”?  Or at least that’s what the vibe most people got from him?  When did he turn himself into the lead singer of Train with all of these bizarre romance metaphors?  I mean I sure as hell wouldn’t swoon at being called an asset with a heart full of equity. 

    Oh and Quavo’s here too.  Someone should have told Justin Bieber that this is 2020 and he’s three years late on the overabundance of Quavo guest features.  That being said, Quavo’s adlibs are the highlight of this song.  As in they get an unintentional laugh out of me, when I’m otherwise bored out of my fucking mind.  That’s the only thing preventing this from being number one on this worst list.  Seriously.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    I’m done.  Enough is enough.

     

    2. “Memories” – Maroon 5

     

    I’m as sick of talking about this nothing of a band, just as sick as everyone is of seeing them appear on numerous worst of the year lists year end and year out.  They bring nothing to the table.  They coast by on whatever qualifications are left on I Heart Radio’s increasingly limited standards of what classifies as hit pop music.  I’m just done talking about Maroon 5.  Just like Adam Levine is done with trying out any new ideas and has been done for nearly ten years now.

    What makes “Memories” the new worst Maroon 5 song ever?  I forget how it goes every time I hear it.  And you would think a song that uses one of the most recognizable chord structures in all of music would be more memorable?  Nope.  I couldn’t even tell you how the chorus goes without listening to it.  Something about memories bringing back you….whoever you are.  The world’s only Maroon 5 fan left I assume.

    Look this song sucks ass.  You know it sucks ass.  I know it sucks ass.  Any good memories left of Maroon 5 are long gone.  Let’s just move on, just like Adam Levine should be moving on from making music.

     

    Spoiler

    And my number one this year wraps all the way back around to the story of this god awful year.

    https://time.com/5791661/who-coronavirus-pandemic-declaration/

    As I was saying at the beginning, when I tell my children about the Coronavirus pandemic, I’ll tell them that March 11, 2020 was the day the world came to a standstill.  After all, that was the day both Tom Hanks and Rudy Gobert tested positive and most of the world realized that COVID-19 should be taken seriously.  Sport seasons suspended.  Entertainment venues shut down.  New movies and television shows all delayed.  The one form of media that didn’t shut down?  Music. 

    While some artists like Gaga delayed their albums for months, hell in Kendrick's case indefinitely, others took advantage of us being locked in our homes by pushing forward with new music.  Album bombs became more of a common occurrence.  More challenges started taking off on TikTok.  And of course, since we are still living through a deadly pandemic that has killed millions, we got charity singles.

     

     

    1. “Stuck With U” – Ariana Grande & Justin Bieber

     

     

    When it comes to all time bad charity singles, I wouldn’t even place “Stuck With U” in my top ten.  Hell, this isn’t even the worst one from this year:

     

    You’re damn right I’m sharing this one with my kids too.  Yeah Ari and Biebs aren’t nowhere near as bad as Gal Gadot and friends.  But when it comes to the most worthless songs of the year, this is absolutely at the top.  This is the safest song I’ve ever heard either of these artists have ever recorded.   A slowed down ballad from Ariana Grande?  Gasp, what a novel concept.  She sure hasn’t done that before.  Justin Bieber singing about how there is nowhere else he’d rather be than with his girl?  Gasp, two for two on original song material.

    This is exactly the type of song that you would expect from either of these artists.  You don’t even have to listen to it to immediately figure out exactly what you’re getting.  Where’s the excitement?  The impact?  This is just a quick cash grab by Scooter Braun, who knows that charity specials were going to be a big thing this year.  Just the correct amounts of evil I expected from this awful man.  And to add to your forced legacy why not get a quick and easy number one?

    Hehe, about that.  We can’t talk about this song without the controversy that came with it.

    https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/chart-beat/9380654/billboard-hot-100-number-one-calculations-6ix9ine

    Yeah, longtime enemy to the music critic community Tekashi 6ix9ine shared his disgust with Billboard’s constantly broken charting system that his comeback single “GOOBA” didn’t debut at number one but this duet did.  Despite the fact that “GOOBA” ruled streaming that charting week as well as dominating YouTube, it only debuted at number three because “Stuck With U” got a last minute sales increase on bundle deals that pushed it to number one.  Probably from Scooter himself.

    What do I think about the “controversy”?  I don’t.  Like I said, Billboard’s charts will forever be broken.  Studio executives and fan armies will always find ways to expose the flaws in Billboard’s charting systems.  Whether it be mass purchasing singles, industry payola, strategic discounts, constant remixes…and so much more.  You name it, people will find ways to get their artist(s) hits.  

    So yeah, congratulations “Stuck With U” from chart-blocking the comeback of a terrible human being who ended up using all the same tricks in the book to get his own duet with a pedophile defender to number one.  But let’s not act like this is not an awful song on its own merits:

    I’ma get to know you better
    Kinda hope we’re here forever

    ….FUCK YOU BIEBER YOU PRIVILEGED SHIT.  I WOULDN’T WISH THIS PANDEMIC ONTO EVEN MY WORST OF ENEMIES.  Worst two seconds in popular music 2020 for sure.

    People are dying and Scooter is out here profiting off of a global pandemic with a half-assed song from two of the biggest popstars on the planet.  Yeah sure the proceeds went to “charity” but the only charity that truly mattered all along was that number one spot knowing Scooter.

    This is the saddest timeline.

     

    Thoughts One Year Later: Yeah wouldn't change a thing about any of these.  At the time it was really hard to work around a glitch my blog was having where media links were not embedding, so some of the videos or photos that are in this post are different from the ones from the original, but yeah otherwise all the content is accurate.  Would I make any additional changes to rankings?  Honestly, outside of "Yummy" by Justin Bieber being another dishonorable mention because it truly is a spectacular trainwreck, I wouldn't change a single post from my top ten.  Hate all these songs.

     

    Next up, my (yikes) Top Twenty Best Hit Songs of 2020.  That one is going to be all sorts of challenging to import onto here.  But looking forward to seeing what sorts of reactions that will get for those who didn't already read it.

    • Like 2
  3. Yep.  You're reading this right.  I'm bringing this back from the dead.  For one last hurrah.  I mean after all its been ten years of these....except for last year...which you can find on my blog. cheap plug is supremely cheap...follow me

    But ever since I've distanced myself from SBC as far as I have, I always couldn't help but feel like my departure from sharing these was as abrupt as it was.  I mean I just decided to drop everything like a fly and just moved on to do my own thing.  Which has gone fairly okay-ish.  My blog may not be as active as it use to be, but I've taken on a few minor writing gigs on sites like Fiverr and have had a few interviews.  Still keeping at it despite not being as active as it was last year.  That being said, I know where I got my start and found my passion for writing through this tight knit group of friends and I would like to thank you all by finishing up what I started with the "tenth" and final anniversary of doing these lists on here for one last time.

    After all, it is the holidays and we need to spread Christmas cheer and give back to our friends and loved ones.  And I will be sticking to sharing this post on my blog like I did last year, but sharing it on here as well at the exact same time.  So whether you chose to read my blog or SBC, the decision is up to you.  But I will be sharing my 2020 lists in this thread as well to make up for some lost time on here before I get around to sharing my lists on here for 2021.

    So happy ten years and looking forward to sharing my year-end lists next month.  And looking forward to reading yours as well if you chose to do a couple yourself. :)

    • Like 1
    • Happy 2
  4. Hey I'm back for another round!

     

    Instagram Fact-Checking

     

    113. Big Fat Fact-Checker

    Film: Big Fat Liar

     

    Mythix is a compulsive liar and slacker living in the fictional city of SBC. Mythix tries to get out of his creative writing essay by making up obvious lies, but gets caught by his English teacher, Mr.Wumbo, who alerts his parents that Mythix has repeatedly shared false information and that the independent fact-checkers said the information Mythix has provided is false. He is given three hours to submit his essay or he will fail English and repeat it in summer school. Mythix uses his talent for spreading obviously fake news to write a story titled "Big Fat Fact-Checker". While riding his old bike to turn in the essay, Mythix is run over by the limousine of an arrogant Hollywood screenwriter and producer, SBL, and he convinces SBL to give him a ride. SBL is in town shooting his action comedy film Crock Blocked. During the ride, SBL admits he also tells lies and that the truth is overrated. In a rush, Mythix accidentally leaves his essay in the limo when it falls out of his backpack. SBL is inspired by the story when he reads it and decides to keep it for himself. Realizing his essay is missing, Mythix tries to explain what happened, but neither his parents nor Mr. Wumbo believe him and he is sent to summer school to repeat English.

    Mythix and his best friend, Homie, later discover SBL has plagiarized Mythix's essay into a fake news media propaganda when they see a trailer for it at the movie theater. During the long weekend, they fly to SBCinemaland while their parents are out of town, and Mythix and Homie sneak into SBL’s office at his eponymous studio to request that SBL confess to his parents, only for SBL to purposefully burn Mythix's essay and call security to remove them. Angered, they decide to inconvenience him until he confesses. SBL's former limo driver and struggling actor, Aquatic Nuggets, agrees to help Mythix and Homie get him back because of his own troubled history with him. They sabotage SBL through a number of pranks, like dying his skin yellow and hair pink, super gluing his headset to his ear, tricking him into going to JCM, in a cameo’s, birthday party, where JCM mistakes him for the hired clown and beats him up, and tampering the controls to his car, causing it to malfunction and play Tom MacDonald’s “Fake Woke”. SBL's car is also rear-ended by a cranky elderly woman, knocking it forward into a violent monster truck owned by a wrestler known as The Old Man Jenkins. Thinking SBL nearly hit him, The Old Man Jenkins destroys his car with his truck.

    SBL plans to produce Big Fat Fact-Checker with SBCinema, but Jjsthekid, the newly-appointed president of the SBCinemas, loses confidence in SBL after the critical and box office failure of his latest film Crock Blocked. Jjs declines to approve the budget for Big Fat Fact-Checker, so Mythix agrees to help SBL in exchange for his confession to his parents. With Mythix’s advice, SBL makes a successful presentation which gets the film approved by SBCinema, but SBL subsequently betrays Mythix and calls security to remove him and Homie for the second time. SBL's assistant, Cha, has grown tired of his reporting behavior and treatment of her and decides to help Mythix and Homie to expose him. They gather SBLNN's other tormented employees and devise a plan to expose him, while Mythix has his parents fly to SBCinemaland after admitting to them what he did the whole weekend.

    The next morning, SBL heads to the news network to begin filming Big Fat Fact-Checker, but his employees delay him through a number of mishaps. As SBL finally arrives, he encounters Mythix, who kidnaps his NFTs. Mythix flees across the studio, luring SBL to a rooftop where he retrieves his NFT and mocks Mythix for trying to make him confess, admitting his actions, arrogantly believing no one is listening or ever will, and proclaiming he will never tell the truth to anyone, believing the truth to be overrated. However, the entire conversation is revealed to have been caught on camera and is witnessed by Mythix's parents, the media, and Jjs, who immediately fires SBL for his actions. Mythix thanks SBL for teaching him an important lesson about the truth not being overrated. SBL insanely laughs, angrily threatens to get him back and furiously tries to attack him, but luckily, Mythix leaps off the building, and safely lands on a stunt cushion, where he finally regains his parents' trust.

    At the end of the film, SBCinema produces Big Fat Fact-Checker after SBL's firing while using the skills of people whom he had abused. The film becomes a critical and commercial success, with Mythix receiving full credit for writing his original story, pleasing his parents and Mr. Wumbo. Meanwhile, SBL declares bankruptcy and begins a new job as a birthday clown.

     

    THIS EPISODE OF SBCINEMA IS BEING DISPUTED

    REASON: FOR SPREADING LIES ABOUT SBLNN

    • God Himself 1
  5. What else can I say except thank you all for following this show for as long as we have.  Even amidst a pandemic, the SBCinema will continue to keep running.  Here's to hopefully another 100 episodes!  And with that out of the way, onto the feature presentation:

     

    100. Boomer

    Film: Joker (2019)

     

    Internet clown and aspiring QAnon conspiracy theorist, Todd Phillips lives with his mother, Jenna, in SBC City. SBC is rife with crime and unemployment, leaving swaths of the population disenfranchised and impoverished. Todd suffers from a medical disorder that causes him to rant at inappropriate times, depending on retweets and follows for medication. After a gang of spammers attacks Todd in an alley, his co-worker Ssj gives him a gun for protection. Todd pursues a relationship with his neighbor, single mother Katie, and invites her to his upcoming twitter rant routine against the liberal agenda.  Live on Twitch.

    While entertaining at a church, Todd's gun falls out of his pocket. Ssj plays devils advocate that Todd bought the gun so he can touch himself at night, and Todd is fired. On the subway, still in his internet clown makeup, Todd is beaten by three drunken Wumbo Enterprises businessmen (Fred, Steel, and Kevin) singing that Frank Sinatra classic….”Send in the Internet Clowns”; he shoots Fred and Steel in self-defense and wounds Kevin before pursuing him off the train and executing him on the stairs calling him dumb. The killings are condemned by billionaire mayoral candidate Ralph Wiggum Fan, who calls those envious of more successful people "internet clowns." Demonstrations against SBC's rich begin, with protesters donning internet clown masks in Todd's image. His controversial rant routines shut down Todd’s favorite conservative platform, Parler.

    Katie attends Todd's twitter rant routine, which goes poorly; he goes off on tirades about stolen elections and how Mike Pence is a traitor and has difficulty delivering his jokes. Todd's idol, popular talk show host, SBL News Network, mocks Todd by showing tweets from his twitter rant routine on his show. Todd intercepts a letter written by Jenna to Wiggum, alleging that he is Wiggum's illegitimate son, and berates his mother for hiding the truth. Todd goes to Wiggum Manor, where he meets Wiggum's young son JCM, in a cameo, but flees after a scuffle with the family butler Old Man Jenkworth. Following a visit from two SBC City Police Department detectives Jjs and SOF investigating Todd's involvement in the train murders, Jenna suffers a stroke and is hospitalized.

