Ed Ranks 2016 Halloween Costumes by Awfulness

Just like with my state rankings (which I'm taking a brief interlude from to post this) I am not the only person to rank terrible Halloween costumes. Websites have done these sort of lists of years and years. However, I haven't bothered to see if anyone has made an updated "2016" version of this list for the latest batch of inane things causing a cancer on pop culture. It's quite possible other people have, but you should ignore those because my ranks are obviously superior.

There are tons of other bad costumes out there. Especially bad "sexy" costumes of things that inherently aren't sexy. You'll see from this list plenty of examples of those. But there are inappropriately "sexy" Ninja Turtles, Pikachus, and Native American girls (sexist AND racist!) every year. This is really more about the zeitgeist that is right here and right now. And two years from now people will look at these costumes and either be like, "Uhhh, what the hell was that all about?" or "Oh yeah, I kind of remember that. Why was that supposed to be funny?"

10. "Sexy" Hamilton

Because I'm not made of money, I never got to see the Hamilton play while Lin-Manuel Miranda was doing it on Broadway. From what I understand, it was apparently super awesome. So without knocking the play at all - let's just focus on how stupid this costume is. Why does Alexander Hamilton need to be a sexy girl? And it says a lot about our culture that nobody gave a crap about Alexander Hamilton until we made an easy-to-consume rapping pop culture play about him. Have you bothered to even read The Federalist Papers? Until this year, the most anyone knew about Hamilton was probably from those "Aaron Burr" Got Milk? commercials. They actually (stupidly) planned to take him off the $10 bill until this year when the popularity of the play made the Treasury Department reverse their position and decide to wisely ditch Jackson on the $20 instead. And while the play might be good, it's enormous popularity will undoubtedly be a fad that will soon fade away. Then you're stuck with a sexy colonial outfit that has no purpose. Sure, you could give it to a Tea Party supporter, but I doubt anyone in the Tea Party could fit into it because they're all 400lb Walmart people.

9. Kim Kardashian Robbery Victim

Part of me actually doesn't hate this idea. It's kind of funny in a lot of ways. The Kardashians are all human waste. The fact that Kim was held at gunpoint and robbed isn't tragic. It's hilarious. I wish for terrible things to happen to all of these people. The fact that this is America's cultural export and what others think of when they think of America sickens me. I have no problem with a costume being offensive. There is no such thing as a costume going "too far." But the reason why I still can't get behind this is simply because it is still Kim Kardashian. Is it making fun of her? Yes. It is tasteless and politically incorrect? Yes. I like that. But even though it's laughing at her instead of with her... the fact that people deem this worthy of a costume means that she is still a thing. I can't wait for the Kardashians to no longer be a thing. Their 15 minutes should have been up about 7 years ago. We never had to put up with Paris Hilton for this long. Can't we send the entire Kardashian Klan to ISIL and get it over with? Kanye is obviously included in this as well.

8. "Sexy "Lady Deadpool

I have no problem with gender-swapping costumes. But quite often when gender swapping we get the needless "sexy"element added. Why does Lady Deadpool need stockings that go up to her cooch? And why is the rest of this costume so terrible in general?  And Sexy Lady Deadpool counts as a "2016" thing because the movie was so big and Deadpool's notability among the general public has never been higher (despite the character being a cult favorite for years).  Compare this with a Harley Quinn costume. Will the Margot Robbie-esque Harley Quinn costume be completely overdone in 2016 because of the Suicide Squad movie? Yes, it will. But Harley Quinn is still an AWESOME costume because it's visually interesting and the character was already inherently supposed to be sexy. And people have been doing Harley Quinn costumes for years, so despite the spike of them this year it's pretty popular in general and will continue to be so in the future. While a creative Lady Deadpool gender swap costume might be perfectly fine, "Sexy" Lady Deadpool is just trying too hard and chances are nobody will care in a year.

7. Snapchat Filter

I can't believe Snapchat is still a thing. This might just be because I'm old. I know I'm old because I heard all this stuff about Snapchat - so I downloaded it and then found myself completely unable to figure out how it works or use it. With regard to Snapchat, I'm pretty much just that old man yelling at kids to stop listening to rap and get off his lawn. I'm Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino (or Clint Eastwood in real life these days, actually). Why hasn't Snapchat gone the way of MySpace yet? Especially after Instagram added their "Stories" video thing. And why do people do these stupid filters? Don't they realize how annoying they are? In the three minutes of my entire life I dedicated to trying to understand Snapchat, I played with the filters. They were stupid and three minutes is all I needed to be completely bored. Who wants to be dogs or bees or pandas or toast or someone who pukes out rainbows? This costume should take a hint from the thing that inspired it, and completely disappear from the earth after 24 hours.

6. Emoji Poop

And speaking of social media trends, Emojis have been around for quite a while but something has happened in the last few years where they've begun to replace language. It's like we're devolving into having a version of hieroglyphics but for stupid people. What will future archeologists think of us when they uncover all of these Emoji Halloween costumes, purses, T-shirts, throw pillows, key chains, shoes, slippers, necklaces, jewelry, coffee mugs, thermoses, smartphone covers, ties, socks, Chia pets, buttons, book bags, fridge magnets, stickers, watches, wristbands, artificial fingernails, pajamas, and so on. How the hell did that 100 with little lines under it (which I'm sure was designed by the Japanese to represent the lowest acceptable classroom test score) come to mean "keeping it real?" And why is that poop so popular? Who wants to be poop for Halloween? And Emoji poop at that.

5. "Sexy" Harambe

There are a couple of things wrong with this one. First - we have the unnecessary "sexy" thing again. Does that mean if it was simply a man wearing a gorilla costume with bullet holes in it that it would be better? Well yeah, actually it would be a little better - but still not good. Like I said, I really don't care if a costume is offensive or "strikes a nerve." I actually enjoy that a little. No, the greatest sin with the Harambe costume - whether it be "sexy"or not - is that it's not even original. This EXACT SAME costume happened in 2015 with Cecil the Lion. Did you forget about Cecil the Lion and the fact that a bunch of people did lion costumes with bullet holes in them a year ago? It's quite likely you did forget - just like you'll forget about Harambe in another year too. The only people who didn't forget were the ones who lazily re-purposed last year's offensive idea to be this year's offensive idea. I wonder what the famous meme dead animal will be for 2018... because you know there will be one.

4. Any Trump Costume

Look, mixing politics and Halloween is unavoidable as Congress has set in law the fact that Election Day will always be the Tuesday following the first Monday in November (i.e. always between November 2 and 8). Every two years there are federal elections and every four years there are Presidential elections. For some states there are even odd year-based local elections, meaning that they'll have some form of election just after Halloween every year. At the very least, every 4 years Halloween will be hijacked by politics. 2016 is one of those years. And doing something political for Halloween will always be stupid. But, of all the Halloween politics options that I'll list here - Donald Trump will be the least awful because in a way he's the most appropriate politician to be a Halloween costume that there ever was. He is already sort of a cartoon or caricature of a real human being. But just because he's the least worst doesn't mean it's a good idea. The awful ideas out there for Trump range from this racist-ey one above, to fairly run-of-the-mill bad wigs and suits for White men, to... yes... "sexy" Donald Trump (sigh).

3. "Sexy" Hillary Clinton

OMG WHY?! Like several others already featured on this list, this costume is also skating around its subject with a vague name - they're technically claiming it's just a "Capitol Hill" costume. Like they're trying to avoid being sued or something. I'm pretty sure that they're already protected under parody laws, but then again this isn't exactly quality parody. It's parody in the way that those "____ Movies" are parody (Epic Movie, Date Movie, Disaster Movie - you know, all those terrible things that aren't funny). This is worse than Trump because, again, at least Trump is effigy-worthy. This is just taking an already-female politician and doing the "sexy twist" on it, which is kind of more condescending than doing the whole gender swap thing.

