Man Crush Revisited: 25 to 21

#25 Robert Downey Jr. 

Previously ranked: #13

 
A fairly large drop, but still in the Top 25. And it's clips like this (sorry about the swearing) that do it for me. Just a great sense of humour about himself.

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#24 Will Arnett

Previously ranked: #19

 
His post Arrested Development career hasn't been great, but a new season is coming at the end of May, so even though he's clinging to life on the list right now, he might have skyrocketed up into the low teens the next time I revisit this thing.

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#23 Nick Offerman

New Entry

Obviously without the greatness of his Ron Swanson character on Parks and Recreation, I probably wouldn't even know who Offerman is. But still, it's a pretty great character, and one that might be enough to get him on this list from that greatness alone. On top of all that, the small amount I've seen of him outside of the show, not only suggests that the man and the character might not be so different from one another, but between some solid appearances on the Carolla podcast and two of the better Reddit AMA's that I've seen, he has definitely earned his place here on the list for more than just Parks and Rec.

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#22 Joel McHale 

New Entry

Again, the assumption here is that my love of Joel McHale stems entirely from my love of Community. And while that is mostly true, McHale has been on my radar for slightly longer than that. I used to enjoy The Soup on a fairly regular basis. And again, his appearances on the Carolla and Nerdist podcasts have pretty much cemented the fact that he's a pretty awesome dude in 'real' life as well.

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#21 Conan O'Brien 

Previously ranked: #15

Conan makes me laugh almost every time I watch something of his. So, why don't I watch his late night show then? I don't know. I used to. But for some reason, I just don't anymore. I still love the man, but if I can't summon enough interest to watch him on a nightly (or even semi-regular) basis, I can't help but have him slip a bit on this list as well. Super solid to follow on Twitter though. One of the best.

Man Crush Revisited: Missed the Cut

The revised Man Crush list features ten new entries from last time. Which is no small amount, really. Six of the previous entries on the list have already graduated to the Hall of Fame  as of last week, but that still leaves four spots that must be vacated in order to make room for the new people. Unfortunately for these folks, they just didn't quite have what it took to make the Hall of Fame, and instead, simply dropped out of the Top 25 altogether.

They are:

Tony Jaa (previously ranked #24): Don't get me wrong, Jaa is an impressive dude. But to be a Man Crush you have to check more than just one box. I fully admit that I was maybe a bit hasty when I put him on the original list.

Gerard Butler (previously ranked #16): I'll admit that I was blinded by my love of 300 when I originally put him on the list. He's done nothing to maintain his spot since then. Moving on.

Adam Baldwin (previously ranked #14): I love Firefly, I do. And the first few seasons of Chuck were pretty good as well. But sadly, they aren't enough to keep Baldwin in the Top 25.

Ryan Reynolds (previously ranked #17): I said it best in my original write up for him: "If it's good enough for Scarlett Johansson, then it's good enough for me." Well, my girl Sco has since tossed him to the curb, and so am I. Actually, that's not the real reason. in fact, this was probably the hardest cut for me to make, since I still think he's a pretty funny/modest/awesome dude in real life. He's definitely still a Man Crush, just not quite Top 25. Although a quality movie/television release could very easily win me back over.

Man Crush Revisited: The Hall of Fame

Well, it's finally happened. I've been doing this blog long enough that I can actually start doing posts about the posts that I have already posted. Enough time has lapsed. So, what I'll be doing over the next several weeks is revisiting a few lists (Man Crush, Cars, etc…) and updating them to reflect any changes/regrets/updates that may have come to pass in the time since they were posted.

First up will be the Man Crushes.

That list was made in early 2010, and now that over 3 years has passed, it could certainly use an update. My biggest issue with the original list was that I didn't know how to rank historical Man Crushes. Was the list a ranking of where these guys were at their very peak, when I was most in man-love with them? Or was it the way I felt at that very moment? I mean, in 1995, my love of Hakeem Olajuwon was a 10 out of 10. But, by 2010, he hadn't played a game in ten years. Sure, I still remembered him fondly, but since so much time had passed since his absolute peak, he had probably faded to a 4 or 5. When the list was being made, Robert Downey Jr. was fresh off Iron Man, and was riding an all-time high of around 7. So, do I put Hakeem ahead of Downey based on his peak of 10 vs Downey's 7, or should I have gone with the ranking as of the day the list was made (5 vs 7)?

In the end, I went with the latter. It made more sense, and felt like a better reflection of me at the time. But, every time I got to the Hakeem's, and Bill Murray's, and Jackie Chan's of the list - guys that I loved greatly, but hadn't been doing enough work to pop up on my radar in recent years - it felt weird to rank them so low on the list, knowing that at their peak, they would have been ranked much higher.

So, I've come up with a solution. Before I revise the list officially, I'm going to create a Man Crush Hall of Fame. This way, I can retire some of these names that really deserve to be on the list, but just aren't as active in my life as they once were. Then the Top 25 can return to being about fully in the moment, and these all-time great guys won't be relegated to the lower rankings that they really don't deserve.

Without further adieu: The Inaugural Class of the Man Crush Hall of Fame:

George Carlin
Jim Carrey
Jackie Chan
Gord Downie
Chris Farley
Michael Jordan
Shawn Kemp
Jason Lee
Bill Murray
Hakeem Olajuwon
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Jerry Seinfeld
John Stockton
Christopher Walken


Honourable Mentions:
(Guys that I came to love after learning about them long after their time had passed. Hard to say I had a Man Crush on them - hard to put them in the Hall of Fame as a result -  but easily would have been Man Crushes, had I been around/alive/aware of them during their peak, and therefore deserve mention)

Andre the Giant
Bill Hicks
Bruce Lee
Paul Newman
Ayrton Senna
Jerry West