About The Site

This is where the lists get serious. The nines and tens can be a little off the wall, a little bit ghetto - a little bit penthouse. It’s where you can express the minorities in the mind, the side that respects Hugh Heffner and everything he stands for, the side that wants to see Rocky lose, because he has to. The part of you that just loves beers in a kiddy pool while listening to the wireless, but also planning to get your Office on later because you just love Dwight so much. Mix all those preferences in a shaker with some vermouth and serve up with a twist of lime and you got your eights. When you get into the eights you’re really getting frontal lobe on that shit now. So, I guess what I’m saying is…time to see if I’m brain dead yet.

Top Ten Movies
8. An American Werewolf In London – Keep clear of the moors.
This has been another favourite since childhood, and yes, I know, my childhood perhaps wasn’t normal where this and other horror flicks always got big runs on the VCR. I am a big fan of the werewolf mythos, and this has to be the best entry into it. David Naughton is awesome as the American attacked on the Moors just outside of The Slaughtered Lamb. His bedding of Jenny Agutter is priceless, but so is his boredom of being alone in England. The movie is honestly so funny; Naughton taking the balloons of the kid when he is naked, the things he says when he wants to get arrested, the meeting of the corpses in the porn film (titled “See You Next Wednesday” for those in the know). Then comes the blood. The scene where the guy is chased through the subway is so well shot that it stills makes me nervous when I watch it now. I don’t even think I need to mention the transformation scene, Rick Baker is a god. I just love that John Landis put this film together. Based on this one little werewolf pic he became forever more known as a Master of Horror, even though he also produced such classics as Coming To America, Trading Places, The Blues Brothers, Oscar, Amazon Women On The Moon, Animal House, The Stupids and The Kentucky Fried Movie. Apart from his pseudo-sequel vampire tale, Innocent Blood, the closest he came to horror again was Michael Jackson’s Thriller film clip. But this flick is easily good enough to put him above so many others in the craft. That’s a classy one hit wonder.

Top Ten TV Shows
8. Scrubs
A really commercial comedy show that is so well written and may have the possibility of aging well. Not a common commodity in tinseltown. So many sitcoms like Friends do not date well at all, the characters are embarrassing and the dialogue more so. Scrubs is very specific in its characters and the way they interact but I feel it has enough heart and smarts to get by. The show is so laugh out loud hilarious, yet can be quite emotional and serious at other times. For juxtaposition to work so well the writing has to be tight, and it’s pretty bloody tight. You care for the characters, because you get to see their range. You see them in all sorts of situations and pairings. One of the best bits ever in a tv show has to be when JD and Cox get to the cemetary and JD asks Cox where he thinks he is, then it all rushes in on him. A great moment of tv because you didn’t really see it coming, sure the hints were there but if you were thinking that hard then you weren’t really enjoying the show, you were too busy trying to second guess it to seem impressive (which never works anyway people, so give it up and just enjoy the show), but also a great moment of acting from both leads. I like that Zack Braff can do such physical comedy here yet completely knock it out of the park in Garden State and The Last Kiss. This should be a show that it won’t be embarrassing to admit you liked it in a decade.

Top Ten Books
8. Eaters Of The Dead – Michael Crichton
I didn’t know what to expect when heading into this book. I had bought it from The Big Book in Glen Innes for a few bucks and got into it in my last days of uni whilst waiting for others to finish their exams/studying so that I could put my books down and go drink some goon. I will admit that I have not read Beowulf, but I do know the story very well, so this did make sense to me. This is a retelling of the Beowulf myth with the characters being North Men, from the Nordic countries. An Arabic ambassador goes to visit Buliwyf, great name, and they come across mist-monsters. The whole tale is presented as an historical document, complete with footnotes to explain what was later found to have happened. I thought that I would like this book, but I damn well loved it! Crichton’s writing is good and the story just flows along. I liked the characters and the Ian Miller illustrations in my copy were fantastic. It’s just a book that has stuck with me because I remember enjoying it so much. Crichton gets derided as airport fiction (I still don’t exactly know the insult there, but oh well) but this is smartly researched and very cool. Total thumbs up!

Top Ten Comic Books
8. Watchmen
It seems so cliché for this to be here, and I hate that, but it totally deserves to be. I read this and was just blown away by what it must have taken to write it. The brains, the ideas, the balls and the vision. It really is a structural masterpiece, but even as something written as a piece of perfect art it is also enjoyable, which are two things that do not always go hand in hand. You get a sense of the characters very quickly, and you understand the setting immediately. You’re thrust into a story where every little thing you must absorb, and if you don’t then you will be sent back until you get it. Every thing is done with purpose and point and I love a comic where nothing is wasted. Each panel is there for a reason and in the end it just sets out in front of you like a tapestry; I can’t tell you how long I spent reading the fifth chapter ‘Fearful Symmetry’. The first panel is symmetrical to the last panel, and the first page is symmetrical to the last and it all flows inward like water down a drain. It is so completely awesome, no other words for it. As new information comes forward you realise that all the signs were there beforehand. It’s a good book where you can’t decide who the most interesting was, The Comedian, Ozymandias, Rorschach, Dr Manhatten. I can see this making a very cool movie, and I hope it does, I really do. Zack Snyder did a good job on Frank Miller’s 300, and that movie stands alone quite well, but Watchmen will always be a comic book.

Top Ten Songs
8. Evil Woman – ELO – There’s a hole in my head where the rain comes in
Electric Light Orchestra was a staple in my house growing up. I could have chosen any of their songs for this space, as I love them all so much, but this is the one where I hear the opening bars and I have to sing. It’s a song that just sounds like relationships and women, and I like music like that. Every guy should listen to this song.

Next up, those evil sevens, watch your wallets and your spouses, they’ll get you every time!

Posted on March 12th, 2008 by ryan
Filed under: books, comics, life, movies, music