In the 80s, I started a magazine called “Animato!” that later grew quite large and popular. I got to meet and interview great animators like Chuck Jones and Ralph Bakshi but later sold the magazine, and it went on to even bigger successes until the internet killed all magazines.
So I’m still an animation fan, but it’s basically impossible to see all the films and all the animated TV shows these days unless you’re a full-time animator or animation historian, I guess.
These days, with so much CGI, we can debate what an “animated film” even is, but generally the accepted definition is that the main characters must be animated — not just the monsters or effects. (And “motion capture” doesn’t count.)
So here’s my annual end-of-the-year list of best and worst animated films (based on their Rotten Tomatoes score). I used to only include films that were released to theaters, but thanks to the pandemic, that no longer applies. Ties are broken by number of reviews, and you have to have at least 10 reviews to make my list.
Senator Sinema just announced she would quit the Democrats to become an independent Senator.
She knew Democrats would run someone against her in the next primary. Switching to independent was a smart move politically — it allows her to drain votes from both parties and have a real chance of getting re-elected. She could win with just 34% of the vote. (On the other hand, she’ll now be attacked by both parties.)
This won’t really change much in the Senate, though.
If she caucuses with the Democrats (which she should do if she wants to keep her committee assignments), we’ll have 51 – 49, which allows for more stuff to get passed and moved out of committees at least.
If she caucuses with the Republicans, then we’re still 50 – 50.
If she joins neither, then we have 50 Democrats, 49 Republican, and one Sinema, and that’s just as good as if we had 51.
So it won’t really change things too much.
In the long run, she’ll probably not run for re-election and instead become a lobbyist.
Oh great, now I’m imaging a Sinema singing “Let’s go out to the lobby” at the cinema
Here’s a former President of the United States claiming that there was massive fraud (there wasn’t, and interviews have shown that he knows that) claiming we should terminate “all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution” in order to chuck democracy and name him dictator.
Trumpies don’t care about the laws or our Constitution (except the 2nd Amendment, which they constantly misinterpret). They’re perfectly fine with having a dictator in charge, as long as it’s their dictator.
Can you imagine how Republicans would scream if a Democrat suggested suspending the Constitution in order to have them named President after they lost an election?
What a sad state our country has become, where a large percentage of our population claims to be patriotic while supporting the most unpatriotic thoughts imaginable.
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a comic strip writer. I drew my own strips, and got to draw them for the school newspaper and everything. I collected all the comic strip collections I could get (I still have most of them) and especially loved Peanuts.
Peanuts was revolutionary in many ways — most comic strips at the time were adventure strips, with ongoing, complicated plots. Schulz introduced a simpler, gag-a-day approach that became the model for comic strips to come.
Charles M. Schulz would have been 100 years old today, and all his comic strip friends decided to honor him and his great influence. Here are a few of my favorites.
I’d like to just take a minute to thank Republicans.
Without your nomination of radical crazies, without your Supreme Court taking away rights, without your treasonous MAGA candidates threatening to steal any election they don’t like, we never would have kept the Senate, won more governors and state houses, and prevented you from winning dozens of seats in the House.
Keep it up! Good work!
