Why "Bad Santa" is my favorite Christmas movie

While there have been well-made examples of propaganda pieces, generally speaking, the most acclaimed war films fit within the "anti-war film" genre. Films like Apocalypse Now and Saving Private Ryan may occasionally make war look glorious, but they by and large don't make war look fun. Any honest assessment of war should cover the psychological toil of battle, and popular sentiment generally echoes this belief: it's why Platoon holds up and The Green Berets absolutely does not.

Christmas films tend, like Christmas music, to be driven by sentiment. People watch the same films at the same time every year and then put them on the shelf for eleven months. And while the ones that are actually worth discussing include some kind of conflict (whether serious, like George Bailey's suicidal behavior in It's a Wonderful Life, or superfluous, like Ralphie Parker's desire for a BB gun in A Christmas Story), they tend to deeply glorify Christmas. It's a magical time of year that can cure depression or get you a toy!

This isn't to knock It's a Wonderful Life nor A Christmas Story, both of which are movies I enjoy well enough, but I do think it's fair to label these design flaws. These are films which do not speak to the reality of Christmas, and so points should be deducted. It's the obvious flaw in the Christmas movie credibility of Die Hard, the favorite Christmas movie of Extremely Hilarious Online Dudes everywhere. Even if you concede that it is indeed a Christmas movie, the holiday is essentially a background character to an action movie that could've taken place at any time.

Bad Santa is probably the most aggressively unconventional Christmas movie there is, certainly at least among mainstream feature films (it made $76.5 million in theaters following its 2003 release). The title isn't subtle--it's a movie about a "bad Santa", Billy Bob Thornton's Willie Soke, who annually plays a department store Santa Claus and who in addition to generally rude and drunken behavior, robs the store at which he works.

One of the most stark things about Bad Santa, nearly as much as its dark tone, is its setting--Phoenix. So much of Christmas movie mythology is built around snowy small towns, but that is not the world in which this film's characters live. They live in the desert. This is what Christmas is if you live in Phoenix--much like any political notions of "real America", this contrasts with the wider perception of Christmas, but this was a metro area with four and a half million people. Why shouldn't they count?

Additionally, Bad Santa includes very little of actual families. This was supposedly what made Home Alone a unique Christmas movie, but the existence of a family, even if a temporarily splintered one, defined the entire story. With Bad Santa, you have one childless married couple, a barely existent relationship between a senile grandmother and her grandson, and that's about it.

But the lack of strict family ties is what makes the relationships in Bad Santa genuinely touching. Willie is an obviously flawed creep/criminal, and the young boy, Thurman Merman, with whom he takes on a de facto father-son relationship, isn't a cute and precocious little scamp, but an awkward, overweight child who you can frankly believe gets bullied by the older kids. Sue, played by Lauren Graham, is the responsible adult of the film, proving far more adept at parental lessons than Willie, and she only enters the picture because of a sexual fetish for Santa Claus. It's twisted, but it works.

Bad Santa demystifies Santa in a way that is considered wildly taboo--every year, we develop a collective insanity in which even the most serious of people treat Santa as an actual person. Mail services receive and process letters from Santa. Meteorologists reference the presence of Santa's sleigh in the night skies on Christmas Eve. Santa is a character that 100% of adults acknowledge is not real, but to publicly say so is strictly forbidden. Earlier this month, a teacher (ostensibly a person trusted to inform children of the truth) was fired for telling children that Santa isn't real.

It has always been a mystery to me why religious people would teach their children about Santa. How does a parent lie about an essentially omnipresent entity who rewards and punishes for good and bad behavior, pull the rug out from under them and fess up to the fact that they lied as a means to manipulate behavior ("Christmas magic" is an absurdity--kids just want presents, man), and then go around and tell them "the people telling you about God, an omnipresent entity who rewards and punishes good and bad behavior...now they're telling the truth?" But I totally understand why nonreligious people, such as my parents, would lie about Santa. They didn't care if I became religious as an adult. They just wanted me to shut up.

And Thurman is the exact kind of boy who is susceptible to Santa--both of his parents are absent and his guardian is present in body only. So when Thurman encounters a decidedly unjolly Willie as Santa at the mall, it is totally believable that this kid believes that this man is magic. And there's something sad about it. If Bad Santa had a stance here, it was that someone should tell this poor kid to stop depending on Santa.

