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- 2009 Recap
My Slightly Opinionated 2009 Recap
2009 has been a rollercoaster year. We’ve seen scandals which entertained us, saddened us, and made us wonder what in the world was going on. There were shocking deaths, outrageous wins in competitive shows, rises to fame, remarkable and movies and television shows, technological trends, memorable music, and so much more. Where to start? I suppose in January.
We saw the releases of many hit films including comedies such as BrideWars, Paul Blart: Mall Cop, New in Town; and for kids: Hotel for Dogs. Scary movies started off the year with The Uninvited, The Unborn, and My Bloody Valentine was released in 3D. The season premiere of American Idol also began in January, which was only the beginning of what would become a media frenzy by the time the finale rolled around in May. Many people took a moment of silence for John Travolta’s son, Jett, who passed away unexpectedly on January 2, 2009. When Nadya Suleman gave birth to octuplets on January 26 caught the attention of many, and the media jumped at the chance for a new face on their tabloids.
February brought us the season 2 return of Chuck and Heroes, as well as the season 2 premiere of Medium. In March, only 2 movies caught my attention: I Love You, Man and Knowing. I’m at a loss for other things which occurred in February. Oh, there was also The Amazing Race 14 which premiered in February. Edit: February also brought us the incident surrounding Michael Phelps and his bong incident.
The third month of this year brought us the season 8 premieres of Dancing with the Stars and The Apprentice. I was shocked, along with many others, when Natasha Richardson died on March 18th after hitting her head in a skiing accident.
In April, Britain’s Got Talent had their season 3 premiere, and the world was introduced to Susan Boyle. She was runner-up in the end, but had the most-viewed YouTube video of the year. Mid-April, during the Miss USA pageant, blogger Perez Hilton asked Carrie Prejean if she thought same-sex marriage should be legalized in all states, to which she answered “Well I think it's great that Americans are able to choose one way or the other. We live in a land where you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite marriage. And, you know what, in my country, in my family, I think that I believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman, no offense to anybody out there.But that’s how I was raised and I believe that it should be between a man and a woman.” Many were outraged by her answer, and she’s even stated that she felt it was the cause of her losing. What do you think about her answer? In April, there were the releases of a few movies which caught my attention. These included Adventureland, 17 Again, and Crank: High Voltage, which is the sequel to Crank. April also featured the release of the well-liked Hannah Montana movie, which I have not seen and will not comment on.
May also had many surprising incidents. Adam Lambert became the runner-up of American Idol, with Kris Allen as the winner. Jon and Kate stars of the reality show featuring their twins and sextuplets had their season 5 premiere and seemed to be in an uncomfortable patch of their relationship. For movies in May, there were a lot that interested me: Ghosts of Girlfriend’s Past was cute and enjoyable for the most part and I reviewed in the MovieBlog; I have yet to see the following movies, but have heard good things about them, or they are ones that I want to see despite reviews I have heard: X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Little Ashes, Star Trek, Angels and Demons, Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, and Up. I particularly want to see Little Ashes and Robert Pattinson’s portrayal of Salvador Dali.
The half-way marking month of the year, June. In my eyes, it was a month full of surprises, shockers, and probably had the most things going on from other months. We lost many loved, appreciated, and famous stars in June: on June 3rd, David Carradine; June 25th, Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson; June 28th, Billy Mayes. That month was the first time I can remember exactly where I was and what I was doing when I found out about the death of someone. June had other notable moments, in television and movies. There were season finales of Medium, According to Jim, Pushing Daisies; Law & Order and “Law & Order: SVU. We were introduced to new shows, and reintroduced to ones we already loved. For the former, we saw Royal Pains, The Listener, Nurse Jackie, along with others. For the latter, we saw Burn Notice, Army Wives, The Closer, True Blood, and The Secret Life of the American Teenager. June also brought memorable movies: Away We Go, The Hangover, Food, Inc., The Proposal, Year One (also reviewed in the MovieBlog), Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, My Sister’s Keeper, and The Hurt Locker, to name a few. June also featured my birthday.
In July, the football world especially was shocked by the murder-suicide of ex-quarterback Steve McNair by his mistress, Sahel Kazemi. At the beginning of July, we were introduced to the television series 10 Things I Hate About You which was based off the movie. Season 2 of Leverage and the season premiere of Dark Blue were seen mid-July. Big Brother 11 came about in July, with a number of twists to surprise us all. Season finales of Harper’s Island, Eli Stone, and The Bachelorette also appeared. Movies in July were also big hits: Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs, Public Enemies, Bruno, I Love You, Beth Cooper, (500) Days of Summer, Orphan, Funny People, and The Ugly Truth. Most memorable, for me at least, was the release of the 6th Harry Potter installment: Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. Better than movie number 5, it was still a disappointment for me, being a huge fan of the books. I’m definitely glad that they are splitting the 7th movie into two.
