Favorites of 2024

lots of tv, not much film

It’s really interesting putting together my list of favorites from the year, it helps give me touch points on the year in the same way that doing an annual review does.

My memory seems to struggle without these touch points.

When I lived in California for a couple of years, the weather was basically perfect. Sunny, clear skies, around 70 degrees every day, year round. Who could complain? But with barely any difference between the seasons, it became even more difficult for my memory as I couldn’t remember if certain events or friend get togethers had happened a few weeks prior, or closer to 8 months.

Time blindness is even worse when you don’t have the memory hints of weather and temperature to help you get your bearings. “When did we hang out with them last? Oh right, it was sunny that day with clear skies and about 70 degrees out…”

So here are some of my favorite touch points of 2024, I’d love to hear some of yours as well!

Stay curious,
Jesse J. Anderson

P.S. The first issue of

ADHD Writers

is out now! Check it out if you’re a fellow writer with ADHD.

P.P.S. It’s been quite awhile since I’ve done a Q&A, something I’d like to get back into the habit of doing regularly! If you have any questions about ADHD, creativity, productivity, or anything else, ask your question here and I’ll be choosing some of these to answer in the future.

Favorites of 2024

A few of my favorite things from 2024.

• 🎮 Indiana Jones and the Great Circle - what can I even say, this game is so much better than I possibly could’ve expected. It’s up there with the best Indiana Jones movies. Every location feels like one you’d see from the movie, the gameplay actively encourages me to avoid combat without it ever feeling punitive, the puzzles are just the right level of difficulty and feel like I’m in the library examining clues and discovering where X marks the spot. The sound is superb—from the little sound cues when an enemy notices you, the sharp crack of the whip (or my fists), the brilliantly adapted and instantly iconic score, and even the voice of Indy himself (done by Troy Baker) which perfectly captures the nuances of Harrison’s performance in the original trilogy. This game was a complete home-run for me, and my favorite game of the year. I’m not usually a completionish but I 100%’ed The Great Circle because I just didn’t want to be done with it. My highest recommendation.

• 🎮 Lorelei and the Laser Eyes - been waiting for this indie game since the “Do you remember the maze?” trailer that fully grabbed my attention on vibe alone. This one did NOT disappoint. A fascinating puzzle game oozing with style, it always felt just barely within my reach to solve each puzzle and I felt like a genius every time. One of my favorite gaming experiences for the past few years, up there with another indie favorite of mine, The Return of the Obra Dinn.

• 🎮 Dome Keeper - this was already my most played Steam Deck game, but a summer patch brought new achievements and unlocks that pulled me back in fully. There’s just something about the blend of mining for resources, upgrading my gear, and defending my base that is a perfect gaming loop I never want to stop.

• 🎮 Star Wars Outlaws - honestly this had a surprisingly slow start for me, the stealth just wasn’t quite working and wasn’t super fun. BUT after a patch that tweaked a few things, and once I got a bit further into the game, this one started to really find its groove. A game that really rewards exploration of its diverse worlds and I love when a Star Wars game mixes it up and doesn’t have to focus on just the Jedi.

• 📚 Slow Productivity (Cal Newport) - not all the ideas in this book were exactly ADHD-friendly, but I still found lots that felt applicable and loved the general message of the book.

• 📚 It All Makes Sense Now (Meredith Carder) - worth reading for the “chicken carcass” story alone!

• 📚 Simple Marketing for Smart People (Billy Broas & Tiago Forte) - I need to revisit this one again. I’ve never been great at marketing—it too often feels inauthentic with funnels and systems and all so I default to just not marketing at all and hoping for the best. This book has lots of practical advice for allergic-to-marketing-speak entrepreneurs like myself.

• 🎬 The Fall Guy - I didn’t get to watch too many new movies this year (too busy watching all the fantastic 📺 this year!), but this one was a fun popcorn action flick that my wife and I really enjoyed. Great blend of action, humor, romance, etc for a good time.

• 📺 Colin from Accounts - Fun little romantic comedy sitcom from Australia that kicks off with a humorous meet-cute that sets off the events of the first season. When it’s in its sweet spot, it’s one of the best shows on tv with a terrific sense of humor. But it does have a handful of stinker episodes (particularly in the second season), usually with extremely annoying side characters that ruin the chemistry and fun of the show.