But this leads to my single-favorite scene in a Christmas movie. It is, in a movie which often veers into silly and dark territory, a poignant one which gives this movie so much more heart than most in the genre.

About three-fourths of the way through the movie, Thurman shows Willie his report card. His grades are mediocre, but Willie notes that they were better than the ones he received. Thurman then, in a continuation of his optimism, asks if this means that he will get a present from him for Christmas, as Santa had not brought him any presents in the previous two years. After Thurman sadly refers to himself as "a dipshit loser", Willie goes on a mini-tirade, asserting that he is not Santa Claus, and that the mere existence of somebody as lowly as him should disprove the possibility of a Santa Claus. But Thurman surprises Willie by replying, "I know there's no Santa. I just thought maybe you'd want to give me a present because we're friends." He then walks away. 

And just like that, a movie marketed more on the shock value of Santa having sex in women's dressing rooms exhibited more heart than most other more "conventional" Christmas movies. By the next time we see Willie, a man who initially aspired only to exploit Thurman is trying to give Thurman the kind of Christmas you see in a typical Christmas movie. He doesn't exactly succeed, but he tries. And Bad Santa isn't a movie about being perfect--it's a movie about making the best of what you have.

Why do people care so much about defending "Baby, It's Cold Outside"?

There is a long-standing controversy surrounding "Baby, It's Cold Outside", the oft-covered 1944 song, which provokes many strong reactions, but there is one important point about the tune which ought not be lost in the midst of it--the song sucks.

Some "Christmas songs" are covered in a myriad of styles, but the many, many incarnations of "Baby, It's Cold Outside" follow an almost identical musical pattern--it fits squarely within the vocal jazz genre popularized by such performers as Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr., both of whom recorded renditions of the song. It is a slow and, frankly, boring song musically, and its appeal is dependent entirely on the quality of the vocal performances, but each version's vocal performances are so tepid and unemotional that I've spent my entire life trying to understand the appeal of it. Until recently, I'd never met anybody who actively liked the song. But suddenly, there is a cadre of people who will defend "Baby, It's Cold Outside" seemingly to the death.

The controversy of the song centers around its lyrics. The controversy is so omnipresent by 2018 that I barely feel the need to explain it, but in case you've missed it to this point, the primary focus from its critics is on the line, "Say, what's in this drink?", sung by the (traditionally) female character in the call-and-response song, which the (traditionally) male character ignores, instead going upon his own rationalization for why the object of his affection mustn't leave his place. Critics say that the line alludes to date rape, with the implication that she has been drugged or, at the very least, that the male character is intentionally trying to intoxicate the woman so that she will be unable to leave (and presumably, later, have sex with him). Defenders of the song note that the female character appears to want to stay and is trying to coyly put on the appearance of putting up a fight, conforming to the social norms of 1944, an era where premarital sex was practiced but much more quietly than it is today.

I think the latter group is probably correct in that the vast majority of the lines imply that she is interested in the man. But enough of the lines don't just imply but outright state that her answer is "no"--most notably, the part where she says "the answer is no", that I absolutely cannot go along with any notion that this is a fun, innocent song that doesn't have a dark underbelly to it. If a woman says "the answer is no", that should be the end of the discussion. It doesn't matter if she doesn't mean it; men should not have unilateral jurisdiction to read intent. This line has always bothered me more than the infamous "what's in this drink" line, and it underscores the predatory nature of the male character (referred to as "wolf", while the woman is called "mouse", I kid you not). I don't believe Frank Loesser was trying to write a regressive song, but the notion that his intent is relevant seems absurd to me. We would never defend a song from 1944 which, say, advocated for Jim Crow laws, yet "Baby, It's Cold Outside" appears to be a sacred cow.

But what I find particularly confounding about the vociferousness of those lining up to defend this song isn't their opinion as much as the fact that this song is the battle they've chosen to pick. When people defend "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" against those who criticize its frequent use of the n-word, they're defending a novel widely accepted as a literary classic (and one which, despite its unfortunate use of an unfortunate racial slur, is generally considered pretty anti-racism). But this is a song in a long-obsolete musical genre which is basically confined to one month of listening a year.

