Same intro as 2018, but more emphatically for 2019. Man, I hate pre-list philosophizing, and it was even worse with end-of-decade lists.
Every site writes a too-long preamble to their year-end top-whatever lists, so I won’t. But I will say that I particularly like constricting lists to top 5 because a) they fit well on Twitter, but also b) for the sake of conversation. Whittling your list to 5 makes it hurt a little bit. Which it should! Especially when we talk about what really, truly impacted you, personally, and is gonna stick with you long after the year ends.

#2019TOP5 MOVIES

1 – THE BEACH BUM – This bonkers movie veers from sleazy to beautiful, ridiculous to philosophical, lodged itself in my brain, and made me rethink my own life between the WTF moments. Isn’t that what great art is for?
2 – JOHN WICK 3 – A marvel of technical skill, visual style and artful choreography. Combined with, honestly, how many times I’ll gleefully re-watch these vs ‘higher-brow’ fare, this series deserves more recognition.
3 – PARASITE – A masterpiece of precision camera and character work that dances between comedy, drama and thriller all while landing a resonant political theme. Weird, wild, and impressive — top to bottom (wink).
4 – MARRIAGE STORY – The raw emotion of the year’s two best performances definitely floored me, but the way the turmoil is tempered with wit and tenderness made it feel even truer. Deep, powerful stuff.
5 – LITTLE WOMEN – Gerwig took a century-old book for teen girls, injected it with energy and humor, and restructured the story to reveal timeless, relevant ideas the original only hints at. A genius script and a total joy.

NEARLY MADE IT – Jojo Rabbit, High Flying Bird, Standoff at Sparrow Creek, Last Black Man in San Francisco, Knives Out
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – The Irishman (merely overrated), Rise of Skywalker (massively disappointing), Uncut Gems (ugly, loud, dull), Joker (an outright disgusting travesty)

#2019TOP5 TV SHOWS

1 – WATCHMEN – It’s hard to believe this show even exists. So ambitious in its storytelling, complex in its exploration of the original’s themes in today’s world, and written, shot, scored, acted, and edited on another level. Damn.
2 – FLEABAG – I thought the first season was an expert bit of writing and acting, with one of my favorite characters on TV. The second deserves all the credit it’s getting, but the supporting cast in particular really stepped up.
3 – CATASTROPHE – My favorite couple on television. They’re not perfect, they’re not even always likable, but damn do I get it, and love watching the funnier version of all our inner thoughts brought to life with real heart.
4 – SUCCESSION – Filmed things that feel like plays are a weakness of mine, as are Shakespearean dramatics, so of course a beautiful show that’s mostly dialogue about the fall of rich assholes does it for me. Also, hilarious?
5 – DEAD TO ME – Though it’s just shy of trashy, I actually loved seeing two outstanding female actors work through friendship and grief while a murder lurks in the background giving everything an extra dash of tension.

NEARLY MADE IT – Veep, Barry, Mindhunter, Unbelievable, Better Call Saul (Was that even this year? Who cares, I love it.)
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – Game of Thrones (no surprise), The Mandolorian (very enjoyable! not that remarkable)

#2019TOP5 BOOKS

*note: I do not read fast enough to make book lists by year of release, so this, like most normal people’s I imagine, will be books READ this year instead.

1 – IF ON A WINTER’S NIGHT A TRAVELER by Italo Calvino – A daring feat of meta-story telling, this nested-doll novel — about the search for the end of another unfinished novel — explores what it means to write, to read, to tell stories, and to live. I couldn’t get enough of its pleasures or its insight.
2 – THE NICKEL BOYS by Colson Whitehead – Few books feel bound to be classics the next generation will be reading in school. This blunt yet heartfelt story of forgotten boys who’ve been through hell deserves to be.
3 – NORMAL PEOPLE by Sally Rooney – Emotionally my #1, because reading about two nerdy outcasts, who grow up feeling out of place in the world and only really themselves around each other, pierced my core.
4 – EXHALATION by Ted Chiang – Every story does what the best sci-fi does: poses a mind-bending question and explores what that means for normal, frail, limited human lives. Each one could be its own post here.
5 – SECRET EMPIRE by Nick Spencer – I’m all for the political turn taken by Captain America’s latest alternate-reality, exploring the tension between heroism and fascism. This crossover felt big, but focused on a worthy idea.

NEARLY MADE IT – WALKING: ONE STEP AT A TIME by Erling Kagge, OUTLINE by Rachel Cusk, FRIDAY BLACK by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – GOLDEN STATE by Ben Winters (great start, terrible end), LANCELOT by Walker Percy (painfully mysogynist, do not read)

#2018TOP5 GAMES

*similar note applies because damn are almost all games too long, meaning one can only play so many the year they’re released.

