Pirates of the Caribbean

I defy you to recall anything that happened during any Pirates of the Caribbean film. And yet 2017 brought us an entirely superfluous fifth instalment (below); the only difference this time being that the lead actor’s innate creepiness overwhelmed his ability to wobble and gurn.

Will and Grace

The best you can say about the revived Will and Grace series is that it was exactly the same as the original Will and Grace series, which means it still felt like your ear was being chewed by four especially irritating chipmunks.

White nationalism

True, white nationalism never really went away. But this year it seemed especially emboldened, with its tiki torch parades and bizarre infatuation with Richard Spencer. Obviously this was bad news for society as a whole – and even worse news for progressives fond of wearing chinos and well-pressed polo shirts.

Mel Gibson

Everyone deserves a second chance. However, Mel Gibson – a man most notorious for screaming racist, violent abuse at the mother of his child in 2006 – has starred in seven films since returning from exile in 2010. The fact that the most recent of these was Daddy’s Home 2 probably means that that’s enough chances now.

Transformers 5

The world needed a fifth Transformers film like it needed to have its jaw kicked off by a donkey. But nobody told Michael Bay, who this year offered up another two and a half hours of robots indistinguishably mashing up against each other to the delight of nobody.

Dynasty

First they brought back Dallas, and that didn’t work. So then they brought back Dynasty – the cut-price Sindy doll to Dallas’s Barbie – and that didn’t work. They will bring back Knots Landing next, and that won’t work either because nobody ever learns.

Political sex scandals

Back in the mid-90s, politicians being caught with their pants down sparked countless resignations. This year, we’ve had a bracing revival across the political spectrum. However, it’s slightly less interesting this time around, because sexual inappropriateness now spreads to all men from all industries ever.

Nuclear tension

Worried that millennials will never experience the heart-stopping terror of nuclear armageddon that helped define several previous generations? Thanks to Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump, existential dread is right back on the table. We will all be dead in a fireball this time next year. Oh, nostalgia.

Nick Knowles

In 2009, Nick Knowles released an anti-war single that sounded like Pierce Brosnan’s Mamma Mia character being trampled by a herd of buffalo. This year he released an entire album of it. It’s called Every Kind of People, it features an acoustic cover of a Barry White song and it’s on Spotify, just in case you need to quickly clear a house.