Although the year isn't officially over, I have compiled my list of the Top Ten Moments for Garrett Hedlund Fans of 2007. Seeing as we're almost halfway through December, I can't honestly promise that any blog posts for the rest of the month will be sober enough not to dissolve into another one of those ranty "Eragon is a dick!" posts or something, so I figured I'd do it now. Now, without a doubt, the biggest events were the releases of Georgia Rule and Death Sentence, and the top moments from those movies are included, but some other stuff happened too. So, without further ado, here it is:

10 - March 20: The Eragon Special Edition DVD thrills fans of Eragon/Murtagh slash by including a forbidden nighttime scene where Murtagh creeps up to a sleeping Eragon and checks out his sword. Homoeroticism aside, it is a scene that gives insight to the Murtagh character while maintaining his mysteriousness, so obviously it was cut. The DVD also gave us a 2-second behind-the-scenes shot of Garrett in costume on set that was somehow more awesome than all of the (surviving) Murtagh scenes in the movie put together. > 

<9 - May 11: Harlan gets a blow job! RELATED: September 4, the Georgia Rule DVD is released, with a deleted scene where Harlan talks about getting a blow job! It turns out he really liked it.

8 - May 8: Garrett's hair has grown back after shaving his head for Death Sentence - has it ever! He appeared at the Georgia Rule premiere with a FANTASTIC 21st century pompadour, pissing off the two fans who preferred the shaved head and several thousand Murtagh fangirls, who were really hoping it would grow back jet black. >

7 - July 21: Garrett spends a star-studded weekend at the grand opening of one of those Atlantis resorts in the Bahamas, drunkenly swimming with wild, possibly man-eating, sharks and posing with Channing Tatum (drunkenly). He shows off more flesh in the pool than we've seen, pretty much, since the bathroom scene in Four Brothers. Apparently, the Teenage Girl Heart Association (TGHA) didn't outlaw such displays after 4B. Interesting!

<6 - After rumors of an August 27th premiere turned out to be false, the Death Sentence premiere finally happened the next evening, on August 28. Some said the event wasn't well-coordinated, but those people obviously didn't pay attention to the cast's awesomely coordinated black outfits!

5 - April - At long last, GQ magazine does an eight page fashion spread featuring Garrett modeling designer t-shirts, solidifying it as the BEST MAGAZINE EVER. RELATED: Photographer Richard Wright utilized Garrett as a subject in a series of photo shoots that kick complete and total ass. (below)

4 - September 18: Patroclus returns with extended scenes and new shots, in the Troy Director's Cut. Best part: the extended training scene. Wait... Patroclus can TALK??

<3 - August 31 - We didn't get to see Billy Darley get his head blown off in Death Sentence (shut up, it was poetic), but we did get to see his fingers blown off, in the fourth goriest shot in the movie! Those fans who gobbled up every clip they could find online before the movie opened were treated to approximately three minutes of footage they hadn't seen (I blame myself). Surprisingly, that included the most badass part of the movie - "No thanks, Dad, I'm taking the car!"

2 - July - It was announced that Garrett would play the lead in an Indie flick called Hectic, with a story than spans several decades. Richard Wright (see 5) directs!

<1 - July 28: Comic Con 2007. The hourlong webcast of Garrett cracking his gum while phantom voices, apparently unaware they were on tape, wondered why they sent their kid to do shitwork instead of letting him meet the Death Sentence guys was cool... but the blitz of interviews, video footage, and photos that followed was Garrett Fan Manna. It ruled, even if no one knew who the hell he was because he looked nothing like the scary guy in the trailers. Within a few weeks of his sharing childhood hunting season stories, the secret to Billy's harsh disposition (bright lights + hangovers), anecdotes about his father, his ringtone (default!), and a rookie-mistake loss at Donkey Kong (on video!), some fans would be back to complaining that Garrett NEVER shares ANYTHING about himself.

And now, the worst of the worst. The Bottom Five of '07:

5 - July - Inheritance Forums shuts down the Murtagh Fan Club. Actually, they shut down all of the fan clubs, but the MFC was the only one that didn't suck. Members rebuilt in a new location, which is now our thriving NMFC forum, so I guess it's not so bad. But it sucked at the time. RELATED: The Official Eragon The Movie web site went offline over the summer, displacing a bunch of fans 20th Century Fox (and everyone else) had no idea had built a small community there. They lobbied for it's return, and the site was reinstated.

4 - ONGOING - Attack of the Posers - Fake Garrett Myspaces are nothing new, but 2007 saw it taken to a whole new level, with "official" GH myspace pages competing to be the most idiotic, illiterate, and offensive. The worst offender goes around to teenage girls' pages insisting he's the real deal, then unloads a bunch of middle school drama - at least before "he" started dating the fake official Jessica Alba Myspace.  

3 - September - Fox Youtube sweep. 20th Century Fox targeted videos that used footage from their films (including Eragon and Death Sentence), nearly wiping out the GH youtube community.

2 - March - The Eragon DVD shockingly contained only ONE deleted scene featuring Murtagh (see 10 above), even though fans, knowing his role had been cut, had been begging Fox to see all of the Murtagh scenes.

1 - September - bloody-disgusting.com gave away Death Sentence movie props, including Billy's long leather jacket. In some grave miscarriage of justice, the jacket did not go to it's rightful owner, Holly Q.

BONUS PARTY TIME PICK FOR 2007!!!

Garrett was reported to have declared "Master Kush" the most universally influential program of all time last January. Cool! I wonder what it's about? I hope it's about unicorns, and handsome princes who are virgins who ride unicorns!!

**UPDATE!**

SUPER BONUS BLOOD SPATTER BARGAIN BUY PICK FOR 2007!!!

Billy Darley's actual mangled hand, complete with finger-exploding action, went up for auction on eBay in December. The $2,500 asking price was reasonable, since the piece is easily worth about a million billion dollars, but the auction ended with just one $499 bid, short of the reserve price, leaving the fate of the Awesomest Prop Ever unknown.

What a year. Let's hope 2008 gives us as much wonderous fan fodder as 2007!

Happy Holidays!

-HollyQ

thanks to mrhedlund.com and hedlund-italy.com