Late August brought the news of the death of Senator Ted Kennedy due to cancer, and his death is mourned by many. Other highlights of August included movies such as Julie & Julia, District 9, Inglourious Basterds, Shorts, Halloween II, and The Final Destination. We also had season 4 premieres of Lincoln Heights and Who Wants to be a Millionaire, and season 6 premiere of Project Runway. Series finales of So You Think You Can Dance and Dirty Sexy Money also occurred during August. The fall season of shows was highly anticipated.
September began the fall season of shows, and it definitely filled up the TiVos and DVRs of many people. Monday nights, we had Dancing with the Stars, Castle, How I Met Your Mother, Accidently on Purpose, Big Bang Theory, Two and a Half Men, House, Lie to Me, and many others. Tuesdays were taken by NCIS and NCIS: Los Angeles, and the new season of So You Think You Can Dance, and more. Wednesdays were filled with a lot of comedy shows, especially on ABC. This included The Middle, and Modern Family; Gary Unmarried, and The New Adventures of Old Christine on CBS. Fox hosted Glee on Wednesday nights, which was a big hit. Thursdays were full of drama, including FlashForward, Grey’s Anatomy, Survivor: Samoa, Vampire Diaries, among others; CBS focused on comedies that night: The Office, and Parks and Recreation included. Fridays featured shows such as Supernanny, Ugly Betty, Ghost Whisperer, Numbers, Dollhouse, and Law & Order. The Amazing Race 15 began in September, and aired on Sundays. September rolled out movies like 9, not to be confused with District 9; Jennifer’s Body, Fame, Capitalism: A Love Story, and best of all: Paranormal Activity.
October was full of excitement, mainly due to one huge hoax. On October 15th, the world paused as they watched the story of Falcon Heene pan out. Now widely known as Balloon Boy, Falcon Heene was claimed to have been in a homemade flying saucer, after having climbed in before the launch of the UFO. The balloon traveled over 50 miles and spanned 3 counties, and the Denver International Airport was shut down. When the flying saucer finally landed, six year old Falcon was nowhere to be found, and the worst was suspected. The little boy was later in the afternoon found to have been hiding in the family’s garage, and relief flooded everyone. That night, in an interview with Wolf Blitzer, Falcon was asked why he had stayed hidden, to which he replied, “You guys said that, um, we did this for a show.” Suspicions then immediately turned to the entire thing being a hoax concocted by parents Richard and Mayumi Heene, done for a reality show attempt. On November 13th, Richard Heene pled guilty to the charge of attempting to influence a public servant. On December 23rd, Richard Heene was sentenced to 90 days in jail, and Mayumi 20 days in jail, which can be served on weekends. A few movies in October which caught my attention were Whip It, Zombieland, Where the Wild Things Are, Saw VI, and This is It. The fall season of television shows continued, and somewhere (give or take a month) we were introduced to V, based on the original show from the 80s.
Almost nearing the end of the year, November brought quite a few notable movies. This included Precious, The Fourth Kind, Fantastic Mr. Fox, 2012, The Blind Side, Old Dogs, and of course, the second installment of The Twilight Saga: New Moon. My movie review of New Moon will be up on the MovieBlog soon. I can’t really think of anything else from November. Thanksgiving was a pretty important day though, eh? And I haven’t mentioned any other holidays from other months yet…oops.
And now we’re in December. All month, and pretty much the day after Thanksgiving, we started seeing all kinds of Christmas-related movies all over television. The only one which I have watched was A Dog Named Christmas. Really cute, but it bothers me a little that all the commercials I see for other movies have dogs who are either yellow labs or golden retrievers. I don’t have anything against either breed, but I wouldn’t mind seeing a mutt every once in awhile. There was also Disney’s Prep and Landing, which I taped awhile back and have yet to watch, and most television shows do some kind of a holiday episode for the season. December has given us, or will soon give us, movies such as Up in the Air, Did You Hear About the Morgans?, The Lovely Bones, Avatar, Nine, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakuel, Sherlock Holmes, and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. And only a few days ago, another star was lost, and will always be remembered: Britney Murphy. Her death at such a young age and so unexpectedly surprised everyone. Since I mentioned Thanksgiving, I suppose I should also go ahead and mention that Christmas is in December, as well as, (I think) Hanukkah, and probably some other holidays which I cannot think of. Oh, and New Year’s Eve, duh.
Five significant technological trends found their way into our lives this year. The first is the increased sales of netbooks and notebooks over desktops. Laptop sales shot up this year, and the compact netbooks became widely used for their sleek design and because they are so small and lightweight, which means easy transportation. Even notebooks, which are heavier and bulkier than netbooks, had a good year. People seem to like notebooks for their easy transportation as well, at least over desktops. Not too easy to carry around a modem, is it?