2. "Sexy" Ken Bone

I repeat again - political costumes are the worst. And this is the worst of the bunch because it hits the double-whammy of being both political and an internet meme. How much more of costume for a short attention span can you get than this? Nobody will remember who this is in three months, let alone next Halloween or three Halloweens from now. There is a good chance most people won't even get this costume right now. If you're at a Halloween party wearing this, expect to be asked what the hell your costume is by everyone. AND STOP MAKING EVERYTHING SEXY!!!

1. This Gods of Egypt Costume

This costume exists for some reason. Nobody saw this movie. Do you remember that this movie even came out? It starred a bunch of white people as Egyptians and made bout $14 at the box office. If you did hear about this movie, its probably because you heard about the fact that many people were outraged over the fact that it just starred a bunch of white people as Egyptians. Could you technically just claim you were dressing up as Egyptian god Anubis by wearing this costume - rather than the specific whitewashed Anubis from this terrible film that bombed? I suppose so. And like with the "Capitol Hill" costume, it's sold under a vague name that doesn't specifically reference the movie. But come on, this is clearly meant to be a costume representing that awful movie. And who wears a costume so they can be a character from a terrible movie that bombed? Did anyone in 2002 wear Pluto Nash costumes? Did anyone in 1995 wear Cutthroat Island costumes? Were the kids of 1991 pushing each other in lines to make sure they were the first to get Hudson Hawk costumes? Of course not, so if you're planning on wearing a costume for a movie that instantly goes into the Walmart $4.99 bin... maybe you should think again and go with Donald Trump as a taco instead.

Ed Ranks the United States (Part 2 of 5)

Our incredible adventure of ranking the states of the United States continues. If you don't remember how the rules work... too bad. I explained them a whole one post ago and you should just scroll to that one. It's not that hard. Unless you were educated, as we've seen, in Mississippi.

We continue with #40...

40. North Dakota

Oh yeah, North Dakota! That's the place with Mount Rushmore, right? Nope! You're thinking of South Dakota. North Dakota has absolutely nothing of interest in it at all. This is an important point. North Dakota isn't completely terrible at education, healthcare or quality of life like a lot of these places I mentioned in the bottom 10. Taking just one of those examples, education, North  Dakota is pretty good - #11 at high school graduation (although it drops to #48 for advance degrees). It's also #12 at women's equality. Good for you!!! But even those states with terrible living conditions that I've talked about have something to do in them. The primary attraction in North Dakota appears to be sitting around and waiting to die of boredom. Sorry North Dakota, you're short on "intangibles."

39. Louisiana

Sure, this looks like a suitable place to build a major American city!

The only good thing that Louisiana has going for it is New Orleans. If this was a rank of cities in the US, New Orleans would rank high because it's awesome. Poorly located, but awesome. Are you a Chocolate City hater? Too bad. But most of Louisiana isn't New Orleans. Most of Louisiana is a craphole with the forth lowest life expectancy, forth highest obesity (okay, maybe that part is New Orleans' fault because the food is so delicious), sixth lowest high school education rates, and eighth lowest household incomes. In January 2016, Politico called Louisiana the worst state. Politico is wrong, but they're not that wrong. But by coming above North Dakota this gets to my point about the value of at least having something to do in your state. In almost every single measurable way, Louisiana is much more terrible place to live than North Dakota. But at least Louisiana has jazz, cocktails and gumbo so you can pass the time while you live your miserably short life of obesity, ignorance and poverty. Yay?

38. Missouri

I could go for an obviously lame Missouri/misery joke here, but you've probably heard it before. Mizzou ranks fairly poor with a lot of the negative statistics that I've already mentioned. First of all, it has some really terrible income inequality. Missouri also ranks low on the aforementioned (in part 1) "well-being index," has high crime rates and high pollution, is the worst state for pay for state government workers, and... get this... has more puppy mills than any other state. Yes, puppy mills are one of those "wild card" ranking factors that I was talking about it. I take everything into account. So Missouri has a big arch in St. Louis? Nobody cares. Every single McDonald's already has two of those.

37. Indiana

The seventh worst paygap between women and men. A recently-signed bill promoting discrimination. Blue laws restricting the sale of alcohol on Sundays. The lowest voter turnout in the last national election. The fourth lowest state for exercise and physical fitness. The sixth highest for lung cancer. The last in the country for eating fresh produce. The worst water pollution. And the most meth labs (or at least the most meth labs shut down since there is no way to measure the meth labs that aren't found... although if you look at Peyton Manning's slack jaw you'll likely come to the conclusion that the rest of the undiscovered labs were likely in the basement of Lucas Oil Stadium). These are all negative things that you might be able to say about some fictional dystopian future Mad Max society. But they are also things you can say about real Indiana in present day. 

36. New Mexico

New Mexico's most famous resident.

New Mexico came in right behind Mississippi as the second worst state to raise a child in. It also was the highest in child poverty in the nation, with 30% of children living in a family with less than $24,000 in annual income. By fourth grade, only 23% of New Mexican children can read. A financial magazine rated New Mexico as the worst-run state in the nation based on 11 factors. Forbes listed it as the fourth worst state for businesses. So you might want to re-think moving to New Mexico based on how cool you thought Breaking Bad was. And I guess like with Nevada some people like sand without all that "water" nonsense that beaches have, right? Do I have anything nice to say about New Mexico? Sure... it's the second most "racially integrated" state in the nation. And this factor will begin coming up a bit too, so let me explain that one for future reference through these rankings. No, I'm not talking about "integration" as in busing kids to schools or Black and White people living as neighbors and singing Kumbaya. This is a more complex set of factors related to equality between races including gaps between income, employment, home ownership, poverty, business ownership, education, voter turnout, etc. And don't think that this racial integration factor is some big "politically charged" stat that was used to denigrate the South.  As we go along you'll see that some of the "North-iest" states suck at this.

35. Idaho

Idaho is like North Dakota but at least with potatoes. Potatoes are great, and thus Idaho ranks higher. Alas Idaho is also a haven for White supremacist and Aryan nation groups. Still, on the plus side crime is low, employment is high, and french fries are still delicious even when grown by racists. So feel free to go to Idaho. Just try not to be Black, a Democrat, or a woman who wants equality if you're planning on living here.

34. Kansas

Running the raw numbers with the statistics, Kansas doesn't actually come out all that bad. But the things that are bad about Kansas are REALLY bad, and I'm not just talking about how its a boring flat land of wheatfields. Kansas has ranked near to dead last in personal income growth versus inflation, scores poorly on obesity and integration, and its economy has essentially imploded due to some poorly executed "libertarian" experiments. Of course actual libertarianism  refers to governments taking a hands-off approach, which Kansas tried on economic (as opposed to social) issues. For social issues this "hands off" approach has been aggressively hands-on with religion famously being forced into school texts,  severe restrictions related to women's health, and an insanely expensive drug-testing program for Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) recipients that essentially caught nobody (because - spoiler alert! - families too poor to afford food are generally way too poor to be able to avoid drug habits too). The math says Kansas is a little higher than #34, but this is a state where my "intangibles" knock it down a few.

33. South Carolina

South Carolina. Famous for this tree. I guess.

Charleston is nice to visit and has good food, but South Carolina doesn't do too well with most of its other statistics. The indicators I'm using to rank the states only have South Carolina doing above average in two areas: personal senses of well-being and employment. Everywhere else it runs in the lower echelons. What is South Carolina really bad at? Women's equality (where it is #45 out of 50 states) and its crime rates (marginally better at #44).  But the wild card factors for South Carolina, unlike Kansas, actually move it up a little: a really cool flag, tasty oysters, shrimp and grits, some pretty parks, nice weather. #33 seems about right. Right?