It should be said that there isn't even really much of an argument that "Baby, It's Cold Outside" is even a Christmas song. The lyrics do not mention Christmas, nor religion of any kind, nor any widespread holiday traditions. Its tenuous tie-in to Christmas is that the song mentions the weather being cold. One could just as easily call this a Presidents' Day song, and it's as Christmas-y as "Snow" by Red Hot Chili Peppers. So what makes "Baby, It's Cold Outside" a Christmas song? Well, mostly the fact that it always gets played around Christmas. It is because it is, and there really isn't any more explanation needed for most people.

Christmas music is a curious "genre" in that it is more of a lyrical motif. "Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 12/24" by Trans-Siberian Orchestra is essentially a progressive metal song, while Bing Crosby's "White Christmas" very much is not, yet the two are folded into the same category. Christmas music is heavily repetitive, with the same two dozen or so songs being covered ad nauseum. Original Christmas songs from the last thirty years or so have been rare, but the few that have become staples, such as "All I Want for Christmas is You" by Mariah Carey or "Underneath the Tree" by Kelly Clarkson, tend to be steeped in a "classic" sound.

But the most curious part of Christmas music, to me, is that is goes away. It comes around near Thanksgiving, it is everywhere, and then once Christmas happens, it is packed away like an artificial tree. It is not as though songs about summertime are reserved for those months. Is "Last Christmas" really a worse song in June than in December? It's not just that it gets played more in December--it's that it gets played exclusively in December.

Yet "Baby, It's Cold Outside", which makes just as much if not more sense as a January or February song, disappears as well. And that's because much more than liking the song, people like the idea of the song. It is a song synonymous with Christmas and tradition, and thus it must be protected.

Regardless of your stance on this particular song, it seems ridiculous to pretend that those who criticize it are acting in bad faith, or that this is an attack on holiday traditions. It is not as though there is a widespread campaign to ban "Jingle Bells" from radio stations (despite the obvious upside that people would no longer feel obliged to pretend that Michael Buble is a competent singer): there is just one particular song that people find particularly irksome. But that is the way this debate is framed: those who want to preserve the good and wholesome Christmas traditions (such as a song that is by its most innocent interpretation about sex) against those who oppose them.

I am arguably a terrible judge of what should and should not stand among Christmas traditions, because I hate Christmas. I hate everything about Christmas. I hate the idea of socially obligated family time and the implication that not associating with one's family, regardless of the context of what kind of people make up one's family, is a moral failing. I hate the concept of Santa Claus: I cannot imagine a worse lesson, particularly for those who hope to raise their children in a religious manner, than teaching kids that lying to people to get what you want (good behavior) is an okay thing (particularly when the lie of Santa is essentially a stand-in for God). I hate the decorations and the enforced whimsy of it all. In my ideal world, the celebration of the birth of Jesus would be celebrated as the significant event it is to those who follow Christianity, but the very much manmade components of the holiday which have absolutely nothing to do with it would go away.

Because I don't like Christmas, I don't understand the protectiveness of "Baby, It's Cold Outside". Curiously, those who typically have advocated for "keeping Christ in Christmas" and "remembering the reason for the season" now find themselves adamant in their protection of an entirely secular song. I think there is certainly some "owning the libs" element to it (the same faction that has long argued about the race, and more recently the gender, of Santa Claus, a fictional character, and which includes Tucker Carlson, who last night ran a segment on Fox News about how they're gingerbread MEN rather than gingerbread people). But while there is some political correlation to the controversy, it's hardly absolute. In many ways, this song has become a proxy for the very idea of tradition.

People who might not have a strong opinion on "Baby, It's Cold Outside" still want it to be there because that's how it has always been. There is a familiarity to it which tells people "Christmas is coming", not because the lyrics of the song allude to it but because of a Pavlovian response. If people only heard "Billie Jean" by Michael Jackson during Christmas time, it would have the same effect as "Baby, It's Cold Outside", while having about as much to do with Christmas. The only difference would be that it is a good song.

It is impossible for me to listen to "Baby, It's Cold Outside" and hear a song that should generate such passionate support, but it becomes easier to understand when I consider that the song is but a metaphor for something else. I may not like Christmas, but I understand why most people do. I just wish people could separate the parts that make the holiday special for them from the background noise. Perhaps then, we as a society could develop better background noise.