We also so a huge increase in social networking: Facebook became saw a huge percentage increase in their users, and seemed to be talked about. The new privacy settings adopted by Facebook recently have caused an upset for many, and Facebook’s Director of Corporate Communications and Public Policy to suggest users lie and are under no obligation to use a photo of them for their profile picture, and users do not have to use their current city. Facebook has succeeded so well in the last year because users are to provide real names and information, so that they can be easier found. Will this privacy setting change hurt them in the long run, or will they listen to the users and make some quick changes? Twitter also saw a huge increase in its users this year, especially from celebrities. People can “follow” others, and keep up-to-date tabs on whomever else is using Twitter. Tweeting is used to describe someone who writes a message with a 140 character limit, answering the question “What are you doing”. I think it’s safe to say that Twitter is going to continue growing in 2010.
Another hit this year was cell phone upgrades, and especially their web-browsing capability. We got a good look at touch screen phones, and being able to update our Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, and all other social networking accounts. We were also widely introduced to “apps”, for both phones and the internet. These applications gave us easy access to all kinds of information, games, and a variety of other things, all at the touch of a button. On the internet, applications helped us “link” all of our social networking accounts so we could update them all at once. Is it just me, or is even the internet becoming lazy?
One major application was GPS and location-based services, right in the palm of our hand. Within seconds, we could find the closest restaurant, movie theater, gym, or just about any other building that would show up on the radar. We could get directions, traffic information, and anything needed so we could get to our destination.
Open Source software is also becoming used more, mainly for the simple fact that it is absolutely free. No cost for the initial download, no cost for upgrades, and a lot of it has quality near to name-brand products. For example, OpenOffice.org lets users download a package similar to that of Microsoft Office products, but for absolutely no cost. Firefox is a free web browser, and provides an internet service by just a simple download. Although they have been around for quite some time, more downloads and files are being compacted into “ZIP files” which basically compacts the file or download into a much smaller file. Free programs can be found through Google, for unzipping programs, which can be downloaded and used to extract the information from a ZIP file.
Beginning in January, we saw tons of music rise to the number one spot in Billboard music charts, and this has continued throughout the year, of course. Beyonce’s Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It) started off the New Year at number one, only to be surpassed a week later by Lady Gaga’s song, Just Dance. There was an inaugural concert titled “We Are One” held at the Lincoln Memorial during the inaugural celebration of Barack Obama. Nearing the end of January, Kelly Clarkson’s song My Life Would Suck Without You, made the jump from 97 to number 1during its first week of release.
February brought us the Super Bowl, with performances by Bruce Springsteen, Faith Hill, and Jennifer Hudson. The 51st Grammy Awards took place, with Song of the Year being Coldplay’s Viva la Vida, and Album of the Year being Alison Krauss and Robert Plant’s duet album, Raising Sand. At the Brit Awards, Duffy won best British female, British breakthrough artist, and best British album. Kings of Leon, FloRida, Katy Perry, and Pet Shop Boys were also recognized. The Lamb of God album, Wrath, debuted at number 2 on the Billboard 200, which made it the highest charting extreme metal album in the last 15 years. One of the most talked about events in February, however, was the assault of Rihanna by her then-boyfriend, Chris Brown.
March brought us Britney Spears’ album The Circus Starring: Britney Spears. In mid-March, Fleetwood Mac began their first worldwide tour in 5 years, as did Britney Spears post-release of her album. Beyonce began her I Am… tour near the end of March. There were also releases of albums by Royksopp, Mastodon, MF Doom, Ayumi Hamasaki, and Super Junior.
In April, Lady Gaga became the first artist since Christina Aguilera to reach the top of the Billboard Top 100 with her first two singles, Just Dance and Poker Face. Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney performed together for the first time since 2002. The world saw Susan Boyle for the first time, and her performance of I Dreamed a Dream became an instant video hit on the web. Carrie Underwood became the only country artist in history to have their first 10 singles off of their first 2 albums hit number one on the country music charts. Taylor Swift began her Fearless tour, which had already been entirely sold out.
Two day music festival, The Bamboozle, took place at the beginning of May. The 90th birthday of Pete Seeger was celebrated at Madison Square Garden. Mid-May saw the release of Greenday’s highly anticipated album, 21st Century Breakdown. Eminem released his album Relapse, which sold 600,000 copies in its first week. Tori Amos releases her 10th album, Marilyn Manson releases his 7th, and Aqua releases their first single in 9 years. Kris Allen wins American Idol over Adam Lambert, and fans were shocked, some even calling it a fix. Was it fixed, or did Kris Allen really pull through with his fans backing him?
