Let's start with our home turf of Mutant Reviewers From Hell, shall we? 2002 marked our sixth year of being a general menace to the populace, and it couldn't have been better. We finally obtained a dot-com addy, slapped a new coat of paint to create a bold new look, simplified the front page, enhanced the review pages, and saw the debut of PoolMan's labour of love, the MRFH web comic. In March, we became ecstatic to find out that Premiere magazine gave our site a nice little review, which caused everyone to flock to us in supermarkets asking for our autographs. And perhaps you don't realize it, but over the past year we saw our readership DOUBLE as the months went by, from a respectable 4,500 unique visits back in January of 2002 to a record high of 9,000 in October (we ended out December with 8,400 visitors that month). Compared to some incredibly popular sites that like to toss of figures like "14 million visitors last week" and such, we've got nothing. But fortunately we are extremely happy with our niche in the film reviewing world, and these figures suggest that MRFH only gets more popular as time goes on.

Oh yeah, let's not forget that it was a full year of pretty much constant updates, literally hundreds of reviews (knocking us well over 500 films reviewed), in addition to numerous features and articles and parades thrown in our honor. Maybe it doesn't seem like such a big thing, to continually pump out updates, but after six years and seeing endless other websites fall into the oblivion of despair, it's a near miracle. A nearacle! *deep breath* It was a very, very good year. I throw my hands wide to invite the entire MRFH reviewing staff to take a well-deserved bow, as their constant efforts and humor and spirit gives life to this site.

What did 2002 mean to me, movie-wise? Well, my personal moviegoing life changed quite a bit. I found myself going out to the theaters less and buying fewer DVDs, possibly to save some cash but mostly because Netflix fills my current movie needs. If you haven't checked out this rental service do it now, because Netflix was made for guys like you and me. It's a wonderful service that mails you DVDs in spiffy little envelopes (you use the same envelope to mail back, and postage has already been paid), letting you create a queue of movies you want to rent on their website. If a movie comes out in the theaters that I'm not willing to spend the effort to go to the theater, I just pop on over to Netflix and put a "save" on that title, so they mail it out when it is released on DVD. If a MRFH reader writes in telling me in no uncertain terms that I must review [title] or my whole family will die, then it's easy to just skip over to Netflix and do so.

No, this isn't a commercial for the site, but I want to be honest how my year was. I typically had a new DVD coming in the mail every other day or so, and that kept me busy watching and reviewing that I didn't have much time or desire to spend more money on movies.

In 2002 some of the most enjoyable movies I watched were on DVD. I don't know if it was the lack of expectations or my choice to ignore the mass marketing campaigns and watch whatever film I wanted to when I wanted to, but looking back over the year, I have quite a few nice memories of just curling up (in a manly fashion, probably holding a large part of a car that I was fixing) and allowing myself to be entertained. Donnie Darko, Van Wilder, The New Guy, Big Trouble, Resident Evil, Brotherhood of the Wolf... these were both the unusual and the underappreciated, and they were all mine!

For me, the high point of the year was seeing two underappreciated cult directors receive credit due by making it big in showbiz. Sam Raimi (Evil Dead series) steamrolled over just about everyone with a fun-filled Spider-Man, while Peter Jackson (Dead Alive) continued his dominance over middle earth with the rousing Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. M. Night Shyamalan continued to keep one foot in cult circles and the other in mainstream with a fairly successful (and talked-about) flick, Signs.

Common sense dictates that for every high point of the year in film, there's at least a dozen lows. I began the 2002 moviegoing year by seeing a highly-advertised dud, Orange County, making me really doubt the sanity of many film critics that gush over this type of second-hand star power vehicle. In early spring, The Fellowship of the Ring failed to get a much-deserved Best Picture Oscar, and what's worse, Russell "I'll kick everyone's butt in this room" Crowe beat that by playing the staple of Academy Award winners, The Crazy Guy.

2002 was a year where we saw many, many singers torture us with "big screen transitions" that went nowhere (Crossroads, Glitter, Walk to Remember, Queen of the Damned, On The Line), and I think I speak for everyone when I say it's time to nip that trend in the bud. Another disappointment that sticks out in my mind is seeing a fairly likable Vin Diesel muck around in XXX, which was touted as a new type of spy flick, but was just as predictable and clichéd as James Bond's traditional outings.

Yet, the lowest of the low in '02 must go to sequels. I seriously cannot remember a movie year that had so many sequels released, and nearly all be such complete duds. Let's name them off: Star Wars: Attack of the Clones (pros: fightin' Yoda, cons: excruciating romance), Austin Powers in Goldmember, Star Trek: Nemesis, Jason X, Men In Black II, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, and Die Another Day. Some were definitely worse than others, but none of those movies will be seeing my repeat play list in the next decade. Plus, let's not overlook Eddie Murphy's unenviable talent for starring in not one, but three of the most crappy movies this year: Showtime, Pluto Nash and I Spy.

So really, it was just another year. I'll still be playing catch-up with 2002 Netflix titles for the next year, but that's okay. It gives me a hobby.

Next: News From The Canadian Front >>