32. Nebraska

Like Kansas, Nebraska's quality of life statistics don't actually make it seem to be a doomed hellhole. And its not a doomed hellhole. If these rankings were based on the numbers I crunched alone, it would have come in higher.  But my rankings also factor in other important issues like "the complete boredom of having nothing to do." What is there to do in Nebraska? I mean I'd love to go through it one day to follow the Oregon Trail. It has a high life expectancy for residents and the second lowest unemployment in the nation. But beyond that I think it's mainly corn and even they're not the best at corn. High life expectancy? Why would you want to live longer if it was just in Nebraska?

31. Michigan

Either the London Fire of 1666 or Detroit on any given Tuesday. Who can tell?

One good thing about Michigan is that it has a fairly good healthcare system. Hopefully that good healthcare also applies to mental health, because Michigan tops the nation in bullying incident rates, with huge numbers of Michigan teens saying they've considered suicide. And we can't mention Michigan without mentioning Flint (holy shit their water is literally made of lead!) and the cesspool that is Detroit. With these two Rustbelt cities alone, it's no wonder that Michigan comes in as having the fourth worst employment rate in the nation. And despite Michigan being somewhat middle-ground with regard to its overall diversity demographics - that diversity is devastatingly segregated, with Michigan being among the worst states for the aforementioned integration statistics.

Well, given the Halloween holiday coming up - the next Ed Ranks Everything will skip the states rankings and I'll have a Halloween-themed post up. But I'll return with number 30 next week.

Ed Ranks the United States (Part 1 of 5)

Am I the first person to rank the States? No. Websites put up lists like this all the time. Even H.L. Menken did it in 1931. But honestly, fuck H.L. Menken. Only Ed Ranks Everything has the academic gravitas and renowned ranking methodologies to rank the States properly and definitively for once and all. I didn't see Menken ever rank Dawson's Creek characters or crayola colors.

But a little more to the point, I actually did a little research and math crunching for this one, so if you feel like I'm boring you with statistics a little bit - that's probably because I used statistics.  My rankings shall include a variety of factors such as education (at all levels), income and poverty, unemployment, overall health and healthcare, violent crime, gender equality, racial equity, childcare, opportunities for young people, and "well-being" (which I'll explain a little later). I won't explain every factor I used. I don't have to justify myself to you!!! I also used some other random "wildcard" factors here and there, and you'll see those pop up. These are things I like to call "intangibles." And just to make sure my own results didn't mirror any other ranking I made sure that I didn't use any of the same qualitative factors that estately.com did for their ranking of the states (although honestly, they used some pretty solid ranking factors).

50 states is a lot, so this will be broken up into five parts. Let's start with the worst, shall we? And not to spoil anything, but if you're from the Deep South you might want to just look away now.

50. Mississippi

Not offended by this? Congratulations! You're racist.

Mississippi has the highest unemployment rate, the highest poverty rate, the highest obesity, the lowest life expectancy, the worst conditions for underprivileged children, and the lowest percentage of people who graduate form high school. But at least it's only the second worst at teen pregnancy, huh? Mississippi and Sudan have very similar GDPs (Mississippi has the worst economy in the nation), and are unfortunately similar in a lot more ways than just that. What do you expect for a state that hasn't bothered to remove the fucking Confederate flag from their own flag? The best part of ranking Mississippi last though? At least no one is offended because nobody from Mississippi can read.

49. Arkansas

Speaking of miserable places that might as well be third world countries, Arkansas isn't that much better. It ranks second lowest in people who get college degrees and absolutely last in people who get advance degrees. It has low employment, low per capita income, low voter turnout, and high homicide and violent crime rates. Its flag also highly reminiscent of... oh... hey, what's that? Some sort of reverse Confederate flag-theme? Again?

48. Alabama

Low employment again? Check. Low income again? Check. High homicide/crime rate again? Check. Alabama also has brutally restrictive voter registration and immigration laws. It's pretty much a slightly less worse Mississippi but with tornadoes. But what you might be asking yourself right now is if their flag is one that instantly invokes some other flag with historical associations to secession, racism, slavery, segregation, and white supremacy? The answer to that question would be "Yes, yes it absolutely does." Hrmmm. Three in a row, all at the bottom? I'm sure it must just be a coincidence.

47. West Virginia

Wild and wond- well... okay. It's wild at least.

Okay, so West Virginia specifically broke off from Virginia to avoid being in the Confederacy, so no problems with that flag issue there for once. But West Virginia has the lowest employment rate and the lowest voter turnout. A 2012 Gallup Poll ranked it the worst state to live in, and the Gallup-Healthways Index ranked it as having the worst "well-being." You'll see this index of well-being references a lot over these five parts, so click the link if you want to understand it further. But basically it refers to people's sense of purpose as well as their social, financial, community and physical opportunities. West Virginia has the second lowest life expectancy and the second highest obesity. It's also regularly the butt of jokes about being inbred and having sex with sisters, so there's that.

46. Kentucky

That Gallup-Healthways Index on well-being wasn't too kind to Kentucky either. The bluegrass state also ranks near the bottom in education, opportunities for young people, women's equality, household income, and life expectancy. Geez, is Kentucky good at anything? Yes - it rates very high in obesity!  That's what happens when your entire economy is based on KFC and bourbon. Admittedly - bourbon is awesome. It might be the only good thing about Kentucky though. Horse racing? Really? How can the Kentucky Derby be a beloved annual sporting event when the entire thing lasts the duration that it takes me to pee? But to more important issues now. Is their flag racist? No!!! Kentucky was a border state that wisely never left the Union and has instead decided that their flag should include an image of Daniel Boone and Henry Clay microseconds away from engaging in a hot man-on-man hug.

45. Georgia

Enjoy not sleeping tonight

A foreigner might come to the United States with one simple question, "What state was Deliverance set in, so I may avoid that state?" The answer is "Georgia," which is 99% of everything you need to know about Georgia. What is the other 1% that you need to know? The fact that after much controversy in 2001 it finally changed its flag to get rid of that Second Confederate Navy Jack (AKA Army of Northern Virginia battle flag, AKA Dukes of Hazzard flag) which is commonly thought of today as "the Confederate flag," even though it technically wasn't because the real "Confederate flag" was the first national flag of the Confederacy, also known as the "Stars and Bars." Whew! What a relief. I'm glad to know that in 2001 the people of Georgia finally moved on from that old racist flag. But what did they change their flag to? An almost exact copy of the first national flag of the Confederacy! So really all Georgia decided to do is make its inherent institutional racism more historically accurate. Fuck you, Georgia. Nobody likes CNN or Delta Airlines anyway. And the fuzz on peaches makes them disgusting and inedible. Who wants to eat food that gives you the same tactile sensation as licking a 14-year old boy's face? Georgians, that's who.

44. Tennessee

Tennessee, where the violent crime rate is the one of the worst in the country (the worst according to the FBI a few years ago, although other rankings differ), it has high rates of diabetes and obesity, a quarter of adults are smokers, and life expectancy and household income are inhumanely low. What else sucks about Tennessee? Poor emotional health, high stress, and a shockingly low number of people who answered that they had "smiled or laughed" in the last day when surveyed. Does their flag look like a Confederate flag? They officially say "no," and that its imagery represents the "Grand Divisions" of the state and that a blue bar on it is "purely for design." But "vexillologist" (Latin for "flag-studying guy") Steven A. Knowlton says that "the Tennessee flag has pragmatic unity with the Confederate flag: both share the element of white stars inside a fimbriated blue charge, and the element of that blue charge on a red field." That claim of a purely "design"-based blue vertical bar also doesn't hold up, with Knowlton noting a resemblance between the flag's vertical bars and the vertical bar of the third national flag of the Confederacy. Nice try, shitbags.