The Godfather Part III and the quest for morality

Note: There are countless spoilers for each of the films in the Godfather trilogy in this post

Last night, I re-watched The Godfather Part III for the first time in several years, having re-watched the saga's first two installments the week before. History has not been kind to Part III, mostly because it is inevitably compared to the first two parts, but on the whole, I think it's a pretty great movie. No, it doesn't have the classic scenes or lines of The Godfather, nor the ambition or powerhouse performances of The Godfather Part II, but despite Sofia Coppola's acting being as poor as advertised, it's a movie worth watching. Assuming you've watched the first two, that is; unlike Part II, which I think could be enjoyed (and understood) without watching the original, Part III requires familiarity with its predecessors.

As time goes by, my opinion of Part III continues to increase while my opinion of the original decreases (to be clear, the original is a cinematic masterpiece and is still, objectively, superior to Part III). To some degree, this should be expected--the original is universally heralded as one of the greatest films of all-time (it is very rare that a film released after it ranks higher on all-time lists), and entering with too high of expectations is understandable. Meanwhile, Part III is regarded almost as a joke, when contemporary reviews were generally positive (if not as positive as the first two films) and it was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture (which should have gone to a superior mafia movie, Martin Scorsese's Goodfellas).

Regardless of what you think of the quality of the film, Part III is a much different type of film than the first two, particularly the original. And while, by most standards, it lags behind the others, from a standpoint of morality and of making a statement about its universe, Part III rises to levels that the original film and sequel do not even attempt to achieve.

The Godfather treats Vito Corleone as a hero, and that he can pass as one despite heading a criminal organization speaks to the effectiveness of the film. But perhaps this is also an indictment of the film's moral compass. While the first scene in the film seemingly shows Vito as a reasonable man who avoids violence when possible--rejecting the request of Amerigo Bonasera to murder two men who had beaten his daughter and instead vowing (presumably) that they be beaten instead of killed--the first extended conversation between Michael Corleone and his girlfriend Kay Adams reveals a horrific man, one who threatened to murder a bandleader for profit.

Vito Corleone, the histrionics of Marlon Brando notwithstanding, is far from a saint. He is, at best, a lesser of two evils (as revealed in Part II, he was more warm-hearted than Don Fanucci, who preceeded Vito as the primary organized crime force in Little Italy). But he does use violence and intimidation to achieve his goals. When he rejects Virgil Sollozzo's proposal to enter the world of drug trafficking, it is not because Vito believes that there is anything wrong with heroin, but because the police he bribed won't like it. It is, to borrow from Godfather universe parlance, strictly business.

The Godfather is full of iconic scenes and characters and performances, but it also glamorizes organized crime. And that is because, at its heart, The Godfather trilogy is not a mafia movie. It's a movie about royalty.

Mario Puzo and Francis Ford Coppola may have crafted the defining mafia story, but anybody with even a passing familiarity with the actual Italian underworld can sniff out how little they actually knew about it. Mafiosi, for instance, do not wear suits as their standard uniform--businessmen do. While organizations are known as "families", this is far less literal than as evoked in the world of The Godfather--Sonny Corleone was essentially a prince, groomed from a young age to inherit the crown of Don, but in real life, while some sons follow their fathers into the underworld, the Corleone family probably would've gone to Peter Clemenza upon Vito's death (it certainly wouldn't have gone to Michael, whose rap sheet included two murders within a few seconds of each other and no crimes prior to that). The Part II murder of Fredo Corleone is an analogue to the closest thing to American royalty's own abhorrent incident of pushing an inconvenient relative aside--the lobotomization of Rosemary Kennedy (not even a minute earlier in film time, Hyman Roth was murdered in an obvious homage to the death of Lee Harvey Oswald). In Part III, when first-cousins Vincent Mancini and Mary Corleone strike up a romance, Michael only objects on the grounds that it is dangerous for Mary. The films are so singularly focused on the power structure of the mafia that a character like Joey Zasa, largely analogous to one of the most famous high-ranking mafia members ever (John Gotti), is regarded as essentially irrelevant by Michael.

