The 2005-06 Gargoyle senior editors recall the music, movies, and other landmarks of pop culture that provided the backdrop to their five years at Uni High

By David Boyle, Ben Erickson, Annie Fehrenbacher, Matthew Freeman, Max Goldberg, Roveiza Irfan, Angelina Liang, Justin Park, Sergei Pourmal & Sam Smyth
2005-06 Gargoyle Senior Editors
Posted Wednesday, June 28, 2006, The OG, arts

SUBBIE YEAR, 2001-02
Our subfreshman year got off to a traumatic start with 9/11. We soon recovered, however, thanks in no small part to the tunes that helped lift our spirits, including Nelly's “Ride Wit Me,” Outkast's “Ms. Jackson,” and Jagged Edge's “Where the Party At.”

In the movie theaters, we found laughs in “Zoolander,” offbeat intelligence in “The Royal Tenenbaums,” and good old-fashioned epic filmmaking in “LOTR: Fellowship of the Ring.”

FRESHMAN YEAR, 2002-03
Entertainment freshman year was, for many (mostly male) students in the school and in our class, dominated by a single institution: EVO.

When a somewhat shady-looking Asian man showed up at our school one day our subbie year asking “Do you like video games?” and handing out fliers riddled with grammatical and spelling errors offering reduced prices on flavored toast, we all ignored his offer. However, come next soccer season, after giving the Internet café on campus a try, EVO quickly became the spot of choice during half days and Friday nights.

For the next year we would enjoy countless hours consuming greasy fries and heavenly peach snows while simultaneously blasting pixels in the multiplayer game “Counter-Strike.” It was entertainment bliss.

We were captivated by the massive battle for Helms Deep in “LOTR: Two Towers” and by “Spiderman”'s high-flying web-slinging, and equally captivated by rising star Kiera Knightley's improbable cheekbones in “Bend it Like Beckham.”

“The Ring” filled our need for scares, although we were all disappointed by “The Matrix: Reloaded,” the follow-up to the phenomenal original “Matrix.”

We were also in “The Middle” (Jimmy Eat World) of a “Complicated” (Avril Lavigne) “Dilemma” (Nelly, featuring Kelly Rowland), as many of us realized for the first time in our lives that “I Need a Girl” (P. Diddy and Usher). Our journey through puberty found outlet in dances where one could “Lose Yourself” (Eminem) aided by the tune “Hot in Herre” (Nelly).

SOPHOMORE YEAR, 2003-04
Sophomore year started with the summer release of “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.” At the stroke of midnight, fans of the series (which included plenty of anxious Uni students) packed Pages for All Ages and Borders bookstores, hoping to be among the first to purchase and read the fifth book. The next few days seemed to be all about the world of wizards as students discussed the book with a sense of amazement about its dark ending.

December brought with it the concluding chapter in the “Lord of the Rings” saga. Although it seemed like ages, “Return of the King” was finally upon us. The final two weeks were an especially painstaking lesson in patience, as the first-floor countdown to the midnight premiere seemed to slow down to a crawl, and the theatrical trailer was on constant repeat in the Mac lab.

Come Dec. 17, Uni students flocked to the local theaters with heavy anticipation, only to leave three and a half hours later with mixed reactions. Some felt that the Battle of Pelennor Fields and the siege of Gondor weren't impressive enough, others lamented the exclusion of the Scouring of the Shire, while others still proclaimed the film to be the best in the series. No matter how they felt about the finale, Uni students were privileged to have one of the greatest cinematic trilogies unfold during their prime high school years.

On the music front, the '03-'04 school year saw the rise of two of today's most prominent hip-hop artists. One was a homegrown ex-drug dealer from Queens rapping over gritty beats, while the other was a college dropout backed up by jazzy instruments and gospel choirs. Although they had little in common, 50 Cent and Kanye West both became huge at Uni, with their albums spinning endlessly in the school's lounge and their faces posted up on numerous lockers.

Around this time, the promised land of EVO began falling into disrepair. The computers were packed up, the supply of delicious wings ran dry, and the crowds stopped flocking on Friday and Saturday nights. With the golden days of enormous 32-person “Counter-Strike” matches coming to an end, Uni's sizable gamer demographic started looking for the next challenge to provide its multiplayer fix.

Throwing together slick controls with largescale carnage, “Halo” quickly became the first-person shooter of choice. For months, it wasn't uncommon to find students crowding around four linked-up television sets, intensely dueling in eight-on-eight gunfights.