43. Ohio

Let's make the Statehouse look like we were too poor to afford a dome

Ohio is straight up "North," so you can't accuse me of a pro-Yankee bias for this one (although if you are the type of person to complain about "pro-Northern biases" in the first place, I probably don't care about any opinion you have on anything except for cornbread recipes). The Gallup well-being index skewered Ohio as its residents typically had low opinions of their lives and opportunities. This is the type of thing that typically happens when you live in a place where your bodies of water catch on fire. Do you know what the one type of thing that typically isn't supposed to catch on fire is? Yes, water. The thing you use to put out fires with (let's not bring up Class D fires, no need to be anal about this). The people of Ohio also have fairly low incomes, low life expectancy and high rates of obesity. They're doing better at education than the Southern states though because, well, they're not the South.

42. Nevada

Oh look. Sand.

Nevada is a terrible state. First of all, absolutely nothing about Las Vegas interests me at all. And Las Vegas itself is just one city in an entire state, so let's stick to talking about the whole state rather than just a city nicknamed aptly for "sin." Nevada has the second highest unemployment. It has the sixth lowest college education. It has the eighth highest crime rate. It's also just mostly a bunch of shitty desert, probably full of snakes and lizards and scorpions. And this last one might come as a shock to you (from a state all about showgirls and brothels)... but Nevada also ranks as one of the worst states for women. It's the worst state for women's employment and insurance, third worst for women's healthcare, and pretty low ranking in women's political participation, life expectancy from birth, and high school graduation. You don't have to go to a slot machine to gamble in Nevada. If you're a woman you're already gambling your future just by being there.

41. Oklahoma

So you thought I was done beating up on you, South? NOT YET! Who has terrible healthcare? You do, Oklahoma! Who has high obesity (including childhood obesity), low-ranking public schools, 16.6% of people living below the poverty line, the sixth highest teen pregnancy rate, and the highest rate of female incarceration? You do, Oklahoma! And while female incarceration may sound like a good premise for a Netflix show (or--let's be honest--a porno)... it's not really a good thing in real life. And I'd be remiss if I don't mention all your damn tornadoes. But my favorite random Oklahoma statistic - it has the lowest consumption of fruit in the US. Who is studying things like that? These big money Washington state apple lobbyists are out of control! Not like those good, honest fracking lobbyists in Oklahoma. What earthquakes? Oklahoma doesn't know what you're talking about with that man-made fracking earthquake nonsense. The fact that earthquakes, which never happened before, have suddenly started to happen in Oklahoma is a TOTAL COINCIDENCE.

Next time: 40-31. These are states that suck slightly less, but still suck.

Ed Ranks Who Negan Will Kill Sunday, From Least to Most Likely

Or maybe nobody will die and they'll just play baseball?

11. Rick Grimes - There is a 0% chance that Rick Grimes will die. AMC just released a Season 7 trailer where Negan is gloating to Rick about just killing his "right hand man." So Rick is, obviously, still alive after whoever was killed is killed because Negan is talking to Rick about how he killed that person. Even before that trailer came out though, the chances that Rick Grimes would die were 0%. It just won't happen. Now, as for him getting a hand sliced off... that's a different matter.

10. Carl Grimes - The chance of Carl dying isn't 0% but it's pretty low. And there is no way that Negan would brag to Rick about killing his son by calling his son his "right hand man." That's just silly. He'd be like, "I killed your son."

9. Aaron - Aaron is not important enough to die, honestly. Do you know how pissed off people would be if they waited this unbearable entire summer break to reveal that it was just Aaron? They'd probably be even angrier than they were when the season finale didn't show who was killed in the first place. And that made people pretty damn angry. Aaron isn't even important enough to get a last name.

8. Rosita Espinosa - Rosita is barely more important than Aaron, but she's been around a little while longer so it's a little more likely. Will she die eventually? Certainly. But they'll likely give her some more important plot line where you follow her for a few episodes and really start to relate to her before they finally stick her reanimated head on a pike. Rosita is a total "mid-season death" type of person. 

7. Sasha Williams - Sasha, unlike Rosita, has had a bit more plot development recently what with that whole "she's gone crazy and lives on piles of corpses" thing. Plus her stuff with Abraham. But she's still at that level of not being quite important enough of a character for an entire cliffhanger of the show to be based around her. If they did this, it would just be a cop out. Like Rosita, you should have no doubt she'll die soon enough - but this isn't the time yet.

6. Michonne - Michonne actually fits the bill of someone who could be considered Rick's "right hand man" (you should have no doubt that the gender of that statement could be included in the trailer by AMC to intentionally be misleading). But it's still not that likely. Although we have finally reached a character who is both important enough to die and it have a huge, epic, impact - but also not so important (like Rick or Carl) that it wouldn't be impossible to do. I just don't see this happening though. The most likely reason it would be Michonne is because she just started having sex with Rick, and via twisted Jason Vorhees logic that means she should be the next. And I'm aware she doesn't have a last name either, invalidating my earlier point about Aaron. But my counter-argument to you on that issue is SHUT UP.

5. Eugene Porter - Eugene Porter is almost not important enough to kill as part of a big cross-season cliffhanger because he's totally a second-tier character, unlike Michonne and other first-tier characters who would have a more devastating impact. But Josh McDermitt is just so damn lovable and great in the role that his death would be pretty devastating. Of all the characters left, he's the one who most consistently gives us comic relief to break the tension of how horrible life is otherwise. If they got rid of the one guy left who can really make us smile - that would be quite a punch to the gut (or bat to the head) and really show us that things are going to get even darker.

4. Glenn Rhee - Glenn might still die at the very place he is supposed to die in the comics. This would almost be a more shocking result than anything else because so many people assume that NO WAY is it going to be Glenn, especially after the Glenn fake-out death less than a season ago. It would be poor/lazy storytelling to "kill" Glenn twice in a year, right? But maybe that was just a red herring which was set up to make us think that Glenn would therefore be safe. And Glenn getting the bat from Negan in the comics is just so memorable. I wouldn't put money on it being Glenn, but it wouldn't be the craziest thing in the world. Still, I think the show is trying to make a point that "anything can happen" and that they don't need to mirror the comics exactly - and killing Glenn would be counter to that point.

3. Abraham Ford - After Season 6 ended and I calmed down from wanting to punch the TV for not showing who died, I settled upon Abraham Ford as clearly being the most likely character who would die. For starters, he was featured a lot last season. Like, a whole lot. His importance to the story and airtime in the show increased tenfold. That's exactly what The Walking Dead would do with an otherwise mid-level ensemble cast member when they're about to kill that person. And Abraham also reached the point where he died in the comics, and managed to survive that event because his death was replaced with the death of Schmidt's chubby girlfriend. For quite some time, it was my absolute belief that they were merely saving his death to be bigger event... like this! In fact, I'll feel bad if it is Abraham because then I know I should have stuck with my guns and picked him as #1. But now, I'm leaning towards The Walking Dead going even bigger and more depressing.