Goodfellas is a mafia movie. You never see the don. The highest-ranking member you do see, Paul Cicero, holds the same rank as Peter Clemenza and Sal Tessio, who are primarily subservient in their scenes in the first film. None of the three primary characters are even in the mafia--they merely represent the kinds of low-level hoods who make the bosses rich. But make no mistake--Vito Corleone had plenty of Henry Hills and Jimmy Conways hijacking freight for him.

The Godfather Part II does more moral reckoning than its precedessor, but the message is mixed. In the original film, Michael Corleone is rewarded for his evil--the murders of Sollozzo and Captain Mark McCluskey could be justified as protecting his father, but the murders of four mafia dons and Moe Greene were strict money grabs. In the sequel, Michael grows more ruthless and begins to lose what he has--his relationship with his trusted, even-tempered brother Tom Hagen is strained, his wife and children leave him, and after he orders the murder of his brother Fredo, he is a man clearly defeated. You don't necessarily feel "empathy" for him, per se, but you are reminded of the innocent Dartmouth grad just hoping to attend the wedding of his sister with his WASP girlfriend in the opening scene of The Godfather. Michael will likely never be arrested, given his ability to avoid prosecution under Congressional investigation, but his conscience, long ignored but ultimately still existent, can punish him.

In Part III, however, Michael really reckons with his past. This older version of Michael is haunted by his past and abhors the violence which caused his soul to be doomed and his family to stray from him. In his first altercation with his ex-wife Kay, what Michael became is evoked clearly. Kay looks older; Michael looks ancient. In the previous films, Michael felt taller (actors Al Pacino and Diane Keaton are both 5'7"). In this one, Michael appears cowardly and defeated while holding a tray of snacks. Michael held the power throughout most of the first two films, and even when Kay threatens to divorce Michael, his apathy doesn't allow her to gain an emotional edge. By the third film, Michael no longer has his undeserved sense of confidence.

The most memorable line in Part III comes from a quiet scene in which Michael bemoans, "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in." There is nothing cool about this line, in the way that "I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse" or "Leave the gun, take the cannoli" is. Michael spends this scene, and really the entire movie, reflecting on the world in which he has surrounded himself. Michael is clearly a better person in Part III than he was in the first two films, but he spends the entire film being defeated. Even when good things happen--when the Vatican presents him a prestigious award, or when he purchases the Internazionale Immobiliare bank--he is so ravaged with guilt that he can't enjoy it. And he deserves it.

Mary Corleone doesn't deserve her fate--she was a good, if naive, person. But Michael Corleone deserves her fate. He deserves to suffer. He deserves what ultimately happens to him--a lonely, unceremonious death. By the end of Part III, you understand this. But when Vito Corleone dies, happily and with his grandson in the garden at his mansion furnished by the blood of countless innocents, one doesn't generally think about how much worse he deserves.

Those who haven't seen the films tend to lump Goodfellas in with The Godfather trilogy, but they are stylistically very different. The Godfather films are deeply artistic, methodical stories of a family (a violent family, but a family), while Goodfellas is the cinematic equivalent of cocaine. You might be entertained by Tommy Devito asking Henry Hill how he's funny, but you immediately recognize him as a scumbag when he murders men for teasing him. Goodfellas is fun to watch, but it doesn't make the actual experience of being a career criminal look fun. The Godfather films do, because they show those who aren't all that involved in the darker elements of that world.

The single best scene in the Godfather trilogy, for my money, is the one in which Michael kills Sollozzo. The civilian Michael hears a passing train with increasing clarity, as it sounds to the audience as though his world is crashing into him. Michael knows that he is a few seconds away from a point of no return, and when he makes the final decision that he is indeed going to murder a drug kingpin and police captain and promptly flee the country, the noise of the train stops. In that moment, Michael is devoid of emotion. He blocks out the rational part of his brain and acts. But until Part III, Michael never truly faces comeuppance for his tendency to remove himself from the humanity of his actions. So while the film may not be the thrilling shoot-em-up that audiences expected from the series, it is a necessary epilogue. Because for a life of crime, Michael deserved worse than a few seconds of staring off into space.

Ranking the Super Bowl halftime performances since last we saw Justin Timberlake

The Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show sucked.

