The 20 Most Read Stories on Goggler for 2020

2020, our first full year in publication, has been a hell of a year. Looking back we’ve learned a lot, some of which we thought we’d share with you, alongside the list of the 20 most read stories on Goggler for 2020.

Some things seem obvious now in retrospect (of course it would take months to be approved for Google Ads during a pandemic). On the other hand, we had no idea whether or not people would read an editor’s note at the top of the site each day. (Spoilers: They wouldn’t!)

Hail to The King: Eternal Monarch?

Our biggest learnings have come from what people are actually looking for when they arrive at our doorstep, and just how many of them would be searching for the same thing. We had no idea just how popular articles about Korean dramas and movies would be on the site this year.

Since June, “7 Questions From The King: Eternal Monarch That Still Need Answering” had been our most popular article, regularly appearing near the top of our top 10 most read pages each month, often claiming the top spot. Until now that is.

In less than a month on the site, the title of “most popular article of the year” has been claimed by another Korean movie, “The Call Ending Explained.” Director Lee Chung-hyun’s timey wimey thriller was beautifully tense and managed to put a new spin on the time travel trope, and that ending! (You’ll have to read the piece for more!)

I guess there aren’t a lot of sites out there catering to Korean content?

Another late entry into our list for the year is our Alice in Borderlands review, another piece from December that leapfrogged over many others to land in our top ten.

Saviours of Cinema?

As probably the “biggest” movie of the year, in terms of budget and hype, we weren’t too surprised that our “Tenet: The Ending Explained” article  would be popular. We tried our very best to explain all the twists and turn(styles) in Christopher Nolan’s latest, to the best of our understanding.

Throughout the year we were continually baffled by the ongoing popularity of our review of The Mystery of the Dragon Seal “starring” Jackie Chan, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Jason Flemyng. The delays to the film’s U.S. release seems to have brought a lot of people our way, wondering if it was worth the seeking out. (Spoilers: It isn’t!)

We always expected local Malaysian and South East Asian content to be popular on the site, and so it was with our review of Pasal Kau, our discussion of the Somebody Feed Phil episode that visited neighbouring Singapore, and of course our review of the Najbi Razak episode of Dirty Money, “The Man at the Top.”

What we hadn’t expected was just how popular “foreign” content would be with reviews of Polish movie 365 Days and South African Crime thriller Trackers proving popular throughout the year.

June saw a lot of you check out the results of our survey on how cinema-going was changing in the face of COVID-19, Are You Ready to Go Back to Cinemas?, although many of the recommendations are moot for the time being, seeing as most cinemas are closed for the moment. (Remember when we used to worry about how we were going to go the cinema, rather than wondering when they would be open at all?

Clickbait is King?

Probably our biggest takeaway from the year?  All those “clickbaity” YouTube video titles and article headlines you see about such and such film’s “ending explained” or “X questions we have after watching” film Y?

They work. People click on them!

With that said, here at Goggler, we’ll always endeavour to only do those sorts of articles if the material warrants it and make sure we do explain them as clearly as possible, or else pose REAL questions and not just some SEO nonsense.

Let us know if there’s anything you’d like us to address in the new year. You can get in touch with us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or email, or even use the contact form here on the site.  

Here’s the list of our 20 most popular articles for 2020, see you in the new year

1. The Call Ending Explained – Shooting into our top spot as of time of writing, we explain the ending, and more, of Lee Chung-hyun’s fantastically enjoyable time travelly thriller.
2. 7 Questions From The King: Eternal Monarch That Still Need Answering – Uma sums up 7 questions he still had as The King: Eternal Monarch neared the conclusion of it’s first season.
3. Tenet: The Ending Explained – We explained the ending, and more, of Christopher Nolan’s latest epic!
4. The King: Eternal Monarch – A Complete Visual Guide Through Its Universes and Timelines – Uma summarizes the various time line and transdimensional shenanigans of The King: Eternal Monarch.
5. Pasal Kau Review – Uma’s review of Adrian Teh’s follow up to the excellent Wira on Netflix.
6. Alice in Borderland Review – Uma and Bahir discussed Netflix’s killer Japanese manga adaptation.
7. Over the Moon: 8 Questions We Have After Watching Netflix’s China Focused Animation – 8 questions that bothered Iain after he’d finished watching Over The Moon on Netflix.
8. 42 Questions I Had While Watching Wonder Woman 1984 – Uma had a lot of questions after watching the messy Wonder Woman 1984. Here are 42 of them!
9. 365 Days Review – Uma’s review of “Poland’s answer to 50 Shades of Grey.”
10. Somebody Feed Phil: Singapore – Bahir and Uma felt that something about the Singaporean episode of Somebody Feed Phil was off. They shared their thoughts in text format.
11. Trackers Review – Bahir reviews the first 3 episodes of South African Crime thriller Trackers, which follows the members of the Presidential Bureau of Intelligence (PBI), a fictional intelligence agency (basically South Africa’s CIA), as they investigate an upcoming terror event happening in the capital.
12. Tenet Review – Uma’s review of Christopher Nolan’s Tenet.
13. Dune: The Alternative Edition Redux – Uma and Iain look back on an old classic with fresh perspective as they discuss the Spice diver fan edit of David Lynch’s Dune.
14. The King: Eternal Monarch – Uma’s review of the insanely popular (as far as we can tell) The King: Eternal Monarch.
15. A California Christmas – Uma essentially writes fan fiction about some character called Manny in the Netflix Christmas movie, which is ostensibly about “a rich guy who decides to go undercover as a ranch hand in order to convince the hard-as-nails-yet-endearingly-adorable farm lady to sell her land to his family business.” 
16. Dirty Money: The Man at the Top – Uma investigates the Najib Razak focused episode of Netflix’s Dirty Money a show that “serves up an after the fact primer on the many cons, frauds, and scandals, that have plagued the world of business.”
17. The Head: A Conversation with Tomohisa Yamashita – Uma interviews Japanese idol Tomohisa Yamashita, aka Yamapi, about HBO’s Antarctic set survival thriller.
18. The Mystery of the Dragon Seal – Uma reviews this stinker starring Jackie Chan and Arnold Swarzenegger.
19. Voices of Fire – Uma and Bahir discuss Netflix’s documentary series focusing on, Ezekiel Williams (Pharrell’s Uncle ), efforts to assemble the best gospel choir that the world has ever seen.
20. Are You Ready to Go Back to Cinemas? – the results of our survey on how Malaysian cinema going was changing in the face 0f COVID-19, posted at the end of June.

Happy Holidays Everyone!