We’re at that time of the year when Best Of lists are being put together, and everyone expects to see carefully curated, well-researched, numbered lists of the cream of whatever crop is being discussed: books, music, TV shows, music, whatever. In theory, it’s something that I’m currently doing for comics, for THR, but there’s just one problem: I can’t really remember what happened this year, as opposed to last, or even next year. My personal Best of 2020 feels more like a Best of Something Close To 2020 But Really, What Is Time If You Think About It, Anyway, No, Really Think About It?
This isn’t a new thing; the fact that I discover work months after its release — and am lucky enough to read other things far ahead of when it arrives in stores — means that I’m always struggling a little with the timeframes of my Best Of lists. (This is the first year in… at least the last three or four, where I only have to create one list instead of two, now that I’m not writing for Wired anymore. I think I’m grateful for that, but I’m not too sure.) But it’s a problem exacerbated by COVID making my sense of time particularly screwy this year, without doubt.
The pandemic has skewed my thinking along the Best Of lines in other, less obvious, ways, as well. It meant no comic conventions, which has left me unexposed to work that I would’ve discovered there, as well as robbed me of conversations that almost always sway my opinions and get me to try things I wouldn’t otherwise. The lack of any true 2020 “buzz book” is almost certainly down to the absence of comic conventions to help build consensus, I’m sure.
And so, here I am, passively — well, perhaps a little more active than that — trying to remember what came out when, and whether they deserve to be placed in the plastic pantheon that is a Best Of list, while also missing the shows I didn’t attend, and the conversations I didn’t have. It feels very 2020, if nothing else.