    Todd sneaks into a private viewing event presenting the first SBCinema film "User Centipede" and confronts Wiggum, who tells him that Jenna never sent him a sexy message and is not his biological mother. In denial, Todd visits Discord State Hospital and steals Jenna's case file; the file says Jenna adopted Todd as a baby and allowed her abusive boyfriend to harm them both. However, Jenna claims that Wiggum used his influence to fabricate the adoption to hide their affair. Distraught, Todd returns home and enters Katie's apartment unannounced. Frightened, Katie tells him to stop creeping; their relationship was merely a figment of Todd's imagination. The following day, Todd kills Jenna at the hospital.

    Todd is invited to appear on SBL's show due to the unexpected popularity of his routine's clips. As he prepares, Todd is visited by ex-colleagues Ssj and Zaid. Todd murders Ssj but spares Zaid for giving him a gift card to Circuit City. En route to the studio, Todd is pursued by Jjs and SOF onto a train filled with internet clown protesters. SOF accidentally shoots a protester and incites a riot, allowing Todd to escape; the rioters brutally beat Jjs and SOF as Todd leaves.

    Before the show goes live, Todd requests that SBL introduce him as Boomer, a reference to SBL's previous mockery. Todd walks out to applause, but starts telling morbid conspiracy theories, confesses to the train murders, rants about how society abandons the classic shows of the 90s, and berates SBL for mocking him on the previous segment. When SBL criticizes him and threatens to call the police, Todd shoots him twice on live television, killing him; he is arrested for murder as riots break out across SBC. One of the rioters corners the Wiggum family in an alley and murders Wiggum and his wife, Megan Thee Stallion, sparing JCM, for another cameo.  Rioters in an ambulance crash into the police car carrying Todd, freeing him; he stands atop the car, tells his followers that Trump will become president again on March 4th to the cheers of the crowd, and smears blood on his face in the form of a smile.

    On Discord, Todd laughs to himself about a joke and tells his psychiatrist Jared Leto that he would not understand it.  Jared Leto asks if it’s because we live in a society. Seconds later, Todd runs from an orderly, leaving behind a trail of bloodied footprints.  Proving Leto correct:

    spacer.png

    Directed by the guy who made The Hangover….whatever his name was….

    • Like 1
    • God Himself 4
  6. On 1/3/2021 at 11:09 PM, Katniss said:

    can we expect a tv list from Mr. Clap? ?

    Honestly I’ve been so busy in quarantine doing yard work the last few days that I completely forgot to do work on my movie lists.  But we shall see about that TV one.  It’s not out of the realm of possibility.

    On 1/4/2021 at 8:28 PM, kev said:

    kev wasn't here

    WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE!?

  7. Surprised to see not a single post about the game since it was released.  I mean after all, it’s the most talked about game of 2020 (unless we are counting Cyberpunk 2077 for all the wrong reasons).

    Love the game, although the GameCube original and arguably New Leaf are both better at this point and time.  Maybe after another year or two of updates, this will feel less like a console version of New Leaf and bring us more depth and excitement.  Because after my island became five stars, I wanted more tasks to do than what was provided.

    But I will give New Horizons the same praise many people have given it this year.  It helped keep me sane during the pandemic and provide a badly needed sense of escapism.  Hell I’m still playing it now although not nearly as much as I did in the pandemic early days.  It’s still giving me serotonin in a year where a lot of people need it.

    My squad btw (with my wife in a cameo):HCIWnG8.png 

  8. On 12/15/2020 at 8:24 PM, Chrismukkat said:

    Clappy? On the forums? It’s a Christmas miracle :Laugh:

    I’m just hanging in there tbh?

    On the forums twice in one week?  Now the world is ending. :Laugh:

    Same.  Hanging in there is a mood right now.

  9. What a finale.  I cheered.  I cried.  Hell I logged on to talk about it.  It was a roller coaster ride of emotions that still has me shaken one day later.  This is the way (yes that was intentional) to end a season leaving me wanting the next one right away.  December 2021 can’t come fast enough.

    • Like 4
  10. On 4/24/2020 at 1:20 AM, Renegade the Unicorn said:

    So I recently watched Rocky Horror again (the version of RHS they broadcast in 2015), and man I forgot how much I love it?

    Great movie

  11. As I alluded to in the worst list, 2019 was a great year.  But is it the best of the decade for film?  And that answer is….yes.

    When this year started, I wasn’t even certain that this was going to be a good year, let alone great.  But the more I stand back and look at this year as a whole, I can’t deny.  As the year went only, the content quality was consistently exceeding my expectations.  There were a lot of damn great movies this year.  This is the best film year I’ve ever covered doing these entertainment threads.  Hell it might be one of the best ever in the box office era if I think long and hard about it.  Like as good as years like 1985, 1994, 1999, 2009 to name a few of the all-time great box office years for film.

    It only made crafting this list all the more harder.  Like my honorable mentions candidates would make the best list proper in other years.  And then some of these best list choices would make it into Top 3 as well if this was 2015 or 2011, two of the weaker film years from this decade.

    What a way to end my film reviewing on this site.  In case you missed my announcement on the decade end list, I've relaunched my blog.  I'm moving on from writing on this site, for good this time.  It's been a hell of a ride and I can't thank you all enough.  Once again if you missed the link to my blog, well here you go:

    http://mediamanbobeh.blogspot.com/

    Anyway, let's prolong this even further with a larger than usual list of honorable mentions.

    Spoiler

    The Lighthouse

    A lot of my regular film fanatic sites I go constantly recommended this movie to me.  And honestly, at first glance it seemed a little too indie for its own good.  And my god did I eat my own words so fast.  This was an absolutely compelling film from start to finish.  Great acting, great imagery, great symbolism.  The ending left me thinking for days about how to interpret it.  Definite recommendation for a good movie that will leave you thinking.

     

    The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part

    Probably one of my biggest disappointments of the year since The LEGO Movie is one of my favorite animated movies of the past decade; and all we got from it was more of the same with a fuck ton of musical numbers in between.  But you know what?  This still made me smile in this dark entertainment timeline we are living in.  That being said, I wouldn’t be surprised if we got any more LEGO movies for quite some time.  After all, it is becoming quite clear that they are becoming a niche audience now with the same humor, same storytelling, same damn near everything.  Oh well, it had a respectable run while it lasted.

     

    Shazam!

    My personal favorite DC Extended Universe movie so far.  Mostly due to being a superhero version of one of my favorite 80s movies “Big”.  Glad to see Zachary Levi become relevant again.  The world needs more Chuck.

     

    Toy Story 4

    Worst Toy Story movie ever.  It was only great instead of outstanding.  My standards for this franchise have dropped.  For real though, Bunny and Ducky were involved with some of the hardest moments I’ve laughed at in any movie this year.

     

    Us

    Let this sink in.  Jordan Peele is now a box-office draw solely as a director.  Only a handful of directors can make that claim.  This wasn’t as good as Get Out, but on second viewing, I’ve grown to like this even more than I initially did. 

     

    IT: Chapter Two

    The first time watching this left a lot to be desired from my perspective.  But I rewatched this while I was on vacation, and you know what?  I liked it a lot more than I remembered.  I still think some of the twists were fairly stupid, but I still think a lot of the acting was good and Pennywise will go down as the horror icon of the 2010’s.  Not as great as the first, but still an entertaining enough movie.

     

    A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

    Tom Hanks transformation into Fred Rogers is something to really behold.  It’s as close to perfect casting as I’ve ever come across.  Even though the rest of the movie is simply good, not great; it is Tom Hanks that makes this movie great.

     

    Always Be My Maybe

    Now this was a charming little film.  Honestly, I’m glad to see that romantic comedies are coming back smarter, with a lot more effort, and have scene stealing Keanu Reeves cameos.  I also hope that this movie helped make Ali Wong a bigger star because she is talented as hell.

     

    Someone Great

    Netflix sure made some damn charming romantic comedies this year, what can I say?  Honestly I liked this one a smidge less than the former I mentioned previously because it had some fairly cringe moments at times, but the message was still fairly well delivered.  Any 20-something who has ever had a romantic life crisis can absolutely relate to the painstaking heartbreak the lead character of this movie is going through.  Also fun facts.  Taylor Swift’s “Death By a Thousand Cuts” was inspired by this movie and this movie helped make Lizzo’s “Truth Hurts” a crossover hit.

     

    The Irishman

    Fun fact.  I saw this movie at the New York Film Festival the weekend before my wedding.  This was originally one of my most anticipated movies of the year.  And for the most part, it held up to my expectations.  Scorsese is a damn good director.  These are all damn good actors.  The de-aging effects were pretty good, not great.  My only problem was the run time.  My mind definitely wandered at times because I was sitting throughout all three and a half hours.  Maybe if I saw this on Netflix and broke my viewing experience into two different shifts, this would be on the list proper.  But still a really good movie all the same.

     

    Ready Or Not

    One of two great murder mysteries from this year.  Nothing against this one in particular, I liked it an awful lot at the time.  I thought for sure it would be a lock to make my best list at the time.  But the other great murder mystery of this year was Knives Out.  I’m not even going to hide the fact that Knives Out made my best list.  Duh.  It was just all the more well-made and just fantastic all around.  Sorry.

     

    Pokémon Detective Pikachu

    Honestly the best video game adaptation of a movie that I’ve ever seen.  Is it perfect?  Hell no.  This movie has so many of the most done to death clichés that were so bluntly obvious that you could see them coming from a mile away.  But the things I loved about this movie made up for so many of the problems.  This is a film universe where I would love to just sit in and spend the rest of my life in.  I hope this leads to even more live action Pokémon movies in the future.

     

    How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World

    Someday we are going to look back and think to ourselves, man How To Train Your Dragon is the best animated trilogy of the 2000’s.  Consistently great movies.  All of them.  This was probably the weakest of the bunch, but that’s only furthering this series greatness that this one was the weakest.  It was damn good, I liked it a lot.

     

    Ford v Ferrari

    When I coined the term “awards bait movies” years ago, this was one of the prime examples of such a candidate.  Based on a true stories starring multi-time nominated character actors, who are priming for another nomination to add to their collection of them.  If I was in a more cynical state of mind, I would have probably hated this for being as such.  But look at the time we are in now, where the cultural zeitgeist is so dour and upsetting.  We honestly need more crowd pleasers like this that make you turn off your brain and get completely invested in stories like this about two guys who love what they do.  Also major props to Christian Bale for once again getting completely lost in this role.  He is seriously one of the best character actors of our time and we should appreciate him for that.

     

    John Wick Chapter 3: Parabellum

    The year of Keanu Reeves.  Seriously if you told me that Keanu would have an action trilogy that would be better than The Matrix all these years ago, I would have laughed in your face.  Well guess whose laughing now?  I am for being proven wrong.  Keep it up.

     

    Fighting With My Family

    An excellent movie about one of my favorite female wrestlers of all time.  It’s like this movie was tailor made for me.

     

    Jojo Rabbit

    Fuck the haters.  This was hilariously charming.  Everyone who has been bashing this movie clearly did not watch the rest of Taika’s filmography before he became mainstream with Thor: Ragnarock.

     

    1917

    I felt like I was watching an epic video game cut scene all in one shot.  One of the best war movies of this decade for sure.

     

    Now onto the last proper 2019 list.  We're counting down one last time!

     

    CLAPPY'S TOP TEN BEST FILMS OF 2019

     

    Spoiler

    1282349.jpeg

     

    And this film is proof of that.

     

    10. Parasite

     

    This is honestly the last film I watched before finalizing my best list.  And maybe I’ll look back and think to myself that maybe I’m underselling how great this really is.  After all, I will be the first to admit that when it comes to foreign films, I usually have to really sit down and invest myself 1000%. 

    And I’m honestly glad that I did just that because this movie is fucking insane.  The way this movie constantly escalates while switching visual tones and blending genres is wild.  All while maintaining such a perfect tone throughout.  Bong Joon-ho absolutely deserves this best director nod.  He’s been making great movies for awhile and it took me awhile to figure out why I recognized his name.  He directed one of the most criminally underrated movies of 2013 with Snowpiercer and then he directed the 2006 version of The Host….which ended up getting screwed up by Hollywood with a remake seven years later.

    And while I did really enjoy both of those movies a lot, they don’t even compare to Parasite.  Which like I said earlier was masterclass filmmaking at its finest.  I don’t think this film would have been as widely praised as it was without a director that knew what he was doing and had an absolute vision for how he wanted this to turn out.  It’s a satire of social inequality that doesn’t hold back and I love it all the same for doing so.

    All that being said, Hollywood.  Please do not do what you always do with foreign movies and remake this with an A-list cast within the next five years.  Because it will completely miss the point.

     

    Spoiler

    I mentioned on my worst list how audiences are finally speaking out against unnecessary sequels, remakes, and reboots amongst other overdone ideas at the box office.  But let’s be real here.  Studios are still going to make them.  It is a proven formula that studio executives are still going to greenlight.  Maybe a little more selectively now. 

    -I don’t think we are going to see any more Terminator movies for a really long time. 

    -And that maybe outdated properties like Angry Birds that made over $100 million domestic at the near end of its relevance shouldn’t get the sequel treatment years later. 

    -And who the fuck cares about ancient properties like Shaft and Charlie’s Angels in 2019? 

    -And not all horror movies should get sequels.  Especially if there isn’t a real demand for them.  Nearly forty years late.  But I’m glad this one happened.

     

    9. Doctor Sleep

     

    Y’all really slept on Doctor Sleep.  I mean I don’t blame you for doing so.  Warner Brothers really dropped the fucking ball with this one.  Who wants to see horror movies nearly a week after Halloween?  Why didn’t they push this to October?  A horror movie with excellent reviews in October would have made them much more money.  One of the biggest release schedule fails of the year easily.

    But yeah, this movie was fantastic.  I talked about its director Mike Flanagan on my best tv shows of the decade list and how you can tell how passionate this guy is about the horror genre.  Flanagan has made so many great horror movies this decade.  His best being a Stephen King adaptation of Gerald’s Game.  A movie I absolutely undersold on my honorable mentions list in 2017.  This Stephen King adaptation is even better.

    Another reason this one also underperformed was probably due to the studio’s not advertising this as a sequel to The Shining.  One of the best adaptations and movies ever made.  For once, I’m glad they didn’t do that.  Do you know how badly the internet would have reacted if they called this The Shining 2 or The Shining Saga: Doctor Sleep?  It would have gotten destroyed by the internet.  I’m glad it didn’t do that.  That would have been a terrible title.

