A pretend opening monologue, of course. I'm certain the host for the evening, Jimmy Fallon, has much better material to work with than what you'll read below.
Regardless, creating an award-show monologue -- just me and my keyboard, both lying on the couch -- and sharing it with all of you has become one of my favorite things about this blog. I'm excited to be able to do it for the fourth consecutive year. (You can read my monologues for 2014, 2015 and 2016 here, here and here.)
So, without further adieu, I proudly present to you, live from the Beverly Hilton hotel in Beverly Hills, me:
"Hello, and welcome to the 74th Annual Golden Globe Awards. Tonight we honor the best in movies and television, as voted on by the Russian government.
"It's no secret that 2016 was a challenging year for all of us. We were divided as a nation. So much tension in this country. We were presented with two polarizing figures and forced to choose. Who could we most trust to lead us going forward? Were you Team Captain America or Team Iron Man? Difficult decision.
"Captain America: Civil War was a great superhero movie. Without question. But I still can't shake the feeling that it was just an elaborate setup for the sequel, 'Captain America: Reconstruction.'
"Lot of conflict in the entertainment world lately. Captain America v. Iron Man. Batman v. Superman. The People v. O.J. Simpson. The People v. The New Ben-Hur. Not a good idea to remake a classic movie that won 11 Oscars, as it turns out.
"But this was the year for superhero comebacks. Ben Affleck, who was Daredevil in a critically panned movie nearly 15 years ago, is now Batman. Ryan Reynolds, former Green Lantern, a nominee tonight for Deadpool. So there's hope yet for all 10 members of the Suicide Squad.
"Will Smith was in Suicide Squad. He played Deadshot, the assassin with a deadly and accurate aim.
"You may not have realized this, but this was his inspiration for the character.
"Meryl Streep is here. She's a nominee for Florence Foster Jenkins. This is her 30th Golden Globe nomination. This is a real comeback story. Prior to this year she hadn't been nominated for a Golden Globe since 2015. She took off 2016 to find herself. And now here she is. Welcome back, Meryl.
"Earlier today I was looking at a list of the highest-grossing movies of the year. Did you know that three of the top five films featured a cast of CGI-animated animals? It really goes to show how dispensable all of you are. And yet you're the ones getting awards, not the animals! It's not right.
"I don't want to shortchange the TV shows represented here tonight. Stranger Things is up for some awards. Very scary show. Didn't turn out the way I thought it would. Every time a wall broke I'd get nervous that the Kool-Aid Man would kidnap one of the kids. Don't let his wide smile fool you. Oh yeah!
"Let's start the show. We have such an exciting night ahead. A select few of you will have the honor of taking home a Golden Globe, having your IMDb page updated, and seeing your name placed in bold on winners' lists published on hundreds of websites around the world. The rest of you will leave here with full knowledge that the next three hours will have been a complete and utter waste of your time. I'm ready."
Like what you read? Follow me on Twitter at @myemptythoughts for more of my comedy.
