The 50 best special effects in all of cinema. Contemporary feminism explored through Claws and Handmaid’s Tale. A retrospective about working on The Jerry Springer Show. Sixty minutes of K-pop. Movies where Matt Damon makes a friend. 2018 was a tumultuous year, but The A.V. Club’s commitment to pop culture, and those who love it, remains consistent no matter what. Below are 19 of the pieces The A.V. Club staff is proudest of this year.
The 50 greatest special effects movies of all time
“Consider this a chronological cataloguing of the movies that still dazzle and amaze and disgust us; whether achieved through purely physical/organic means, through the digital magic available at a mouse click, or through something as simple as a cut, the effects within them hold a monopoly on our imaginations.” —by The A.V. Club
The 25 best set pieces of Steven Spielberg’s career
“Broadly defined, a set piece is a thriller within a film, a self-contained showstopper-slash-showcase whose success depends in large part on a director’s chops. Since the 1970s, Steven Spielberg has reigned as its Hollywood master; regardless of what one thinks of his sentimental or narrative instincts, it’s hard to deny that the man knows spectacle.”—by The A.V. Club
Matt Damon is here to make friends: 11 movies where the actor finds a buddy (or 10)
“In celebration of our favorite Harvard dropout’s 48th birthday, we give you 11 movies in which Matt Damon kicks it with some old comrades or finds a few new familiars. Turns out the friends Matt Damon made along the way were… the friends Matt Damon made along the way.”—by The A.V. Club
8 graphic novels to get your kids hooked on comics
“Comics for kids are an awesome gateway—you want to get your children closer to chapter books, and they provide lots of visual stimulation along with some basic reading comprehension.” —by The A.V. Club
On Mission: Impossible, Edge Of Tomorrow, and the morbid star power of Tom Cruise
“In the face of such gleefully reckless self-endangerment, the temptation to psychoanalyze can be overwhelming. Is Cruise just a sensation junkie, an Evel Knievel with a nine-digit budget to splurge on his daredevil addiction? Is all of this a protracted midlife crisis, the way for an aging movie star to stave off dread about his advancing years and waning celebrity?”—by A.A. Dowd
Netflix created a monster with its Cloverfield stunt, and Altered Carbon won’t be the last victim
“The streaming service sacrificed a potentially more rewarding and lucrative series for the quick-fix rush of its Cloverfield marketing gimmick (with a much less positively reviewed product, at that), and like many who buy into the hype for J.J. Abrams’ mystery-box style of storytelling, they may soon find it empty at the center.”—by Alex McLevy
Here’s a look at the Chicago city block that Hollywood loves to destroy
“If you like going to Hollywood blockbusters—The Dark Knight, Divergent, and most recently, Rampage—there’s one city block that by now should look very familiar. Located at East Upper Wacker Drive between North State and North Wabash in The A.V. Club’s hometown of Chicago, the block is a one-of-a-kind collection of architectural styles gathered on opposite sides of the Chicago River.”—by Baraka Kaseko, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky
This season, The Handmaid’s Tale is making the connection between Gilead and present-day America explicit
“The Handmaid’s Tale is showing us: See how these people experienced the same things you experience, and see where all this can lead. See how the commonplace marginalization and oppression we’re accustomed to, how the rollback of civil rights, could look in a worst-case scenario.”—Caitlin PenzeyMoog