    Either way, I really don’t want to reveal too much more about this movie.  It’s really one of those movies you all have to see to really believe why a sequel to The Shining was absolutely warranted.  

     

    Spoiler

    In the honorable mentions, I talked about crowd pleasers.  Well ladies and gents, let’s talk about my favorite crowd pleaser of 2019.

     

    8. The Peanut Butter Falcon

     

    Honestly, this movie was one of the best feel good movies I’ve seen in a long time.  It reminded me a lot of Mark Twain novels like Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn except about a kid with Downs syndrome.  And they could have spent the entire movie making it about the fact that this guy has Downs syndrome, but instead they make him just another guy with a lot more depth than meets the eye.

    Zack Gottsagen is a motherfucking star.  He is going to get so many more movie roles because of how excellent he was as Zak.  And not only did he act his ass off, but he also turned around the life of one Shia LaBeouf.  2019 was a career renaissance for Shia LaBeouf as he finally addressed his personal demons and turned in some of the best acting of his entire career.  Shia has been on the record that one of the ways his life got turned around was by meeting Zack Gottsagen and developing such a deep personal friendship with him.  So to everyone who thought that moment at the Academys was rude of Shia, do some actual research.  I hate cancel culture.

    But yeah, watch this movie fam.  You’ll be on the edge of your seats smiling, laughing, crying, and just feeling good after seeing this.  You won’t be sorry.

     

    Spoiler

     

    Bohemian Rhapsody sure got trashed by y’all in 2018.  A lot of it having to do with Bryan Singer being a toxic terrible person.  Y’all aren’t wrong.  Fuck that guy.  But this movie sure made a fuck ton of money.  Proving that there is a market for musical biopic’s of rock stars from yesteryear.  Who knows.  Maybe one of these days, one will be so great that it ends up on my best list….

     

    7. Rocketman

     

    Dammit Taron Egerton is bloody fantastic.  This guy is going to be one of the biggest names of the next ten years, mark my words.

    Now that I got that gushing out of the way, let’s go back to that preamble.  Bohemian Rhapsody ended up replacing Bryan Singer during production with some D-list director named Dexter Fletcher.  Now how much of the movie was helmed by Fletcher?  I couldn’t tell ya.  But based off some of the comparable visuals in the movie, maybe a couple scenes because Rocketman has a lot of artful transition sequences between musical numbers from Sir Elton John’s discography and his personal life.  And you know what?  They fucking work excellently.  Every single one of them.  So kudos where its due to Dexter Fletcher because clearly this is his style of filmmaking and it works well for him.  He could make nothing but musical biopics for the rest of his life and I wouldn’t complain if they all looked exactly like Rocketman’s.

    But most importantly, this movie was a damn near perfect biopic of one of my favorite singers of all time.  I don’t know how many of you know this about me, but I’m a pretty massive Elton John fan.  And unlike with Bohemian Rhapsody, Elton John had massive amounts of creative control over this story of his life.  Was a lot of it glamorized by Hollywood studios?  Of course, let’s not kid ourselves here.  But at least it was 100% true.  Elton John was always a theatrical performer so of course it makes sense that his story translates so seemlessly to film.

    More of this please.  Less Bohemian Rhapsody.  And maybe, just maybe musical biopics will be still standing.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    You know even with one of the best years for movies of my life time, I can still manage to dedicate an entry to one of my favorite genres, the “coming of age” high school movie.

     

    6. Booksmart

     

    And this came from Olivia Wilde of all people.  Sure as hell didn’t expect in the year 2019, but this year was chalk full of surprises.  This movie being one of them.  I’ll give all my shoutouts to Kat for finally convincing me to see this.  What the hell took me so long?  I loved every minute of it.  Weird thing being I think I loved it for different reasons than she did.

    One of the things that the critics wouldn’t stop gushing about with this movie was how fresh of a spin this movie took on the buddy comedy approach.  And I’ll be honest, they are dead wrong.  Except for one lesbian sex scene and a hilarious drug trip, absolutely nothing about this movie was nothing I’ve ever seen before.  Keep in mind, that’s not a complaint.  I like unoriginality as long as it comes from a good place and for this movie’s sake, it keeps me laughing.  Which it did both of that in spades.

    But I think the one thing that more people should praise this movie for, and is the key element that I took away from this, is about stereotyping.  This movie’s message about realizing that nobody is a stereotype was phenomenally handled.  Like even I typecasted a lot of these characters when they were first introduced, but every single one of them was not what I expected of them by the time the end credits rolled.

    This movies gets an A+ and I can’t wait to see what “coming of age” movie makes my best list next year.  Because let’s face it, we are on a roll with getting one new good one each year.

     

    Spoiler

    5. Honey Boy

     

     

    I think this goes without saying, but Shia LaBeouf is one of the most polarizing actors of our generation.  The guy is nearly the same age as me and all his drug and alcohol abuse makes him look like he’s lost ten to fifteen years of his life.  The guy has some serious demons from his personal life that has led to him going to rehab to heal himself for the sake of his mental and physical health.  And during his latest stint, he wrote this movie.

    Honey Boy is a honest, intense, and powerful look at “Otis”, a young actor who struggles to deal with his mental health due to his relationship with his abusive manager/father.  This movie is not subtle.  “Otis” is Shia.  And Shia plays the role of his own father.  Absolutely nothing is held back here and how honest this movie is about Shia’s relationship with his dad was absolutely worth streaming the moment I got a chance to. 

    But seriously, you can see why Shia became the way he was as we watched how his father treated him during his Disney childhood and the “Transformers” and “Indiana Jones” movies launching his career into a young star on the rise and how he handled it.  You will come out of this movie feeling personally sorry for how fucked up Shia’s life was.

    I seriously hope making this movie helped cleanse Shia of some of the personal demons he has been dealing with over the last ten years.  This movie made me want to root for the guy.  Hell I feel like the Academy absolutely robbed him twice for nominations for both movies.  More so for Honey Boy than The Peanut Butter Falcon.

    2019.  The year that hopefully resurrected Shia LaBeouf’s career.  It sure did for me.

     

    Spoiler

     

    It’s sad to see the Star Wars franchise in state of flux at the beginning of this new decade.  It’s really made me look back at where it all went wrong and honestly, it’s the same thing that made The Force Awakens the highest grossing movie domestically.  Fan service.  The Star Wars fanboys have been fairly vocal for quite some time now, but with Disney at the helm of the franchise, vocal fandom has taken a new low as it has lead to MANY changes for the future of the iconic franchise. 

    And the outpour of fandom toxicity became all the more apparent after The Last Jedi subverted our expectations.  A lot of die hards HATED that film so much that they started a petition to remake it.  So sad to see because honestly, The Last Jedi was the best Disney Star Wars movie out of the five we have gotten so far.  But Disney took note of the extremity of The Last Jedi’s fan reception and not only brought back JJ Abrams, but they cancelled Rian Johnson’s trilogy of Star Wars movies.  Poor Rian.  What will he go on to do now?

     

    4. Knives Out

     

    Bring back murder mysteries in a whole new light.  That’s fine by me.

    This was the sleeper hit in a year where sleeper hits couldn’t get to 100 million domestic.  I can’t believe Rian Johnson was able to do it with a genre that has gone largely on the decline over the last ten years.  Most murder mysteries end up on television now or more commonly, books.  To do what he did with a lesser budget and a great cast was amazing.

    Honestly that’s what made this phenomenal.  This cast.  I loved every performance.  I love Christopher Plummer, despite how little we got to see of him.  I love the eccentricity of Jamie Lee Curtis, Michael Shannon, and Toni Collette.  Three actors playing completely in their element perfectly.  Ana de Armas is a star that’s absolutely on the rise.  But you know who the two best performances were from?  Chris Evans playing a completely not Steve Rogers type.  This GIF will absolutely be used by me for quite some time:

    giphy.gif

    And most notably, Daniel Craig.  The moment he opened his mouth, I absolutely laughed at how bad his southern accent was.  But then it became supremely charming the more it grew on me.  And then it became a recurring joke throughout the movie how bad it was.

    I can’t wait to see More Knives are Out.  Hint hint Lionsgate for your sequel’s movie title.

     

    Spoiler

    Honestly, what’s left for there to say about this one?

    giphy.gif

     

     

    3. Avengers: Endgame

     

    I’ve talked countlessly; and I do mean countlessly, about how excellent of a sendoff this was for the first ten years of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  I wouldn’t have changed a damn thing.  Even the time traveling, which let’s be honest, we can sit here and nitpick everything this movie could have done differently since they introduced it into the film.

    Somebody I followed on Twitter made the completely accurate comparison of how this movie was like when Michael Scott left The Office.  The Office still continued, but that was the perfect finale and nothing was ever the same since.  I fully expect the Marvel Cinematic Universe to continue for another ten to twenty years.  Hell possibly until the day Kevin Feige dies.  But I’ll be hardpressed to find a more satisfying ending than that last battle against Thanos and company.  That will be the penultimate comic book moment in cinematic history.  I nerded out super hard more so than quite possibly anything I’ve ever sat through than that.

    I Love Endgame 3000.

     

    Spoiler

    As I previously announced, I’m not doing a decade end list for movies.  Since it’s basically impossible for me to do so because I don’t have a definitive best and I have an obvious worst.  But I already teased that there would be two 2019 movies in my top ten shortlist for movies that I would consider the absolute best of the 2010s.  So let’s talk about them.

     

    2. Marriage Story

     

    Clappy’s Best Picture of the Best Picture 2019 candidates.  I’ve praised this movie to death on Discord so I’ll keep this one short.  This is an acting clinic to the point that these characters feel like real people.  I would have honestly given all three nominees the best actor, actress, and supporting actress for Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson, and Laura Dern respectively.

    But the most important aspect of all this is how real this movie felt.  Watching two people who were once happily married fall out of love and go through the entire legal aspects of divorce just felt so real.  And the one, count it, ONE scene of these two arguing was an absolutely intense moment and is one of the best acting scenes captured on film in the last ten years for sure.  If the day comes that I become a film teacher or professor, I would show that scene to my students and tell them that this right here is how you act:

     

    Marriage Story is one of those movies I hope makes a lasting impression in film circles for years to come.

     

    Spoiler

    And yet, my number one completely defied every expectation I ever had for it.  It got all time robbed by the Academy in basically every category.  And if you all don’t know what it is by now then click this link:

    https://ew.com/movies/2019/12/03/adam-sandler-uncut-gems-oscars-win-bad-movie/

    To understand why I’m excited for Grown Ups 3: Fart Camp.

     

    1. Uncut Gems

     

    Simply put, this is the movie that will make me never give Adam Sandler shit ever again.  Because his acting here was transcendent.  I quite often point out that there are roles in movies where the casting was 100% perfect because you can’t picture anyone else doing this role.  Well nobody but Adam Sandler could have played the role of jeweler Howard Ratner.  He’s just so hateable to the point that he’s absolutely charming.  Only Adam Sandler can do a role this perfectly.  Even in his most detestable movies, Adam Sandler is such a charming personality that you can’t hate the guy as a person.  And even though he is obviously playing a character, this character transcends being such to the point that it makes you look beyond into him as an actor.  Dare I say it, I’ve always been an Adam Sandler fan.  Because I knew the guy could act.  He’s made a handful of legitimately damn good movies that prove as such.  But this is an all-time great performance.

    And kudos where its due.  He was able to get that performance due to some fantastic direction.  I knew nothing about The Safdie Brothers before this movie.  This movie made me check out their previous works and my god these guys have some mighty bright futures.  Watching this movie is like a constant assault onto everything I thought I knew about how crime thriller movies like this tend to go.  It felt like I was watching an action movie at times when I wouldn’t consider it that.  Not even close.  Kudos where its due to the editing and cinematography as well.

    And hell, why stop with Sandler’s performance alone?  This casting list is the polar opposite of Knives Out in regards to that being star studded and this being a list of why are they in this movie.  I mean this movie also stars Idina Menzel, Judd Hirsch, LaKeith Stanfield (who ironically was also in Knives Out) Mantis from Guardians of the Galaxy, and basketball player Kevin Garnett and The Weeknd playing themselves in bigger roles than you’d expect.  And the shocking thing about all these supporting actors and actresses are that they all do a damn good job acting. 

    But at the end of the day, this is Adam Sandler’s movie.  And I can’t stop praising his performance enough.  Fuck it.  You win Sandman.  Fitting that the guy who helped launch my interest in film critiquing on this site with my Baby Sandler rating system gets my prestigious honor of Best Film of 2019; which is also my last film list for this site.  Got to love it when things come full circle like that.

    Grown Ups 3: Fart Camp.  For your consideration for Best Picture 2020.

     

    Thank you all for reading.  I Love You 3000.

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  12. Hey so this topic is as good as any to make this announcement in.  Some of you already know what this is about from a conversation on Discord last week.  But to those of you who missed it, well here ya go.

    I've got two more lists I plan to do.  The Best Films of 2019 and The Best Hit Songs of the 2010's.  I was originally planning to do a Best/Worst Films of the 2010's list, but honestly, there is no real surprises.  I don't have a definitive best film of this decade.  I have multiple.  And if you guys want to know what the five best films of this decade are....well here ya go:

    Spoiler

    The Social Network, Whiplash, Silver Linings Playbook, Roma, and my Best Film of 2019 (to be continued lol) are all amazing films in their own right to the point that I can't really rank them.  Honorable mentions in no particular order include my second Best Film of 2019, The Avengers, Ex Machina, The Wolf of Wall Street, and Blade Runner 2049.  There you go.  An unofficially official top ten list.

    And my worst film of the decade isn't even a contest.  It's my worst film of 2019, The Haunting of Sharon Tate.  I did a damn good job explaining why its terrible there and I really don't feel like repeating myself again.  Probably one of the top three worst movies I've ever seen.  The Devil Inside (2012) is second in case anyone wanted something else to hold them over.