2. Daryl Dixon - There are a couple of reasons why killing Daryl would be a good and probable move by AMC, despite the "If Daryl dies we riot" meme which the internet has embraced. In fact, the "If Daryl dies we riot" sentiment might actually increase the likelihood that Daryl will be killed, because it's believed that he's such an important, untouchable character that there is NO WAY he could die! Therefore the shock of killing him anyway, despite how incredibly important he is and how beloved he is, would be a really effective move. It would be a game-changer for the show. Will people be furious? Yes. Sad? Yes. Will they stop watching in droves like they claim they will? Not really. Anyone who watches Game of Thrones knows that killing characters you love won't drive them away. A couple of additional reasons it could be Daryl? He could absolutely be called Rick's "right hand man." His character, who wasn't in the comics, was also inspired to a large degree by the comic character Jesus. Now that Jesus has been introduced to the show - is there room for both Daryl and Jesus?  Obviously the way that Jesus is being portrayed in the show is very un-Daryl-ish, showing that there could be enough of a differentiation for this reason to be a non-factor. But probably the most damning reason it could be Daryl is simply the fact that actor Norman Reedus has already been given another show. This show is also on AMC, so it could just be a fakeout by the Network to fool us. But  when you really have to start thinking of justifications like, "Oh, well that other show doesn't take too long to film and The Walking Dead is an ensemble cast, so Norman Reedus has plenty of time to film both shows," it's really time to think that maybe you're trying too hard to convince yourself that Daryl won't die.

You can be depressed now.

1. Maggie Greene - I saw one internet article that said that there was no way that Maggie would die, because the show would never stoop so low as to kill a pregnant woman. Which really makes me wonder if the person who wrote those words had ever seen a single episode of The Walking Dead in their life. Maggie is, depressingly and horrifically, the perfect character to kill off. Murdering a pregnant woman would be awful and terrible. It would be the darkest possible thing that the show could do. That's why it will happen because what the show wants to do is make Negan the most hated villain possible. Beyond that - think of the practicality of Maggie surviving and giving birth to a child. Story-wise, what exactly would that add to the show that hasn't already done with baby Judith Grimes? The show already has absolutely no idea what the hell to do with Judith. Just imagine if there were TWO babies hanging around. A few more reasons it will be Maggie? As I stated before, the whole "right hand man" comment being included in the trailer for Season 7 seems like the ultimate decoy to lead us in the direction of Daryl. Why release that clip if it just gives it away? Is Maggie really Rick's right hand man? In a lot of ways, no. But Negan doesn't really know these people that well and has only seen bits of them. The last few episodes made a concerted effort of making Maggie more badass and assertive. In particular, she led the negotiation at the Hilltop Community and participated in the raid against the Saviors. I could easily see how Negan would see Maggie in that right hand man role based on the last few episodes of Season 6. It also fits the show's pattern of killing people off once they've had major character development and airtime. Killing Maggie would also be a show "game-changer" just like killing Daryl would be (and thus worthy of a cliffhanger). There is a lot of out-of-show evidence too, ranging from Lauren Cohen's seeming lack of being in the Atlanta area when the show is filming, hints dropped by other cast members in interviews about how dark and sick the conclusion would be, and the fact that a slip of the tongue by a show producer in an interview referred to "deaths" when speaking about Negan killing rather than "death." Now Negan could kill two people as part of the cliffhanger resolution, the producer could have misspoke, or he could have simply referenced the fact that Negan will (of course) eventually kill more people as the season goes on. But another thing that the plural could refer to is Maggie and her unborn child. Yet there is even more compelling evidence. From the last trailer, the blood splatter on the right side of Rick's face would support a Maggie kill (she was to the right of Rick), and an object appears in a pile of guts on the ground that eagle-eyed fans using the pause button have said looks like Maggie's wedding ring. But the #1 reason it will be Maggie? It's simply the best story the show can do in order to both pay tribute to the source material while simultaneously mixing things up in a new direction. We've all been dreading Glenn's death via baseball bat and the horror of Glenn and Maggie's wonderful relationship being over. The show can still do that, while still making the event very Glenn-focused, by killing his wife instead. 

Unless they just lazily kill Abraham. In which case, forget I wrote these last two.

Update 10/23: 

Yeah, so I'm pretty bad at this. Don't let such a minor fluke let you distrust the rest of my rankings. Those things are all solid.  I never said I was Nostradamus.

You'll NEVER Guess How Ed Ranks Clickbait Headlines. #7 Will SHOCK You!

This blog is essentially listicles. Listicle websites are usually clickbait nonsense. The people who run clickbait websites should be doused in gasoline, squeezed inside of a tire, and set ablaze (with the exception of in the UK, where they should be squeezed into a tyre instead). I try to ensure that my ranks never resemble clickbait. Buzzfeed, Yahoo! "News" (in quotation marks deliberately), Huffington Post and others are usually pretty bad offenders... but there are so many more. This is a list of the worst types of worthless clickbait headlines, with #1 being the most annoying and stupid.

This face should be on the side of a milk carton.

10. Why Hollywood Won't Cast [_____] Anymore!

The majority of clickbait spam headlines are cut and paste nonsense, with the same article being used again and again with a slightly different thing filling in the blank. I have seen the "Why Hollywood Won't Cast X" headline a hundred different times with various names. Some of them are people who are absolutely still cast in films, and other ones are like, "Oh yeah, I haven't seen Brendan Fraser in a hot minute." I don't think humans actually write this article. I think some sort of bot just makes up a vague article and fills in a name from a list of 200 different B-actors.

9. [_____]'s Net Worth will SHOCK you!

No, it won't. This is usually a person who is an actor/musician/athlete or famous businessperson. These people are generally always rich. Occasionally this clickbait article is flipped and it's about someone who you'd think should be rich but is actually poor. Generally this doesn't shock anyone either because the celebrities who have gone broke are already famous for going broke. Like MC Hammer and Brendan Fraser.

8. All [_____] Share THIS in Common! 

All millionaires share this in common! All celebrities share this in common! All people who live to 100 share this in common! All geniuses share this in common! All people with successful marriages share this in common! All successful entrepreneurs share this in common! All happy people share this in common! Once again, another copy-and-paste headline that plays on stupid people's beliefs that if they learn that one secret to success that every single other successful person shares then they too will become successful. Guess what, morons... there is no easy, minimalist answer that solves all your woes. These articles will be full of generic Tony Robbins motivational pep talks about how believing in success will make you successful. As if the people who are successful were simply the most "hungry" for success and worked hardest for it. Well, I'm sure there are emaciated child slaves all around the world who are really, really, REALLY hungry to break away from their oppression and have freedom (and also hungry for actual food, because they're emaciated), and yet they never find as much success as Brendan Fraser. Conversely,  there are successful assholes who merely inherited their good fortune without ever working a day in their lives. It's like when a NFL commentator says that the team who "wants to win more" will win. Uh, no. If you put a team of cancer patients up against the New England Patriots and say the team who wins will get the cure to cancer, the Patriots will still win even though the cancer patients surely "want to win more." And don't think for a minute that Bill Belichick will throw the game and let the cancer patients win. Bill Belichick is evil.

7. #7 Will Shock You! 

Did this shock you? Of course not. #7 never shocks anyone. Like #9 above, the people or robots who generate these headlines don't seem to actually understand what the word "shock" means. This number is not always 7, but it is quite often 7. Why? Well, most clickbait websites are just slideshow pages anyway, which means you have to click some "next" buttons to move forward. Every time you click next all the ads on the page refresh and you get brand new ads and additional page counts for the website to boost its stats. Sometimes these things go on for like 100 damn pages. But most people won't stick around for that long. Most people might go two or three pages before they go, "Ugh, stupid slideshow. I'm closing this." But this devious method of hyping up #7 can trick a lot of people to going at least that far with the promise that the monotonous and uninteresting bullshit that the first few items on the list were will suddenly be "shocking" at #7. But there is never anything interesting or special about #7. It's just filler like the rest. Probably filler about Brendan Fraser. 

