the things that brought me nerdy joy in 2021
So, Tordotcom has this annual round-ups of all the things that brought them nerdy joy, and I've been wanting to do similar posts on my blog for awhile. So I figure this is as good a time as any to recall my favourite things in 2021.
Jet watching Kimmie's recital in Cowboy Bebop
I mentioned this in my newsletter about the live action series, but yes, this is still the one scene that makes watching this whole series worth it. And one of the things that gave me the most joy this year. Oh, and special mention to Faye's queerness, of course! And John Cho. Three things I will miss now that Bebop has been cancelled.
Yelena explaining hysterectomies to Alexei
There are a lot of things to love about the Black Widow movie, and all of them are related to Yelena. I just love the MCU version of her character so much. Anyway, after the terrible handling of Natasha's character (IMO) in Age of Ultron, where her entire personality seemed to get boiled down to "I am a woman but I can't make babies, and this makes me a monster" - she couldn't even say what happened to her without having to tiptoe around the subject - Yelena's attitude felt refreshing.
Other gems from Black Widow - every time Yelena assesses whether something is a cool or not cool way to die, Yelena confronting the family about how she felt regarding their abandonment, Yelena mimicking and mocking Natasha's superhero poses, Yelena talking about her super cool jacket with its many many pockets.
Just Yelena, okay? She brings me great joy. Right now she is my favourite in the MCU.
book clubs and resource sharing
Goodbye Facebook, hello Discord. From January to June we had our Megan Whalen Turner's Queen's Thief book discussions, and then we started - although we never finished - on Susan Cooper's Dark Is Rising books. The book chats were fun, but what I loved even more was us getting sidetracked and talking about folklore, and sharing books and essays and podcasts over on Discord. The last couple of months have been quiet because the book club kind of tapered out, but it was really fun while it lasted. I'm trying to finish the last two Susan Coopers by myself this year, so that I can go on reading the other books I had planned to choose for next year - Katherine Addison's Goblin Emperor and Witness for the Dead, Maggie Stiefvater's Raven Cycle, and Marissa Meyer's Lunar Chronicles. And/or Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles of Prydain just because.
S.J. Whitby's Cute Mutants
Honestly, if money weren't an issue I'd be reading a lot more indie stuff, especially if they're all THIS good. Cute Mutants is a YA superhero story that is very obviously inspired by the X-Men comics, and honestly, even though so many others have tried, this is the one that really, truly works in my book. I've only read the first book so far (these books are EXPENSIVE) but it's so hilarious and cute and occasionally gross and full of X-Men references and I will kill anyone who hurts the Cute Mutant kids okay.
Speaking of the X-Men...
Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men
The greatest podcast to ever exist, seriously. I believe I started listening to Jay & Miles last year; it was definitely during one of the lockdowns. While on lockdown I listened to anywhere from 3 to 8 episodes a day, at first to recall some of my old favourite stories and filling in the holes in between (since I only ever owned random issues of the Claremont era). Then I caught up to the end of the Claremont run and started to buy collections off BookXcess (if available) or read along on Marvel Unlimited. A couple of months ago I caught up to them - now they're doing the very long Onslaught arc, so it's not quite as exciting as usual, but I still click play the moment I realise a new episode is up. Any day I get to listen to the two discuss comics in the morning while feeding my cats is a better day than most.
WandaVision
After a whole flarking year of no MCU content, I almost teared up the first time I saw the Marvel intro/logo thing at the beginning of WandaVision episode 1 early this year. And, oh, what a show it was. It was like nothing the MCU had put out before, and yet it's so very much a Marvel thing. You know, while also being very like Diana Wynne Jones' Hexwood which you might know is one of my very favourite books by one of my very favourite writers. And while story-wise it takes more from older West Coast Avengers stuff, the entire vibe of this series is very like Tom King and Gabriel Hernandez Walta's Vision, which is - along with Hickman/Larraz/Silva's House of X/Powers of X, the Aja/Fraction Hawkeye run, Tom Taylor (and various artists)'s All-New Wolverine, and James Robinson (again, with various artists)'s Scarlet Witch, oh and of course the Gillen/McKelvie Young Avengers run - one of my favourite recent comics.
I guess I would have to add "from Marvel" to that, just because Tom King's Batman run and Gillen/McKelvie's The Wicked + The Divine exist. And Gillen/Hans' DIE. But yeah, in general, Vision is top-tier to me, and while WandaVision doesn't take that much from it, what it does take - the quiet suburban horror - is one of the reasons why I love the comic so much. Also, Agatha Harkness is way more amazing than I imagined an MCU version could be, and Elizabeth Olsen & Paul Bettany finally getting to show us their range, especially when it comes to comedy, was just superb.
