I started the year doing such a good job tracking my various cultural pursuits: the books purchased and those actually read the music I dug into deeper than just a single listen, the movies and TV shows that occupied my thoughts long after the viewing was done.
And then it all fell off about halfway through. But I still have a pretty good handle on The Year That Was, even if there were a few “Oh yeah, forgot about that one!” moments as I read through other Best of 2023 lists.
So these rankings aren’t scientific or even in any kind of ascending or descending order, but rather just groupings of things I enjoyed throughout the year.
Books
I think the best book I’ve read all year is the one I’m ending the year with, and that is Tananarive Due’s The Reformatory. The sibling relationship at its heart was deeply moving and the sense of dread I felt for what might happen to 12-year-old Robbie in the reformatory, was pronounced. A ghost story like none I’ve read before.
On the darker side, I really enjoyed Grady Hendrix’s How to Sell a Haunted House, Stephen King’s Holly, S.A. Cosby’s All the Sinner’s Bleed, and Chuck Wendig’s Black River Orchard, which was a perfect Fall read, especially if you want your Fall read to include folk horror and small-town cults and an aftertaste of a lasting wariness of apples. Owen King’s The Curator was released in 2023 and was one of the best books I’ve read in a while, but I technically finished it in December ‘22 and so didn’t include it here but I could’ve and probably should’ve, it was a captivating read in any year.
On the lighter side, Gabrielle Zevin’s Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow and the first of Richard Osman’s four The Thursday Murder Club were perfectly comfortable and satisfying reads, and I enjoyed the dive into an alternate Hollywood history in Anthony Marra’s Mercury Pictures Presents.
Among non-fiction books, the ones I dug the most were David Grann’s gripping The Wager, the ‘80s Sly vs Arnold rundown of The Last Action Heroes, the history of Marvel’s movie efforts in MCU, and Quentin Tarantino’s Cinema Speculation, which was his uniquely encyclopedic walk-through of New Hollywood movies.
Two of the most fun books I read in 2023 are 2024 releases: Rio Youers’ latest slam, The Bang-Bang Sisters (July 24), and Duane Swierczynski’s darkly funny California Bear (January 9). Both authors consistently deliver books that encourage and reward rapid page-turning and these are both among their best.
I tend to avoid ranking comics and graphic novels in any way since I’m so close to them in one way or another, but always earning a place atop any such list are the graphic novels by Ed Brubaker & Sean Phillips. As good as that team has been for years now, I think their books are even more unique and striking thanks to the addition of colorist Jacob Phillips to the team. Their 2023 offerings, Night Fever and Where the Body Was, stack up nicely alongside their Criminal series, Reckless, and all the others.
And as with every year, I end this one with a sizable to-be-read stack I’m eager to find time to dig into. One of those books also features my favorite cover of the year, too. Even if I didn’t already like Daniel Kraus’ books, I’d still find this cover irresistible:
Music
Spotify Wrapped may think it knows me and my tastes but I find that its annual recap is usually pretty off-target. Maybe it’s because so much of my listening is spread across not just Spotify but also Apple Music, Bandcamp, little bits of Amazon Music, and vinyl, but I find that Wrapped never quite has a proper handle on my year. There’s no way Miley Cyrus topped my listening for two years in a row, really.
If anything, the bands I think I spent the most time with all year were Rival Sons, who released two albums in ‘23 (Lightbringer, the stronger of the two) and Royal Blood (whose Back to the Water Below continues their streak of, basically, releasing nothing but great music since their start). Also in heavy rotation where Noah Kahan, Low Cut Connie, Jelly Roll, Lil Yachty, boygenius, Paramore, Inhaler, Lori McKenna, The Sherlocks, the reunited Gaslight Anthem’s latest; Black Pumas’ Chronicles of a Diamond, the always consistent Jason Isbell’s Weathervanes, Margo Price’s Strays, recent discoveries The Teskey Brothers and Zach Bryan (who seems to be studying Isbell’s every move but it works for me), and even Olivia Rodrigo (sorry, Miley, but I think Guts earned more listens than Endless Summer Vacation).
On the nostalgia front, Depeche Mode, Madness, Duran Duran, The Rolling Stones, and Nas put out credible reminders of why we should all still be glad they’re around and releasing solid music.
