Must Try Harder

Oi, 2016, you've been here for a month now and frankly I expected better of you.  So far you have done a whole heap of underwhelming. Now not only are you letting me down you're letting everyone else down and, most of all, you're letting yourself down. Pull your socks up, 2016.

Now I don't really like pulling apart things that people have put their heart and soul into - I always think it looks a little bit too much like jealousy but there comes a point where the underwhelming just gets a bit overwhelming.  You want examples...

wonder.land
Oh Damon Albarn, what have you done? You've written so many good songs. Why didn't you put any of them in your musical? I was pretty excited, especially when I got there and the Olivier atrium was awash with shiny interactive gubbins. Turns out, watching a virtual reality cat whilst sitting on the toilet doth not an entertaining evening make.

A Winter's Tale
Just because you've been dead 400 years doesn't mean I'm not ripping you apart too. This was the biggest named Shakespeare play that I hadn't seen. It's just Pericles, only with all the plot rushed through in one exposition scene at the end, so that the first hour of the play can be padded out with very boring filler.

Our Endless Numbered Days
I appreciate that I'm a year off the pace with this one.  But then I'm not certain that it was the book's fault that I didn't like it. It was the review, and that sits fairly with you 2016. The review compared it to Station Eleven.  I bloomin' loved Station Eleven - it was a quirky, multi-charactered, world-straddling, post-apocalyptic riot.  If the review had said "adequate coming-of-age story in a forest" I wouldn't have read it and I wouldn't have been underwhelmed. So come on 2016, sort it out.