6. You'll Never Believe What [_____] Looks Like Now!  

Is this an article about how some awkward child actor grew up to be beautiful (that girl from Spy Kids)? Is this an article about how a cute child actor grew up to be ugly (Haley Joel Osment)? Is this an article about how someone who used to be fat got skinny (I've seen a million versions of this that claim "Precious" got skinny to get you to click, even though she totally didn't)? Is this an article about how someone who used to be skinny gained weight (Brendan Fraser)? Is this an article about how someone who was attractive when they were young is still attractive now that they're older (Phoebe Cates)? Is this an article about how someone who was attractive when they were young is now ugly (Brendan Fraser)? No matter what the headline is, you shouldn't click it because it doesn't matter and you should stop being obsessed about looking at before and after pictures of Brendan Fraser. He looks generally the same now, but ages like everyone else does (except Phoebe Cates).

5. [_____] Does [_____] and YOU WON'T BELIEVE What Happens Next! 

They'll tell you a very scant first part of a story, and then you'll have to click their stupid headline and go to their website to see the next part of it. Don't worry about those pop-up ads which appear on your screen! And if one of their ads tells you that your computer needs to be "optimized" by installing this software... you should definitely do it, because it's legit. An animal gets abandoned and I won't believe what happens next? Actually, I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that a different animal adopts it and raises it, because that is the end result of that headline 99% of the time. The other 1% is when a human (sometimes, but not always, Brendan Fraser) adopts it and nurses it back to health instead. I want to see just once where this headline winds up with "the baby duck starved and died alone in the cold!" That would be super depressing, but also: 1) quite a twist on how these stupid headlines go, and 2) pretty reflective of the sad reality of life.

4. Only [Low Number]% of People Will Know [_____]! 

These headlines are often associated with lame slideshow "quizzes" where you, again, have to click next about 25 times to get some result. In the very worst of these you'll get to the end and it tells you to enter your email to get the result. You would never have gone through with it if you had known that at the beginning, but now you've wasted 10 minutes and you're committed. Generally the quiz will be super easy and you'll get a much higher percent than the low number stated at the beginning. Why do people click these? Because everyone wants to show to everyone else how smart they are and how much better they are than everyone else. Only 10% of people can identify these countries! Only 15% of people can answer these trivia questions about Star Wars! Only 20% of people can identify which movie this is by one screenshot of Brendan Fraser from it! You'll take these quizzes and even if you're downright stupid you can probably get 80%, because the low number is just a lie they made up. The vast majority of human beings can easily differentiate the outline of France from the outline of Germany, and can also recognize essential differences between the wardrobe choices of Rick O'Connell and Professor Trevor Anderson. 

3. One Weird Method/Trick You Can Use to [_____]! 

I'm not quite sure why the adjective in this clickbait is always "weird." A lot of times, these are very similar to #1 below (don't jump down yet... you'll get there soon enough). When they are like #1 below, they can be downright dangerous to your health if you believe them. One weird trick to weight loss! Is it to stop eating and drinking water? But just as often the weird trick is just about inane bullshit. One weird trick to getting your Hermes handbag cheaper! You'll probably click 12 different slides and download 4 viruses to your computer in order to be told "wait until there is a sale." One weird trick to stop Brendan Frasier from stealing your food! The answer to this one is usually, "tell Hollywood to hire him again so he can afford to buy it." Honestly though, most of these weird trick things are about penis size.

2. Watch [_____] Destroy/Decimate/Eviscerate/Shred/Aggressive Verb [_____]! 

These are sooooo annoying and they're getting worse every month just from the fact that they're multiplying like bunnies as headlines. These are almost always political and show a person from one side of an issue "totally destroy" the other side with their brilliant understanding of how things REALLY work. They're also often just a link to a short clip of a TV talking head giving some group-think propaganda to their target audience while strawmaning the opposing side. Liberals and conservatives are equally guilty of these clickbait crimes to your Facebook news feed, and chances are you're only seeing the ones you want to see anyway because you've already unfriended (or at least unfollowed) all your old high school, college and work friends who are of the opposing political party. On the few occasions these headlines aren't political you might see something like "Watch Brendan Fraser destroy your childhood with Dudley Do-Right!"

1. Doctors Don't Want You to Know [_____]! 

As alluded to above in #3, this one goes above and beyond the usual harmless clickbait nonsense and into a zone that can endanger your life. Although if it does you're likely very stupid and deserve the consequences. Similar to the #8 "All [_____] Share This in Common" nonsense, people want to believe their is one magical thing that will solve everything. And so many people are completely obsessed with the idea that "doctors" or "Big Pharma" are behind some massive conspiracy and hiding the secrets to better health or the cures to diseases. Chris Rock hilariously hit a nerve with his "Ain't no money in the cure. The money's in the medicine!" routine. People want to believe that we can magically become healthy with this one trick that doctors, pharmaceutical companies, or Brendan Fraser playing biotech executive John Crowley in the 2010 film Extraordinary Measures don't want you to know about because it will take away all their money. These clickbait headlines are often tied in with "alternative" or "natural" medicine that the evil cabal known as "they" don't want you to learn about. And what are these natural homeopathic miracle cures? Acai berries, kale, vinegar, honey, gingko biloba, ginger root, coconut oil, aloe, onions, magnets, cardamom, reflexology, getting rid of gluten, wellness bracelets, or anything you've ever heard Dr. Oz say. These are all snakeoil for the 21st century. They share the same lack of any scientific evidence to back them up as do "anti-vax" and "detox" nonsense. When pointed out though, the people who believe in this readily turn to their convenient conspiracy theory. Do you know what Pfizer would do if they found the cure to cancer or AIDS? Hide it so they could sell "the medicine" rather than the cure? You are a moron if you think so. They would do exactly what they have done with the rest of their business model - patent the formula so that only their company can sell it and get billions and billions of dollars. Do you want to know why I say this? Because science has totally cured or created vaccines to completely prevent dozens of diseases before. Polio, smallpox, diphtheria, tetanus, rabies, measles, yellow fever, etc. In the 1920s, there were an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 cases of diphtheria every year in the United States, causing 13,000 to 15,000 deaths per year. Between 2004 and 2015, a total of two cases of diphtheria were recorded in the US. Why did Crucell, a biotech vaccine company which is a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, not "hide the truth" of their diphtheria-preventing Quinvaxem® from the world as part of the big pharma conspiracy? Because contrary to noted health expert and supporting actor in Grown Ups 2 Chris Rock, Johnson & Johnson can actually make a shitload of money from the cure. If kale could cure a damn thing then every single kale seed would already be the intellectual property of GlaxoSmithKline, and you'd have to pay $40 a seed. 

The picture next to the "Cinematic Masterpiece" in the dictionary.

Ed Ranks Batmen

Everyone wants to be Batman! Minus that little
"your parents getting murdered" part.

A lot of people have played Batman. Some of them were very good, and others had nipples on their suits. These are their stories.

10. (Tie) Everyone Else - Let's not pretend this list is definitive. DC Comics over the past several years has been releasing tons of straight-to-video animated stories that feature people like Jeremy Sisto, William Baldwin, Bruce Greenwood, Jason O'Mara, Michael C. Hall, and a million others voicing Batman. There were also serialized radio dramas featuring Batman back in the yesteryear. Lewis Wilson and Robert Lowery played Batman in the 1943 Batman and the 1949 Batman and Robin, both 15-part theatrical (low budget) serials. The 1943 serial, obviously being made in the middle of World War II, featured Batman as a heroic US-government agent fighting the evil Japanese (referred to lovingly in the film as "shifty-eyed"). The 1949 serial featured a villain named "the Wizard," who's amazing wizard power was that he could create a gadget that could control cars. And speaking of cars, some dude played Batman in OnStar commercials. Remember that? But nobody cares about any of these people or their Batman portrayals as they are waaaaay too obscure. Let's move on to some real Batmen...

