Aaron's 2010 Favorites

This week, our writers are announcing their selections for the best in entertainment this year. Be sure to check out Dylan and Butler's pieces to see their picks for best new TV series, best video game, best movie, etc.

Best Comic: Wednesday Comics by DC Comics

Marvel's Siege event was rather lackluster, and DC's Blackest Night moved from bad-ass to cornball a little too quickly. Greg Rucka's Detective Comics run and Grant Morrison's Batman & Robin deserve serious praise, but the comic book project that won my heart this year was Wednesday Comics. Printed on giant 14" x 20" pulp paper to evoke the sensation of old fashioned Sunday newspaper comics sections, Wednesday Comics was a weekly anthology series featuring fifteen comic strips starring classic DC Comics properties, ranging from recognizable icons like Batman and Superman to lesser-known characters like Deadman and Metamorpho. Each strip featured a different writer/artist team paying tribute to the glory days of adventure comic strips, inviting comparisons to classics like Prince Valiant. The best aspect of Wednesday Comics was the simple pick-up-and-read quality of it; people who don't read comics could find simple, fun introductions to fifteen of DC's most important franchises - all printed on these delightfully-enormous newspaper pages. The Flash strip is by far the best Flash comic DC has published in a decade.


Best Gadget: Apple iPad

The iPad is by no means a perfect product; it is hampered by a number of fundamental problems that ultimately led to me selling mine. But I have a profound respect for what the iPad is, and more importantly, what it means for consumer technology. The mainstream tablet computer has been a technologist prophecy since the very inception of mobile computing. It has been attempted by countless companies and eluded Microsoft for roughly two decades. The arrival of affordable multi-touch displays, low-power processors, and mobile-optimized operating systems like Android and iOS created a perfect storm for the tablet computer's ascendancy into mainstream computing, and the iPad marks the beginning of a massive transition. As consumers migrate to smartphones and tablets as their primary ways to experience the internet, the way that we shop for these mobile computers will change dramatically. A decade ago, you'd buy your computer based on its RAM, processor speed, and ability to run Windows software. Today, you'll be buying your computers based on physical form, ease-of-use, and app store selection. The iPad may not save the print medium, but it's creating a product category that will drastically change the way you consume information and entertainment.

Best Movie Moment: