The Nineties Blogfest Today

Today, is The Nineties Blogfest where I invite you to tell me your favourite things from the Nineties.

It's not too late to join in. Choose one thing from each year from 1990 to 1999, be it a Film, a TV show, a radio show, a particular episode of a TV or radio show, a piece of theatre, a book, a comic, a piece of artwork, something online or something else entirely, and then tell us what you love about it.

Here are some of my favourite things from the Nineties:

1990
The Secret Of Monkey Island
Deep in the Caribbean, Guybrush Threepwood wants to be a pirate and sword fighting, buried treasure, The Fabulous Idol of Many Hands, cryptic voodoo, ghost pirates, barely navigable forests, overzealous salesmen, a weird tree stump, cannibals, barely navigable caverns and piranha poodles all conspire to get in his way. "If there's one type of piracy I don't like, it's a CONS-piracy".

The citizens (and denizens) of Mêlée Island make this game as solid and believable as it is funny and weird. This is the game that the Pirates Of The Caribbean movies wish they could be. I love this game and since it has recently been given a posh remastering now is just as good a time to give it a go.

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1991
The Fisher King
Terry Gilliam's attempt at a "simple" film is anything but. The Fisher King is a funny and touching modern Arthurian fairytale. The cast are brilliant and it is shot beautifully, but it also has a tragic honesty that raises it above the competition. The film asks important questions about the responsibilities of the media, post-traumatic stress disorder and the wooing of tattooed ladies.

I really love this film.

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1992
Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
The first twelve Discworld novels are all wonderful, but as luck would have it number thirteen is an absolutely spectacular piece of work. It's a brilliant treatise on faith and organised religion that is both hilarious and intelligent regardless of your faith or indeed lack thereof. Less I'll believe it when I see it and more I'll see it when I believe it.

If ever I am asked to recommend a Discworld novel for first time or seasoned readers alike, Small Gods is it.

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1993
Red Dwarf VI
I waxed lyrical about the sixth season of Red Dwarf recently to celebrate the show's return. Maybe I've said enough, but just in case...

Red Dwarf was already a show firing on all cylinders, but the sixth series of the sitcom that shakes its sit up and succeeds masterfully much to the benefit of its com. The loss of the eponymous ship and a beloved regular character really invigorates the show. The new dynamic is cramped, claustrophobic and, crucially, forces the Boy from the Dwarf together. The search for Red Dwarf, the returning characters and the running gags, often lead the show's critics to call this series formulaic, but they ignore a vital factor when doing so. There is a formula at work here, but it's a fantastic formula. The cast are uniformly brilliant, the jokes are very funny and the science fiction is genuinely intelligent and thought-provoking.

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1994
Pulp: His 'N' Hers
The theme of feeling like an outsider runs through tales of domesticity and sexual alienation before apparently reaching the conclusion that you are better off an outsider than fitting in. I don't remember the first time that I heard 'Do You Remember The First Time?', but I do remember loving this album as soon as I heard it. Coming to it after Different Class, it seemed rawer and rougher around the edges. It's a spectacular blend of synth-pop and style. Tracks like 'Joyriders', 'Babies' and 'Happy Endings' just go to show a band waiting for the rest of us to catch up with them.

How 'Joyriders' failed to become an anthem, how the phrase 'Acrylic Afternoon' hasn't caught on and how this album lost out on the Mercury Music Prize to M People I'll never understand.

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1995
Pulp: Different Class
The true winner of the Blur versus Oasis debacle was neither of those bands, but instead Pulp claimed the Britpop crown. I had this album on cassette tape and indeed it was the first album that I ever bought and it remains one of the best that I ever bought.

Pulp's breakout album is twelve absolutely fantastic tracks all crammed full of wonderful observations about the human condition.

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1996
Trainspotting
It would never have occurred to me reading Irvine Welsh's novel that it could be a film. The novel is a meandering series of vignettes with a shared group of characters and the genius of the film adaptation of Trainspotting is not in its faithfullness to the book, but instead in its wonderful inventiveness. It works like a strange homeopathic dilution that somehow focusses the material and makes it stronger. The Worst Toilet in Scotland, the Bond references and Dale Winton's game show are all great examples to the story.

The cast are fantastic, the soundtrack is fantastic and the assault on post-Braveheart Scottish identity is well meant. Danny Boyle, John Hodge and the cast achieved what seemed impossible and they've done it with style.

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1997
Buffy The Vampire Slayer, season one
Probably the greatest American TV drama series ever made starts here. In the first season, Buffy and her friends prevent two apocalypses and see off vampires, a witch, a praying mantis, some hyena-possessed teenagers, a demon on the internet, a demon on the stage, the nightmares of whole town and a murderous invisible girl alike. Although, that's not really what this show is about and the "high school is hell" metaphor is at its strongest here.

The cast are great, the writing superb and the set pieces border on the visceral. In the short term Season One set the tone for the rest of Buffy's run and the spinoff series Angel, but in the long run you can see its impact on practically everything ever made since.

The first eleven episodes of season two also aired in 1997 and took the show up to the brink of the game-changing Surprise and Innocence two-parter.

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1998
Pulp: This Is Hardcore
It was suggested to me that three albums by the same artist is cheating. Maybe so, but I don't care. Pulp made us wait three years for their sixth album and given the terrible music that dominated the charts in their absence it was a long three years indeed. My expectations were high and this album more than met them. Both lyrically and musically, the album is a masterpiece. The exploration of the themes of hitting the big time, living the high life and getting everything you ever wanted only to find out it wasn't worth having is nothing short of fantastic.

On different albums 'The Fear', 'Dishes', 'Help The Aged', 'Seductive Barry', 'Sylvia', 'Glory Days' and 'The Day After The Revolution' would each be the stand out track, but together and with the title track being such an astonishing piece of work it raises the bar considerably.

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1999
Spaced, season one
The first sitcom of the twenty-first century arrives two years early as Spaced reinvents the genre. The characters are wonderful, but the rapid editing, pop-culture references, surreal moments and zombies make this series one that it's easy to see why so many have taken it to their hearts.

Tim and Daisy have extended their childhoods and never grown up. It's implied at times that they might be better off putting away childish things, but when I watched this on its first broadcast it was all I ever wanted in life and now many, many years later if I'm honest with myself, it still is.

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Here are the details on how to take part:

• Leave your name and link on the linky below.

• Feel free to publicise the blogfest on your blog, facebook, twitter, etc and post the above image on your blog if you wish.

• On the 15th of October (that's tomorrow) post a favourite something for each year 1990-1999, and tell us what you love about each of them.

• Leave a comment here, so that we know that you have posted your efforts for all to see.

• Visit as many other participating bloggers as you can on the list below. Compare, contrast and comment on their choices.




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