1 – OUTER WILDS – Like 2018’s #1 (Obra Dinn), this wasn’t close. A combat-free mystery, solved by discovering and decoding clues, while visiting weird planets, trapped in a time loop, in awe of the lonely universe. Wow.
2 – BATTLETECH – A must for fans of XCOM and the like, because once your squad are giant mechs, the tactical strategy foundation gains a layer of attrition, adding survival-by-the-skin-of-your-teeth drama to every battle.
3 – CELESTE – This simple-looking platformer hides tons of mechanical depth and challenge, and a sweet, sad story about dealing with depression, all set to a wonderful soundtrack — and I don’t even love platformers.
4 – OBSERVATION – Creepy, gorgeous, mysterious sci-fi that feels like playing 2001 with a bit of a dash of Alien and a little BioShock thrown in. And it’s short enough to play in a day! More games should be like this!
5 – CONTROL – Not enough big action games are cool with being weird. The 3rd-person action delivers a satisfying X-Men power trip, but the Twin Peaks-y, X-Files-ish world made it a far more memorable one.

NEARLY MADE IT – The Outer Worlds, Apex Legends, Jedi: Fallen Order, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – Also Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, because I really liked it but it was so punishing I gave up halfway through, which is a huge shame.

#2019TOP5 ALBUMS

1 – BE GOOD by Off With Their Heads – An almost platonic mix of burly riffs and melodic vocals that took me back to indie/punk favorites from my youth, in a year where I needed some loud guitars and angsty energy.
2 – ON THE LINE by Jenny Lewis – It comes on pretty gently, but spending time with this album reveals this rich warmth of sound and feeling that really wrapped its arms around me over time.
3 – MALIBU KEN by Malibu Ken – The trap style that’s so popular in current hip hop doesn’t do much for me musically, but this gonzo collab between lyrical master Aesop Rock and trippy fuzz-god Tobacco sure goddamn did.
4 – PURPLE MOUNTAINS by Purple Mountains – This forlorn, twangy plunge into regret stuck in my brain and moved my soul even before Berman left us — I even had tickets to the tour. Now, it’s etched in history.
5 – SOUND AND FURY by Sturgill Simpson – Rarely does such a departure make me love an artist even more, but the giant guitars and seething anger were a big swing that paid off. Bonus: the Netflix full-album anime video.

NEARLY MADE IT – I,I by Bon Iver, OPTIMAL LIFESTYLES by Pkew Pkew Pkew, DEAD MAN’S POP (REISSUE BOX SET) by The Replacements, and I think Lizzo is mandatory, right?
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – I didn’t listen to enough new music this year to be that disappointed in anything, though the latest New Pornographers seemed to be missing some magic.

So, what were your #2019top5 picks?

TLBMiSF earned a lot of credit in its slightly off-kilter but beautifully framed opening scene, combining flavors of both Spike Lee and Barry Jenkins right out of the gate. It continued on, just strange enough to feel like a dream, gorgeous enough to look like a painting; but that level of abstraction can also put you at a slight distance. Is this literal, or metaphor? Are these characters and their challenges meant to be related to directly, or are they meant to represent the ways in which we’re victim to much larger forces — the ones driving people out of their cities and homes, and away from their sense of history and self?

Thanks to heartfelt performances from the two leads, the answer ends up not mattering so much, because the film accomplishes both. Home is a place. Home is a feeling. Home is people that matter. We find a way to hold on to what we can, or to take with us the things we can carry from one place to wherever we find ourselves next.

Crucially, the film isn’t purely us-vs-them. The detail that the three-generation black family of San Franciscans were only able to buy a house in the city when the Asian families that came before them were forced out should not be overlooked. The home Jimmy fights to preserve from a new wave of invading residents was once someone else’s too. We only ever rent our right to call a place home, in the larger sense. All of America is that way. For almost everyone, none of us were first.

This idea left the biggest emotional impression on me, walking out of the film. I have never lived anywhere for even twenty years. I’ve never had, and may never have, that kind of history with a block, or neighborhood, or town. Am I going to lead a poorer life for that? Will everywhere I ever live be the result of pushing out someone who does have that, diminishing the overall level of rootedness in any city I call home? Should I rearrange my priorities to achieve that? Or is it mostly nostalgia and revisionist history to prize a place so highly? Can we only hold on to a sense of home if we also refuse to move on, move out, and move forward?

More practically speaking, when does a place become home?

When do you earn the right to call a city or neighborhood yours, if you weren’t born there?

If it’s not just a matter of time, what do you have to do to earn that?

I’ve been participating in the annual Goodreads Reading Challenge since its inception in 2011 (succeeded five years, failed three), in which you set a personal goal of books to read that year. It’s a nice motivator throughout the year, and a fun little badge each December once I’ve sprinted to the finish, usually with a few short story collections or graphic novels.

