What surprised you about pop culture this year?

As bad as 2021 could be, pop culture has given us some bright spots. Be that pretty good movies, solid video games, or enchanting novels, there have been many ways to escape from a year that has unusually jumped back and forth between the tolerably bad and the painfully painful.

In many cases the things we wanted or needed to be good ended up being good, maybe even great. You already know that a Marvel movie will give you a solid 2.5 hours of fun, or yes original on Netflix (which your company actually deserves to say exists) will usually be worth a binge on the weekends. More interesting, however, are things you didn’t expect to enjoy as much as you did, or things you initially had mixed or negative thoughts about, but eventually won. That kind of unpredictability is always welcome.

There were a few pleasant surprises for me during 2021. I didn’t fully expect it to win me over Hawkeye of all the shows, or get some pleasure from the absurd short-lived Cowboy Bebop. Like many others, I was not ready for it Mysterious to win me over completely, or for Lords of the Universe: Revelation to make He-Man’s corner of the universe worth worrying about. As for the film, I was thrilled Malignant, No time to die, and Dune, to name a few. And because of the games, I came in really busy Guardians of the Galaxy (As many people) after E3 is shown, along with a dazzling anime RPG Scarlet Nexus and a dizzying first-person shooter Boomerang X.

As we are on the last weekend of 2021, tell us: what did you watch, play or read this year that surprised you? Alternatively, is there something you thought you would want more than you actually want? Let us know in the comments below and have a nice holiday.

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