    But I wanted to take the time to mention that what I posted on the first page is really self-fulfilling.  You'll be seeing a lot less of me around these parts after I'm done with those last two pieces.  I mean obviously, real life priorities already make me come on a lot less these last six years or so.  But honestly the main reason I still come around here is due to the friends I still keep up with from here and my writing.  And my writing is now moving back to blog form (again):

    http://mediamanbobeh.blogspot.com/

    It's back!  I plan to update this blog again in an effort to get recognized once more from one of the publications I plan to apply to.  I mentioned to y'all once I got an interview with /Film awhile back.  And it was thanks to that blog.  I really want to follow through with my ambitions to write for a major publication so I'm going to give this a second chance with my music and movie reviews.  Already got multiple projects in the works to keep me around that blog for quite some time.  I already shared a couple updates like the obligatory welcome back post and I shared a music year end retrospective (The Worst Hit Songs of 1974).  Hell, I'm planning a few crossovers with other content creators (the obligatory Wumbo crossover is obligatory) as well kind of like I do around here.

    So don't consider this a goodbye.  Consider this as me moving on.  I've already stated that I don't believe in people "leaving forums" because you can always login.  Either way, I'm moving on from these types of year end threads since I've got a blog for that now and if you want to read those, I'll gladly appreciate it.  But I promise I'll fulfill my final two lists.  It really helped inspire me to pursue this venue again after years of wondering what ifs.  And to that, I say thank you all for reading.

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  13. Ever since I started doing these year-end threads, my personal takes on movies in general for the year have been a roller coaster ride of quality.  The odd numbered years have been mostly bad while the even number years have been mostly good.  So with that being said, how do I feel about 2019 for cinema?  It’s very complicated.

    I’m not calling it a bad year for movies.  Honestly, if you want a general take, it was a great year.  More about that when it comes to the best list.  But Cinema 2019 will not be remembered for its quality to me.  It will be remembered as the year the general public has finally spoken up.  To paraphrase one of the box office sites I go to, Boxofficeprophets.com, we as a society now have multiple formats to view movies.  We now have theaters offering us deals to pay to see unlimited movies.  More and more lesser known studios are starting to take their projects to streaming services like Netflix and Hulu instead of giving them theatrical releases.  And you know who this is affecting the most of all?  The Box Office.

    2019 box office returns were not kind to any studio not named Disney; which has adapted incredibly well to the times that its scary how much bigger they are going to get.  Multiple properties outside the Mouse House bombed in major ways.  Domestic returns on established money earners from the past underperformed.  Sequels, remakes, reboots, adaptations, etc. are no longer guaranteed to get greenlit after seeing some of the financials from this year.    The general public is finally speaking up after all these years of me pondering if they ever will want more original material.  2019 may be a year of underperformance, but I feel like this is a good thing.  It will get more studios to try new things or build something from an established property into something even bigger like Marvel Studios did with the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  Who knows what will happen from this point forward, but I think it’s about time we stopped being satisfied with the status quo.

    And with said change coming, it’s about time I change with the times too.  Original movies from streaming services are finally capable of qualifying for my year end lists.  I’ve slowly integrated them in the past if they had theatrical releases, but I think it’s about time to fully allow it to happen.  So let’s start with some dishonorable mentions:

     

    Spoiler

    Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

    I may have went in with lowered expectations, but this movie still was not good.  Say what you want about the prequels, but at least George Lucas had an idea as to how the trilogy was going to turn out long term.  This movie confirmed that Disney only made this trilogy solely to make money.  I can go on a long soliloquy about all my problems with this movie, but everything that has been said about this has been said.  I really don’t have anything original to really state. 

    This isn’t dethroning Attack of the Clones for worst movie in the Star Wars saga, but at least Attack of the Clones has distinctly memorable moments that stand out.  Anything memorable about Rise of Skywalker has already been done better in other Star Wars movies.  The final action scene which admittedly was cool at first?  It’s something this series has done four previous times.  Rey and Ben using the force to communicate with each other?  The only idea that was kept from The Last Jedi.  Lando…just Lando.  This trilogy’s sole purpose is to make its fans nerd out at seeing these familiar faces again…and dammit I did such a thing.  I’m part of the problem.

    Disney should just let Star Wars lay to rest for awhile.  I fully expect more movies in the next couple years because they want to make money.  I get it.  But if that’s the case, then Disney should at least look at what’s going on over at Disney+ because The Mandalorian is fucking phenomenal.  Take a page out of Jon Favreau’s book.  See why that is working and why their theatrical movies aren’t.  Because if they don’t fix this problem, well…..THE DEAD SPEAK. 

     

    Gemini Man

    I love Ang Lee.  I love Will Smith.  But this was just a flat out disaster.  I almost feel bad for even mentioning this when it’s guaranteed to make so many worst of the year lists already.  But that first trailer was absolutely a warning sign of what was to come.

     

    Men In Black: International

    It’s okay to completely forget that a Men In Black movie came out in 2019.  I know I sure did.  Chris Hemsworth’s track record outside of the Thor movies should seriously be put into question if it wasn’t for the fact that he is just so damn likeable.

     

    Richard Jewell

    So glad to see this overrated piece of shit barely nominated for anything at this year’s Oscars.  Most of the movie is fine.  Kathy Bates being nominated for Best Supporting Actress in this is fine, she was good.  My main problem is the controversy about this movie is absolutely justified.  Olivia Wilde’s false character portrayal of engaging in sexual activities for confidential information just absolutely rubbed me the wrong way.  With how many major names were attached to the production of this movie from Jonah Hill to Leonardo DiCaprio to the man who also directed this too, Clint Eastwood; you would think at least one of them would do some actual research to know that this all kinds of wrong.  Like I felt unclean watching this.

    Otherwise, the rest of this movie was insanely dull. 

     

    The Curse of La LLorona

    Warner Brothers “Conjuring-verse” of spin-offs from things briefly mentioned in other movies; only to set up future movies within its own movies and not focus on its own movie, is really starting to piss me off.

     

    Annabelle Comes Home

    Warner Brothers “Conjuring-verse” of spin-offs from things briefly mentioned in other movies; only to set up future movies within its own movies and not focus on its own movie, is really starting to piss me off.

     

    Countdown

    Honestly this one was destined to make it on here from the premise alone about a smartphone app that knows the exact day and time that you’re going to die.  And it still ended up sucking harder than I thought.  Come on guys.  Try harder.

     

    Frozen 2

    Doesn’t deserve to actually be on this list.  It’s a mediocre two star movie overall, but that ending was seriously one of the worst endings in any major wide release movie in years.  It’s so incredibly unearned, unwarranted, infuriating, scatterbrained, poorly thought out, stupid, terrible, idiotic, and frustrating.  Placing it on this list just for that ending alone.

     

    Murder Mystery

    Adam Sandler’s latest excuse to go on vacation might not be one of his worst movies in recent memory, but it’s absolutely infuriating all the same.  The movie didn’t even feel like it started until close to the first hour.

     

    Maleficent: Mistress of Evil

    Did anybody ask for this sequel?  What was honestly the point of this even existing?  Disney has already monopolized the market enough.  Do we really need to add unnecessary sequels to their unnecessary live action adaptations to their line-up?  I may have changed my tune about Disney’s live action adaptations this year, but at least they are worth trying to rework.  Who thought this was a good idea?

     

    Sextuplets

    Marlon Wayans is seriously one of the worst comedic actors working today.  Why is Netflix giving him a platform?  We aren’t in the 1990’s anymore.  His time in the spotlight should have ended twenty years ago and here we are.  He’s certainly made worse, but this is top five levels of bad.

     

    CLAPPY'S TOP TEN WORST FILMS OF 2019

     

    Spoiler

    I always tell myself that I have to be honest when it comes to these lists.  And why I usually hate every movie that makes these lists, I don’t really hate this one.  I kind of like it for all the wrong reasons.  But it deserves to be on here just for being flat out awful.

     

    10. Playing With Fire

     

    Seriously watch the trailer if you haven’t before.  This is a family comedy that came straight out of the 2000s.  A decade that was chalk full of these nostalgically terrible movies about tough guys who come across kids that turn them into big ole softies.  See most of The Rock and Vin Diesel’s family comedies from the 2000s as a prime example of this kind of movie.  Why not try this again since John Cena is basically taking the exact same road to stardom that The Rock did.  Although, let’s be real here.  John Cena is not The Rock.  He’ll be lucky if he becomes half the box office draw The Rock is.

    But yeah, this movie is reminiscent of all those nostalgically terrible movies of yesteryear.  It has all the same problems that those did to the point that it is honestly embarrassing watching these talented actors make absolute dumbasses of themselves.  Like this is easily the most embarrassing thing John Leguizamo has done since The Pest.  Key from Key & Peele really needs to fire his agent or at least switch to Jordan Peele’s because he keeps making the most baffling of film choices when his best friend isn’t involved.  One of the kids is Negasonic Teenage Warrhead from the Deadpool movies.  It’s really hard to not associate her from that role in this movie.  And then there is John Cena, the living meme himself.  At one point the movie focuses heavily on John Cena’s nipples.  Yep that is a scene I just spoiled.  And he falls in love with a scientist in the most baffling way that I really don’t want to spoil.

    In a weird way, I respect how off the walls levels of bad this movie is.  It definitely made me reminisce of a time where these movies made inexplicable amounts of money at the box office.  But this definitely deserves to be called one of the worst movies of this year.  I do think John Cena has potential to be taken seriously as an actor.  I’ve followed this guy’s career for many years being the wrestling fan that I am.  He can succeed.  But he really needs to be smarter picking out his projects.  The man who use to make poop jokes in his wrestling promos really needs to stop picking movies where he poops in a forest while staring directly at this child who doesn’t want to leave his side…seriously what was this movie.

     

    Spoiler

    9. Escape Room

     

    Fun fact:  Did you know Sony was planning to use this movie to make an Escape Room cinematic universe?

    More importantly:  Did anyone ask for an Escape Room cinematic universe?

    And most important of all:  This film is so bad that I had to rewatch it to remember how awful it was.  Seriously, absolutely god awful writing and acting all around.  And coming from someone who absolutely loves to do escape rooms for fun, this was painful to sit through and solve why anyone thought this was a good idea.

    You solve the puzzle.  This film sucks and isn't even worth mentioning it.

     

    Spoiler

    2019.  The year of…Keanu Reeves?

    https://www.cnet.com/news/toy-story-4-star-keanu-reeves-owns-2019-and-its-an-excellent-adventure/

    Of all the stars out there to have a career year, I did not anticipate Keanu Freaking Reeves.  I remember fifteen years ago when people were bashing this man relentlessly.  Myself included…I joke about my hatred of Keanu Reeves though.  I don’t hate him.  I never did.  If anything, I thought his movies were Nicolas Cage levels of quality if that makes any sense.  Just so absurdly dumb and his acting being hilariously emotionless.

    But the back half of the 2010s have been incredibly kind to Keanu.  With the John Wick movies reviving his career.  Followed shortly by scene stealing star turns in many movies these last couple years including Toy Story 4, The Neon Demon, Always Be My Maybe, and many more.  Also helping his cause is more public information coming out about how swell of a guy he is in a world where more and more male celebrities are being exposed as scum.

    I guess in that light, I sort of get the appeal of Keanu Reeves in 2019.  But even in a career year, Keanu can still manage to pick out a bad project to star in.

     

    8. Replicas

     

    How many of you remembered this coming out?  It opened in the month were studio’s purposely dump out their turd films, quickly bombed, and ended up being just a blimp in the year of Keanu.

    And that’s what this movie is.  I already forgot about it.  I watched it again to remember it.  And guess what?  I forgot about it once again.  I’m not sitting through this plot hole filled movie once more to try and remind myself exactly what happened. 

    All you guys need to know it is a bad sci-fi movie about a scientist who brings his family back to life after they died in a car accident.  And every movie cliché about the ethics of cloning and how they aren’t the same as they were before they died applies here too.  Nothing else really matters.  The acting was bad, even for Keanu.  The writing clearly was first draft because there are so many plot holes that don’t get resolved. 

    But who the hell cares.  This won’t be a high or a low point on Keanu’s film resume.  Nobody will remember it.  I sure as hell don’t and I sat through it twice.

     

    Spoiler

    Might as well post these next two together.  Because it epitomizes a trend that I’m officially done with.  All it had to take was two movies to kill my spirit.

     

    7. Aladdin (2019)

     

    6. The Lion King (2019)

     

    You guys were right this whole time.  Disney’s live action remakes of their animated properties have officially gotten lazy.  They are just simple cash grabs.  Removing the heart and soul from movies that I loved growing up.  And by doing so, completely pissing me off in the process.

    Let’s start with Aladdin.  Where it proved that Disney has so much confidence that these live action remakes will make a profit that they can place PTA stage performers as some of their main characters.  Before the movie was released, all the memes were directed at Will Smith’s Genie.  And rightfully so.  But little did I expect that Will Smith was the best part of this movie.  Every time he appeared on screen, the movie came to life.  Whenever he wasn’t there, it felt like I was watching an elementary school play.  Everyone else was that wooden and one dimensional.  A lot of people praised Naomi Scott’s Jasmine…and I guess she was probably the second best of the bunch.  But that’s like adding a garnish to a pack of Lunchables.  It’s still going to be bland as fuck.  After sitting through this and sharing my thoughts earlier in the year, I thought for sure that Disney wasn’t going to churn out something this grade school levels of garbage.

    I wished I was wrong.  Because then Disney awoken something in me.  They outright didn’t try with one of the biggest properties in their backlog of animated classics.  One of my all-time favorite movies got turned into a soulless, effortless, bland pile of rotting gazelle carcass.  This movie betrayed everything positive I said about the same team I praised for The Jungle Book (2016) not sucking.  This right here was what I feared that former movie was going to be.  Everything about this infuriated me.  From the unexpressive faces of the photorealistic animals to the heavy amounts of rehashing line for line to lacking a heart, period.  And with how much I criticized Aladdin’s cast, at least 95% of that cast were basically unknowns.  Disney touted for a whole year who they got to voice act for this Lion King.  And outside of Billy Eichner and Seth Rogen doing Timon and Pumba, not a single person stood out.  I love Donald Glover, but anyone could have done Simba.  Beyonce was absolutely replaceable as Nala.  Chiwetel Ejiofor’s talents are totally wasted as Scar, and the stunt casting of having James Earl Jones return as Mufasa just shows that he is tired of it all just as much as we are.