This Atlantic article digs into why we effectively “give ourselves homework” in this way with books so much more often than other hobbies usually considered leisure:

Other forms of entertainment straddle that line—watching documentaries, for example, can be both educational and fun—but reading seems to inspire this gamification, homework-ification, and quantification to a unique degree. Perhaps that’s because society tends to view reading as an intrinsic good, whereas other media—movies, TV, the internet—are often seen as time-wasters. “Given many [people] feel they’re consuming too much media, the goal is usually to limit consumption,” Ayelet Fishbach, a professor of behavioral science at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business who studies goals, told me in an email. “In this sense, for many people reading is a virtue—so you want to increase it—while watching TV is a vice—so you try to limit it.”

Then, it goes a bit deeper into why… but not quite deep enough. Not a single interviewee admitted anything along the lines of, “It makes me feel smart. It’s part of my identity — that I’m a person who reads more than most, which isn’t hard, considering over a quarter haven’t read any and the average is only about 12.” Seems like a reporting miss to not get to why.

Why do you read as much as you do? Or not read as much as you do?

What do you get from it beyond the content of the books themselves, or what do you free yourself up to do by not reading more?

What, if any, inherent value is there in reading books at all?

Every site writes a too-long preamble to their year-end top-whatever lists, so I won’t. But I will say that I particularly like constricting lists to top 5 because a) they fit well on Twitter, but also b) for the sake of conversation. Whittling your list to 5 makes it hurt a little bit. Which it should! Especially when we talk about what really, truly impacted you, personally, and is gonna stick with you long after the year ends.

#2018TOP5 MOVIES

1 – SORRY TO BOTHER YOU – Wildly original, dense with ideas, perfectly performed, and hilariously weird, but never loses its anti-capitalist thread (even at the point everyone seems to think it does, and I will fight on this).
2 – A FUTILE AND STUPID GESTURE – David Wain directs an extraordinary cast, led by an outstanding Will Forte, in a funny, moving origin story to the particular sense of absurd humor that has shaped my entire life.
3 – WIDOWS – An artful, thoughtful, politically aware (but still badass!) take on the heist genre that deserves to live alongside Heat and other classics, but with the visual care and performances of a Terence Malick film.
4 – BLACK PANTHER – A ripping Marvel blockbuster that still takes on ideas as big as colonialism vs revolution, and where every supporting character is as memorable as the lead.
5 – ANNIHILATION – Wonder and beauty mix with dread and horror to create an unsettling and surprising feast of unforgettable images and philosophical quandaries to chew on long after the film ends.

NEARLY MADE IT – Eighth Grade, The Favorite, Into the Spider-verse, The Death of Stalin
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – Roma

#2018top5 TV SHOWS

1 – THE GOOD PLACE – Even in its not-best season, a deeply kind show this joke-dense, intelligently written, and in which every character is so lovable and expertly performed, is 100% still the best thing on TV.
2 – HIGH MAINTENANCE – No other series shows such a deep empathy for such a wide range of characters just trying to get through a life that can be lonely and sad but never without moments of beauty and joy.
3 – WILD WILD COUNTRY – This (almost unbelievable?) cult documentary confronts viewers with its conflicting ideologies, forcing us to examine our own beliefs, whose side we’re on, and why, like nothing I’ve ever seen.
4 – AMERICAN VANDAL – How this show pulls off a cutting true-crime satire AND a genuinely heartfelt story about teenage life, while remaining an actually-compelling mystery story, continued to blow my mind in year 2.
5 – ALTERED CARBON – The premise of portable identity unlocks so much, but the future-noir setting, martial arts action and gorgeous production sealed the deal. Thoroughly enjoyable and constantly thought-provoking.

NEARLY MADE IT – Killing Eve, Succession, Atlanta, Legion, Better Call Saul, Big Mouth (whoa I watch too much TV)
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – Sharp Objects, The Americans, Ken Burns’ The Vietnam War (I know that wasn’t this year but man I want those 20 hours back)

#2018top5 BOOKS

*note: I do not read fast enough to make book lists by year of release, so this, like most normal people’s I imagine, will be books READ this year instead.

1 – EXIT WEST by Moshin Hamid – Profound yet lighthearted, a pleasure to read while tackling the toughest challenges of refugee living, this magical realist world and the love story at its heart moved me deeply. A must read.
2 – THE POWER by Naomi Alderman – In a world where men have to fear women for once (they can electrocute through touch), everything changes, and this story digs deep into the many myriad effects that has. Loved it.
3 – MS MARVEL VOL 1 by G Willow Wilson – I haven’t fallen so hard so quickly for a main character in ages. Quirky, nerdy, teenaged Kamala Khan dealing with newfound powers in this punkish, witty comic is a delight.
4 – ALTHOUGH OF COURSE YOU END UP BECOMING YOURSELF by David Lipsky – Spending time with a genius offers you the privilege of a peak into his incredible mind, but also forces you to face your own insecurities as someone who will never be one. DFW was a treasure.
5 – SEA OF RUST by C Robert Cargill – This pulpy Mad Max-but-with-robots future story also conceals all kinds of questions about the conflicts that arise when AI start governing themselves. (I would love to see an anime adaptation.)

