Lists

It's the end of the year which means it's time for "Best of" and "Top Ten" lists. I'm not going to post any myself, although I do love a good list. No, I'm just here to complain about the fact that so many people deem it necessary to contribute a "Worst of" list. What's the point of these? I can see absolutely no good reason for compiling a "Worst of" list. I hate them. They represent the worst in the reviewing system we have. Why does a reviewer feel the need to remind us of the worst things they saw that year? Not to mention singling out the people who were involved in those pieces. It's, well, just plain mean.

Actually, I think our whole reviewing system needs to be...um, reviewed. We need to get rid of the star rating. It's ridiculous to try and rate a piece of theatre, film, or dance or even a restaurant, out of five stars (or four if you're The Globe and Mail or The Star). Just give us the written reviews. We should be able to surmise ourselves what was thought of the show from the body of the review, shouldn't we?

We could even go a step further and only publish the reviews that are positive. I'm not sure about this one, although it would get rid of those reviewers who only seem to be able to write anything negative. You know the ones. They get a kick out of being clever and bitchy and like to make the review more about themselves then the piece they saw. Worst kind of reviewer is the kind that thinks they're more important then what's being reviewed.

I realize a change in the reviewing system isn't going to happen but it'd be nice to not see any "Worst of" lists next year. Too much to ask?