    If any year is a sign of how much Disney is going to commit to this live action trend, it was this year.  We got five of them this year.  Talk about overexposure.  Maybe this will lead to the crowds getting tired of this shit just like I did.  My defense of this trend was that Disney at least tried something different instead of remaking them scene for scene.  And that’s why Dumbo, Maleficent 2, and the Disney+ exclusive Lady and the Tramp avoided the harsh criticisms I had with the other two.  Maybe if we get more of that in the future, this trend won’t burn out?  We shall see.  All I know is that this trend can go away any day now.

     

    Spoiler

    Hehe oh god.  I completely forgot that this came out this year.

     

    5. Hellboy (2019)

     

    Yes, let’s reminisce the already forgotten Hellboy reboot from the unfortunate depths of hell this idea came from.  If there was ever a perfect example to highlight how done the general public was of unnecessary reboots/remakes in 2019, it was this.  If anything, the general public was asking for a third Hellboy from Guillermo Del Toro since there were still loose ends left to tie up after 2008’s The Golden Army.  But due to disputes between Del Toro and the powers that may be, Universal sold off the spawn from hell to Lionsgate, who instead wanted to reboot the character completely because of a certain other hard R-rated, fourth-wall breaking, red anti-hero:

     

     

    It’s hard to ignore the foul-mouthed mutant in the room so let’s just say it now.  Lionsgate wanted their own Deadpool with this new Hellboy.  Except what they forgot was good screenwriting, good directing, and good CGI…dear god they forgot the good CGI.  It’s been over ten years between Hellboy movies and somehow the 2019 Hellboy looks like flaming hot garbage.  Ron Perlman’s Hellboy looks ten times more realistic than David Harbour does.  Speaking of David Harbour, he’s the only redeemable part of this movie and what saves it from being any lower.  He is at least trying to make this good.  Can’t say the same for anyone else.  Let’s just leave this shit burn on the front door steps of hell and hope everyone else has forgotten about this experiment gone wrong this time next year.

     

    Spoiler

    And we can’t talk about mutants and experiments gone wrong without the film that killed the Fox X-Men movies once and for all.

     

    4. Dark Phoenix

     

    Honestly, is it the third worst movie of the year?  Probably not.  If we are talking about straight up quality, it probably doesn’t deserve to be this high.  But I can’t think of a single movie that represents how uninspired, lazy, devoid of anything worthwhile than what the X-Men franchise has become.  It’s been twenty years of this franchise just existing.  Not all of the movies are bad mind you.  I liked X-2, Logan, Deadpool, and to a much lesser extent Days of Future Past perfectly fine.  What I’m saying is the franchise was becoming stagnant.  The stakes just weren’t there anymore.  And it seemed like Fox had no clue what to do with these characters anymore.

    With that last sentence in mind, why not redo the Dark Phoenix storyline after they infamously botched it the first time around; said some studio hack at Fox?  I’ll tell you why.  Because it just goes to show that even the studio hacks don’t have any sense of originality.  And that’s what pisses me off most about Dark Phoenix.  Nobody seemingly gave a shit while making this.  And it unsurprisingly ended up being the worst X-Men movie of all time.  Yeah.  I went there.  Worse than Origins: Wolverine.  Worse than The Last Stand.  At least those movies fucking tried to tell a cohesive story.  This movie is literally all over the place.  How can you possibly fuck that up when Simon Kinberg not only wrote, but directed this?  Didn’t he learn his lesson after he failed the first time thirteen years ago with The Last Stand?  Apparently not.

    Seriously, there is nothing to recommend about this movie.  The characters motivations are rehashed as fuck to completely awful (Xavier is made out to be a huge dick).  The CGI is dogshit.  The action scenes are unremarkable.  The acting is atrocious outside of maybe Fassbender as Magneto.  I hated every single fucking minute of this movie.  Maybe the guys at Fox didn’t give a shit anymore since Disney was in the process of finalizing their deal to buy the studio.  But this was not the way to send out one of your biggest properties remaining.  I hope Disney doesn’t touch the X-Men franchise for a very long time before they end up being integrated into the MCU to the surprise of no one.  Because this is a property that badly needs a sense of purpose again. 

     

    Spoiler

    Any other year, this would be a runaway winner for worst of the year.

     

    3. Cats

     

    Do I honestly need to give this the full treatment?  You all saw the trailers for this.  You all saw the extreme levels of negative reaction online.  You all know how big of a CGI trainwreck this movie is.  It’s exactly as bad as the trailers made it out to be.  And yet still worse because the trailers didn’t give away that everyone involved in the creative process had no idea how to make a full hour and thirty minute long movie out of this.

    If I had anything positive I got out of this is that the choreography is pretty good.  The trailers kept mentioning that it involved the team who did the choreography for Hamilton and I can tell.  It feels like I’m watching a Broadway show choreography wise.

    And that’s it.  That’s the only thing remotely positive I can say.  Because more than 50% of the problems with this movie…well…

    LOOK AT IT!

    5dd418f7695b58052a542ebc?width=777&forma


    LOOK AT IT!

    ae8e561e380abdf9cd51fca093467f3b4ee52162

    I WANT ALL OF YOU TO LOOK AT IT!

    JasonDerulo.jpg?resize=900,600&w=450

     

    ANYONE WHO THOUGHT THESE HUMAN/CAT CGI HYBRIDS WOULD BE A GREAT IDEA NEED TO BE STUIDED BECAUSE THESE ABORTED ABOMINATIONS ARE FUCKING HIDEOUS.

     

    And the other 50 or so percent goes to Tom Hooper.  Who clearly hates me with his awful awards bait movies.  I hated The King’s Speech.  I hated Les Miserables.  And Cats is far and away his worst movie.  He has no idea what to do with this adaptation.  So let’s just have this A-list cast move around like actual cats with added motion capture.  Do musical numbers (not everyone can sing).  Act horny (I’m surprised we didn’t get a cat orgy scene with how many times this movie made me go what the fuck).  And just do shit without any real sense of direction.

    Cats flat out sucks.  I know it sucks.  You know it sucks without even having to watch it.  But god bless, the internet collectively shitting on this was such a sight to see.  I can fully see this getting a cult following in the years to come due to its legendary stature of awful.  That being said, this is cat shit.

     

    Spoiler

    I’ll give Cats this.  At least it’s going to be remembered for being distinctly bad.

     

    2. The Goldfinch

     

    I don’t think a single soul even remembered this movie coming out a few months ago.  That’s the thing about this year.  Audiences were pickier than ever before about how to spend their hard earned money and what movies to support with it.  So there had to be something distinct to pull this in.

    With that said, there was not a single distinctly memorable about this movie.  It’s a three hour utter bore.  I get that we are always going to get film adaptations based on novels.  That has been a proven formula for almost one hundred years now.  The Goldfinch is an example that not every book has to have a movie based on it.  And I’ve never read The Goldfinch, but just sitting here watching this movie, I immediately knew it was based off a book I have zero plans to read now because of this awful bore. 

    How could I tell that this was a book?  Because there is so much filler that could have been cut from this movie, so I immediately knew it was writers struggling to figure out what to leave in and what to leave out.  And you’ll never guess who the sole screenwriter was for this movie?  The guy who wrote 2017’s worst list entry The Snowman.  After all the backlash that movie got from cutting too much, this movie suffered for not cutting enough.

    This should have been so much better.  The cast is talented (Ansel Elgort, Nicole Kidman, Jeffrey Wright, Sarah Paulson, Finn Wolfhard).  The director made one of my favorite movies of 2015 (John Crowley).  But at the end of the day, I never wanted a movie to not exist for being so flavorless as I did with this.

     

    Spoiler

    Was it ever going to be anything else?

     

    1. The Haunting of Sharon Tate

     

    Honestly, no.  But deep down, I had a paranoia that we were going to get something worse than this.  My fiancé assured me that we wouldn’t, but this year surprised me plenty of times throughout that I questioned such a thing really happening.  Because months later, I can in fact state this with the upmost confidence.  The Haunting of Sharon Tate is one of the worst movies I have ever seen.  It’s definitely the worst movie I have ever placed at number one on these year-end entertainment lists.  Yep, worse than Fan4stic.  Worse than Norm of the North.  Worse than The Devil Inside.  You can pull up any of my other eight year-end threads on here and I’ll say this one is the worst of them all.

    And that’s really saying something from a guy who use to have a thread dedicated to reviewing bad movies.  I’ve sat through tons and tons and tons of shitty movies throughout my life.  The Haunting of Sharon Tate is one of those rare times I’ve come out of a viewing experience just feeling unclean and feeling what I sat through as absolutely tasteless.  This movie is that bad.

    What is this movie that changed Clappy’s perspective on what defines a movie being that bad?  Why didn’t I see it in theaters?  It wasn’t a major release.  It was one of those limited city viewings and I honestly don’t have any idea what it’s true theater count was.  Hell, I found this one online and didn’t see it until three months after it came out.  I knew the word of mouth going in was flat out terrible.  But god, I did not expect what came of it.

    For starters, all the problems come down to the writer, director, producer: Daniel Farrands.  Yes the acting is bad too, no wonder Hillary Duff is going back to Disney after this mistake.  But I feel like the acting has a lot to do with Farrands awful script.  This writing isn’t even first draft.  It feels like it was improvised on the fly.  It was that incompetent.  The directing is obnoxious.  A lot of shaky cam, unfocused shots, and then a mixing of real life footage of Sharon Tate interviews that just made the movie feel all the more tasteless.  And speaking of tasteless, let’s talk about the concept of this movie for a minute.  It’s a supernatural horror movie of the true life event of Sharon Tate and her friends getting murdered by the Manson Family.  Sharon Tate starts to get premonitions and subliminal message of these events happening that absolutely terrify her.  Some of the decisions made throughout this movie are beyond bad taste.  They are offensively exploitative to a point that I didn’t even know was possible.  And there is a twist ending that is just borderline repulsive. 

    I…I just can’t acknowledge this movie anymore without making the skin under my skin crawl.  This movie is a career killer.  Like I said, Hillary Duff ran back to Disney probably for many reasons.  This might be one of them.  Daniel Farrands seems to fetishize supernatural horror on real life events. 

     

    His movie out now is along the same lines with the next real life event he tackles being Nicole Brown Simpson’s murder.  I don’t know if it churned out less of a profit than this one did, but I hope so.  I…I’m done.  Fuck everything this movie represents.  Go see Once Upon a Time….in Hollywood.  Where Sharon Tate’s murder gets treated with the actual class and respect it deserved.  Not for shock value and exploitation.

     

    Thank you all for reading.  Best films list coming next month.  As well as the decade list.  I sure am doing a lot of writing.

    • Like 6
  14. I think most of the revivals were due to feeling reinvigorated by Total Drama again.  Only to lose interest in them when I realized how much work I'd put in to each and every pilot to make it excellent.  But thank you so much for remembering the good ole days of Spin-off Action.  Determined to someday find the old stuff on the tv.com archives and share them again.  Someday.

    Happy 10 years man!  So proud of you for everything that you do for this site.  Love ya man.

    • Thanks 1
  15. Let me keep this short and sweet.  WE ARE LIVING IN A TELEVISION RENAISSANCE!

    What a time it is to be alive for new and exciting ways to reinvent how we view television.  From streaming our shows to binge-watching a series in a matter of hours thanks to streaming, we are definitely living in the best timeline to watch television in ways we couldn’t have imagined twenty years ago.

    And honestly, that’s why it was that much harder to write this best list.  Because I had to make so many painful cuts and I had to keep watching more 2010s shows so I didn’t miss anything else.  And I’ll be honest, I probably missed a lot of stuff that you guys are going to point out in the comments and replies.  So I’ll save you all the trouble and put it on my constantly growing watch list when I have the time to keep watching more and more shows.

    So with that being said, here is what this tasteless idiot thinks are:

     

    CLAPPY’S TOP TWENTY BEST SHOWS OF THE 2010'S

     

    Spoiler

    On a personal level, this should probably be a lot higher than it actually is due to it being one of my all-time favorite shows.  But in terms of how it was in the 2010s, quality was absolutely a mixed bag.  But I can’t not place this on my best of the decade list for one reason.  It was always a major priority to watch each week.  And it still has that to this day.  It’s still doing something right.

    20. South Park (Comedy Central)

    No show lovingly frustrates me as much as this one does.  When it’s great, it’s amazing.  When it’s good, it’s great.  When it’s okay, it’s still good.  Hell, even at its most grating, it’s still bad enough to intrigue me what the hell they were possibly thinking more so than outright infuriate me.

    Most of this past decade revolved around continuity.  Which is something South Park has never fully committed to before outside of rare occasions like anniversary specials or the random callback here or there.  And while I had a problem with how they wrapped everything up quite often most seasons, it goes to show that Matt and Trey were willing to try something new with an over twenty year old property.  Even with how mostly boring this new season was, it still intrigued the hell out of me with all the new intro titles, plots, and focusing on different characters (the best episode of the season was about Scott Freaking Malkinson of all people).

    I once named South Park my all-time favorite show.  And it still is one of them with how lackluster it’s been as of late.  Because even with all the things I wish would change, at least it still manages to hold my attention.  It’s still doing something right.

     

    Spoiler

    Look there was another reason that I waited until the year was officially over before I got this list out.  Because there was one show in particular that got released two months before the year ended that made me eat tons of crow.  And it is low on this list just because it’s only eight episodes.  But good lord does it have all the potential in the world to be something special.

    19. The Mandalorian (Disney+)

    After one season, I’m 1000000% on board with what they are going for here.  It reminds me a lot of what I fell in love with the Star Wars property in the first place.  Not a lot of talking and great action sequences.  This is the sort of space western that makes the core Star Wars movies look like they’ve forgotten their roots a bit.  Well maybe The Mandalorian can help on that front because I haven’t seen a Star Wars property this universally beloved since the animated Clone Wars series.

    But yeah, this is the sort of show that is clouded in mystery for all the right reasons.  Even after eight episodes, there are still so many questions that thankfully have not been answered yet.  Because Mando is a man of mystery.  He speaks so little.  His backstory isn’t fully established yet.  All we know is that he follows his code and always wants to do the right thing.  I love that they are taking the slow burn approach with this character because everything about him is cool.  His personality.  His gear.  His weapons.  Don’t rush giving him a full character yet.  We are at the exact right point of what we should know about this character with much more room to grow in Season 2.