9. George Clooney - Batman and Robin (the 1997 version, not the 1949 version) was awful. Every single actor in this film was miscast. Every single costume was terrible. The set designs were terrible. The cinematography was terrible. The story was terrible. The only redeeming quality of this film is the ability to ironically quote its terrible puns. In fact, I'd go even further and make up additional puns that weren't in the movie but seem like they could have been. Anyone can do this. Just make up a terrible joke that uses the word "chill," or "cool," or "cold," or "ice," or freeze," and do it in a bad Arnold Schwarzenegger accent. Instant fun! Notice how I haven't actually talked about George Clooney at all in this ranking? That's because he's totally forgettable. What did he do in this film? Nothing that I can recall. Get kissed by Uma Thurmon? I kind of recall that. I'm pretty sure he didn't even get top billing.

Hey! From the same artist as the forty cakes meme.

8. Olan Soule - You might not think you know who Olan Soule is, but if you heard his voice it would likely bring some tingling of nostalgia to you (at least if you are of a certain age group). He was the primary television animation voice of Batman from 1968 to 1984, although Adam West was sometimes invited to reprise the role in animated features during that time. He voiced the role in The Batman/Superman Hour,  The Adventures of Batman, The New Scooby-Doo Movies, Sesame Street, Super Friends (1973 series), The All-New Super Friends Hour, Challenge of the SuperFriends, The World's Greatest Super Friends, and Super Friends (1980 series). He was also a solid television character actor, and appeared on just about every show from the 1950s to the 1980s that you can imagine from I Love Lucy to Simon and Simon.  So there, now you know about this guy.

7. Val Kilmer - Batman Forever, like Batman and Robin, is another terrible Joel Schumacher film with the same flaws as described above with mediocre casting, sets, scripts, etc. But at least Iceman had a slightly better portrayal of the caped crusader with more to do in this film than Clooney ever did. And yet Jim Morrison still seems to be just a boring supporting character to Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey, who I'm sure get more screen time in the film as the villains than Batman himself ever does. They even get the better girls. Two-Face got to double team Drew Barrymore and Debi Mazar while Doc Holliday had to settle for lame Nicole Kidman. Poor Simon Templar. Okay, that's it. I've reached the end of my Val Kilmer role knowledge.

6. Ben Affleck - I like Ben Affleck, and have no objection to him playing Batman like many others did. However, he just hasn't done it enough to soar that high in the rankings yet. With only Batman vs. Superman and a very small cameo appearance in Suicide Squad as of yet, we haven't seen too much of him. I like the fact that he's playing an older, more grizzled Batman. I'd like it even more if they just hired Michael Keaton to come back as an even older Batman to coach Terry McGinnis in a Batman Beyond film - but hey, I'm sure that will happen one day (two reboots from now?). The thing about Batman wanting to kill Superman until he realized that their moms had the same name was super stupid, but I think Ben Affleck has a lot more to give than that.  Ask me again in a few years after Justice League and Battfleck's own solo Batman film come out and maybe he'll move up the ranks (or down, in the event that 60% of Justice League is just Batman wanting to kill Aquaman until he remembers that his dad also talked to fish). 

5. Will Arnet - Will Arnet is Lego Batman, who is absolutely awesome.

Television's first gay couple! Progressive.

4. Adam West - The 1960s Batman TV show (and its 1966 movie) straddle the line between "so bad its good" and something that's legitimately good. It was intentionally campy and a send-up of the juvenile Batman comic in general. When you look at how cheesy and over-the-top a lot of the show is, you also have to wonder how much of that was due to low budgets and how much was done just because they thought it would be funny to make it cheesier. Adam West worked perfectly for this show, and the fact that he had Bat-Everything in his utility belt was ludicrous. Shark repellent? Really? So many elements of this show worked their way into the Batman mythology that it was forever changed. The bad part of that was the 60's Batman show became so associated with Batman as a whole, that the Batman character was sort of a joke for a number of years until Tim Burton saved Batman from his underwear-on-the-outside self.

3. Christian Bale - The Dark Knight Trilogy are all great films, and I have nothing negative to say about them. Christian Bale is great in these. After Joel Schumacher ran the Batman series into the ground by bringing elements of the campy 1960s Batman back into the film series, Christopher Nolan again saved Batman and gave us the darkest and most morally complex portrayal of Batman yet. Maybe he would rank #2 instead of #3 if not for that damn gravelly voice. WHERE'S RACHEL?

 

"As a matter of fact, I have danced with the devil in the pale moonlight."

2. Michael Keaton - Michael Keaton's Batman is almost the best. As alluded to above, the association of Batman being "badass" is entirely due to Tim Burton helping to make Batman cool, ass-kicking, and awesome again in the late 80's. After the 1960s, Batman was universally thought of as a goofy, pun-making idiot who ran around in a silly suit. Keaton's darker and complex take on Batman, and the overall darkness of the story, redefined the character for the next generation. Before Hollywood started "rebooting" everything - this was really the mother of all reboots that started the idea that you could take an entertainment franchise and totally redefine it. Christian Bale's Batman would have never been if it wasn't for Michael Keaton paving the way.