On the live front, maybe because they were the final two shows of the year for me, but the two December shows I caught — The Airborne Toxic Event with the San Diego Symphony, and Queens of the Stone Age’s show at SDSU were particularly thrilling ways to end a pretty robust concert year. Although the musical highlight was taking my daughter to Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour in Los Angeles. We also caught Harry Styles and Danny Elfman (separately, I mean, not on a double bill), and had a chance at seeing one more together, Kiss’ final LA show, but she probably wisely passed on that one.
There were a lot of other good shows — Frank Turner, Blackberry Smoke, and A.J. Croce singing his father Jim’s songs were three particularly solid shows over a 2-week time, which was a nice way to end the summer concert season. I’m sure the Eras Tour will make for the best lasting memory due to the smile it put on both my kid’s face and mine throughout the nearly 4-hour performance.
Movies & Streaming
On the TV front, time all feels very fluid but I think all of these shows debuted in 2023: Poker Face, Shrinking, Beef, and The Diplomat all worked well for me, and all have me looking forward to more (with the exception of Beef, which I don’t believe is coming back for more, nor should it).
As final seasons go, Succession, Ted Lasso, The Other Two, and Winning Time all offered generally satisfying finales that offered plenty of reminders of I enjoyed ‘em all the way through. The completely engaging Winning Time ending at least one season too early—and with a finale that concludes with a Celtics win, of all terrible things—is among the worst calls a ref has ever made during a basketball game.
I know I saw a dozen or more movies in theaters this year but I can’t say that many of them made a lasting mark. Oddly, Godzilla Minus One is probably the one that looms largest for me, because it was effective, gripping, and emotionally affecting in ways I never would’ve expected from a Godzilla flick.
Movies like Oppenheimer and Barbie made for good theater-going experiences, and I thought John Wick 4 was stunningly shot. But this was the year I skipped a few comic-book movies or wished I would have; although the Spider-Verse sequel and The Marvels were both fun.
I did see other big movies and indie films alike in theaters — I do still mostly enjoy the movie theater experience but it’s getting harder to, isn’t it? The 30 minutes of trailers before every movie is taxing (and one of the reasons I’m waiting for the streaming release of the over-3-hour Killers of the Flower Moon) but not too many have lingered in my head all year.
This is partly on me: as I say, I’ve not yet seen Killers, or The Creator, or Past Lives; I did instead go see movies like Thanksgiving (a perfectly fun if maybe a bit too funny slasher throw-back), Scream VI, and Five Nights at Freddie’s, because I like seeing horror flicks with audiences even if the movies themselves aren’t always so great.
The final Indiana Jones was perfectly fine, and Ferrari was a solid if not landmark Michael Mann outing, but I’ve thought more about Alexander Payne’s latest, The Holdovers, than I have either of those two. Which again says more about me than the overall slate of movies released this year, I’m sure.
Holiday Close-Outs
Finally, before we close out 2023 entirely, a couple last things: the fourth side of my office spinner rack’s holiday covers included these comics. I tend to like a solid mix of sentimental, funny, and mean-spirited images on each side. Kinda weird that guns being pointed at Santa’s face—or Santa being the one doing the knife- or pistol- pointing—was a sub-theme of its own on the holiday covers this year but so it goes.
But now that the holiday is past, those have to give way to the few New Years covers I added in to help ring in 2024. I only own the first three of these so I clearly need to get busy tracking down others before the end of ‘24.
But as 2023 gives way to 2024, I’d like these covers to stand in as a visual wish for the happiest of new years to all of you. Based on the many extremes that 2023 threw at me, I have no idea what to expect from ‘24 but expectations aside, my hope is that it throws more good than bad your way throughout. Thanks for indulging all of my comic-related nonsense here (and elsewhere) all year.
Have a great New Year.
Sad that I wasn’t mentioned, as we almost got far-too-expensive tickets to see Duran Duran in May. But no worrries! We’ll always have “Mixed Emotions.” I’m thinking about picking up one or two of the novels based on your recommendations. Probably.
Seriously, thx for a great Year in Review! Loved it! HNY to you and yours. I’ll give chubby LeBon a hug for you.