JUNIOR YEAR, 2004-05
Notorious for being the most stressful time at Uni, we found comfort during junior year with our television counterparts in “The OC.” With the beginning of the second season and the release of the first season's DVD, our class stopped our work every Thursday night to catch the drama and dilemmas of the rich in Newport Beach, Calif.

The girls in particular quickly fell for the sarcastic, intelligent, and attractive Seth Cohen, while the boys began contemplating law careers modeled after that of public defender Sandy Cohen. Our class as a whole mulled over how these television juniors had time for galas and gun fights while we only had time for physics and PSATs.

The end-of-summer release of the stoner comedy “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle” provided a portion of our class with plenty of fodder for the first few weeks of school. We identified with the Korean-American and Indian-American stars who faced intense cultural pressure to succeed, and we found their political incorrectness and humor a source of escape from our own stressful schedules.

The DVD release of “Napoleon Dynamite” caused a flurry of “Your mom goes to college!” comebacks and repetitions of the same lines about nunchucks and hunting. Big Show even gave the movie a nod when Max Goldberg did a dance reminiscent of Napoleon's “Vote for Pedro” performance.

The quirky film “Garden State” combined comedy and romance in a fresh way that spoke to the plight of suburban youth. The feel-good movie was made even better by its soundtrack, which featured The Shins, Coldplay, and Frou Frou.

Within school, the lounge stereo was taken over by G-Unit, and non-rap aficionados were quickly silenced as they were forced to listen to arguments over the beef within the G-Unit collective. In any given week, numerous arguments would break out over whether it was the Game's or 50 Cent's fault that G-Unit was breaking up. We also learned how to drop, pop, and park it like it was hot from Snoop Dogg and Pharrell.

Junior year was the year for the best dance songs. In addition to Snoop Dogg's “Drop It Like It's Hot,” Usher's “Yeah” became a staple song at Uni dances.

And as the year rolled to a close, we learned how to spell “bananas” from Gwen Stefani's song “Hollaback Girl.” The annoying beat, however, quickly got old, and we started our summer with newfound appreciation for the Postal Service's “Sleeping In.”

SENIOR YEAR, 2005-06
Returning to Uni for one last year, we sought refuge from the toil of school in the mellow ballads of Sufjan Stevens' “Come on Feel the Illinoise” and Death Cab for Cutie's “Plans,” both released over the summer.

However, these tranquil albums were quickly overshadowed by the release of Kanye West's sophomore project “Late Registration.” Although most of us agreed that “Late Registration” didn't outshine Kanye's captivating debut, “College Dropout,” it was nonetheless popular enough to make the rounds in the lounge stereo virtually every day of first semester.

The jazz-infused single “Touch the Sky” qualified for the championship round of our painstaking vote for graduation recessional song, only to be beat out by Semisonic's “Closing Time.” We later ousted “Closing Time” in favor of “Such Great Heights” by the Postal Service, a throwback to our carefree underclassman days.

Hollywood supplied plenty of bait to keep us running to the theaters this year. A stream of socially conscious films such as “Crash,” “Brokeback Mountain,” and “Good Night and Good Luck” provided fodder for history class debates and casual lounge conversation alike, while the comic relief in “Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” Wedding Crashers,” and “40-Year-Old Virgin” resonated with our less introspective side.

We watched “Wedding Crashers” on repeat during our senior trip, trying to set a record for most consecutive viewings of the same movie. On the bus ride home, we were kept in hysterics by Dave Chapelle's “Half Baked” and equally amused by the fact that none of the chaperones turned it off.

Of course, the biggest buzz in entertainment news this year centered on the adventures of our favorite little wizard. In July, we painted lighting-bolt scars on our foreheads and flocked to Pages for All Ages for the midnight release party for “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince,” the penultimate book in J.K. Rowling's enchanting series.

We fetched our capes and brooms back out of the closet in November for the cinematic interpretation of the fourth book, “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.” We scrutinized every detail of the movie, many of us having reread the book in anticipation.

Now that we've survived five grueling years at Uni, we look forward to a summer of vegging out in front of the tube and staying in bed listening to our favorite tunes. While many great things await us in life, certainly the most exciting will come to pass on Aug. 15 with the release of “Snakes on a Plane.” Click here if you don't believe us.