11 Good Reasons
Did you know we love genre? Here's why.
      Compiled by the staff of The 11th Hour

REASON 6: Myth-arcs.

OUR FAVORITES: Millennium, The X-Files, Buffy, Babylon 5 and the one with The Log Lady.

Spike offers comfort to Buffy, who's distraught over The X-Files' lack of resolution.

Linda and Lisa just can't go past the second season of Millennium. "The Wongs' vision of the apocalypse is pretty damn screwed up. And I love them for sharing it," says Linda, while Lisa opines: "Millennium's season two myth-arc gives me the shivers. In a good, incredibly creeped out way." Sarah adds her own indirect Carter admiration when she admits: "As much as it pains me... the goddamn X-Files, for keeping me in suspense for four seasons, causing me to look up phrases like 'Area 51', 'Tunguska meteor' and -- oh, help me -- 'Eric von Daniken,' and then trampling all over my heart, leaving every stupid mystery unsolved. What did happen to Samantha, really?" David gives The X-Files the nod as "the most obvious example of a stolen mytharc," but, he says, "I've gotta give this one to Babylon 5." For Rachel, it's "Buffy, always Buffy, but especially that Season 2 thing. Man, that was brilliant. I still have yet to recover." And for Julie, David Lynch is still the man. "Twin Peaks, baby!" she exults. "Not only 'who killed Laura Palmer?', but who killed Madeline Palmer, who is Mike, who is BOB, what is the White Lodge, what is the Black Lodge... and why is there a fish in the percolator?"

REASON 7: The Outfits.

OUR FAVORITES: Dress blues, black, leather, pretty dresses...

And Lisa only wants the boots?

Julie loves that "fucked-up hair and pimpin' wardrobe of Samuel L. Jackson's in Unbreakable." Linda loves those "... dress blues of the Space: Above and Beyond Marines. God bless whomever decided that dress blues would basically stay the same for the next 60 years or so." Says Rachel, "The fashions of La Femme Nikita just rule. No matter what anyone says about that infamous hat, Nikita, Michael, Madeleine, and even Birkoff are style personified. As is Angel. What can I say? I love black." So does David: "The Matrix wins this one, simply for making leather a necessity rather than a fashion statement." And Lisa agrees: "Everybody in The Matrix was so well dressed," she maintains. "Keanu Reeves looked like a total bad-ass, and I want his boots." Sarah has other items on her genre shopping list: "Jennifer Lopez in The Cell, Jennifer Connelly in Dark City, and Uma Thurman in Gattaca. The dreamworld/parallel universe/future sure has some cool fashion going on. Honorable mention to the women in almost any Hitchcock movie -- not quite genre territory, but I would happily transport myself to the 1950s to get a dress like Grace Kelly's in Rear Window."

REASON 8: Unresolved Sexual Tension.

OUR FAVOURITES: It's pretty much Mulder and Scully...

"It's called Unresolved Sexual Tension, Mulder."

Julie, Rachel and Sarah agree that The X-Files' dour duo are the very definition of the above phrase. "Mulder and Scully," says Julie. "Didn't they re-invent that term?" Rachel concurs. "Mulder. Scully. A dark room, no torch, and no one gets out alive until they admit their deep and abiding love for each other. Then they get abducted by aliens and are never heard from again. (I love my brain. It comes up with the best things.)" David qualifies his approval with: "Early X-Files handled this marvelously," (but he believes that "Farscape is where it's at these days.") Sarah, however, seems to believe that the real heat between everyone's favorite FBI agents is off the set. She just loves the UST between "Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny," she tells us. "And myself and David Duchovny." Linda, denying that Mulder and Scully invented the concept (or even that David Duchovny and Sarah did), praises the love/hate relationship of Spike and Buffy. "'Out. For. A. Walk.... Bitch,'" she points out. But, surprisingly, Lisa discloses that for her, the ultimate in UST is that other frustrated X-Files couple. "Easy. Mulder and Krycek. What? I'm SERIOUS!"

REASON 9: Special Effects.

OUR FAVORITES: The Matrix, Space: Above and Beyond, and the one non-Ewany reason to like The Phantom Menace.

