In ancient times, when Saturday Night Live was funny and Wicker Park was cheap, the Sun-Times was a great paper. The left-leaning tabloid was filled with terrific reporting, and mornings started with Mike Royko on the second page. Best of all, you could read it on the el without giving yourself muscle spasms finding the jump.
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Reading Roeper’s columns is like gaping at a traffic accident: you hate yourself for it, but it’s so awful you have to look. Each column answers the question “What would the most boring guy in the bar say about this subject?” He’s worse than the much vilified Bob Greene–at least Greene, in his bumbling way, occasionally writes about something that matters. Roeper’s banality is as breathtaking as the Grand Canyon. And as with that mass of hollowness, you get a better perspective on Roeper’s oeuvre if you view it from a distance.
January 4: Roeper explores the origins of the expression “boo-yeah.”
In February he turns introspective:
On February 27 he marvels at how soft he has it reviewing movies for a living.
March 29: Annoyed that the guy selling him a $4.14 cup of coffee can’t make change.
On October 3 he encounters annoying skateboarders, which leads him to muse about kids always trying to annoy their elders.