June started with Pearl Jam being the first musical guests on The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien. Taking Back Sunday released their album, New Again, and in mid-June, the Jonas Brothers release their second album, and kick off their world tour only days later. Demi Lovato and David Archuleta also kick off their tour for the summer. Late-June saw the beginning of Warped Tour 2009, in Pomona, California.
The summer month of July brought many more music including the 10th EXIT festival, Rockstar Energy Mayhem Festival, Rock Fest, 2009 10,000 Days Festival, and the IndieTracks Festival, to name a few. Lady Gaga had 3 singles off her first album hit number one on an American Billboard chart since Avril Lavigne and Ace of Base. Two members of Panic! At the Disco leave the band to start the group The Young Veins. The memorial for Michael Jackson was held at the Staples Center, with many performances and tributes.
August brought more album releases, which included ones by Third Eye Blind, Arctic Monkeys, LeToya, and Whitney Houston. The beginning of August had Lollapalooza 2009, and the mid-August Rock Gone Wild 2009 was cancelled. Miley Cyrus released the single Party in the USA, and her first EP, The Time of Our Lives. The Sugababes released their comeback single, Get Sexy.
September was full of notable releases, including Owl City’s second album, Ocean Eyes; Muse’s new single Uprising; and Jay-Z’s eleventh album. Also, Lights released her first full-length album. Other album releases included ones by Brand New, Jeffree Star, Three Days Grace, Paramore, AFI, Mariah Carey, Breaking Benjamin, and Selena Gomez. Alice in Chains released their first album in 14 years. The Beatles had a game dedicated to them in The Beatles: Rock Band, which was like other Rock Bands, however it featured The Beatles. 2009 saw the first ever Sunset Strip Music Festival, in mid-September. The 2009 MTV Music Awards also aired in September, hosting the well-known Kanye West/Taylor Swift incident, in which he jumped up on stage and interrupted her during her acceptance speech. It didn’t take long for the internet to be full of outraged fans of both stars. Despite everything, Taylor Swift went on to continue her wins with other awards. Muse’s fifth album, and Kid Cudi’s debut album also saw releases in September. In mid-September, the Spice Girls reunited in public for dinner and drinks- minus Victoria Beckham- which raised questions about whether or not they would start performing again.
October also had noteworthy moments: Beyonce was named Woman of 2009 by Billboard, KISS released their first album in 11 years, Michael Jackson’s single This Is It was released, and later in the month his album This Is It was released. Other releases included Relient K, Shakira, Tokyo Hotel, Backstreet Boys, Nellie McKay, Rammstein, Rihanna, Emily Osment, Creed, and Train, among others.
November was full of album releases, from many much-loved bands. These included Slayer, Carrie Underwood, Melanie Fiona, Amerie, Leona Lewis, Alejandro Sanz, One Republic, Justin Bieber, Rihanna, and Lady Gaga.
One of the most controversial nights was November 22nd, and the American Music Awards. Adam Lambert performed his song, For Your Entertainment. 1500 complaints poured in to ABC about his raunchy performance. His Wednesday appearance on Good Morning America was cancelled, and the internet became a flurry of comments- some people opposing his performance, and others on his side. He has admitted that he did get carried away, and didn’t stick with what was done during rehearsal, but it was 10 or 11 o’clock at night, depending on your timezone. Parents complained that their kids had been watching, but why didn’t the parents just be responsible and change the channel? No one seemed to care that Eminem had sung about raping women, or about the revealing costumes the women performers wore, or any number of things they shouldn’t let their kids be exposed to. It’s been quite obvious that there is a definite double standard for gay men- on Barbara Walter’s yearly special, The Most Fascinating People of 2009, she stated that certain parts of Adam Lambert’s performance couldn’t be shown there (referring to his kiss with a male keyboardist, or the simulated oral sex, or both) yet Lady Gaga’s kiss to another women was freely shown during Barbara Walter’s interview with Lady Gaga, not too long prior. In my opinion, it is also obvious that ABC only wants to portray gay men as their stereotype, as can be seen on such shows as Ugly Betty and Modern Family, and they were uncomfortable with Adam Lambert’s performance. I do understand that there was stuff with the FCC and all that, but I also think they blew it totally out of proportion when other performances were just as raunchy, yet had no repercussions for those stars.
Eleven months later, we finally reach December. More album releases came this month from Gackt, Timbaland, Chris Brown, Clipse, Gucci Mane, Snoop Dogg, 30 Seconds to Mars, and Alicia Keys. In mid-December, the soundtrack to the hit movie Avatar was released. Of course, most radio stations are playing holiday music, and in a lot of public places, there are also holiday music. Sometimes I feel like it’s a sugar cookie that’s just too sweet.
I really have absolutely no idea who, if anybody, is going to have read (or skimmed) through this, but it’s been fun to write. I had no idea how much stuff went on in 2009, and this barely touches on it. Hopefully you enjoyed it as much as I did. I’m not going to proofread it right now, but if you catch any typos, let me know. If I’ve missed any television shows, movies, music, technological stuff, or anything you want me to include, please let me know and I will edit it in. Have a wonderful New Year!
