Chatterbox: This year's rotten eggs

For keeping us entertained for all the wrong reasons, we present the 2003 Chatterbox awards and offer some predictions for next year

MAN OF THE YEAR: We can't remember if he released any new music or even performed live, in fact we are sometimes not even sure if he is alive at all. Maybe just a hologram? He's certainly a shadow of his former self, albeit one with a new but melting hooter. The most memorable things he did this year were climb a tree, hang a baby over a balcony and get arrested. This is the kind of behaviour you expect from a bad-attitude nu-metaller but our Man of the Year was actually a softly spoken 45-year-old father of three. For the slo-mo car crash that is his career, for squandering his talents and a fortune, and for just the sheer novelty value of his life we have to give this award to someone who isn't even in entertainment anymore but is a whole three-ring circus in himself. Come on down, Michael Jackson.

WORST MOVIE: Always a tough call, especially in a year when Gwyneth Paltrow gets into trolley-dolly gear and does the "chicken or fish?" thing in A View from the Top (We said: "If this comes on during your next international flight, please fight temptation to make use of emergency exits."). And in the sub-category worst sequel, the clear winner was not Matrix Revolutions but 2 Fast 2 Furious ("the faster you go the bigger the mess").

But for squandering money, time and its very modest talents (Randy Quaid's presence should have set off alarm bells) we hail the Eddie Murphy mafia-on-the-moon nonsense that was Pluto Nash. We're pretty sure it went straight to video - we'd hate to think DVD technology was wasted on it - so if you have a yen for really bad movies you might want to check it out. But be warned, this isn't bad in a good way, it's just bad.

WORST ALBUM: Maybe not the worst but surely the most over-rated "talent" out there - and we mean in AvrilWorld - is Dido. We hate to point out the bleedin' obvious here, but folks, she can't sing. The evidence has been when she's performed live on the telly and is consistently flat. She'd never make it through the first round of an Idol show and her Life for Rent album is beige. It has all the life and variation of a desert landscape. At night.

PREDICTIONS FOR 2004: That the Darkness, despite being knobbled by an afternoon slot at the Big Day Out, will become our new favourite band, not just because of their Queen-meets-AC/DC attack but because frontman Justin Hawkins has a terrific sense of humour, wears the most absurd stage clothes this side of Fat Elvis, and gives great interviews.

That the 70s look, as sported by the Kings of Leon, will make a minor comeback on university campuses. Necessary accessory might be a German shepherd.

There will be more movies with loose ends leaving the way open for a sequel, possibly extending to a trilogy.

That Orlando Bloom and Colin Farrell will cut back on their commitments and will be in only every third film as opposed to every second as they are now.

That Britney will become a nun. No, just joking folks, she won't become a nun at all. But she'll do something ironic - like posing for Playboy as a madonna, maybe even The Madonna - and get an interesting religion which will in fact have all the depth of a K-Mart manual on mysticism.

That folk music will not be the new rock.

That Madonna will just keep on kissing women but fewer of us will be interested.

That we'll see a slew of previously unknown local hip-hoppers signed to major labels who are trying to emulate Scribe's success. They'll end up in bargain bins.

That internationally a famous hip-hopper will get shot. Country musicians, seeing publicity in it, will opportunistically start shooting each other. Some, out of desperation at not being shot at, will shoot themselves. We'll be happy with that.

That next year will be fun. We see joke bands and humour making a big comeback, and only the truly boring will take themselves seriously because they think that makes them intelligent or interesting. They aren't and this year will be shown up for what they really are, dullards.