THE END OF THE YEAR IS NIGH...MUST BE TIME FOR A STUPID FUCKING LIST

Every two-bit and even some four-bit critic got their best of the year list, and then there's the default best-of lists, like the Golden Globe nominations (and whatever doubts I may have about the Hollywood Foreign Press Association), the WGA noms (a list of series I just can't much argue with) and the AFI awards. Though I don't know about any awards selected by these guys. -->

So what did I like in 2007, you may be asking yourself. And if you are, you're probably referring to yourself, but I mean me. You make your own list.

Me? I'm forgoing the list. No bullet points for you. I'm going for something a little more conversational, though largely one-sided. Though there is a comment button, I invite you to use it, especially if you disagree with me but also because I'm probably forgetting something, but make no mistake, I am not forgetting Californication.

As evidenced from this post, Doctor Who rocked my TV so hard, it was in danger of breaking the DVR and knocking some things off the wall. Paul Cornell and Steven Moffat are the latest to to be added to my personal pantheon of shiny golden gods.

And Moffat wrote Jekyll, which kicked lion ass and left an opening to do more...and I hope he does. He's right on the edge with that one.

Mad Men was all kinds of cool this year, from meeting Matthew Weiner and getting the awesomest reaction from mentioning that I was adding a Mad Men spec to my arsenal to the actual show itself. I must like it if I spec'ed it. Why would you ever spec a show you don't like? It will totally show through in the worst way. It'll make you look like a hack that doesn't get it.

30 Rock. Go ahead. Click it.

I've always dug House, but after writing my spec earlier this year and seeing it do really well in the Screenwriting Expo competition, it deepened my love of the show. I look forward to it more than most other series at the mo' and the change-up with the Survivor-format was inspired and I think it worked beautifully. I fear change not. And I got a little crush on Thirteen maybe.

And speaking of the Screenwriting Expo, that was just fun. Not for the classes and seminars, no. For the people first and foremost. People like Emily, my partner in crime for a couple of days, and also meeting Fun Joel and Shawna Benson. Secondarily, the writing competitions, the aforementioned teleplay one and also the crazy CS Open, which yielded me this short piece that I like so much I want to do something with it, like get it illustrated as a comic, or animate it or something else I don't have the skill to do.

There were also the missed meetings that I hope to rectify, like fellow Expo finalist Jane Mountain, who wrote a fantastic Ugly Betty. Maybe after New Year's, eh?

And hey, I met Josh (after the Expo and a missed SDCC phone call) too. He's cool and a half (times six). You watch out for him, you'll be seeing his name in places soon.

Joss Whedon brought me new Buffy and made me do a little happy dance. Usually licensed comics kinda suck, but this is straight from the man. Season eight. If you liked Buffy and you're not reading this series, then you might be the kind of peson who enjoys living but just stops eating, wearing seatbelts and taking medicine for no good reason. Buh-bye.

That Buffy is the highpoint of a year where a lot of comics and comics companies were consistently letting me down by pushing all manner of nonsensical crossover destruct-o-crap at me. Though, there was one crossover (smaller in marketing scale but huge in story) that knocked my socks off at every turn. Had I been wearing sneaks at the time, it could have caused damage.

Geoff Johns's exquisitely crafted Sinestro Corps War was a solid twenty-two pages of power in every book it touched. You have to wonder why it took so long fro someone to come up with an opposite Green lantern Corps, but it's so much better for the time it took, incorporating Qwardians, the best Tales of the Green Lantern Corps story ever (by Alan Moore), Manhunters, and even that verdammt Anti-Monitor and Superboy Prime (I'll call him what I want).

In film, the two flicks I've most looked forward to haven't opened yet. Sweeney Todd and Charlie Wilson's War. It takes a lot to get me into the theatres these days, no matter what praise is heaped on it. I'm a great Coen Brothers fan, to be sure, but I'll probably hold off until Netflix gets No Country For Old Men. I've, however, long held a special place for the Demon Barber, and of course anything written by the Sorkin gets an automatic.

Speaking of the Sorkin, seeing The Farnsworth Invention last March was energizing. Now that it's on Broadway, if you're anywhere near New York or planning to be, go. I exhort you. Heh. I exhorted. And I remain amused that my post on the play remains the number four Google hit for the title and the highest review, ahead of the New York Times.

Some nice DVD sets came out. Like Veronica Mars Season Three, which filled me with rage over the the glimpse of a fourth season I have been denied. Not unlike the still painful Global Frequency fiasco.

Twin Peaks. Finally. Complete. Damn fine discs.

What else?