We saw the releases of many hit films including comedies such as BrideWars, Paul Blart: Mall Cop, New in Town; and for kids: Hotel for Dogs. Scary movies started off the year with The Uninvited, The Unborn, and My Bloody Valentine was released in 3D. The season premiere of American Idol also began in January, which was only the beginning of what would become a media frenzy by the time the finale rolled around in May. Many people took a moment of silence for John Travolta’s son, Jett, who passed away unexpectedly on January 2, 2009. When Nadya Suleman gave birth to octuplets on January 26 caught the attention of many, and the media jumped at the chance for a new face on their tabloids.
February brought us the season 2 return of Chuck and Heroes, as well as the season 2 premiere of Medium. In March, only 2 movies caught my attention: I Love You, Man and Knowing. I’m at a loss for other things which occurred in February. Oh, there was also The Amazing Race 14 which premiered in February. Edit: February also brought us the incident surrounding Michael Phelps and his bong incident.
The third month of this year brought us the season 8 premieres of Dancing with the Stars and The Apprentice. I was shocked, along with many others, when Natasha Richardson died on March 18th after hitting her head in a skiing accident.
In April, Britain’s Got Talent had their season 3 premiere, and the world was introduced to Susan Boyle. She was runner-up in the end, but had the most-viewed YouTube video of the year. Mid-April, during the Miss USA pageant, blogger Perez Hilton asked Carrie Prejean if she thought same-sex marriage should be legalized in all states, to which she answered “Well I think it's great that Americans are able to choose one way or the other. We live in a land where you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite marriage. And, you know what, in my country, in my family, I think that I believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman, no offense to anybody out there.But that’s how I was raised and I believe that it should be between a man and a woman.” Many were outraged by her answer, and she’s even stated that she felt it was the cause of her losing. What do you think about her answer? In April, there were the releases of a few movies which caught my attention. These included Adventureland, 17 Again, and Crank: High Voltage, which is the sequel to Crank. April also featured the release of the well-liked Hannah Montana movie, which I have not seen and will not comment on.
May also had many surprising incidents. Adam Lambert became the runner-up of American Idol, with Kris Allen as the winner. Jon and Kate stars of the reality show featuring their twins and sextuplets had their season 5 premiere and seemed to be in an uncomfortable patch of their relationship. For movies in May, there were a lot that interested me: Ghosts of Girlfriend’s Past was cute and enjoyable for the most part and I reviewed in the MovieBlog; I have yet to see the following movies, but have heard good things about them, or they are ones that I want to see despite reviews I have heard: X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Little Ashes, Star Trek, Angels and Demons, Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, and Up. I particularly want to see Little Ashes and Robert Pattinson’s portrayal of Salvador Dali.
The half-way marking month of the year, June. In my eyes, it was a month full of surprises, shockers, and probably had the most things going on from other months. We lost many loved, appreciated, and famous stars in June: on June 3rd, David Carradine; June 25th, Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson; June 28th, Billy Mayes. That month was the first time I can remember exactly where I was and what I was doing when I found out about the death of someone. June had other notable moments, in television and movies. There were season finales of Medium, According to Jim, Pushing Daisies; Law & Order and “Law & Order: SVU. We were introduced to new shows, and reintroduced to ones we already loved. For the former, we saw Royal Pains, The Listener, Nurse Jackie, along with others. For the latter, we saw Burn Notice, Army Wives, The Closer, True Blood, and The Secret Life of the American Teenager. June also brought memorable movies: Away We Go, The Hangover, Food, Inc., The Proposal, Year One (also reviewed in the MovieBlog), Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, My Sister’s Keeper, and The Hurt Locker, to name a few. June also featured my birthday.
In July, the football world especially was shocked by the murder-suicide of ex-quarterback Steve McNair by his mistress, Sahel Kazemi. At the beginning of July, we were introduced to the television series 10 Things I Hate About You which was based off the movie. Season 2 of Leverage and the season premiere of Dark Blue were seen mid-July. Big Brother 11 came about in July, with a number of twists to surprise us all. Season finales of Harper’s Island, Eli Stone, and The Bachelorette also appeared. Movies in July were also big hits: Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs, Public Enemies, Bruno, I Love You, Beth Cooper, (500) Days of Summer, Orphan, Funny People, and The Ugly Truth. Most memorable, for me at least, was the release of the 6th Harry Potter installment: Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. Better than movie number 5, it was still a disappointment for me, being a huge fan of the books. I’m definitely glad that they are splitting the 7th movie into two.