Seriously, it was terrible. It was a famous halftime show, because of the comically oversized controversy surrounding people who weren't me seeing Janet Jackson's right breast. But it was bad.

You may be asking yourself, "Wait, John, you're a sports fan. You didn't watch Super Bowl XXXVIII?" Of course I did! I even started watching the halftime show but my attention drifted because it was a boring hodgepodge of musical mediocrity. Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake were the least of the show's problems, with P. Diddy, Nelly, and Kid Rock (seriously, the NHL was getting roasted last weekend for having to settle for him for their All-Star Game, and 14 years ago he did THE HALFTIME SHOW AT THE SUPER BOWL) taking the stage. So I got bored and played a handheld Tetris game instead.

A lot has changed since then. Janet Jackson became a musical pariah for reasons I do not understand beyond sexism (this is probably most of it) while Justin Timberlake's next single was a "House of Jealous Lovers" homage. What a world! But relevantly, the Super Bowl halftime show became more focused on one specific artist rather than a medley of popular artists past and present. Of course, if the NFL had considered how popular the U2 halftime show two years prior had been, they perhaps could have realized this was the direction to go, but the NFL has never exactly known for being cutting-edge.

Here is a ranking of the thirteen mini-concerts held during halftime of the Super Bowl since the last time Justin Timberlake took the stage. It remains to be seen where JT Part II will slot. He's apparently not actually going to have a Prince hologram on stage with him, so that's a start.

13. Super Bowl XLV: The Black Eyed Peas featuring Usher, and Slash
For about a year, the Black Eyed Peas were HUGE. They were popular longer than that, but for a while, they were the biggest band in the world. And while "Let's Get It Started" fits the Super Bowl aesthetic in a fairly obvious way, their intergalactic 2009 hits "Boom Boom Pow" and "I Gotta Feeling" did not. And was anybody really asking for Fergie to cover "Sweet Child O' Mine"?

12. Super Bowl XLIV: The Who
The entire point of The Who was relentless energy. They are a necessary touchstone in the invention of punk rock. Prime Who would be perfect for this spot. But by 2010, Keith Moon and John Entwistle were dead and Roger Daltrey's once-legendary voice had clearly deteriorated. They stuck to their 1969 and later discography, which was a mostly good idea (does anybody really want to hear a man in his mid-sixties saying "I hope I die before I get old"?) but it meant they were stuck with a fairly monotonous performance. And the less said about Daltrey's "Won't Get Fooled Again" scream, the better.

11. Super Bowl XL: The Rolling Stones
For rock and roll dinosaurs, the Stones have aged relatively well and they covered over forty years of music with their three songs. "Start Me Up", the last truly major Rolling Stones hit, was a logical choice, and their next choice, the months-old single "Rough Justice", was a surprising pick, but it is one of the better Stones singles of their decidedly post-peak era. They closed out with "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction", with Mick Jagger acknowledging a fact that was abundantly obvious given the "energy" of the performance--that they could have played the song at Super Bowl I. While the Rolling Stones are one of the great rock and roll bands of all-time, this performance was not one of their highlights. Their lethargy was understandable given their age, but unlike the previous year's performer, who could hide behind a piano, energy is their game. And it was lacking.

10. Super Bowl XLIX: Katy Perry featuring Lenny Kravitz and Missy Elliott
There were nine songs performed. Nine! Six were Perry's, and dancing sharks were the most iconic part of it. The song selection was mostly good--she performed the only two Katy Perry songs really worth ever listening to ("Dark Horse" and "Teenage Dream") and it's kind of hard to not close out with your hit called "Firework", even if it's not a very good song. Lenny Kravitz was a bizarre addition to the show, especially considering he didn't perform any of his own songs (to the extent that Lenny Kravitz songs are "his own")--presumably, the NFL didn't want Perry herself singing "I Kissed a Girl", lest the diversion from the Human Demolition Derby that is an NFL game be sullied by lesbian undertones. Missy Elliott was fine but her pop culture moment was so brief that there were absolutely no surprises about what would be performed.