    And of course, we can’t talk about this show without the other main character.  The Child that has spawned so many memes:

    twitter-in-stream-wide-babyyoda1.jpg

    He’s adorable, yes.  But just like his now appointed guardian, he is also mysterious.  Is he a descendant of Yoda or just another of the same species?  How did he get to where he is?  Is there more of him?  And just like with Mando, we are at the exact right point of what we should know about this character with much more room to grow in Season 2.

    This show has all the potential to be something truly special.  And I’m ecstatic to see where this show goes from here.  I placed it over a shit ton of other series that have so many more episodes.  But I’m ranking it this high because of two reasons.  One, I’m that large of a Star Wars nerd and the best Star Wars property in years gets you really far on my list.  Two, because I believe that much in what this show is capable of becoming.

     

    Spoiler

    I’m just going to put this out there early, but if there is going to be a television genre that will be underrepresented from this list, it will be dramas.

    Sorry guys, it’s absolutely a “me” thing.  I just can’t sit through dramas as well as others.  They mostly bore me.  I can sit through movie dramas perfectly fine.  Television shows, I mostly can’t.  What is usually thirty minutes to one hour television dramas, feel like they last forever.  I don’t know why.  Probably because I mostly watch television to laugh.  So for a drama to really rope me in, you’ve got to go the extra mile and just fully invest me.  And this show absolutely did that to me in record time:

    18. American Crime Story (FX)

    Not going to lie.  This show is only this high for one season and one season only.  The OJ Simpson season.  This is the best adaptation of this news story that I’ve ever seen.  And we lived in a decade where this infamous story got revisited.  A lot.  A LOT.

    For starters, they got the casting down perfectly.  Cuba Gooding Jr. was damn near perfect as OJ.  They also had John Travolta as Robert Shapiro, David Schwimmer as Robert Kardashian, Selma Blair as Kris Jenner…and I could go on about the absurd casting group they had for this movie.  But the most absurd part is that I can’t picture anyone else playing these parts because they fit in so seamlessly.

    There was another season about the murder of Gianni Versace with another absurd cast list with Darren Criss, Penelope Cruz, and Ricky Martin of all people.  Honestly, it is good.  Not as great as the first season, but that’s mostly due to the OJ Simpson story being one of the biggest crime stories of my life time.  Still super fascinating how he got away with it twenty five years later.

     

    Spoiler

    17. The Haunting of Hill House (Netflix)

    This is another show that is only so low on this list because it only has one season to its name.  Granted that season was almost two years ago and I have no idea why it is taking so long to get to season two.  But The Haunting of Hill House is so phenomenal that it deserves to be on here.  Hell, I’ve rewatched it multiple times since then and I only keep on catching things I missed the first time around that impress me.

    This comes from Mike Flanagan, who has made some of the best horror movies of the 2010s.  Flanagan is quickly becoming a name of quality to me because he is clearly a fan of the horror genre and wants to keep making quality horror movies, shows, etc.  And I’m all for that because horror as a genre is underappreciated since most of the time, it can come off as quite gimmicky.  But if there is one thing that makes Flanagan’s brand of horror stand out is fully developed characters.  You get quite attached to these characters that you start to feel like you are in their shoes.  The line between television and reality gets fairly blurred.

    One thing that I’m going to give this series a ton of credit for is unforgettable imagery.  I’m not going to spoil too many of the scares here, but Jesus.  They stuck with me.  Even when I was trying to sleep after each binge.  Also, another thing that I love?  How each family member represents the five stages of grief.  Not going to spoil why, WATCH IT.                                                                                                                                                                                          

    Apparently Season 2 is going to be about Bly House.  And I’m hyped for that.  But for now?  This is the best adaptation of The Haunting ever.  Yes, better than the 60s classic and the terrible 90s remake.

     

    Spoiler

    Every decade needs its group hangout sitcom.  The 90s had Friends.  The 2000s had How I Met Your Mother.  And the 2010s had, for better or worse, New Girl.

    16. New Girl (Fox)

    New Girl is such an absolutely frustrating show that I absolutely loved to pieces.  Just like I mentioned with South Park, this show had its highs and its lows in the 2010s.  When it was low, good lord was it insufferable.  It played out like a bad romantic comedy levels of cringe.  And this show should have not had a shortened seventh season.  It didn’t deserve one.  Not even with the time hop.  Because more often than not, it just dragged through everything we knew was going to happen.

    But even at this show’s absolute low points, there was one thing this show had going for it that I absolutely loved more so than anything else.  Great chemistry from the main cast.  Everybody played off each other so well.  I can’t think of a single pairing that did not work.  And the one that did not work in the shows early stages (Winston and Cece), ended up being my favorite comedic pairing by the time the series ended.  Seriously, Season 6 onward.  It made me want to see these two get a spin-off, even though they were happily married to other people.

    As for those high points, Season 1 was phenomenal.  The back half of Season 3 wiped off the stench of Season 2 and the first half of Season 3.  Season 4 recaptured what made me fell in love with Season 1.  Season 5 continued that by bringing back a lot of what I didn’t like with Season 2 and basically redoing it right this time.  And Season 6 was what should have been the final season.

    New Girl was a very frustrating show to follow, but I have no regrets doing so.  If there is any show that is going to get some sort of nostalgic following the way a lot of these group hangout sitcoms did in hindsight, it would not surprise me the slightest if it was New Girl.  And I’m all for it.

     

    Spoiler

    I think you all know where this next one is going based off this preamble, but I will always and I mean always, watch anything based off one of my favorite sports.  WRASSLIN’

    15. GLOW (Netflix)

    Hell yeah.  A show about the famous 1980s promotion the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling.  Count me in….was my first thoughts before binge watching the first season.  But little did I know I was going to be super invested in the true backstory of these characters.  This show is incredibly smart about the reasons why these women inflict pain onto each other.  And that’s what kept me invested in this series with each passing season.  The complexity of its characters. 

    The core of its series is the power of friendship.  I say that because the main relationship of this series is the friendship of Ruth and Debbie, which has been fractured by betrayal and diverging ambitions.  It’s an incredibly complex friendship because these women always tease if they will ever become normal again or not and I like that because it does a great job at displaying both sides reasons for why they should and shouldn’t.

    GLOW ends next year and I’ll badly miss it.  It’s a sharp series that not only delivers wrestling in its cheesy gloriousness, but smart characters that constantly grow with each passing season.

     

    Spoiler

    And you know what else I’ll watch anything off of?  A show with an opening theme by The Cranberries.

     

    14. Derry Girls (Netflix)

    That was literally what suckered me into watching this show.  I heard “Dreams” playing and I ran into the room to watch this with my wife.  Little did I know I would be completely invested in this show about a group of female friends (with one guy tied into this group without any real say).  I will say, watch this show with the captions on.  These actors/actresses have thick Irish accents and they talk so fast that it’s tough to keep up with at times.

    Not a complaint though.  Because the humor comes at you and at you fast.  Same goes with the plot points.  The situations the Derry Girls get themselves into are absolutely ridiculous that you just have to roll with it all and laugh hysterically.  I’m not going to spoil all of them here because you all really should watch this show, but let me just say that the pilot starts with them being accused of killing one of their teachers in such an over the top fashion that I laughed so hard.

    Leave it to Ireland to knock the piss out of everything.  Because back in the 90s, where this takes place. Northern Ireland in particular was going through heavy political turmoil.  Well that honestly plays like background fodder here as it’s the least of the shows worries.  They want you to remember the gloriousness that is 90s nostalgia.  And I’ve been waiting for a show to truly capitalize on the 90s nostalgia boom and not suck.  Well Derry Girls is that show.

     

    Spoiler

    Nearly halfway through this list and you guys notice what has been underrepresented so far?  Cartoons.

    You guys do now I’m Old Man Clappy for a reason.  I don’t keep up with a lot of the cartoons you all are watching now.  Well I’m giving you a heads up now.  There are only three non TV/MA cartoons that made my list.  And I did have to make a few painful cuts on my end.  But let me point out the obvious and say that just because it’s a cartoon, doesn’t mean it’s a show specifically for kids.  Exhibit A.

    13. Regular Show (Cartoon Network)

    I miss this show already.  It feels like just yesterday this debuted around the same time as Adventure Time.  Who would have thought that both shows would end up leading CN back to an animated revival of sorts.  And while I do like Adventure Time, I was just not able to get fully invested into keeping up with it.  Definitely understand why it caught on the way it did.

    But Regular Show, I did not initially expect to be so universally loved.  It had such an absurd sense of humor.  It had the most out of left field pop culture references.  It’s animation style was a tad dated initially.

    What brought it in for me, alongside a lot of you, is that was completely unique and anything but regular.  The main cast is not what one would consider a regular cast.  Our two leads are total slackers.  Which as someone who use to be such a huge slacker, yeah I can vibe with Mordecai and Rigby.  And then the show became more and more openly irregular.  To the point that there were continuous storylines instead of ridiculously obscure one offs.  Hell the last season took completely in space.

    Regular Show was such a fascinating show to keep track of.  Hell I cried during the series finale.  Something I can only say for less than a handful of finales on this list.  It caught me offguard.  And that’s honestly something I can say for the show in general.  It catches you offguard when you least expect it to.

     

    Spoiler

    Exhibit B.  Taking something old and making it feel vintage and new.

    12. DuckTales (2017) (Disney)

    Yeah I know we are only two seasons in, but this is how much Disney has appeased me with the handling of one of my favorite 90s properties of theirs.  They somehow took something great and made it even better.

    And how did they do that?  First of all, clever writing.  There are so many Disney in-jokes that it constantly keeps cracking me up.  Second, they gave Huey, Dewey, and Louie separate distinct personalities.  Do you know how long I’ve been waiting for Disney to make these three distinct instead of just grouping them all into one entity?  For far too long.  Third, by stacking this cast with incredibly talented voice actors.  This is a who’s who of underrated voice actors starting with Doctor Who himself, David Tennant.  Alongside Ben Schwartz, Danny Pudi, Bobby Moynihan, and Kate Micucci to name a few.

    I love how much effort Disney put forth into making this show stand out.  It’s super ambitious.  Hell, Della Duck, Donald’s sister, finally appeared on the show this past season.  That’s another first that I absolutely did not expect before tuning in.  I can’t wait to see where this series goes from here forward.  DuckTales.  WOO FUCKING HOO!

     

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    11. Key and Peele (Comedy Central)

    It’s so funny to see people talking about these guys like “I knew them before they were famous.”  And to that I say, please.  I doubt half of the people who talk about these guys being superstars now actually watched their sketch show from back at the start of the decade.  Key and Peele to the 2010s was what Chappelle’s Show was to the 2000s.  Except Key and Peele’s careers continued to take off afterwards while Dave Chappelle was perfectly fine sitting back from the limelight.

    Since there really isn’t much to talk about with it being a sketch show, I’ll just name my top ten favorite sketches before moving onto the next show.

    10. Gremlins 2 Brainstorm

    9. I Said Bitch

    8. East/West College Bowl

    7. Ray Parker Jr.’s Other Hits

    6. Video Game Sensors

    5. Insult Comic

    4. Pizza Order

    3. Flicker

    2. Obama Meet & Greet

    1. Substitute Teacher

     

    Spoiler

    As most of you can tell by now officially halfway through this list, I have a thing for comedies.  What can I say?  I’m an absolute fan of this genre.  Especially in the back half of the decade when movie comedies are basically on the decline.  So I started tuning in to television comedies more and more.  And I found this show on the most obscure of channels, only to eventually find it on streaming too.  Thanks Canada!

    10. Schitt’s Creek (Pop TV/Netflix)

    What a great find this turned out to be.  I originally found out about this show on Netflix in 2015 during my period of unemployment.  One of the lowest points of my life where I needed good laughs.  And this show provided plethora of laughter.  I fell out of this show for a few years afterwards, but found it again about two years ago and this show is A LOT better rewatching it the second time.  Where the characters kept feeling more and more developed while finding the same amount of high laughter.

    And while I like practically all the main cast of characters, you know who the two stand outs are?  Eugene Levy’s son, Dan Levy is fucking priceless.  I always had such a high appreciation for his character David.  But his comedic timing kept getting more and more perfect each passing season and more and more depth was added to his character.  He has a supremely bright future when Schitt’s Creek ends this year.

    The real MVP of this show is Catherine O’Hara.  Her character Moira is insanely enjoyable.  This woman is supremely quotable and an absolute delight in every sense of the fashion.  Her evolution from the very beginning to where we are now has been such a pleasure to watch.  She is still the same person she was at the beginning but with so many more layers of humble and greatness.  I love this woman and I’ll miss her more than any other.

    And I’ll miss everyone from the Rose clan when it ends in 2020.

     

    Spoiler

    And last but not least, Exhibit C.  The one you were all expecting to make it really high on here.

    9. Gravity Falls (Disney)

    What is there left to say about how amazing this show is?  I mean practically everyone knows this show is great.  It ended great.  We knew how Disney ended this show at the peak of its greatness.  And you know what?  I’m glad it did.  Because in my honest opinion, Disney did this show dirty.  Sending it from Disney to Disney XD.  But at the same time, I had no problem with how they handled this show’s air times.  Disney XD was the right network this entire time.

    So yeah, I literally have nothing else to say about a show that has made my best television list for so many years.  Sorry to keep this one short.  But I’ve got so much writing to do that I’m trying not to burn out.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    8. Community (NBC/Yahoo)

    Now this is one of the more recent shows that I caught after I announced this project in order to knock out the best of the best programs of this decade.  And this was hands down the best of the binges.  Everything else on this list is stuff I knew was going to make it as high as it was, so this might be where the surprises stop if you know me by now.

    Community was a show that even at its two worst seasons was still a damn great show that basked in being different.  Season 1 was just a normal group hangout show about a bunch of random people going to community college and it was still entertaining cast chemistry.  Season 4 was probably the worst season due to Dan Harmon leaving the show for a year and even then, it was still fine. 

    The other four seasons though were an absolute joy ride as Harmon basked in intentionally making this series absolutely different from every other sitcom of its time.  I mean what other shows out there could say they had episodes in 8-bit graphics, a GI Joe parody, mockumentaries, pseudo documentaries, film parodies, Rankin/Bass style animation, musicals, Dungeons and Dragons based, fourth wall breaking, alternate timeline dimension hopping, and just so many more odd and end based episodes.  All of these while still tying in the theme of each episode incredibly well?  Only Community.

    Community really was a show ahead of its time with a great cast, great writing, and incredibly quotable.  It’s the show that launched Donald Glover into a household name and also making fun of the fact that Chevy Chase is an unlikeable ass.  It really is worthy of its running gag of being six seasons.  Now all we wait for is the movie.

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    Spoiler

    Earlier in this post, I stated that New Girl was THE group hangout show of the 2010s.  But do you know what I wish would actually be THAT show?

    7. Happy Endings (ABC)

    Now here’s a show that deserved a much better fate than it got.  Take everything I said about New Girl and multiply that cast chemistry nearly double the amount.  Hell it even has Damon Wayans Jr. who was on New Girl.  He was originally on this show as Brad before taking the gig of Coach on New Girl, only to double back when he realized this show was surviving cancellation.  Smart man.  Wish he was a bigger star than he is now.

    But yeah, this show was ahead of its time.  I really wish it lasted longer than it did because it perfectly encapsulates what I want from my television sitcoms.  A reality I wish I could live in.  I wish I had friendships as strong as the core six here.  Where they all play off each other so well to the point that I fully believe that they are all friends outside of this show.  I want to go out with them and drink.  They have that strong of a bond.

    Sorry to be super vague, but I only hope that this show gets a cult following so it can be renewed on a streaming service like so many other short lived network shows.  If it could happen to The Mindy Project, then I only wish it would happen for Happy Endings.  I’m probably super late to the party on that thought, but a guy can dream, right?

     

    Spoiler

    You know what sitcom based subgenre I wish wasn’t as played out?  Family sitcoms.

     

    We have too many of them.  And there are only maybe a handful I can say I truly love.  You already saw one on this list, but Schitt’s Creek doesn’t really count.  Because the children are full grown adults.  I’m talking about actual shows about actual families with actual children.  Well one stood out above the rest this decade to me.  And it is about a pseudo famous comedy writer and his semi dysfunctional childhood and…you all should know by now what it is.

    6. The Goldbergs (ABC)

    And this came from Happy Madison of all companies.  Further proving that maybe Happy Madison isn’t so bad after all.  But they don’t deserve the praise.  It all goes to Adam Goldberg himself.  By making his full length episodic versions of his home movies.  Okay they aren’t completely 100% factual.  After all, Erica Goldberg was really an Eric.  But they feel semi-real and not all completely glamorized afternoon daytime specials.  I think part of that is due to the strong acting.  Especially from Wendi McLendon-Covey as Beverly Goldberg; who is amazing as the over the top in every way imaginable Beverly Goldberg.  But the child actors are really good here too and that’s saying something from me who doesn’t often highlight child acting.  More often than not, I get fully invested with each Goldberg child’s storyline because they are super relatable.  Whether it be dating issues to being embarrassed of their parents to wanting independence from them to not being good with money…they are all super relatable problems not stretched out and overdone.

    And of course, the other big plus, the setting.  I know I know.  80s nostalgia is getting rehashed and overplayed.  You’re not wrong.  I’ve noticed it to.  It’s been done to death in the 2010s going into the 2020s too with everything that is coming out this year.  And The Goldbergs fully bask in 80s nostalgia to the point that some piece of pop culture from the 80s plays some sort of role in each episode.  It is incorporated fairly well and isn’t used like a poster saying REMEMBER THIS. 

    By the time the 2030s start, I doubt anyone will want to do anything with the 80s ever again because people will be sick of it.  But you know who won’t be?  Me.  I love this admittedly overrated decade.  I love every bit of nostalgia from this decade I did not grow up in and I’m still not sick of it now.

     

    Spoiler

    And we can’t talk about 80s nostalgia without the best show about it.

    5. Stranger Things (Netflix)

    The Stranger Things phenomenon still ceases to amaze me.  I still remember four years ago where it was this small little show that garnered a cult following due to word of mouth.  Then Netflix sustained that momentum and really turned this series into something special.  I mentioned how The Goldbergs made me feel like I was living in the 80s.  Stranger Things not only does that, but it also makes me feel like I’m watching one of those epic 80s movies.  It has a real sense of vintage Steven Spielberg about it.  And not just due to the E.T. parallels, which admittedly do exist.  Quite blatantly. But The Duffer Brothers are clearly inspired by the hugeness of Spielberg’s biggest hits and you feel like you’re involved in this world they have built.

    I constantly praise the kid actors of this show all the time.  And here I go doing it again because all these kids are clearly talented as hell.  Some of them are already involved or being set up to become bigger names outside of this show like Finn Wolfhard and Millie Bobby Brown.  The others I wouldn’t be surprised to still seeing them down the road in the entertainment industry because I haven’t come across a single untalented child actor on this show.  And even after a kind of disappointing, but still great second season, the third season really gave me huge vibes and made me excited to see where this show goes from here.

    I don’t know how many more seasons this show has left, but Netflix really has something special going here.  This is lightning in a bottle that I doubt they will ever capture again, but Stranger Things is one of the few cultural phenomenons whose quality is justified.

     

    Spoiler

    4. Brooklyn Nine-Nine (FOX/NBC)

    Going to keep this one short.  Why?  It’s made my best list practically every year since its inception.  If that isn’t a sign of continuous quality, I don’t know what is.  I’m glad NBC saved this show from the brink of cancellation and it is continuing as strong as ever.  FOX never felt like the proper network for this show to begin with since it is one of the most diverse shows on network television with its inclusion of strong female characters and pro LGBT inclusion in the main cast.

    Also, I’m a huge Andy Samberg fan and will follow this man’s career until the end of time.  You want to know what one of my highlights of 2019 was that wasn’t my wedding?  Seeing The Lonely Island live.  That’s how big an Andy Samberg fan I am.  Stream The Bash Brothers Experience.

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    There I wrapped it up with a Gina GIF.  It all came full circle to the main point after all.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    Man 2020 is going to be the end of a lot of high quality shows.  And the highest praised one ends in a week.  So let’s talk about a show that at least 50% of this site watches and the other 50%, what’s taking you so long?

    3. BoJack Horseman (Netflix)

    I have always struggled to articulate my feelings towards BoJack Horseman as a whole.   I don’t know why.  It’s excellent.  The animation is great.  The writing is great.  The characters are great.  The direction of this show always misleads me when I think I have everything figured out.

    But I think the thing that really stands out to me the most about this show is just how real the content feels.  Depression, anxiety, substance abuse.  These are all really complex matters that this show tackles effectively even more so than its live action counterparts.  And here’s the thing about it all.  Any time something happens on this show.  Even the smallest of side plots.  It comes back eventually at some point.  The actions these characters take have long standing points in the continuity of the show.  Because they want to make these characters feel as relatable as possible.

    I’m not even beginning to speculate how the back half of the final season is going to go.  Because I’ve learned my lesson about trying to predict how this is going to end.  I’m just going to watch in awe as to where this show is going to go because I know it’s going to end with me in my feelings again.  Like this show always has.

     

    Spoiler

    Have I mentioned how many great shows are ending in 2020?  This one is going to hurt the most.

    2. The Good Place (NBC)

    I know a lot of you are going to question this show’s placement.  This over BoJack?  I have my reasons.

    Honestly, this show and BoJack have a lot in common when you really think about it.  Both shows are about flawed people who want to learn to be better.  Both shows have taken unpredictable roads to get where these characters are.  Both shows have fully fleshed out characters that we have watched develop along the way.

    But to me?  Why is this number two?  Because at the end of the day, I can watch a new episode of BoJack at any time I want and not rush through it all.  Ever since I’ve discovered The Good Place, I have watched every episode as soon as I was able to with a sense of urgency.  We may live in a binge watching era where we can watch shows at any pace we want to, but nothing beats watching a whole new episode the day it comes out.  And I’ve watched practically every episode of The Good Place either the day of or the day after only due to work.  That’s how dedicated of a fan The Good Place has made me.

    It ends next week as well.  And I’ve requested off work to watch the finale.  I’ll miss these characters.  I’ll miss the unpredictable nature.

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    Spoiler

    Number one is not a surprise to any of you if you really know me.

    1. Parks and Recreation (NBC)

    I binge watched the entire series in a course of month of unemployment in 2015 and my life was never the same afterwards.  I fucking love this show.  I fucking love these characters.  Parks and Reccing it has become an expression in my life when it comes to dropping what I’m doing and just watching an episode or going through an umpteenth binge watch of this series.

    Only a few shows rival this one when it comes to being my all-time favorite.  You already saw me mention South Park, but unlike South Park, this show ended at the most opportune time.  I already said I’ll follow Andy Samberg’s career wherever it will take him.  And I’m sure as hell going to follow Greg Daniels and Michael Schur’s careers due to how much I love this show.  Hell, I also just talked about another Michael Schur show seconds ago with The Good Place.  And Greg Daniels and Steve Carrell have Space Force coming to Netflix at some point in 2020.  It might end up being The Office 2.0 but I wouldn’t even fucking care the slightest bit.  I love Greg Daniels that much.

    Parks and Rec is one of those shows you can just tell that practically everyone involved loved being in it.  Amy Poehler and Nick Offerman constantly collaborate because of their association with Parks and Rec.  No matter how huge of a movie star he is now, Chris Pratt has appeared at two Parks and Rec reunion –Cons because he constantly talks about how much he loved being a part of the show.  This show is simply amazing and I too will forever be grateful that it exists.  Parks and Rec.  My best show of the 2010s.

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    For waiting and reading this list.  I know it took awhile to get out, but I hope it was worth the wait.  My best hit songs list is up next.  

     

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  16. So yeah.  How was the 2010s for music?

     


    Honestly, it will be interesting to look back on this decade years and years from now.  It just went through so many phases.  From the club boom to the biggest years of pure pop music since the 90s to self-serious pop to trap music.  Lord knows what trend is coming up next.  This decade has had so many identities that I can't really define it.

    But man, did Billboard get this decade end list right.  For all my problems I've had with their year end lists the last couple years, these definitely feel like the 100 biggest songs of the 2010s.  Good job Billboard.  Every dog has its day and credit where credit is due.  This is absolutely a worthy decade end list.  So worthy that in all honesty, I liked more than 50% of this decade end list.  Which made crafting the worst list that much harder because most of these songs really didn't make previous worst lists.  Which gave me a little more room to work with.

    What will the 2020's bring us?  Don't have a clue, but I’ll sit back in eager anticipation of what’s to come.  Because that’s what I do.  I follow pop culture and even if I’m not on this site five to ten years from now, I’ll still be following entertainment closely.

    And because this is a decade end project, just like I am with all the other formats of entertainment on this thread, this will be a Bottom 20/Top 20.  Because I’m going that extra step to make this final big project all the more significant.  So we are counting down!

    CLAPPY'S TOP 20 WORST SONGS OF THE BILLBOARD 2010'S DECADE END LIST

    (that's a mouthful of a title)

    Spoiler

     

    As far as 2000’s female popstars go, I can’t think of a single act who has stopped trying more so than Pink.  She keeps making the same songs over and over again to the point that any sort of meaning has been hammered out of it.  Yet here she is.  Still racking up hits even in 2019.  That must be some nice payola she is getting.  Do you know who would be a close second in terms of this category?

     

    20. “Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You)” – Kelly Clarkson

     

    And this is a damn shame to me.  Because I was a bigger Kelly Clarkson fan than I ever was of Pink.  When Kelly Clarkson was at her peak quality, good lord she was just untouchably great.  She had some of the best hits of the 2000s and I’ve come to accept the fact that she went artistically bankrupt this decade trying to replicate her past success. 

    But none of her singles of the last ten years are more artistically bankrupt than “Stronger”, otherwise known as “Since U Been Gone” clone number 234556.  Not only because Kelly Clarkson has done this song obviously better, but it’s that chorus that absolutely kills my interest in this song.  I can think of at least thirty songs off the top of my head that have used each and every line from that chorus.  It’s such an overused and overdone cliché.  And normally I would be more forgiving of clichés from one of my favorite female popstars if she showed some of her fiery passion.  But this is the most disinterested Kelly Clarkson has ever sounded from one of her own songs.

    Kelly has had a couple more hits after this that have ranged from mediocre to boring, but I’ll give them all this.  At least it wasn’t “Stronger”.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    And speaking of half-assed songs.

     

    19. “Sucker” – Jonas Brothers

     

    "Sucker" still sucks.

     

    Spoiler

    And this still sucks too.  But this wasn’t the first time Ed Sheeran and Justin Bieber collaborated together.

     

    18. “Love Yourself” – Justin Bieber

     

    It took me three years to really develop a thought.  Or an opinion of some sort on Justin Bieber’s biggest song of all time.  But after the radio refused to let this song go away after all these years, I can finally say with full thought that I cannot sympathize for Justin Bieber.  He’s such an empty vessel when it comes to emotional weight.  Hell, venom and spite are hard emotions to pull off.  If Ed Sheeran performed this song, than maybe I would have bought it.  But instead he wrote it for one of the most unlikeable shits of this decade.  And I could not care less that Bieber is so pissy about a girl who broke his heart.

    Honestly, the more I hear this song, the more I hate it.  I was able to write about 30-35 dishonorable mentions for 2016 and couldn’t find a spot to talk about this?  2016 sure was a weird year man.

     

    Spoiler

    And to think, I used to like this song.  But the more I hear it, the more apparent this song conveys absolutely nothing.

     

    17. “Airplanes” – B.o.B (featuring Hayley Williams)

     

    Wow that is one hell of a chorus by one of my favorite female vocalists of the last fifteen years. Is it really?  I use to think that, but this chorus is just total nonsense after ten years of overplay.  That metaphor is some weak shit.  I hate to say it since I love Hayley Williams so much, but this is the most phoned in chorus she has ever done.