1. Kevin Conroy - Kevin Conroy is Batman. If you don't know who Kevin Conroy is, you have no business even looking at this ranking or pretending like you care about Batman.

~~~~~~~

Admit it, you just came a little looking at this dapper gent.

0. Ultimate Morphed Batman - Dafuq is this?! In the history of Ed Ranks Everything there has never been a #0 before!  How can there be a number zero? Is zero better than one or is it worse than one?  Well, it's both. It's better than #1 in the sense that it would be better, but it's not actually the best because it doesn't exist. A few years ago, Reddit user morphinapg created a picture where he merged the faces of Adam West, Michael Keaton, Val Kilmer, George Clooney, and Christian Bale. The end result was this picture to the side of the most handsome man ever. Coincidentally, this was actually done before Ben Affleck was cast and so it actually doesn't include Affleck. But you could almost swear it does. As if Ben Affleck was always meant to be part of this. Scientists need to get working on gene splicing so we can make this ultimate morphed Batman a reality. Earlier this year, a baby was born with three genetic parents. It's just a matter of time before we take this technology into the eventual destination it was always meant to go - creating the perfect Batman. And how could highly-advanced Batman-related technology ever go wrong?

Ed Ranks Eurozone Countries by their €1 Coins

While there are 28 countries in the European Union (soon to be 27, thanks Obama! UK!) only 19 of those countries are in the "Eurozone," and thus share the same paper money and the "common side" of their coins ranging between €0.01 and €2.00. Because only one side of the coins is common across the zone, each country gets to depict whatever it wants on the other side. Well, almost whatever it wants. I'm sure there are some pretty sensitive topics in Europe that allow other countries to get some veto power.

How about I rank these countries by their aesthetic €1 coin choices? No? Too bad, I've already written it.

Way to make your monarch look
like a burn victim, Netherlands

19. The Netherlands - In 2014 hideously ugly depictions of King William-Alexander replaced hideously ugly depictions of Queen Beatrix (who abdicated the throne) on all Dutch Euro coins. Whenever I see Dutch coins, I want to find a forge and melt them into bullets that I can use to shoot whoever designed them. And by that I mean shoot them in the leg or something to teach them a lesson. I'm not a monster.

18. Slovenia - AGHHH! Want your currency to give you nightmares? Check out this depiction of (super angry-looking) 16th Century Protestant reformer Primož Trubar featured on the Slovenian €1 coin. He looks like a version of Santa Claus that might go around breaking into people's houses through the chimney to murder them. Look, I mean no disrespect to Primož Trubar. I'm sure he's a revered national hero. It's not like you're going to put Melania on your coins. But this particular depiction of him resembles a police sketch of a homeless man who has been seen flashing women at the park.

17. Spain - As you'll quickly be able to tell from this set of rankings, I am not really a fan of countries that simply put their silly monarch's face on their coins and call it a day. Like the Netherlands, Spain is one of these countries. Since "old monarch abdication fever" (OMAF) caught on in the early 2010s, the Spanish €1 switched from King Juan Carlos I to the new King Felipe VI. Unlike the Netherlands, this is a pretty straightforward depiction of their ruler without any failed attempt to be artsy. Unfortunately for Spain, the profile picture of Felipe used makes this coin look like it has Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad on it. Not so good.

16. Belgium - Belgium's €1 coin is boringly just the same picture as all of their other coins - a profile of their (again) current monarch, King Philippe. And also like Spain and the Netherlands, the face on the coin recently changed. Before Philippe it was King Albert II... who, yep, abdicated again! I had totally forgotten that happened, just like most people totally forget that Belgium even has a king. Fortunately for Belgium, their king in no way resembled a genocidal tyrant who uses chemical weapons on civilian populations.

15. Estonia - The Estonia €1 coin is a silhouette of Estonia. How creative! Estonia should have looked to its Baltic state colleagues in Latvia and Lithuania if they wanted advice on how to make an awesome coin.

14. Luxembourg - All Luxembourg coins feature slightly different stylized effigies of Grand Duke Henri of Luxembourg. This is almost as boring as Belgium and the others, but at least the angular stylization of the depiction of the Grand Duke on the coin is somewhat interesting. The Dutch also went for angular stylization. I'm not particularly a fan of any of the coins that rank this low, but Luxembourg pulled it off the "face of some guy" thing a lot better than the rest.

Better than putting Freud on their coin

13. Austria - The only famous Austrians are those characters from The Sound of Music, Hitler, and Mozart. So Austria wisely went with Mozart for their €1 coin. And their economy is still probably 40% Mozart-driven, with I'm sure half the cafes and stores in the country being named Mozart something-or-other. I'd suggest they replace Mozart with a Sachertorte if they really want a high ranking coin rather than just another boring picture of someone's face. Schnitzel and apfelstrudel are obviously more renowned, but a little harder to depict on a coin. So get on that, Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern who I'm sure has no other important issues to deal with like what to do with all those Syrian refugees flooding into Europe (thanks a lot for that Felipe VI, uhh... I mean, Assad).

WTF is this?

12. Cyprus - Cyrpus's coin depicts the Idol of Pomos, a cross-like prehistoric fertility goddess sculpture dating back to the Chalcolithic period, circa the 30th-Century BC. While this has deep and important historic and cultural meaning to the Cypriot people, unfortunately the coin looks sort of stupid. The Idol of Pomos is even wearing a necklace on the coin - a necklace of the Idol of Pomos. While the idea of recursion on a coin should be amazingly hilarious to me, when I look at this coin I go "meh."

11. France - I can't tell what the hell this is supposed to be. I guess a super-stylized tree or something. But it could be Bastille Day fireworks for all I know. There are so many awesome things about France, you think they could choose something better than a tree. Napoleon? A guillotine? A pencil-mustached man wearing a striped shirt and beret while carrying a baguette? All of these would be clearly better choices.

10. Finland - Finland's Euro coin is graced by two swans flying over a distant, lake-filled landscape. Aww, totes adorbs! But also kind of bland. Your nation's coat of arms is a crowned lion about to deliver a deathblow with a sword. That would have been much better.

9. Ireland - This is a Celtic Harp, as seen on the side of their bottles of Harp beer. Does it represent Ireland pretty well? Yeah, sure it does. Is it that interesting otherwise? Not particularly.

8. Slovakia - This is ALMOST a really exceptional coin featuring the coat of arms of Slovakia, which is mainly focused on a double (patriarchal/Byzantine/Orthodox) cross on three hills. This same symbol can be seen on their flag. But the Slovaks could have learned a lesson from the Malta about simplicity in design (we'll get to them later). Slovakia goes for some sort of bumpy background texture behind the cross design, as if the cross was carved onto stone. Entirely unnecessary. A simple/clean double cross on the rounded minimalist suggestion of three hills from their coat of arms would have been a sharp and appealing design. All that "chiseled on rock nonsense" ruins the effect of something that's only 23.25mm in diameter.

7. Germany - The German €1 features the "German eagle," which is a badass-looking heraldic symbol that is fortunately different enough from the eagle that the Nazis used, because that certainly wouldn't be good. Two problems bring it down a bit though. First, it doesn't look as awesome or angry as other version of the German eagle, which would be better. And secondly - Germany wasn't the only European country to historically use eagle heraldry to represent the nation. The Spanish, Byzantines, Russians, Poles, and others all used pretty similar-looking eagles. Since a number of countries which came from those empires (especially the ex-Byzantine countries) still use those very similar eagles and are in the EU - what gives Germany the right to claim this one? I mean, other than the fact that they are the economic powerhouse that really runs the entire EU behind the scenes anyway.

Italian Vishnu

6. Italy - The Italian €1 coin features Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man, also known as "that Renaissance Goro picture" (to people who didn't take as many art history courses as I). It is a great coin and going with iconic Italian art was a good decision for the boot country. Most of the Italian Euro coins are pretty good. The Birth of Venus by Botticelli is on the tiny little €0.10, and could easily also make a great design on a larger coin.

5. Portugal - All Portuguese Euro coins feature various Portuguese royal seals, with the €1 coin featuring the royal seal of 1144. It's throwback and historic-looking, which I really like. Above all other EU coins, this would be the most desirable coin to find spilling out of pirate treasure chests.

The tiara means she's single
and ready to mingle

4. Latvia - Latvia's coin features a Latvian maiden (colloquially known as "Milda"), a holdover from the 5 lats coin and a popular symbol of independence during the Soviet occupation. She looks pretty cool and has a headpiece thingie that I was trying to research the name of so I didn't just call it a "crown." I was unable to figure out what it's actually called, but I did learn that the headpiece is worn only by unmarried women. Which is a pretty convenient shortcut to know who's single or not when you're playing the field in Riga.

3. Malta - Sometimes you don't need anything complicated or over-designed like France's busy and silly €1 coin. Malta keeps it simple and just used the Maltese Cross. Is it is pleasant design? Absolutely, the design has been used by the Order of St. John since 1567 and has its origins in 6th-Century Byzantine. Does it represent Malta well? Absolutely, it's the MALTESE cross. This is a sweet coin.

A killing machine

2. Lithuania - All Lithuanian coins, from €0.01 to €2.00, feature the same design - Vytis, a knight on horseback from the coat of arms of Lithuania. And while I knocked Belgium and some others for having the same design on every coin... the same rule doesn't apply when your coin is absolutely boss. This knight is the man! He's swinging his sword in the air while riding his horse and he's ready to kill the hell out of any filthy person who dares fight him. I would guess Russians. Lithuania might be new to the Eurozone, but they came in and break-danced all over everyone else's shit with this coin. Yes, Lithuanians are famous break-dancers. Don't question it, it's just one of those facts that you should blindly accept because I said so.

Hell yeah, it's Bubo!

1. Greece - Greece's €1 is another throwback. Except it's throwing back REALLY FAR. It's a copy of the 5th-Century BC 4 drachma coin of Athens, featuring an owl - the symbol of goddess of wisdom Athena, for which Athens is named. It is absolutely incredible and awesome. Technically I guess it's also a coin within a coin... so recursion again, baybeeee! The Greeks dropped the proverbial gauntlet on the rest of Europe and were like, "Look bitches, we invented coins on Aegina Island around 700 BC. Nice try with all your stupid new designs, everyone else. But we're just going to use the same design that we used 25 centuries ago and it will be better than all of yours." And they were right. I guess the only thing that's too bad about this whole situation is that after essentially inventing money, the Greeks forgot how to use it.