Superman: Son of Kal-El
If you told me five years ago that I'd be obsessed with a Superman comic... I would probably believe you but also be very curious to see how a Superman story could actually keep my interest for more than a few issues. Turns out, it could when it's not Clark, but Jon Kent. I've loved him as Superboy for a few years now, but didn't like that they aged him up too quickly in the Bendis run. Now that he's taking over the mantle as Superman, though, we're finally getting a Superman whose struggles seem to be more internal, and the different way Jon approaches superheroism compared to Clark. Jon asks himself, should he do something just because he could? What does that really mean, to wield such godlike power? And what would happen if he goes after the root of the problems he faced, rather than fixing the symptoms? And of course the fact that Jon recently came out as queer - further cementing the fact that DC is now going through their All-New All-Different phase - fills me with nerdy joy.
Katy and Shang-Chi's friendship
The BFF duo I never knew I wanted! Awkwafina is just so flarking brilliant as Katy, and I love, love, LOVE the fact that this movie doesn't shove them into some stupid romance. (I also didn't expect this movie to pass the Bechdel test, but it totally did.)
Morris the Dijiang
Another thing from Shang-Chi I never knew I wanted - adorable mythological creature sidekicks. Morris is so adorable and comparable to Jeff the Land Shark to me. Speaking of Jeff...
Jeff the Land Shark
I already love Jeff from Kelly Thompson's West Coast Avengers (oh! another of my recent Absolute Faves) and Leah Williams' Gwenpool Strikes Back!, but this year we were gifted with the Marvel Unlimited digital comic, It's Jeff!
It's not set in the 616 canon but I'm totally fine with that because Jeff deserves more love.
Arcane: League of Legends
I'm not sure if nerdy joy is quite the right way to describe this rather grim series, but story aside, I binge-watched this in two days with my niece, and I am now super invested in these characters from a game I don't even play. And the art! The art and animation definitely gives me lots of nerdy joy.
I kept thinking, what if the D&D franchise gets this level of effort put into it, it would be a thing of beauty. I would so very much love an animation this good about the legend of Drizzt.
ACNH 2.0
Again, this is something that I already spent an entire newsletter on, so I won't spend too much time on it. But this expansion is just so good at giving us new things to do/experience and I keep finding new surprises to love.
Wayne Family Adventures
I was a bit skeptical when DC announced that they were going to start doing Webtoons - not because I look down on Webtoons, but because a lot of DC's stuff are grimdark and take themselves so seriously and I can't imagine them in a Webtoon format. But Wayne Family Adventures is... really very good? I think it's the kind of comic that even non-DC fans can enjoy, but of course, if you're a BatFam fan (like I am) it is such an amazing gift.
getting obsessed about "new" Webtoons
While I enjoy Webtoons, I find keeping up with too many titles kind of stressful, so I tend to just read my few favourites. This year, though, I discovered "new" (not really new, but new-to-me) Webtoons and became obsessed enough to binge on The Remarried Empress and Let's Play all day long.
Yelena and Kate Bishop
The duo I never thought I needed, part two. I love Yelena, and every scene with her in episode 5 of Hawkeye are my favourite scenes in this whole series so far. Especially her being both scary and funny, making macaroni in Kate Bishop's burned down apartment. I want these two to team up!
Side note: the scenes of Kate and Clint (and Pizza Dog) being a dysfunctional family of three are also excellent.
queer romance novels
I enjoy romance novels. And for a time, I would say I enjoyed romance novels - because, the older I got, my lower my tolerance gets for problematic cishet BS. I can barely reread books that used to be faves, and in the recent years I've bought books that I would usually love just to DNF them because they were so flarking boring. (Example: Emily Henry's Beach Read.) But this year we got Casey McQuiston's amazing One Last Stop and Alison Cochrun's The Charm Offensive and Lana Harper's Payback's A Witch and Ashley Herring Blake's Delilah Green Doesn't Care and Annabeth Albert's Out of Character, and these are just some of the romances that I loved this year. Now can all of them get picked up for live action adaptations, please.
[redacted]
I would love to talk about Spider-Man: No Way Home, which brought me SO MUCH NERDY JOY, but it's still very new and I don't want to spoil anyone, so let's just say that there is so much to love about this movie and even though it's not my favourite MCU movie (that is probably still Thor: Ragnarok) it is in my top ten. Maybe even my top 5, I don't know. I'd need to rewatch it a couple of times before I know for sure.
And... here are some 2022 stuff that I'm really looking forward to:
So many books, of course. Among them: Heat Wave by T.J. Klune, In the Serpent's Wake by Rachel Hartman, Akata Woman by Nnedi Okorafor, and The Grief of Stones by Katherine Addison.
Destiny of X, the second Krakoan era of X-Men
Ms. Marvel finally getting her own series on Disney+
STAY SAFE!