Today may not be an anniversary, but it’s definitely a milestone as The Young Folks hits 10,000 posts with the publication of this article.
How do you celebrate creating 10,000 different and wonderful pieces of content? As much as we wish we had the time to honor them all, I asked our Editors to choose two articles from their respective sections and share why they would like to highlight them on this occasion. Choosing was difficult because we have an incredible team of staff writers who deliver exceptional work all the time, but I like to coordinate, so here are only 10 (of many!) posts we love to honor our 10K achievement.
Video Games
Editor: Evan Griffin
Mr Travis Hymas has written more articles than we could ever think to ask of him for The Young Folks, but this review is pivotal and important. Not only is it one of only 3 perfect 10/10 scores on TheYoungFolks.com video game section (The others being Donald’s take on Uncharted 4, and Alex Suffolk’s praising of The Witness in 2016) it’s the only perfect score by our site in the year of 2017, just narrowly beating out the likes of Super Mario Odyssey, The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild, and Injustice 2… two of those he reviewed also. So believe me when we say, Night in the Woods is an essential, important game, and if you’re a young gamer like many of us are on this website, it is essential that you take the time to play it. Plus, it’s on the Nintendo Switch now, so you have even fewer excuses not to play it.
Leading up to the release of the Nintendo Switch, we did a ranking of all Nintendo consoles ever to exist and it was a fun list to make that was a collaborative effort between myself and a few other writers on the team. Ryan got to gush about retro games and hardware, meanwhile I was getting sassy coming out of the winter depression haze. Another cool thing about this list was that we got to analyze the changes in features of Nintendo’s hardware development over time, and so by the time we got our hands on the Nintendo Switch, it was clear what elements from Nintendo’s history were being blended together into now 2017’s greatest selling piece of hardware across the globe.
Music
Editor: Ryan Gibbs
Jen Norman’s tribute and obituary for Gord Downie is one of the most gripping editorials we’ve run on The Young Folks. Her piece perfectly encapsulates what made Downie and his band The Tragically Hip so important in her native Canada, as well as the philanthropic efforts and work with Canadian First Nations charity, which dominated his last few years as he was dying from cancer.
The piece is also a wonderful example of cross-section collaboration here at the Young Folks; Jen is a video game writer that does not typically write about music. However, her piece here is so touching and brilliantly written that those details become somewhat irrelevant. It was my favorite music piece we published last year, and after you read it, you might feel the same way.
The Young Folks’ music section has done countless interviews over the years. While we’ve done many great ones with cool, up & coming pop or indie rock acts, there’s one that I usually like to mention as one of my favorites. Jennifer Baugh got the chance to interview film composer Lesley Barber in November 2016; Her Q&A not only touches on Barber’s score for the Oscar-winning Manchester by the Sea, but also her early work for the 90s cartoon Little Bear and the use of music to capture emotion in a film. Jennifer’s questions were thoughtful and Barber’s answers were detailed and informative. It’s always a piece I refer back to when thinking of our best journalistic moments.
Television
Editor: Mae Abdulbaki
The Young Folks is celebrating the publishing of its ten thousandth article! That’s an amazing accomplishment. Since joining TYF, it’s been nothing but a wonderful experience. In honor of ten thousand articles, I chose two pieces from the TV section that I believe spoke about many issues within two very different genres. The first is a review for the Netflix series Atypical. Our writer, Will Ashton, broke down why the show was sometimes problematic (but not as problematic as The Big Bang Theory) and also drew upon his own experience with Asperger’s Syndrome. It’s a well written piece that’s both a bit personal and thoughtful in its analysis of the show. For the second article, I was encouraged to share my own piece about how James Olsen was wronged in Supergirl’s second season and how his diminished character importance was partly due to racism and being replaced by a white man. Here’s to hoping The Young Folks gets to another ten thousand articles!
What Atypical Gets Right (and Very Wrong) About Living with Autism
Film
Editor: Allyson Johnson
I’ve spent more time talking with my film writers (and fellow editors) over the past five years or so than I have with people I’ve actually physically met. Upon reaching our 10,000th article, it’s incredible to look back and see how the writers have grown and developed their own specific voices, tailor-made to the projects they love and champion. I could have chosen many to highlight. Nathanael Hood, one of our long-time writers, reviewed Blade Runner 2049 and it was a clear showcase of both his talent and just one demonstration of how our writers have grown since their first entry. It’s as good a piece of criticism as any out there. AJ Caulfield a film and television writer who also co-hosts the Finding Her Voice podcast alongside myself and EOC Gabrielle, began a column further highlighting women in film. In her second week, she wrote about the Andrea Arnold film American Honey – it was both poetically written as well as showcasing the determination the film section – and site – has held in championing female voices in film and film criticism.
Books
Editor: Lauren Wengrovitz
The Young Folks’ books section has seen a lot of fantastic content over the past 10,000 posts, and choosing just two to highlight was much harder than one might anticipate. That being said, I managed to narrow it down to two timeless – and timely – posts that I am proud we shared on The Young Folks.
The first is Will Ashton’s in-depth review of Carrie Fisher’s The Princess Diarist. Posted shortly after Ms. Fisher’s death, it’s a fondly thoughtful look at her life, her writing, and the memories she left behind.
The second post is Rachel Pfeiffer’s “5 Tweaks that Make Classic Retellings Worthwhile.” Retellings have been all the rage in recent young adult literature, but what makes a retelling worth reading? In this post, Rachel dissects Christina June’s Cinderella retelling, It Started With Goodbye, to determine what makes it successful; Her discoveries can act as a guide in determining the success of a retelling.
In Celebration of Carrie Fisher, The Writer, As Seen Through The Princess Diarist