Late August brought the news of the death of Senator Ted Kennedy due to cancer, and his death is mourned by many. Other highlights of August included movies such as Julie & Julia, District 9, Inglourious Basterds, Shorts, Halloween II, and The Final Destination. We also had season 4 premieres of Lincoln Heights and Who Wants to be a Millionaire, and season 6 premiere of Project Runway. Series finales of So You Think You Can Dance and Dirty Sexy Money also occurred during August. The fall season of shows was highly anticipated.
September began the fall season of shows, and it definitely filled up the TiVos and DVRs of many people. Monday nights, we had Dancing with the Stars, Castle, How I Met Your Mother, Accidently on Purpose, Big Bang Theory, Two and a Half Men, House, Lie to Me, and many others. Tuesdays were taken by NCIS and NCIS: Los Angeles, and the new season of So You Think You Can Dance, and more. Wednesdays were filled with a lot of comedy shows, especially on ABC. This included The Middle, and Modern Family; Gary Unmarried, and The New Adventures of Old Christine on CBS. Fox hosted Glee on Wednesday nights, which was a big hit. Thursdays were full of drama, including FlashForward, Grey’s Anatomy, Survivor: Samoa, Vampire Diaries, among others; CBS focused on comedies that night: The Office, and Parks and Recreation included. Fridays featured shows such as Supernanny, Ugly Betty, Ghost Whisperer, Numbers, Dollhouse, and Law & Order. The Amazing Race 15 began in September, and aired on Sundays. September rolled out movies like 9, not to be confused with District 9; Jennifer’s Body, Fame, Capitalism: A Love Story, and best of all: Paranormal Activity.
October was full of excitement, mainly due to one huge hoax. On October 15th, the world paused as they watched the story of Falcon Heene pan out. Now widely known as Balloon Boy, Falcon Heene was claimed to have been in a homemade flying saucer, after having climbed in before the launch of the UFO. The balloon traveled over 50 miles and spanned 3 counties, and the Denver International Airport was shut down. When the flying saucer finally landed, six year old Falcon was nowhere to be found, and the worst was suspected. The little boy was later in the afternoon found to have been hiding in the family’s garage, and relief flooded everyone. That night, in an interview with Wolf Blitzer, Falcon was asked why he had stayed hidden, to which he replied, “You guys said that, um, we did this for a show.” Suspicions then immediately turned to the entire thing being a hoax concocted by parents Richard and Mayumi Heene, done for a reality show attempt. On November 13th, Richard Heene pled guilty to the charge of attempting to influence a public servant. On December 23rd, Richard Heene was sentenced to 90 days in jail, and Mayumi 20 days in jail, which can be served on weekends. A few movies in October which caught my attention were Whip It, Zombieland, Where the Wild Things Are, Saw VI, and This is It. The fall season of television shows continued, and somewhere (give or take a month) we were introduced to V, based on the original show from the 80s.
Almost nearing the end of the year, November brought quite a few notable movies. This included Precious, The Fourth Kind, Fantastic Mr. Fox, 2012, The Blind Side, Old Dogs, and of course, the second installment of The Twilight Saga: New Moon. My movie review of New Moon will be up on the MovieBlog soon. I can’t really think of anything else from November. Thanksgiving was a pretty important day though, eh? And I haven’t mentioned any other holidays from other months yet…oops.
And now we’re in December. All month, and pretty much the day after Thanksgiving, we started seeing all kinds of Christmas-related movies all over television. The only one which I have watched was A Dog Named Christmas. Really cute, but it bothers me a little that all the commercials I see for other movies have dogs who are either yellow labs or golden retrievers. I don’t have anything against either breed, but I wouldn’t mind seeing a mutt every once in awhile. There was also Disney’s Prep and Landing, which I taped awhile back and have yet to watch, and most television shows do some kind of a holiday episode for the season. December has given us, or will soon give us, movies such as Up in the Air, Did You Hear About the Morgans?, The Lovely Bones, Avatar, Nine, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakuel, Sherlock Holmes, and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. And only a few days ago, another star was lost, and will always be remembered: Britney Murphy. Her death at such a young age and so unexpectedly surprised everyone. Since I mentioned Thanksgiving, I suppose I should also go ahead and mention that Christmas is in December, as well as, (I think) Hanukkah, and probably some other holidays which I cannot think of. Oh, and New Year’s Eve, duh.
Five significant technological trends found their way into our lives this year. The first is the increased sales of netbooks and notebooks over desktops. Laptop sales shot up this year, and the compact netbooks became widely used for their sleek design and because they are so small and lightweight, which means easy transportation. Even notebooks, which are heavier and bulkier than netbooks, had a good year. People seem to like notebooks for their easy transportation as well, at least over desktops. Not too easy to carry around a modem, is it?
