brendan halpin

Welcome to my annual “best of” roundup! Which is of course actually “favorite” of 2024 because there are no objective criteria for art!

Favorite TV of 2024: “A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder”,” Netflix 2024: Here’s my original review:

absolutely top-notch noir mystery in which a quiet, teetotaling good student turns into a relentless obsessive while investigating a five-year-old murder in her town. Emma Myers, who was great in Wednesday, is great here too. Why did they cast an American actor as a small town British gal? I don’t know! Why did Tom Friggin’ Hiddleston play Hank Williams, for chrissakes? Ahem. Anyway, great performances top to bottom, one twist I saw coming three episodes away, a couple of others I did not, and a lot of great moral ambiguity as protagonist Pip is challenged about her motivations for pursuing a case whose resolution is going to harm a lot of people. Oh yeah, great queer representation too, and, like most noir, this is concerned with the abuse of power. Riveting—my highest recommendation.

Honorable mention: Elsbeth, CBS 2024. Okay, so this is not prestige TV. What is is, though, is an absolutely fantastic update on the Columbo formula. Every week there’s a guest star who we see commit murder, and then Carrie Preston, a lawyer kind of inexplicably working with the NYPD (I mean, the phrase “consent decree” is thrown around a lot, but it’s never fully clear exactly what she’s doing there, and who cares?), solves it in part by being both underestimated and annoying. Carrie Preston is great, there is no annoying will-they-or-won’t-they element (lookin’ at you, High Potential), and it’s an utterly charming, fun series. The guest stars seem to be having a lot of fun as well. Jesse Tyler Ferguson was a standout. Copaganda factor is medium—Elsbeth is not a cop and is far more competent than the cops she works with, but the cops she works with are all good-hearted and caring, but as long as you remember my Middle Earth formula*, you’ll be fine.) *It’s okay to watch shows with elves in them as long as you don’t start thinking elves are real. So it is with shows that feature diligent, caring, hardworking cops with a passion for justice.

Favorite Book of 2024: Silver Nitrate by Sylvia Moreno-Garcia. (2023, but I read it this year) Cursed old film? Occult cults? An actually beautiful friendship between two deeply flawed protagonists? I’m all in! So yes, I love the whole “somebody unearthed this cursed piece of media and complications ensue” trope, but what really made this one a standout (and what really helps sell the supernatural elements) is the fact that everything in this book happens to characters who feel very much like real people. Their motivation for continuing to investigate when things start to get dangerous is realistic, and I actually found the friendship at the center of the novel quite moving, as these two fuckups don’t have much, but they’ll always have each other. Great stuff.

Honorable Mentions: Secrets Typed in Blood and Murder Crossed Her Mind by Stephen Spotswood. Have I mentioned how much I love the Pentecost and Parker mysteries? Okay, well, I really love them. In post-WWII New York, World’s Greatest Detective Lilian Pentecost has MS and wants to train up a successor, so she hires circus roustabout Will (but girl Will) Parker to do legwork she can’t really do anymore. The mysteries always resolve in satisyfing fashion, but, as in all the best mystery series, the deepest pleasure is in spending time with two delightful characters. Great queer representation too!

Favorite Movie of 2024: Wicked, 2024. Movies have the power to completely transport us to another world, and they very rarely use it. (Indeed, Fellowship of the Ring was the last time I felt like a filmmaker created a world that felt completely immersive.) Great music, great performances, and despite its staggering 160-minute runtime, it never drags or feels long. Believe the hype!

Honorable Mention: Late Night with the Devil, 2024. Despite a plot hole you could drive a Ford F-250 through, the 70’s aesthetic and the performances made this a very enjoyable horror movie that was actually creepy.

Favorite Album of 2024: Couch Slut, You Could Do it Tonight. I’ve written about this at least once this year, but got-damn this is a great record. It’s not conventional or easy to listen to, but it is an incredibly powerful, challenging work of art. A lot of “extreme” music is actually very conventional and safe—some heavy riffs, some incredibly treble-y solos, and some lyrics about Satan or Vikings or some shit. Couch Slut is not conventional or safe, and it’s thrilling to encounter a band reanimating the corpse of rock and roll to make something weird and difficult and transformative.

Honorable Mentions:

Zombina and the Skeletones, The Call of Zombina

Teen Mortgage, Teen Mortgage

The Edge, From the Middle of Nowhere

Nick Lowe and Los Straightjackets, Indoor Safari

X, Smoke & Fiction

Favorite Concert of 2024: Three-way tie!

X at the Wilbur Theater, Boston

Nick Lowe & Los Straightjackets, Brighton Music Hall, Boston

Stevie Wonder, United Center, Chicago

Favorite Meal of 2024. Actually Ever: Dirt Candy, New York City, NY.

A splurge—went to celebrate my older daughter’s completing her master’s degree. Chef Amanda Cohen creates stunning works of art out of vegetables. They’re not just stunning visually, but taste-wise as well, and there’s a really impressive degree of creativity on display in each of the 10 (!) courses. I approached the manager at the end of the meal and said, “I am fifty-five years old, and I just want you to know that this is the best meal I have ever had in my life.”

Favorite Things By Me of 2024: All available for free!

I dropped sentimental favorite heist story “Cookie Heist” here on this very blog!

How I Found Her, a novel about how a middle-aged woman’s life falls apart when she’s falsely accused of killing the woman her husband left her for.

I See Red, a high school noir about a kid who’s good at violence but doesn’t like it taking on rape culture in his high school.