"Boy, Bye" to 2021!!

A look back at what we watched, read, and listened to this year

Y’all, another year is bidding us adieu, and while a lot of people are complaining about how little seems to have changed since 2020, I’d like to first say “What did you think was going to happen, we’d all just go back to NORMAL like PSYCHOPATHS!??” and then remember that a lot HAS changed. We have a vaccine that works. We have treatments that work. We were there for each other when we needed to be [many of us!].

And, of course, we watched, read, and listened to a ton of great stuff! Culture happened! Movies were made! Kim Kardashian entered her rocker chick era! Timothée H. Chalamet is one year older but still doesn’t look a day over Adorable! Kirsten Dunst might finally win her Oscar, Andrew Garfield is gracing Earth with his beautiful soul, and Florence Pugh invented acting yet again! Oh, and at one point we all entrusted our daily mental health to an aging dog! We truly LIVED.

And there was so much content out there to love.

So tonight I’m indulging in a little roundup of 2021. I’ve gathered all the recommendations I made since Hannah’s Weekly launched in July [I could’ve sworn I’ve been doing this longer than five months, damn] and added a few more of my favorites from the entire year. At the end of each section, I’ll award a few of my favorites by category. But not to worry—everything on this list has a gold star of approval from This Blog.

I also would love to hear YOUR favorite recommendations from 2021. What did you watch, read, or listen to that changed your life, or made you laugh, or you can’t stop thinking about, or just helped you through the year? Did I miss anything absolutely essential? What should I put on my list for 2022?

Can’t wait to do another year with you! Come back next week for fresh recommendations. 🙂 In the meantime, have the absolute BEST New Year available to you. 💜

My Favorite Movies of 2021

I didn’t review all of these on Hannah’s Weekly because I have a LIFE and we all have a limited attention span, but I do recommend them each in roughly but maybe not descending order!

I’ve also included the critics’ score from Rotten Tomatoes, both for your reference and to show how great I am at identifying critically acclaimed ~*~F-I-L-M-S~*~.

• Dune (83%)

• Free Guy (80%)

• Black Widow (79%)

• Pig (97%)

• Passing (90%)

• The Last Duel (85%)

• Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (91%)

• Old (50%)

• Red Notice (critics 36%, audience 92% !)

• The Harder They Fall (88%)

• Spencer (83% - only worth it for the KStew performance)

Hannah’s Weekly Movie Awards:

The One I’ve Thought About The Most: The Last Duel

The One Where I Laughed the Most: Free Guy

Favorite: Pig [a jewel for Nick Cage lovers everywhere]

My Favorite TV Shows of 2021

TV shows are the moment. TV shows are a lifestyle. TV shows are life. These are my favorites from the year, also with the critics’ Rotten Tomatoes scores because—let me repeat myself—Yours Truly has absolutely nailed it with the tasteful recommendations.

• Loki on Disney+ (92%)

• Insecure on HBO Max (97%)

• White Lotus on HBO Max (89%)

• Shadow and Bone on Netflix (88%)

• Ted Lasso on Apple TV+ (97%)

• Hacks on HBO Max (100%)

• Reservation Dogs on Hulu (98%)

• Only Murders in the Building on Hulu (93%)

• LuLaRich on Amazon Prime (100%)

• The Great British Bake Off on Netflix

• What We Do in the Shadows on Hulu (97%)

• Midnight Mass on Netflix (86%)

• Squid Game on Netflix (94%)

• Maid on Netflix (93%)

• Dopesick on Hulu (86%)

• Hawkeye on Disney+ (92%)

• Wheel of Time on Amazon Prime (82%)

• The Sex Lives of College Girls on HBO Max (97%)

• Station Eleven on HBO Max (97%)

• Succession Season 3 on HBO Max (97%)

Hannah’s Weekly TV Awards:

The One(s) I’ve Thought About The Most: Maid, Dopesick, & Midnight Mass

The One Where I Laughed the Most: What We Do in the Shadows

Favorite(s): Succession and Bake Off

My Favorite Podcasts of 2021

• Winds of Change - series by Crooked Media on Spotify

• The 2020 Olympics - episode by Vox

• The Simone Biles Story and Why the ‘Twisties’ Are So Dangerous - episode by The Ringer

• Bad Blood: The Final Chapter - series by John Carreyrou

• The Myth of the Student Athlete - episode on The Experiment

• Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard

• Pantsuit Politics

• Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang

Hannah’s Weekly Podcast Awards:

The One I’ve Thought About The Most: Pantsuit Politics

The One Where I Laughed the Most: Las Culturistas

Favorite: Armchair Expert

My Favorite Books of 2021

I’m cheating here because I hardly ever read books. Not all of these came out in 2021 but they’re ALL the books that I actually *finished* in 2021. [High-School-Aged, Tolstoy-Reading Me would hate me.]

• Severance by Ling Ma

• Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

• Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant

• On Fragile Waves by E. Lily Yu

• Please Don’t Sit On My Bed in Your Outside Clothes by Phoebe Robinson

• Passing by Nella Larson

• This Too Shall Last by K.J. Ramsey

• It’s OK That You’re Not OK by Megan Devine

Hannah’s Weekly Book Awards:

The One(s) I’ve Thought About The Most: Passing and Severance

The One Where I Laughed the Most: PDSOMBIYOC (too long to write out again)

Favorite: Station Eleven

My Favorite Articles in 2021

• Tapping Into the Brain to Help a Paralyzed Man Speak - New York Times

• Marvel Villains, Ranked by Hotness - Vulture

• His Name Was Emmett Till - The Atlantic

• The Radical Courage of Simone Biles - The New Yorker

• Jason Sudeikis is Having One Hell of a Year - GQ

• Simone Biles is Both the Climber and the Mountain - The Ringer

• “The White Lotus” Finale: Mike White Accepts Your Criticism - Vulture

• A Timeline of Afghanistan’s 4 Decades of Instability - NPR

• The Opposite of Toxic Positivity - The Atlantic

• Why Do American Grocery Stores Still Have an Ethnic Aisle? - The New York Times

• Eating Crawfish in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana - The New Yorker

• Twenty Years Gone: One Family’s Struggle to Make Sense of 9/11 - The Atlantic

• What Does it Mean to “Never Forget”? - The New York Times

• The Secret to a Fight-Free Relationship - The Atlantic

• A Middle of the Date Questionnaire - McSweeney’s

• There’s Always Been More to Kirsten Dunst - The New York Times

• How Old Does Ben Platt Look in Dear Evan Hanson? - Vulture

• I Don’t Know How to Tell This Story - by Cecily Strong, in Vulture

• Lena Dunham on Joy Sorman and Unnameable Female Pain - The New York Times

• Slackers of the World, Unite! - The Atlantic

• 10 Terrifyingly True Tales of Absolute Terror - Jezebel

• Can This Man Save the World from Artificial Intelligence? - The London Times

• One woman’s hilarious reaction to That Proposal at the Adele concert - “Hung Up” by Hunter Harris

• The Elephant Who Could Be a Person - The Atlantic

• Keanu Reeves Knows the Secrets of the Universe - Esquire

• Draco Malfoy’s College Recommendation Letter That I Totally Don’t Feel Conflicted About Writing Whatsoever - McSweeney’s

• Help! I’m Watching a Christopher Nolan Movie Without Subtitles! - The New Yorker

And that’s it for 2021. See you in 2022!