    But most of my problems with this song all fall back to Mr. Flat Earther over here.  It must have been so hard to be Bobby Ray over here, who in his second hit single is complaining about the pressure of stardom.  No wonder he didn’t stay relevant.  He couldn’t handle the pressure of fame so early in his career and is now spewing some bullshit about the Earth being flat like he’s Neil DeGrasse Tyson.

    I don’t know if there was any other meaning behind B.o.B.’s part of the song, but it’s kind of hard to tell since he let studio hacks meddle with his big single and hammer any potential meaning out so they can commercialize the hell out of it.  Which you know, good for him.  Chase that money because you sure need it so you can keep on preaching your already disproven bullshit.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    16. “One More Night” – Maroon 5

     

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    Spoiler

    15. “Meant to Be” – Bebe Rexha & Florida Georgia Line

     

     I thought for sure this would be lower on this list when I was first drafting out my decade end list.  But little did I know that this tediously dull song actually helped mold the modern trends of pop music.  Now we are getting more and more country-pop on the charts.

    That is the only thing I will give it credit for because honestly who the hell cares about this slog of a song.  Bebe Rexha only further proves that she wastes her potential on middle of the road shlock.  Florida and Georgia only further prove that they don’t want to be a country music act anymore.  They both sound bored with what they are currently doing and would rather switch genres to find success.  Well congratulations.  You did it.  And nobody cares.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    14. “Dark Horse” – Katy Perry (featuring Juicy J)

     

    And while we are at it.

     

    13. “Fancy” – Iggy Azalea (featuring Charli XCX)

     

    Two white girls borrowing heavily from black culture to make in the moment bops that will age terribly. 

    Meanwhile, you have two of the biggest pop stars from the year 2014 making me cringe with these two songs.  Ironically, from when they were both at the peak of their fame.  I was going to declare these two a tie, but Iggy’s song nudges out Katy’s due to the fact that it makes me cringe just a tad harder.  That doesn’t make the former any less awful.

    Katy has done songs with guest rappers in the past, but every single hit from the Prism era just felt like Katy being even more tasteless than we’ve come to expect from her.  And while Snoop and Kanye didn’t bring their A-material to their songs with Katy, at least they don’t have that fucking terrible “eat your heart out like Jeffrey Dahmer” line.  Thanks Juicy J.

    Iggy, on the other hand.  She is really the product of this time frame, isn’t she?  I do think she is talented.  Listen to that flow.  Listen to her wordplay.  That Charli XCX chorus is still fire.  But all my problems fall back on Iggy’s rapping.  And that’s why this song made it this high.  I don’t know what an Australian girl who grew up stateside is supposed to sound like, but it’s not supposed to sound this intentionally offensive.  And that’s why Iggy’s career bottomed out after one year of being in the spotlight. 

    Both songs suck.  Both need to stop borrowing from hip hop culture.  And both are on downward spirals career wise.  Gee I wonder, why?  Next.

     

    Spoiler

     

    Like I said on my 2019 worst list, Sheeran is allegedly taking a multi-year break from performing.  I have my skepticism over this announcement, but it wouldn’t surprise me if Ed stuck to this.  Because in our year 2019, cracks finally started to show in the Sheeran Empire.  I don’t know if that’s true in the UK, where Ed is still one of the biggest acts ever, but definitely over here stateside.  His new album bombed with the critics.  Most of the singles off that new album flopped except for two.  And I’ve read multiple publications grow tired of his constant self-depreciation.  Which you know, is one of his main tricks with his songwriting.

    I still think the guy is talented, but I’m getting so sick of him.  He’s made my worst list/dishonorable mentions the last three years after I promised to stop shitting on him.  But I think most of the backlash Sheeran has faced as of late may be due to one huge reason.  His biggest song, one of the biggest of all-time, is already supremely dated and supremely lame.

     

    12. “Shape of You” – Ed Sheeran

     

    It’s only been two years and “Shape of You” is already starting to be declared one of the worst songs to ever make it as big as it did.  How can a song that charted nearly sixty weeks in the Top 20 nearly two years ago already to start to receive such immediate heat?  It’s not like it’s all unwarranted, but it’s just a harmless silly pop song.

    Honestly, I think a lot of it has to do with that beat.  It’s so weak, so limp, so juvenile for a song about sex from a guy who looks like a grown up Chuckie Finster.  I mean of all the male superstars of the 2010s, Ed Sheeran is probably the last person I would go to for a sex jam because he just doesn’t pull the part.  He’s a singer-songwriter.  He’s folky.  He bags on himself all the time.  He can’t pull off sexual and sensual.

    I think Ed will go down as one of the defining pop stars of the last ten years.  It’s just a damn shame that his biggest song ever is one of his worst.  Isn’t that quite often the case?

     

    Spoiler

    11. “All of Me” – John Legend

     

    And speaking of which, it also only made sense that John Legend’s biggest hit to date ended up being his worst.  This may not have been one of the worst songs of the decade technically, but this is easily one of the dullest songs of the decades.  Let’s move on to the next song before I fall asleep.

     

    Spoiler

    Okay we are halfway to the finish line.  The top ten worst huge hits from this decade.  And what better way to ring this half in with one of my favorite artists of the last twenty years making an absolute ass of himself.

     

    10. “OMG” – Usher (featuring will.i.am)

     

    For as much shit as I’ve talked about the year 2010 in every music thread I’ve ever been associated with, how dare I not even once mention this atrocity?  What else can I say but WHAT THE FUCK IS USHER DOING?  Usher.  One of the smoothest and coolest men alive.  Being delegated to sounding like a fucking teenager.

    This is the same guy who has had some of the smoothest pick-up lines of the last twenty years.  And what smooth lines does he have in this one?  Honey’s got a booty like pow, pow, pow.  Honey got some boobies like wow, oh wow.  For real, did a teenager write this?  What kind of idiot would think these sorts of lines would be any level of smoove..

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    And of course we can’t talk about the year 2010 without the man who practically ruined the first half of this decade with his lifeless robotic production choices.  At least will.i.am’s part is kept super brief, but his garbage lyrics leave a rotten stench over the rest of this song.

    But you know what the worst part of this song is?  THAT CHANTING.  WAS THIS RECORDED IN FRONT OF A LIVE STUDIO AUDIENCE?  Hell I can barely hear anything because the chanting is that distracting from everything else.

    This song gave me a migraine while writing this, so let’s move on so I can get this annoyance out of my head.

     

    Spoiler

    …so that’s what Meghan Trainor is up to now.  You know part of me kind of feels bad that the internet music community basically ended Meghan’s chart success by trashing her so much.  One of the worst artists of the 2010’s is something I constantly see associated with her.  Myself included since “Dear Future Husband” is hands down one of the worst hit singles of the decade.  Possibly all time.  It’s that heinous.

    But it is not like the quality was there for her fortunes to be reversed.

     

    9. “All About That Bass” – Megan Trainor

     

    Part of me thinks placing this song this low is a tad harsh.  But as each year passes, my hatred for this keeps growing.  I never want to hear this smug song ever again for the rest of my life.

    Meghan Trainor sounds like Michael Scott when it comes to talking about sex.  She knows it exists.  But she has no clue what she’s talking about.  And hearing her cringe talk her way through three minutes of faux empowerment over a doo-wop beat is definitely one of the most annoying songs of this decade.  She is annoying and she knows it.  There is no subtlety.

    And that’s why the Meghan Trainor backlash happened so swiftly.  There is nothing subtle about her music.  It’s just a constant annoyance.  And while I do feel bad that this is what Meghan Trainor’s career has been delegated to, it’s not like it isn’t undeserved.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    ….how can one of the biggest hits of the decade get so easily forgotten?  I guess you could say, it was magic!

     

    8. “Rude” – MAGIC!

     

    And just like that, POOF!  Any trace of MAGIC! disappeared.

     

    Spoiler

    Hey you guys.  Remember when this was the first song review I did on my music review thread?  Oh the memories.

     

    7. “Roar” – Katy Perry

     

    This is another one I’m going to keep short since I’ve talked about this song so many times now.  But for all the problems I’ve had with self-empowerment anthems, “Roar” is definitely one of the worst of this decade for being so limp and lifeless.  I can’t believe the same woman who gave us “Firework” gave us this lethargic dull turd.  For a song called “Roar”, it should have been renamed “Snore” because not once did Katy Perry sound empowering.  Next.

     

    Spoiler

    The 2010’s “Crank That (Soulja Boy)”.

     

    6. “Watch Me” – Silento

     

    Watch this go down in history as being the inspiration for the music of the future the way Soulja Boy was ten years ago.  Or watch this go down as supremely dated and lame like it is now.  I’m leaning towards the latter.  Who would dare say they were influenced by Silento of all damn people?

     

    Spoiler

    Wow does this keep getting worse and worse.  What was I ever thinking?

     

    5. “Blurred Lines” – Robin Thicke (featuring Pharrell & T.I.)

     

    I was probably thinking, wow what a good use of that Marvin Gaye sample.  And you know what, it still works in that regard.  But I can’t listen to this song without thinking of all the discourse that has happened the years after it was huge.  And it’s not like it isn’t for good reason.

    But I said this on Discord months ago and it still rings true.  This is the “Joker” of music.  It is too stupid to being worth of all this intense debate.  But while I found “Joker” to being a mediocre movie, this song is awful for different reasons.  Robin Thicke is walking anti-charisma.  Pharrell feels underutilized as the “woo guy”.  And T.I. literally adds nothing to this song.

    This was meant to be a joke track since all three guys are dads, but this is a “dad joke” gone terribly horribly wrong. 

     

    Spoiler

    4. “Girls Like You” – Maroon 5 (featuring Cardi B)

     

     

    On the plus side, this is the last time I’ll ever have to talk about this song ever again.  I’m really getting tired of talking about this song so many times over the last two years and I’ve grown especially tired talking about this band who hasn’t had an original idea in over ten years.  Fifth biggest song of this decade.  One of the biggest songs of all time.  Please put an end to this shit.

     

    Spoiler

    I know one of the most relevant comments from my 2018 worst list was my placement of harmless pop songs like “Never Be the Same” and “Perfect” were really worse than rainbow haired pedophiles and domestic abusers.  And to answer that, I say this.  Of fucking course they are.

     

    3. “Perfect” – Ed Sheeran

     

    I talked a few entries ago about how “Shape of You” backlash.  Is it stupid?  Yes.  But at least the songwriting is very Ed Sheeran-y.  The backlash of the Sheeran Empire began for me a year later when this lingered in the Top 20 for over a year like a prolonged fart.  This is the first Ed Sheeran song ever where I felt anybody could have done this.  And that is really damning when we have had over 20 Ed Sheeran knockoffs in the past five years alone.

    And I’ve had my problems with your James Arthur’s and your Lewis Capaldi’s of the world, but I’d rather hear them do a song this half-assed than listen to the original.  Yep, you heard me right.  I would rather hear Lewis Capaldi and his god awful self-impressed singing voice belt “DANCING IN THE DAWK” than hear Sheeran sound so uninspired and looking for a cheap wedding song cash-in.

    So, yes.  No regrets over placing “Perfect” at number two on my worst list last year.  Hell, I’m regretting not placing it at number one.  It’s that worthless.

     

    Spoiler

    2. “Sexy and I Know It” – LMFAO

     

    I’m not posting the music video for this song.  After eight years of watching that offensively tasteless unfunny garbage flopping around my computer screen, enough is enough.  End this.

     

    A month ago, Todd declared “Someone You Loved” as arguably his worst number one hit of the 2010s.  It made me go back and look at all the number ones of this decade and figure out my own personal worst number one.  And that honor goes too…”PILLOWTALK” by Zayn.

    Yeah this is not just one of the worst numbers of all time, but one of my personal least favorite songs ever.  It exemplifies how absolutely joyless pop music ended up becoming this decade and is honestly such an unsexy song.  Absolutely heinous.  But “Sexy and I Know It” is definitely the second worst number one of this decade for exemplifying the polar opposite.  I’ve mentioned in the past that I’ve missed the bad tasteless pop music of yesteryear.  Well “Sexy and I Know It” proves me 10000% wrong there.

    And while this song is a bad joke taken the 10000th degree, what makes this song so infuriatingly awful is the production.  Which consistently grates on my ear drums that it drives you absolutely bonkers.

    “Party Rock Anthem” has only grown on me in the same amount of time it took for “Sexy and I Know It” completely shrink on me.  It’s lame and it knows it.

     

    Spoiler

    So what ended up taking the top spot on this list?  Well to put it simply, I once called it one of the top five worst songs of all-time on my increasingly embarrassing and increasingly dated Top 50 Worst Songs of All-Time list.  And while I continue to regret ever making that thread, one thing still remains the same.  It may not be one of the worst songs of all-time, but this is still hands down one of the most inexplicable songs I’ve ever heard.

     

    1. “Hey, Soul Sister” – Train

     

    Over ten years.  I’ve been hearing this song on the regular for over ten years.  And to this day, I still don’t get exactly what Pat Monahan was going for.  It is so inexplicably awful that it infuriates me every time I hear it. 

    I often try to avoid highlighting the lyrics of a song unless I really have to, but here:

    https://genius.com/Train-hey-soul-sister-lyrics

    Here is the link to all the lyrics of this song.  There are too many inexplicably bad lyrics that I could make a Top 10 list…hell I could make a Top 20 of all the infuriating lyrics in this song.  And it’s easy to say “I’m so gangsta, I’m so thug” would top this list, but you know what would actually top this list?

    Your lipstick stains on the front lobe of my left side brains

    Y’all know what the left side of your brain is responsible for, right?  It controls the right side of your body and tasks that do with logic.  So when I hear that lyric at the very beginning of this song, I take it literally.  I take it that Pat Monahan’s soul sister kissed his brain which led to brain damage and a lack of logic for all the lyrics that follow.

    Friends of mine compare Pat Monahan as a lyricist to Tommy Wiseau.  And to that I’ve always said, dead wrong.  Tommy Wiseau at least manages to be entertaining.  What he thinks is meaningful, I at least find to be entertaining trash.  Pat Monahan just makes me miserable.  He sounds like he constantly tries with every song Train releases.  But his music constantly comes out brain dead.

    Fuck this hack.  Fuck this song….tonight.

     

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