• 📺 Dark Matter - I read the book a couple years ago: hated the first half, loved the second half. The show was similar, though I didn’t hate the first half nearly as much as with the book, it was just a bit slow and for far too long, the reader/viewer feels like they are way ahead of the where the characters are. But the final act isn’t afraid to go to some wild places and makes up for the somewhat slow and predictable beginning.

• 📺 Rings of Power: Season 2 - I don’t care what other people say, this show is excellent watching. While the dynamics of Durin, Elrond, and Disa were the best part of the first season, this time it was the storyline of Celebrimbor’s partnership with Sauron (disguised as Annatar) that had me completely hooked. Absolutely loved the payoff here and can’t wait to see more.

• 📺 Slow Horses: Season 4 - Another great season of the best show that no one seems to be talking about. British spy thriller that mixes Jason Bourne with office politics. Highly enjoyable.

• 📺 Fallout - One of my favorite video game franchises of all time, I was expecting to enjoy this show but I did not think they would be able to capture the unique blend of tragic dystopian drama and quirky over-the-top humor as well as they did. Anything with Walton Goggins is going to be good, and Ella Purnell was perfectly cast as the plucky protagonist Lucy.

• 📺 Fargo: Season 5 - pretty much every season of this show is excellent, and this season did not disappoint. Juno Temple absolutely shines as the unassuming yet extremely resourceful Dorothy “Dot” Lyon. This series was a blast and had several epic action set pieces. Prestige TV at its finest.

• 📺 Manhunt - great moody thriller about the manhunt that followed Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. It’s wild how I learned more about what happened in this period by a tv show than I did in all the years of history in school. Every episode had me scouring wikipedia for most information on some of the fascinating things that took place.

• 📺 Masters of the Air - while this was probably the weakest of the WWII miniseries trilogy from Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg, still an excellent show for those craving more after Band of Brothers and The Pacific.

• 📺 Silo: Season 2 - this season wasn’t as strong as the first season, but it’s still one of my favorite shows built on a great dystopian sci-fi premise. Really excited to see what comes next and hope we don’t have to wait too long.

• 📺 Sugar - loved the noir vibe of this and Colin Farrell is perfect for the role. It has a huge twist late in the season that was… divisive for many. I thought was super fun and a wild choice that I was here for. Really interested to see what they do with a second season.

• 📲 Pocket Casts - after being a loyal user of Overcast for over a decade, a bug-filled redesign eventually had me looking elsewhere for my podcast listening. While Pocket Casts isn’t perfect, the Up Next playlist works really well for the way I prefer to consume my podcasts.

• 📲 Portal - love the nature sounds and videos from this app which I use often when I’m writing or trying to focus on a project and need a bit of an escape. Works especially good as a second-monitor app! (Get 30 days free with this link: https://portal.app/offer/extrafocus)

Honorable Mention

• 📲 Monarch. I can’t really call this budgeting app a Favorite of 2024 since I’ve only been using it for a couple of weeks. But it seems to be connecting for me in a way that YNAB (another popular budgeting app) never did. Here’s hoping this one sticks! It’s got a much simpler budgeting model called Flex Budgeting which feels much more my style than strict envelope-style budgeting.

Rewatching Old Classics

This summer, we decided to do a weekly family movie night and watched a lot of the 80s and 90s classics that our kids had never seen. It was amazing and the kids loved it! Definitely something we’ll do again to catch some of the movies we missed.

I was initially worried that the kids might be bored by some of these older films, but so far they’ve been a fan of everything. 🙌

Overall, the movies actually held up pretty well too! Well… except for Back to the Future Part II. 😬

Here are most of the movies we watched.

• Back to the Future: I-III - the kids LOVED the first and third one, the second one had a bit too much 80s raunch for our family’s tastes (though I still love the vision of “the future” in the opening, complete with hologram Jaws, self-lacing shoes, and the hoverboard).

• Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark + The Last Crusade - huge hit with the kids! I remembered most of the more violent scenes to warn them, and we are firmly an Indiana Jones family now. 🤠

• Cool Runnings

• Honey, I Shrunk the Kids

• Jumanji

• Jurassic Park - (we waited til the youngest went to bed for this one 🦖🦕)

• The Princess Bride

• That Thing You Do

What classic 80s/90s family movies did we miss?