9. Super Bowl XLVI: Madonna featuring LMFAO, M.I.A., Nicki Minaj, and Cee Lo Green
The closest post-Janet halftime show to a pre-Janet ensemble, this show would have been better as a more Madonna-centric endeavor--the world did not really need to hear "Music" as a medley with the instantly-forgotten LMFAO nor did "Give Me All Your Luvin" need to be included at all, other than as an excuse to trot out M.I.A. and Nicki Minaj. I assume Cee Lo was there as a way to market The Voice, which airs on the same network broadcasting the game. Bonus points to Madonna for not playing "Like a Virgin", a song she correctly dislikes.

8. Super Bowl XLVII: Beyonce featuring Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams
Her halftime headlining came at a transition period in Beyonce's career--she had cultivated the Sasha Fierce stage persona but didn't quite have the songs that matched it ("Run the World" matched it a bit, but not quite to the level of songs from her self-titled album or Lemonade). "Crazy in Love" was a given, but the reunion with Destiny's Child was mostly unnecessary (who was going to really complain if Beyonce had just done "Bootylicious" on her own?) and I will remain on my "Single Ladies" is one of the worst pop songs in recent memory soapbox regardless of how many people don't agree. That said, Beyonce could sing the phone book and it'd be an acceptable show.

7. Super Bowl XLII: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
It was Petty's nature to be workmanlike and his M.O. for Super Bowl Sunday was a solid performance and this is precisely, no more and no less, what he offered. He focused a bit more on big hits than perhaps would have made for the most energetic show--"American Girl" and "Runnin' Down a Dream" were correct picks, but opting for "Free Fallin" rather than something which more captures the energy of the Heartbreakers or the Super Bowl was playing it a bit too safe. Still, it was a good performance by a good band, even if they were a bit too conservative for my cantankerous liking.

6. Super Bowl XLIII: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band
Jokes about sportswriters being infatuated with The Boss aside, there isn't a Baby Boomer rock star who has aged quite as immaculately as Springsteen. He mixed obvious ("Born to Run", "Glory Days") with less obvious (the album track/concert staple "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out", his new album's "Working on a Dream"). Like Petty's performance the year before, it was more or less what one would expect from a Springsteen halftime show, though I'm giving Bruce, an artist whose music I generally like less, a slight edge for better capturing the energy of the event.

5. Super Bowl XXXIX: Paul McCartney
To avoid controversy following Nipplegate (a stupid term I will only use once here), the NFL went with Paul McCartney, the Living Dean of English-Language Popular Music. Because he is arguably the most popular songwriter of the rock and roll era, Sir Paul had countless hits from which to choose, opting for a fairly simple concert of two big but not overdone Beatles hits ("Drive My Car" and "Get Back"), a Wings hit ("Live and Let Die"), and "Hey Jude", a song he is obliged thanks to a pact with Satan to include in all of his setlists. He could've gone more adventurous and I might have enjoyed it more but it's hard to argue against his largely upbeat, solid performance.

4. Super Bowl LI: Lady Gaga
The modern (fill in name of whatever eclectic, talented as all hell musician you want--I'll go with David Bowie but this is your call), Lady Gaga brought back the solo show and it paid off. Following a pre-recorded "God Bless America" and "This Land Is Your Land" intro, Gaga went through six of her biggest hits, with her somber "Million Reasons" interrupting the dance-pop of the rest of the set. It sticks out like a sore thumb, but I suppose it's unreasonable to expect a non-legacy halftime act to not do some self-promotion by playing their newest hit. Claims of political overtones, I believe, were highly overstated if not totally invented--this was just one of her era's most provocative performers performing provocatively. As you were.

3. Super Bowl 50: Coldplay featuring Beyonce and Bruno Mars 
Man, the NFL really wasn't sure about Coldplay, were they? Chris Martin and company were partnered with two recent previous Super Bowl headliners, and while Coldplay, a band whose live identity is built on trying to be U2 but without nearly the track record of songs, seemed like a risky choice, but they were fine. Bruno Mars only had one hit since his last halftime performance, but it was everywhere, so performing "Uptown Funk" with Mark Ronson was a given. Next, Beyonce performed "Formation", a song released the day before. The three acts joined forced for a mini-Coldplay medley; unlike previous, mediocre medleys, the three acts (essentially co-headliners when all was said and done) had established themselves on stage and the whole thing worked.