We also so a huge increase in social networking: Facebook became saw a huge percentage increase in their users, and seemed to be talked about. The new privacy settings adopted by Facebook recently have caused an upset for many, and Facebook’s Director of Corporate Communications and Public Policy to suggest users lie and are under no obligation to use a photo of them for their profile picture, and users do not have to use their current city. Facebook has succeeded so well in the last year because users are to provide real names and information, so that they can be easier found. Will this privacy setting change hurt them in the long run, or will they listen to the users and make some quick changes? Twitter also saw a huge increase in its users this year, especially from celebrities. People can “follow” others, and keep up-to-date tabs on whomever else is using Twitter. Tweeting is used to describe someone who writes a message with a 140 character limit, answering the question “What are you doing”. I think it’s safe to say that Twitter is going to continue growing in 2010.
Another hit this year was cell phone upgrades, and especially their web-browsing capability. We got a good look at touch screen phones, and being able to update our Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, and all other social networking accounts. We were also widely introduced to “apps”, for both phones and the internet. These applications gave us easy access to all kinds of information, games, and a variety of other things, all at the touch of a button. On the internet, applications helped us “link” all of our social networking accounts so we could update them all at once. Is it just me, or is even the internet becoming lazy?
One major application was GPS and location-based services, right in the palm of our hand. Within seconds, we could find the closest restaurant, movie theater, gym, or just about any other building that would show up on the radar. We could get directions, traffic information, and anything needed so we could get to our destination.
Open Source software is also becoming used more, mainly for the simple fact that it is absolutely free. No cost for the initial download, no cost for upgrades, and a lot of it has quality near to name-brand products. For example, OpenOffice.org lets users download a package similar to that of Microsoft Office products, but for absolutely no cost. Firefox is a free web browser, and provides an internet service by just a simple download. Although they have been around for quite some time, more downloads and files are being compacted into “ZIP files” which basically compacts the file or download into a much smaller file. Free programs can be found through Google, for unzipping programs, which can be downloaded and used to extract the information from a ZIP file.
Beginning in January, we saw tons of music rise to the number one spot in Billboard music charts, and this has continued throughout the year, of course. Beyonce’s Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It) started off the New Year at number one, only to be surpassed a week later by Lady Gaga’s song, Just Dance. There was an inaugural concert titled “We Are One” held at the Lincoln Memorial during the inaugural celebration of Barack Obama. Nearing the end of January, Kelly Clarkson’s song My Life Would Suck Without You, made the jump from 97 to number 1during its first week of release.
February brought us the Super Bowl, with performances by Bruce Springsteen, Faith Hill, and Jennifer Hudson. The 51st Grammy Awards took place, with Song of the Year being Coldplay’s Viva la Vida, and Album of the Year being Alison Krauss and Robert Plant’s duet album, Raising Sand. At the Brit Awards, Duffy won best British female, British breakthrough artist, and best British album. Kings of Leon, FloRida, Katy Perry, and Pet Shop Boys were also recognized. The Lamb of God album, Wrath, debuted at number 2 on the Billboard 200, which made it the highest charting extreme metal album in the last 15 years. One of the most talked about events in February, however, was the assault of Rihanna by her then-boyfriend, Chris Brown.
March brought us Britney Spears’ album The Circus Starring: Britney Spears. In mid-March, Fleetwood Mac began their first worldwide tour in 5 years, as did Britney Spears post-release of her album. Beyonce began her I Am… tour near the end of March. There were also releases of albums by Royksopp, Mastodon, MF Doom, Ayumi Hamasaki, and Super Junior.
In April, Lady Gaga became the first artist since Christina Aguilera to reach the top of the Billboard Top 100 with her first two singles, Just Dance and Poker Face. Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney performed together for the first time since 2002. The world saw Susan Boyle for the first time, and her performance of I Dreamed a Dream became an instant video hit on the web. Carrie Underwood became the only country artist in history to have their first 10 singles off of their first 2 albums hit number one on the country music charts. Taylor Swift began her Fearless tour, which had already been entirely sold out.
Two day music festival, The Bamboozle, took place at the beginning of May. The 90th birthday of Pete Seeger was celebrated at Madison Square Garden. Mid-May saw the release of Greenday’s highly anticipated album, 21st Century Breakdown. Eminem released his album Relapse, which sold 600,000 copies in its first week. Tori Amos releases her 10th album, Marilyn Manson releases his 7th, and Aqua releases their first single in 9 years. Kris Allen wins American Idol over Adam Lambert, and fans were shocked, some even calling it a fix. Was it fixed, or did Kris Allen really pull through with his fans backing him?
June started with Pearl Jam being the first musical guests on The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien. Taking Back Sunday released their album, New Again, and in mid-June, the Jonas Brothers release their second album, and kick off their world tour only days later. Demi Lovato and David Archuleta also kick off their tour for the summer. Late-June saw the beginning of Warped Tour 2009, in Pomona, California.