NEARLY MADE IT – IQ by Joe Ide, LESS by Andrew Sean Greer, THE VISION by Tom King
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING by Joan Didion, MANHATTAN BEACH by Jennifer Egan, ANNIHILATION by Jeff VanderMeer

#2018top5 GAMES

*similar note applies because damn are almost all games too long, meaning one can only play so many the year they’re released.

1 – RETURN OF THE OBRA DINN – Unique stippled art and elegant design made this game beautiful. Clever plotting and an ingenius mystery-solving mechanic made it unforgettable. A tight, intriguing, somber masterpiece.
2 – INTO THE BREACH – Removing the element of chance makes each tactical mech battle a perfectly intellectual puzzle-solving exercise that’s so satisfying to play and eventually conquer that it’s impossible to put down.
3 – MARVEL’S SPIDER-MAN – The most gorgeous game of the year. Not just for its city, its fluid web-swinging animations, and its thrilling action set-pieces, but for its earnest hero and sympathetic villains. One of the best Spidey stories ever put to screen.
4 – FEAR OF LOATHING – Game writing tending to the eye-rolling, this stick-drawn western RPG succeeds on its laugh-out-loud (honestly! the jokes are that good!) writing but gets extra points for balancing depth with fun.
5 – WHAT REMAINS OF EDITH FINCH – More games should be comfortable with the artistic, the abstract, and the emotional in their storytelling. This beautiful short story of a game tries weird, crazy things and opens new doors to what games could look like.

NEARLY MADE IT – God of War, Goragoa, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – Red Dead Redemption 2

#2018top5 ALBUMS

1 – HISTORIAN by Lucy Dacus – The mix of introspective lyrics, beautiful voice, and loud-quiet-loud guitars are what I look for in most music, and this album stayed in my rotation all year long for nailing it so well.
2 – HOPE DOWNS by Rolling Blackouts, Coastal Fever – When most straight-up indie rock is either seemingly absent or sad bastard dad stuff, a power-pop record with this kind of energetic bounce is so, so welcome.
3 – HEAD OVER HEELS by Chromeo – These dudes are unapologetically horny and I love it. Every song is about wanting to make sweet love in a charmingly silly, totally catchy, perfectly pop way.
4 – FUTURE ME HATES ME by The Beths – Girls and guitar riffs was a huge theme of most of the music I loved this year, and this one just happened to do that wonderful mixture the best out of many. Punky good fun.
5 – LP5000 by Restorations – The best songs off this short album were the ones that got stuck in my head the most this year. A throwback to full-throated, unapologetic feeling in simple, soaring indie rock shout-alongs.

NEARLY MADE IT – ORDINARY CORRUPT HUMAN LOVE by Deafheaven, DANCE ON THE BLACKTOP by Nothing, SOME RAP SONGS by Earl Sweatshirt, EVERYTHING MATTERS BUT NO ONE IS LISTENING (QUIET SLANG) by Beach Slang (the best band working)
DEFIANTLY ABSENT – I’ll forever love both of them, but the new albums by CHVRCHES and DECEMBERISTS didn’t reach their previous heights, for me.

So, what were your #2018top5 picks?

In The New York Times, Wesley Morris asks the difficult question, in a long but well-reasoned essay: are we too concerned with the moral correctness of art (and creator) to fully engage with its quality or worth as art?

The real-world and social-media combat we’ve been in for the past two years over what kind of country this is — who gets to live in it and bemoan (or endorse!) how it’s being run — have now shown up in our beefs over culture, not so much over the actual works themselves but over the laws governing that culture and the discussion around it, which artists can make what art, who can speak. We’re talking less about whether a work is good art but simply whether it’s good — good for us, good for the culture, good for the world.

I tend to come down about two thirds toward correctness, personally. There is so much art out there, it’s totally fine to go through life ignoring the works of people who’ve done terrible things, or art that fails in its attempt to condemn the terrible things it depicts. I doubt I’ll watch another Woody Allen movie in this life. I am the rare person who thinks Wolf of Wall Street and Goodfellas are not that great, because despite being expertly made, they spend too much time glamorizing terrible people to be effective condemnations of the monsters whose eventual downfall they depict (as evidence, look at how their worst, biggest fans react to and hold up those works as aspirational).

What acclaimed works of art do you object to morally?

Do we owe these works attention despite, or because of, the moral reactions they provoke?

Or is a better world of art on the other side of engaging with fewer “problematic” works?