Space's Hammerheads rush off to another battle, and afterward, the pilots will shower.

Aside from David's belief that: "Blade Runner boasts primitive FX work that still beats any CGI today," it's The Matrix versus Space: Above and Beyond in the special effects stakes, with general approval across the board for both. For Lisa, "I loved the very subtle, very gritty look of the effects on Space: Above and Beyond. That was definitely a future I could believe in," while Linda singled out one particular scene: "The shot of the cartwheeling hammerhead in 'Sugar Dirt.'" Praise for The Matrix came from Rachel, Sarah, Linda and Julie... for Sarah and Rachel, though, that other 1999 sci-fi blockbuster was worthy of note. "The Matrix, Dark City, and, yes, The Phantom Menace," says Sarah. "It's creative, visionary CGI like this that atones for the loss of old-fashioned makeup artistry, as seen with the great Tom Savini and Dick Smith."

REASON 10: Superheroes.

OUR FAVORITES: The Tick, Batman, The Joker, Michael Wiseman, and almost the entire Marvel universe.

Hugh Jackman is Wolverine-alicious.

While Julie showed her knowledge of the cult, mentioning "The Tick and his posse: Arthur, American Maid, Die Fledermaus, and Sewer Urchin," Rachel proved the biggest hero fan, with avowed admiration of such comic book luminaries as, "The X-Men. Daredevil. Spidey, Gen13 and The Silver Surfer. Oh, and the Powerpuff Girls. I want to be Blossom when I regress to childhood and regain my power of flight." David -- some Comic Section editor he is! -- chimed in with this rumination: "I thought Christopher Reeve was the only actor to ever nail down a superhero so precisely -- then Hugh Jackman came along and made me forsake the man of steel for the man of adamantium," while Linda came closest to such fervor with her approval of "Batman, but only as envisioned by Tim Burton and the cartoony guys from The WB." Also from Burton's Batman, Sarah confesses a disturbing love of "... The Joker. I saw this in the theater when I was ten -- about fifteen times. Although he's kind of villainous, isn't he? I would like to say Han Solo just to have something for this category, but my heart keeps reaching out to Darth Vader. Heroes are boring." Well, counters Lisa, unless they're like Michael Wiseman from Now and Again, who is "as close to superheroes as I usually come. And as an added bonus, in many episodes he was a towel-clad, half-naked, dripping-wet superhero. They don't come any better than that."

REASON 11: Half-naked People.

OUR FAVORITES: Oh, who are we kidding? Any half-nakedness is pretty much okay by us.

David Boreanaz is often half-naked, and as an added bonus, occasionally chained up.

Julie is perplexingly unimpressed by the combined Mutant Enemy beauty, citing "Rod Rowland takes off his shirt to change the bandage on his bleeding [talking] tattoo in the X-Files episode, 'Never Again,'" and "A mute, snarling Charlton Heston wearing a nothing but loin-cloth in the first half of Planet of the Apes" as favorites. David similarly proves himself blind, by first asking "Do I have to answer this one?" before finally relenting: "Okay, Carrie-Anne Moss in Red Planet, which was the only reason to see that flick." Sarah, meanwhile, waxes poetic about: "Agent Mulder, circa Duane Barry. Indiana Jones, my dream date. Vin Diesel in Pitch Black -- just for the arms. And, of course, David Boreanaz, the master of half-nakedness." Linda continues with the David Boreanaz theme, openly lusting after "the male casts of Buffy and Angel, for both quality and sheer volume." Rachel agrees: "Buffy and Angel are our presents from the kind and beneficent god of pure, unadulterated lust. You've got your Nick, your James, your Seth, Marc, David and Christian, and now the lovely young thing that is J. You know the people who write for these shows? I love them." But it is Lisa who really sums up the spirit of this category... and this magazine: "Since it's 'people', in the plural, I get more than one, right?" Right. "Eric Close on Now and Again, Michael Biehn in The Terminator, and James Marsters on Buffy. Also, James Marsters, and James Marsters. Did I mention James Marsters?" Hmm... no. Who's he again?

We would love to hear all about your favorites. Send your lists in to letters@the11thhour.com.

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