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A Look Back at 2021: Marginally Better Than the Last One

    

    Well shit. After the preview of 2020 that I got last year, I had no idea the laws of the universe in order to prevent a paradox would overcorrect so drastically that it would contrive an even worse version of 2020 than I had foreseen! Turns out I may be responsible for this past year… Sorry! But before the mobs come after me to burn and eat my flesh as a potential COVID cure, I feel I should share that I found a way (I won’t divulge how but it involved a blood ritual with Mephistopheles) to visit the future again and see what 2021 has in store for us and if we indeed have anything to look forward to post-Year of Hell:

January –Joe Biden is inaugurated the 46th President of the United States on the 20th. Loser Donald Trump leads a march of his supporters on the Washington Capitol Building in one last attempt at a coup, only to find they changed venues without telling him. In the middle of a subsequent furious tirade, the failed oligarch suffers a sudden cardiac arrest and dies on the spot.

February –Canada’s CERB payments are expanded to low-income earners and isolated communities much to the horror of Conservative politicians and the begrudging support of New Democrats. Asked by opposition parties how they feel about the economic repercussions of such a thing, the government at last admits that money isn’t actually real.

March –By the 19th, every politician in every developed nation (except of course New Zealand) receives their COVID-19 vaccination. With the most important people protected against the deadly virus first, rollouts gradually begin for the rest of the expendable population as right-wing elected officials all over the world go right back to calling the virus a hoax.

April –After a two month delay, the Oscar ceremony for 2020 takes place with social distancing measures. As winners accept their trophies in a near empty Dolby Theatre, viewers are stunned to learn that Schitt’s Creek was somehow eligible, walking away with everything but Best Sound Mixing -awarded instead to Tenet, because the Academy refuses to learn what sound mixing is.

May – Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion release an extended cut of their hit single “WAP” which is even more explicit, even more sex positive, and features a surprise cameo from Cher. Scandalized talk radio shows and church groups pool funds for a family friendly alternative about the evils of masturbation, but can only get Kid Rock and Buddy Love. The resulting monstrosity kills the music industry forever.

June –Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe, secure in his majority government, resumes his side gig as a hit-and-run driver for the Sask Party. After fourteen incidents, including three more deaths, the RCMP decide to issue him a $500 ticket for property damage when he accidentally rams a person into the side of one of their stations.

July –In their search for a new messiah to triumph over the fictional Deep State, conspiracy cult QAnon elects Alex Jones to rally behind without question. After learning the gay frogs have infiltrated the highest levels of government, they buy up and consume vast quantities of their leaders’ patented truth-seeing serum and Jonestown II is an unqualified success.

August –The TERF movement in the U.K., spearheaded by a collective of failed writers, organizes into a political party, stealing MPs away from both the Tories and Labour. Holding the balance of power, they manage to produce a Bathroom Bill, requiring they be present to watch any transgender person use the lavatory -for the sake of the nations’ children or something…

September –The AT&T decision to release all Warner Brothers movies on HBO Max predictably backfires when pirate sites wind up making more off this strategy than Time Warner. This in conjunction with filmmakers fleeing Warners in droves and an array of expensive legal cases results in WB declaring bankruptcy just in time for Disney to sidle onto the scene looking for a new bitch.

October –Nineteen months after it began, the COVID-19 pandemic is officially declared to be over. An adjustment period of at least six months is expected though for the millions of insecure people who had gotten used to hiding their faces behind masks. Meanwhile, somewhere in the jungles of Peru, a monkey sneezes on a beetle and it dies instantly.

November –Elon Musk at long last achieves his lifelong dream of going to space in his SpaceX Starship. Unfortunately, he is mysteriously cut loose during a spacewalk and is never seen from again. All of his assets are afterwards inherited by Jeff Bezos who uses them to buy the Moon and transform it into a detention centre for irate employees still whining about something called a “living wage”.

December –Denis Villeneuve’s Dune comes out and is a smash hit, instantly spawning a new franchise and at last usurping Star Wars as the great sci-fi mega-hit! Dune sells millions in tie-in merchandise, a new Dune fandom forms and quickly becomes incredibly toxic, and Disney shelves their Salacious Crumb show in favour of an hour-long sandworm-oriented prestige drama that captivates audiences -unaware the real sandworms have already taken over and are plotting a Christmas feast of 7.8 billion human mcnuggets, with a side of tossed salad to even out the carbs.

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