2012 was the year where I feel I really started to become a fan of film and I think the movies that came out this year had a big part in that. BaconShelf already succinctly explained what made this year so special, but let me break it down a little further:

This was the year that the MCU really started so it was a unique time right before all the studios desperately tried copying it. There were still plenty of unique movies being released and it feels like there were more hits than misses. Just looking through the movies on google, this is the only year where I have a positive opinion of most of the movies I saw. Even the big studio films I was excited for exceeded expectations. The only one I really didn't care for was the Hobbit.

2017 was a really solid year for the big studio movies. Many of them produced movies that were some of the best in their respective franchises (except JUSTice league). I thought TLJ was laughably bad when I first saw it, but I've really come to appreciate what it was going for and think it's easily the best Star War that Disney has given us so far.

2014 feels like the last year where studios were still releasing original/somewhat risky movies. However, this is also the year where studios kept churning out rushed franchises. Remember Dracula Untold? Remember Divergent? Pepperidge Farm remembers.

Overall the good greatly outweighs the bad. John Wick and Kingsman also launched franchises but it doesn't seem like they intended to and it only happened because they were so good. It was also a great year for Marvel. Winter Soldier and GOTG are undeniably some of the best movies in the franchise. I think Interstellar is the only movie that can make me tear up, weirdly enough.

2018 had some movies that really surprised me in a good way. Idk, this is one of the sections I'm working on last and I'm getting burnt out on writing these.

2019 was a decent year. The box office was completely dominated by Disney and it's kind of getting disturbing. They made seven of the top eight movies this year and the other one was Spider-Man...

It feels like the more interesting/unique movies are being released on streaming services where they'll probably reach a wide audience much easier. I mean they've been doing this for years but it seems like this is the year where it really became legit.

These platforms will likely kill the movie theater industry sometime this decade. Not sure if Disney is going to fall this decade. The Marvel series has lost its two lead characters, it seems like they're running out of animated movies to plagiarize, and I don't know if they'll ever figure out what to do with Star Wars.

2013 was a bland year with some gems in the rough. I had it lower but I gave it a bump because some of those movies really are great. I remember going to the theaters a decent amount this year but not feeling strongly about many of them.

2010 I had this ranked higher at first because I remember it pretty fondly but looking through the releases, there was a lot of trash. Having it as high as I do might be generous, but I really like Inception, the Town, the Social Network, etc. quite a bit and there were a several other movies that were just a lot of fun.

These are of course offset by a majority of movies that are just terrible. Maybe I'm somehow biased but it feels like they don't release this many bad movies in theaters anymore and they're usually reserved for Netflix or just not even greenlit. But I'm not gonna lie, I kind of miss it.

2015 had a lot of gigantic movies being released, and I can't think of one that was all that memorable. I feel like this is the year where I kind of quit getting hyped up for big movies.

TFA? AoU? Jurassic World? Spectre? All pretty disappointing for how much excitement I had going into them. There were some gems, but nothing that blew me away. Even acclaimed movies like the Witch, which people still talk about to this day, didn't do much for me.

2016 was like 2015 Part II except instead of the movies being disappointing, they were actively terrible. Some of the biggest names in the industry all managed to give us franchise lows this year.

I think there were about the same amount of movies I liked as in 2015, but the bad ones weigh it down.

2011 honestly feels like a bygone era at this point. Harry Potter satisfyingly concluded and the Fast and Furious series managed to revitalize itself with probably its best movie in the franchise. That's about all I can say in its favor. This was the year when the Marvel movies were first starting to expand, and they're both two of the worst/dated movies in the franchise.

Some of the highest performers were Transformers 2, Twilight 4(?), Pirates 4, and Hanover II, all of which were complete garbage. I can only think of 3-4 movies that I saw in theaters and two of them I was dragged to. And this was a time when I could drive and had nothing but free time on my hands. A lot of really bad comedies for some reason. There were some other decent movies but I don't find any of them to be that memorable. I might have missed out on some decent films but this was a year where the Best Picture winner was a black-and-white silent film, so I'm guessing nothing significant.

I don't think 2012 could have been such a great year if it wasn't for this one.