Seeing is Believing (The Year in Review 2019)

The end of a decade meant the end of many beloved series, and I spent much of 2019 bidding fond farewells to my favourites: the Skywalkers; the Baskets family rodeo; detective Angie Tribeca and her merry band of misfit cops; Jared-Donald and the gang from Silicon Valley; Selina Meyer, who will forever remain our Veep; Maggie Gyllenhaal and the Jameses Franco inhabiting The Deuce; and, of course, Fleabag, who left us just as we were getting to know her.

But 2019 was also a year for some wonderful new creations, challenging us not only to look forward, but to reconsider how we look. From a drug-fuelled odyssey that dizzily toyed with our perceptions, to a religious dramedy that circled questions of faith, to a glitchy Space Odyssey riff that forced gamers to view the world through an artificial lens, these are my picks for the best of 2019.

FILM 

Hereditary was terrifying, but MIDSOMMAR is believable. That's the main reason why Ari Aster's sophomore effort, a horror film set in a remote Swedish community, is better than its predecessor. The always excellent Florence Pugh stars as Dani Ardor, a college student struggling with the combined burdens of (a) a recent, if cliché, personal tragedy, and (b) a fucking awful boyfriend. It's that boyfriend who grudgingly allows Ardor to tag along on a "guy" trip to study a pagan cult hidden away so far north that, for several months mid-summer, the sun never sets on their community. Such a setting would be alien enough as is, but thanks to a combination of peer pressure and more insidious methods, Pugh's character spends most of the film high as a kite, taking the audience along for a very unsettling and hallucinogenic ride. Just call it the world's longest anti-drug PSA.

It begins with ABBA and ends with the Beatles, but THE TWO POPES is about so much more than the musical tastes of its title characters. Though nominally about a fateful meeting between popes Benedict (Anthony Hopkins, excellent) and Francis (Jonathan Pryce, in his best role since Brazil), this funny and moving chamber piece is better described as a biopic of the latter, current pontiff. Say what you will about the Catholic Church, but the film makes a strong case for Pope Francis as a real reformer, a man of unwavering faith and a deeply felt moral commitment to concerns such as inequality and climate change. The witty and banter-heavy script won't score any points for profundity, but its earnestness may make even the most hardened cynic reconsider their views on the guy(s) in the funny hat.

The delightfully-named US is the best socially-conscious horror film since Get Out, which means it is also the best Jordan Peele film since Get Out. In quick succession, director Peele has established himself as a brilliant satirist of western hypocrisies - especially those of our neighbours to the south. Where Get Out directly confronted anti-black racism, US operates as a slightly more subtle - as subtle as a mounting pile of blood-splattered corpses can be - allegory on, well, whatever you choose to make of it. Is US's tale of creepy doppelgängers really about capitalism? Race relations? The North American genocide of Indigenous peoples? That each of those interpretations is equally plausible - far more so than the comparably inane conspiracy theories that surround Peele's beloved influence The Shining - is a testament to the director's skill at putting just enough, but never too much, information up on screen. Lupita Nyong'o is fantastic in the lead role.

TELEVISION

Is it déjà vu, or is it THE TWILIGHT ZONE that's making you wonder whether you've seen Jordan Peele's name twice on this list? Nope, it's just the fact that in Peele's effort to take over all corners of your pop cultural mind, he put together a (mostly) enjoyable new sci-fi anthology series that, like his films, is heavy on the social commentary, loves to play with audience perceptions, and can be very funny - but only when it needs to be. Not all the episodes land, but standouts like "Replay" and "Not All Men" make for must-watch television, in the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and between the pit of man’s fears, and the summit of his knowledge.

Violently satirical THE BOYS works well both for those who love superheroes (me!) and those fed up with their total domination of contemporary pop culture (also me!). While the concept is hardly original - what if superheroes existed in our world (or a close approximation of it) - the delivery is first-rate. Jack Quaid and Karl Urban headline a stellar cast of vigilantes who set out to expose and take down a team of intimidatingly powerful corporate-owned "heroes"/asshole celebrities known as The Seven. Each member of the Seven is a thinly veiled analogue for a familiar Marvel or DC superhero, inviting viewers to imagine what would happen if someone like Superman or Aquaman, instead of using their powers for good, did that thing which, frankly, seems far more likely: exploit those abilities for personal gain.

GAMING

OBSERVATION really only works if you've already seen 2001: A Space Odyssey. If you have, then you'll get infinitely more enjoyment out of this intriguing and at times bewildering sci-fi adventure that places you in the digital shoes - and behind the digital eyes - of a spaceship's mysteriously evolving on-board Artificial Intelligence, nicknamed HAL SAM. As SAM, you must try to survive a doomsday scenario in which most of your crew are dead and your ship is falling to pieces. Much of Observation is confusing by design; other parts are confusing by mistake. But even when the going gets seriously weird and the glitches threaten to derail the experience - at one point, I spent ten minutes floating blissfully outside the spaceship before realizing that I wasn't actually supposed to be there - it never ceases to be compelling. CUBE, CUBE, PYRAMID, DOUBLE ARROW, INFINITY, amirite?

UNTITLED GOOSE GAME asks the question no one dared ask: what's it like to see the world through the eyes of a chaos-fomenting waterfowl terrorizing the inhabitants of a quaint English village? As I wrote in my review, the answer is the most absurdly low-stakes stealth-puzzle adventure this side of Sneak 'n' Snore. Nipping little boys on the shirttails, stealing carrots from a cranky old farmer: does life get any better than this?

When you're tired of reality, it's nice to know that Home VR has finally landed, bringing with it a whole new way of looking at - and experiencing - the world, including that of the wonderful little puzzler A FISHERMAN'S TALE. It's not a long game, and most of it boils down to finding the right widget to stick into the right doohickey. But oh, what a joy to move around in Fisherman, its world made vastly more intriguing by VR's ability to mess with the player's concept of space (and, after a couple hours in the headset, time). Short and sweet, and one of the finest demos for what not-reality can offer.