The summer month of July brought many more music including the 10th EXIT festival, Rockstar Energy Mayhem Festival, Rock Fest, 2009 10,000 Days Festival, and the IndieTracks Festival, to name a few. Lady Gaga had 3 singles off her first album hit number one on an American Billboard chart since Avril Lavigne and Ace of Base. Two members of Panic! At the Disco leave the band to start the group The Young Veins. The memorial for Michael Jackson was held at the Staples Center, with many performances and tributes.
August brought more album releases, which included ones by Third Eye Blind, Arctic Monkeys, LeToya, and Whitney Houston. The beginning of August had Lollapalooza 2009, and the mid-August Rock Gone Wild 2009 was cancelled. Miley Cyrus released the single Party in the USA, and her first EP, The Time of Our Lives. The Sugababes released their comeback single, Get Sexy.
September was full of notable releases, including Owl City’s second album, Ocean Eyes; Muse’s new single Uprising; and Jay-Z’s eleventh album. Also, Lights released her first full-length album. Other album releases included ones by Brand New, Jeffree Star, Three Days Grace, Paramore, AFI, Mariah Carey, Breaking Benjamin, and Selena Gomez. Alice in Chains released their first album in 14 years. The Beatles had a game dedicated to them in The Beatles: Rock Band, which was like other Rock Bands, however it featured The Beatles. 2009 saw the first ever Sunset Strip Music Festival, in mid-September. The 2009 MTV Music Awards also aired in September, hosting the well-known Kanye West/Taylor Swift incident, in which he jumped up on stage and interrupted her during her acceptance speech. It didn’t take long for the internet to be full of outraged fans of both stars. Despite everything, Taylor Swift went on to continue her wins with other awards. Muse’s fifth album, and Kid Cudi’s debut album also saw releases in September. In mid-September, the Spice Girls reunited in public for dinner and drinks- minus Victoria Beckham- which raised questions about whether or not they would start performing again.
October also had noteworthy moments: Beyonce was named Woman of 2009 by Billboard, KISS released their first album in 11 years, Michael Jackson’s single This Is It was released, and later in the month his album This Is It was released. Other releases included Relient K, Shakira, Tokyo Hotel, Backstreet Boys, Nellie McKay, Rammstein, Rihanna, Emily Osment, Creed, and Train, among others.
November was full of album releases, from many much-loved bands. These included Slayer, Carrie Underwood, Melanie Fiona, Amerie, Leona Lewis, Alejandro Sanz, One Republic, Justin Bieber, Rihanna, and Lady Gaga.
One of the most controversial nights was November 22nd, and the American Music Awards. Adam Lambert performed his song, For Your Entertainment. 1500 complaints poured in to ABC about his raunchy performance. His Wednesday appearance on Good Morning America was cancelled, and the internet became a flurry of comments- some people opposing his performance, and others on his side. He has admitted that he did get carried away, and didn’t stick with what was done during rehearsal, but it was 10 or 11 o’clock at night, depending on your timezone. Parents complained that their kids had been watching, but why didn’t the parents just be responsible and change the channel? No one seemed to care that Eminem had sung about raping women, or about the revealing costumes the women performers wore, or any number of things they shouldn’t let their kids be exposed to. It’s been quite obvious that there is a definite double standard for gay men- on Barbara Walter’s yearly special, The Most Fascinating People of 2009, she stated that certain parts of Adam Lambert’s performance couldn’t be shown there (referring to his kiss with a male keyboardist, or the simulated oral sex, or both) yet Lady Gaga’s kiss to another women was freely shown during Barbara Walter’s interview with Lady Gaga, not too long prior. In my opinion, it is also obvious that ABC only wants to portray gay men as their stereotype, as can be seen on such shows as Ugly Betty and Modern Family, and they were uncomfortable with Adam Lambert’s performance. I do understand that there was stuff with the FCC and all that, but I also think they blew it totally out of proportion when other performances were just as raunchy, yet had no repercussions for those stars.
Eleven months later, we finally reach December. More album releases came this month from Gackt, Timbaland, Chris Brown, Clipse, Gucci Mane, Snoop Dogg, 30 Seconds to Mars, and Alicia Keys. In mid-December, the soundtrack to the hit movie Avatar was released. Of course, most radio stations are playing holiday music, and in a lot of public places, there are also holiday music. Sometimes I feel like it’s a sugar cookie that’s just too sweet.
I really have absolutely no idea who, if anybody, is going to have read (or skimmed) through this, but it’s been fun to write. I had no idea how much stuff went on in 2009, and this barely touches on it. Hopefully you enjoyed it as much as I did. I’m not going to proofread it right now, but if you catch any typos, let me know. If I’ve missed any television shows, movies, music, technological stuff, or anything you want me to include, please let me know and I will edit it in. Have a wonderful New Year!