2. Super Bowl XLVIII: Bruno Mars featuring Red Hot Chili Peppers
Bruno Mars, despite a number of hits, felt like such an underwhelming headliner that the NFL seemed to threw the Chili Peppers in there at random, but it was Bruno Mars who stole the show. In many ways, Bruno Mars is the ideal halftime show performer--he has hits, yes, but he also has pure energy and multi-instrumental talent while also being middle of the road enough to not upset older viewers. Bruno himself was awesome--it was just completely unnecessary to have Anthony Kiedis anywhere near his stage.

1. Super Bowl XLI: Prince
The gold standard. Prince focused on the spectacle of the event and highlighted the things that made him an icon: his eclecticism (who the hell expected a Foo Fighters cover?), his incomparable wail, and his jaw-dropping guitar shredding. It is pure, dumb luck that it started raining in Miami just as Prince segued into "Purple Rain" but the Super Bowl is all about the greatest the game has to offer hoping to line up their talents with luck in a bid for immortality. Prince did that.

What we're really saying when we talk about Donald Trump's weight

Donald Trump is a proudly ignorant bigot who believes in limiting immigration from countries he deems undesirable (the word "shithole" in "shithole countries" is not the loathesome part; the sentiment is) and who responds to criticism by telling his supporters--declining in number but still strong by per capita passion--that there is a media conspiracy against him. Donald Trump is certainly at least one of two things--very stupid, or (much more likely) cynically exploiting semi-reasonable criticisms of subliminal media bias and turning the narrative into "they're out to get us." He is, of course, a born-on-third-base-wealthy white man, but it's nothing new for people in such a position to want to play the underdog.

Donald Trump is also overweight. According to his personal physician, Dr. Ronny Jackson, Trump weighs 239 pounds. Trump is relatively tall, at 6'3", and thus he falls one pound shy of being categorized as "obese".

Mockery of Trump's physical appearance is more deserved than it is for, say, Chris Christie, not because Trump is politically awful (though he is), but because he has specifically attacked others based on appearance. Just over two months ago, Trump tweeted a (STRONG) implication that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is "short and fat". Trump joked about referring to Rosie O'Donnell as a fat pig during a Republican presidential debate. 

Donald Trump speaks to a very basic urge to mock on appearance. He doesn't actually care if Rosie O'Donnell is overweight--he cared that she is an outspoken liberal. The same Republicans who would mock Hillary Clinton for having short hair and wearing pants suits didn't mind the look from Elizabeth Dole because their criticisms of Clinton were actually about who Clinton fundamentally is. One might think they should, you know, stick to the subject at hand, but people really enjoy personal attacks. Were Republicans crass for exploiting that bit of humanity? Perhaps, but they're also really good at politics.

Of course, the left isn't innocent in this matter. Today proves that.

Is Donald Trump actually 239 pounds? Maybe! It does seem a bit convenient that he comes ever-so-close to obese, but does it really matter?

Donald Trump weighs more than I do and has a Body Mass Index higher than I do--this is going off the measurements he has supplied. He does not have a higher Body Mass Index than I've had at my peak weight. He does not have a higher Body Mass Index than either of my parents. He does not have a higher Body Mass Index than many of you.

Obviously, the reason Trump is being mocked for his weight is because he sucks on levels beyond his physical appearance, but when this mockery is broadcast on social media (and since virtually nobody has a direct line of communication with Trump, any criticism of his weight is being done as a matter of public grandstanding), the wrong message is being sent to those who are overweight and/or obese and, say, don't want to ban Muslims from entering the United States. Particularly with Trump, none of this is coming from a position of concern--calling him fat isn't a way of convincing him to adopt more healthy habits (encouraging healthy behavior is fine in ways that body shaming is not). We are correlating being bad and being overweight. This may not be our intent but it is what we are doing.

This is a problem we have as a culture, particularly online. When we want to criticize Gamergaters who targeted female video game developers and reviewers, we call them ugly virgins. But is the problem whether they are ugly and/or virgins, or is the problem what they are actually doing? In addition to shaming those who feel unattractive or sexually inexperienced who don't target women demanding to be treated as equals, are married Gamergaters (which very much exist) immune from the criticisms? When similar criticisms are levied at the alt-right, would a leader who, say, is married to his third model wife, be part of it?

If the worst thing you can say about Donald Trump is that he is fat, you aren't trying hard enough.