eruthros

The top five (*cough*) vids from 2008 that I posted a while back made me think about the vids that I missed when they were first released; I listed my vids in order of download, and I kept thinking "no, that's actually from 2006!" And then I totally wrote half of a post on it, and forgot I'd done so. *facepalm* But still, on the off chance that you too missed these vids in 2006, here are some of the best vids I came to late:

Sunset Boulevard, Angel: The Series, by butterfly (July 6, 2006; it was part of a Vividcon vid show this year)
This is amazing, so completely something I wanted out of the show and didn't get. I wish Gunn got to have this kind of coherent narrative, that his sacrifices and choices were made as clear on the show as they are in the vid. I thought I wouldn't like the vid, because it's the John Barrowman version of the song, and I greatly dislike John Barrowman's singing. BUT. This vid triumphs regardless, makes a beautiful thing of Gunn's plots on Angel, and I love it to pieces.

Holding Out for a Hero, Hercules: the Legendary Journeys, by marycrawford (February 27th, 2006; I found it when I went to Mary Crawford's website looking for Improper Dancing)
OMG. Just: OMG. I saw that Mary Crawford had done this vid, and thingswithwings and I downloaded it and watched it together, and you guys, I have never occupied the gay male gaze as hard as I did here. Also: I almost can't believe that all of these clips appeared on the show. And I watched it recently. It's a glorious celebration of Hercules-as-hero, pursued by women and drag!Iolaus, and it celebrates Hercules's camp and magical realism and it's just lovely.

Cool Rider, Veronica Mars, by dualbunny (January 22nd, 2006; I found it when I was idly scrolling back through dualbunny's vids)
Another great, fun vid -- dualbunny has me in the introduction, which is just completely brilliant -- Logan on his scooter, Weevil on his bike. Man, way to take the awesome Logan/Weevil relationship on the show and pick just the perfect, most hilarious song ever. Nobody else knows what Logan needs!

Joy to the World, Starsky and Hutch, by giandujakiss (December 29th, 2006; I hadn't been much in S&H, and then when thingswithwings started watching, she was like "hey, did you know gianduja did some s&h vids? we should download them!" And then they were awesome.)
So, a lot of Starsky and Hutch vids celebrate the angst and the buddy-cop relationship, and hey, I was in the Sentinel in the 90s, of course I love those vids like crazy. But Starsky and Hutch is also great fun: it's fun to watch, it's fun to think about, it's fun to write about. I mean, they go undercover as gay hairdressers twice. And this vid celebrates the fun of S&H -- the Joy-to-the-World, the laughter, the crazy times. It's got beautiful timing, and great clip choice, and it's all about Starsky and Hutch having fun crazy times and laughing at and with each other. I watch it when I'm bummed out, because my bummed out can't survive giandujakiss's awesome verse about the times they go undercover-straight, and the choruses with dancing. Whee!

Five on the Dime, Buffy, by shati (November 6, 2006)
and while you're there, download Boulevard of Broken Songs too (September 11, 2006)
shati does something awesome with Five on the Dime: she recontextualizes the sacrifices of the Scoobies, especially Willow, around Buffy. Just, completely amazing, the lines she draws between early seasons and later seasons, Buffy's sacrifices and a certain kind of hopelessness.

What About Everything, Babylon 5, by _happyme_ (the original is from 2005; remastered and/or edited August 8th, 2007. sineala sent the link to me a while back when I was lamenting the lack of B5 vids)
I really strongly suspect that if you've never seen B5, or only seen three minutes of it, that this vid will make absolutely no sense at all, because it's really fast and really contextual. (Also, if you're a B5 fan? It has season five in it. FYI. Also, I assume I don't have to tell you anything other than that it is a B5 vid, but just in case.) This vid fills me with glee -- it's Sheridan focused, but there's a verse for everybody, and everybody's pain and everybody's growth is in here -- the Ivanova bit is beautiful, the Garibaldi bit is great. _happyme_ has me from the moment of "some stubborn leaves / that didn't fall with the fall" -- it's exactly the kind of foreshadowing, exactly the kind of tentative-hopeful, that B5 is. Also, it has two of the most beautiful lines I've ever seen in a vid, when the song says "I find it hard to complain / when compared with," and it's G'Kar and Londo, their relationship really really fast in those two lines, because this might be a Sheridan vid, but, well. When compared with.

Clearly the whole "once a week" thing was more of an estimate than anything else. I'm home sick again today, so I'm in the mood for bouncy-upbeat music and giggling. Hence action vids rather than, say, unrequited love vids. I'm really not as shallow sex-and-violencey as my previous post and this one would imply. Honest.

Some people believe that action vids are automatically "recruiter" vids -- vids you can show to people to interest them in a show -- but I don't agree. For one, action is probably the least likely thing to interest me in a show, and the vids I've found to be best for recruiting are actually ThatFangirl's "China" (B5) and Laura Shapiro's "Rook" (XF), both of which are slow and atmospheric and character-driven. Plus, just because a vid is mostly about action and fighting and jumping around and has fast cuts doesn't mean that it doesn't have an internal narrative, or that the clips don't make more sense in context. Some action vids are so fast-paced, in fact, that they make very little sense to someone who isn't very familiar with the source, familiar enough to place clips in half a second. (These vids should all be fun even if you don't know the source, but they might make more sense if you do.)

( Wicked Amp's Buffy vid 'Fight' to 'Fur Elise - Techno Remix,' song by Vanessa Mae )

( Rob1's Smallville vid 'Freak No. 1' to 'Le Freak,' song by Chic )

( Imation's Angel vid 'Black Suits Comin',' song by Will Smith )

( Nancy's Firefly vid 'Die Another Day,' song by Madonna )

More to come.

Remember: just because a vidder's site is password protected is no reason to give up on ever seeing that vid. Vidders don't password-protect to keep you out; they password-protect to control bandwith, to keep TPTB out, and to make sure that everyone who downloads their vids knows that distributing them without the vidder's permission is not cool. It really is okay to ask a vidder for the password; they don't hate you, they don't care whether or not you're a BNF, and whatever you say will be fine.