We dove into the politics of fantasy in January, with articles from M Harold Page (“Why Medieval Fantasy is not Inherently Conservative,”) and Derek Kunsken (“Is Fantasy Inherently not Political?”) — both of which cracked the Top Five for the month.

We didn’t steer clear of controversy on the rest of the chart, either. Nick Ozment dissected the latest Peter Jackson pic, with a little help from friends Frederic S. Durbin and Gabe Dybing, in “Inkjetlings Round eTable: Jackson’s Desolation of The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug.”

Rounding out the Top Five for the month were our look at the economics of labeling the film 47 Ronin an early flop, and Joe Bonadonna’s detailed review of The Sacred Band by Janet Morris and Chris Morris.

The complete Top 50 Black Gate posts in January were:

1. Why Medieval Fantasy is not Inherently Conservative
2. Inkjetlings Round eTable: Jackson’s Desolation of The Hobbit
3. Universal Labels 47 Ronin a Flop less than 24 hours After Release
4. Heroic Fantasy with the Sharp Edge of Reality: A Review of The Sacred Band
5. Is Fantasy Inherently not Political?
6. Observations: The Fellowship of the Ring movie
7. The Weapons of Fantasy
8. Observations: The Two Towers movie
9. You Can’t Go Home Again
10. A History of Godzilla on Film, Part 3: Down and Out in Osaka
11. A History of Godzilla on Film, Part 2: The Golden Age
12. Terror in the Heroic Age: Lovecraft and Culbard’s At the Mountains of Madness
13. Ancient Worlds: But is it true?
14. Art of the Genre: Interview with Jack Crane
15. Griots: Sisters of the Spear
16. Vintage Treasures: Night Monsters by Fritz Leiber
17. Goth Chick News: I Frankenstein, You Potentially Disappointed
18. New Treasures: Runequest 6 by Pete Nash and Lawrence Whitaker
19. Gonji: The Deathwind Trilogy by T. C Rypel
20. Vintage Treasures: Shardik by Richard Adams

     

21. Ol’ Standbys
22. Art of the Genre: Artistic Melancholia for the Ruins of the Cyber World
23. Fantasy New Years Musings
24. Nascent Impulse to War Gaming? A Question from the Wag of Oz
25. New Treasures: Old Mars
26. New Treasures: Spectrum 20
27. Syria A.D. 256 City of Dura Europos
28. New Treasures: The Big Book of Adventure Stories
29. Magic and Miracles: An Interview With Bruce McAllister
30. Leiji Matsumoto, Bushido, Manhood and Womanhood, pt 1

     

31. Legendary ConFusion
32. Observations: The Return of the King movie
33. You Can’t Get There From Here
34. 40 Years of Adventure
35. Gifts from the Godfather of Space Opera: The Collected Edmond Hamilton, Vol. 4
36. At the Intersection of Merritt and Howard
37. How Edgar Rice Burroughs and Mad Magazine got me into Trouble
38. Blogging Dan Barry’s Flash Gordon, Part Nine
39. Win a Copy of M Harold Page’s The Sword is Mightier and Blood in the Streets
40. Life Underground

     

41. Revisiting A B Mitford’s The 47 Ronin: Japanese Tales of Vampires, Ghosts, and Renegade Samurai
42. Death Knight Love Story: WMA meets WTF
43. Beware the Man with the Stolen Soul: Steve Ditko and Stalker
44. January-February Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction now on Sale
45. New Year’s Resolutions of Oz
46. Margaret St. Clair, Andrew Offutt, and Appendix N: Advanced Readings in D&D
47. The Science Fiction and Fantasy of Mick Farren
48. A Contemporary Eye on the Pulps: Fantasy Review, April-May 1949
49. The Church and Treasury of the Teutonic Order, Vienna
50. December Short Story Roundup
51. The Series Series: Heart of Briar by Laura Anne Gilman

The Top 5o Black Gate blog posts in December are here, and you can see all 102 posts we made in the month of January here.