The Top 25 Cracked Articles of 2012

23 6 Fictional Places You Didn't Know Actually Existed

Part of what makes fantasy and sci-fi appealing is that it's not just a bunch of characters -- it's a whole world. One you want to live in.

That's true even if it's an objectively bad place -- Gotham City looks like a shithole, but who wouldn't trade their current life with a chance to go there and fight supercriminals with Batman? Of course, that's part of the frustration, too -- we'll never actually see the Shire or Mordor firsthand. But you can come pretty close, because it turns out a lot of these fantasy settings were based on real places. For instance ...

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Related: 6 Fictional Places You Didn't Know Actually Existed

22 8 Ordinary Photos Hiding Mind-Blowing Details

21 6 Insane (But Convincing) Fan Theories About Kids' Cartoons

For every innocent cartoon out there, there's at least one obsessive fan on the Internet who managed to crap out a semi-coherent theory finding something disturbing about it, like that Tom & Jerry was actually Nazi propaganda, or that Barney & Friends is a metaphor for the Watergate scandal. But just like a broken watch, even the Internet is right every once in a while: The most disturbing fan theories are the ones where you just can't help but agree with them ...

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Related: 6 Insane (But Convincing) Fan Theories About Kids' Cartoons

20 6 Creepy Things You Never Noticed About Famous Kids' Cartoons

19 6 Horrible Aftermaths Implied by Movies With Happy Endings

It's amazing how you can ruin a movie's perfectly happy ending with a little bit of analysis (as we've previously shown here and here). For instance, in the following films, the ending turned out just fine for the main character, but totally screwed characters who were left conveniently off-screen.

For instance ...

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Related: 6 Horrible Aftermaths Implied by Movies With Happy Endings

18 18 Images You Won't Believe Aren't Photoshopped (Part 9)

As we've demonstrated many times before in our most popular feature on Cracked, the forces of the universe love the sound of people shouting "Fake!" at their computer screens, and photographers love to capture the proof. In case you missed the previous episodes, here's Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, the gritty reboot that doesn't acknowledge the previous editions, Part 6, Part 7, and Part 8.

17 The 7 Most Baffling Things About Women's Clothes

There are a lot of annoying things about being a woman, like periods, childbirth, and not being able to play basketball in a way that keeps spectators awake. But near the top of the list has got to be buying clothes.

I know one way to fix it is just to be ballsy and wear men's clothes, and that's a bold choice. But you take a social hit for wearing "masculine" clothes, and most women don't want to take that hit. So they go to buy clothes made specifically "for women," and generally find a set of the most impractical, low-quality, high-maintenance crap that a sweatshop can make.

Here are a few of the many, many awful things about the clothes that manufacturers want women to wear ...

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Related: The 5 Most Baffling Things About Pinterest: Explained

16 5 Things Nobody Tells You About Living in Japan

15 The 6 Creepiest Lies the Food Industry Is Feeding You

As we've talked about before, the food industry is based almost entirely on a series of lies that, quite frankly, most of us just prefer to believe ("'All natural?' Sounds healthy to me!"). But we have to draw the line somewhere, right? Especially when the food you buy has nothing to do with what it says on the label ...

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Related: The 6 Creepiest Lies the Food Industry is Feeding You

14 5 Ridiculous Sex Myths Everyone Believes

13 9 Actors Who Do the Exact Same Thing on Every Movie Poster

You wouldn't think there'd be many specific rules for movie posters beyond "make the star look cool" and "don't show any dong." But as we've mentioned before, certain actors seem to have amazingly specific and arbitrary elements that must be included at all costs, logic be damned. For instance ...

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Related: 9 Actors Who Do the Exact Same Thing on Every Movie Poster

12 Greatest Note Ever Left on a Dented Car

11 7 Movies That Put Insane Detail into Stuff You Never Noticed

We've mentioned before how film directors occasionally go a little bit crazy when it comes to certain minor details, including ones that 99 percent of the audience are never even going to see. A horrifying amount of time and work go into things that will be forever unnoticed by everyone except a few members of the crew. So let's again take a moment to appreciate the awesomely obsessive ...

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Related: 7 Movies That Put Insane Detail into Stuff You Never Noticed

10 6 Ridiculous Lies You Believe About the Founding of America

When it comes to the birth of America, most of us are working from a stew of elementary school history lessons, Westerns, and vague Thanksgiving mythology. And while it's not surprising that those sources might biff a couple details, what's shocking is how much less interesting the version we learned was. It turns out our teachers, Hollywood, and whoever we got our Thanksgiving mythology from (Big Turkey?) all made America's origin story far more boring than it actually was for some very disturbing reasons. For instance ...

9 6 Real People With Mind-Blowing Mutant Superpowers

We've all dreamed of having superpowers at some point (today), but the majority of us have to accept the sobering reality that preternatural abilities simply aren't possible. That is, except for some rare cases of real, actual people with bona fide powers that defy explanation (and in some cases practical application).

For instance ...

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Related: 5 Real People With Mind-Blowing Mutant Superpowers (Part 3)

8 6 Famous Symbols That Don't Mean What You Think

The entire point of using a symbol is that it conveys meaning and saves space -- you see one picture of a stick figure in a dress and you no longer need the phrase "This is the place where female humans can discharge waste." But what is fascinating is that sometimes the meaning of a symbol will get lost to history, but we just keep right on using it anyway.

But would we do that if we knew ...

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Related: 6 Famous Symbols That Don't Mean What You Think

7 The 5 Stupidest Habits You Develop Growing Up Poor

6 6 Mind-Blowing Special Effects You Won't Believe Aren't CGI

Computer generated images are like the foam sets of the present era: 20 years from now, people are going to laugh their asses off at the fact that this stuff looked even remotely real to us.

That's why, as we've mentioned before, there are still filmmakers doing special effects the old-fashioned way -- even if the results are so impressive that you'd never know it's not CGI ...

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Related: 6 Mind Blowing Special Effects You Won't Believe Aren't CGI

5 5 Ways Modern Men Are Trained to Hate Women

4 6 Things Rich People Need to Stop Saying

All of a sudden, it's like you can't make huge amounts of money without people getting all pissed off about it. And it's only going to get worse -- with the election coming up and the weather getting warmer, this whole "Occupy" movement is probably going to come back strong. The 1 percent will feel even more besieged than before.

"What the hell?" you're probably thinking, if you're somehow both rich and reading an article with this title, "I didn't crash the economy!" You might even be tempted to take to a microphone to defend yourself and your wealthy friends. But before you do, I want you to stop and ask yourself, "Will this make me sound like an out-of-touch douchebag?"

3 5 True Stories Cut from Movies for Being Too Unrealistic

As we've repeatedly pointed out, in Hollywood the words "Based on a True Story" are usually just a code for "Vaguely Resembling a True Story, but Mostly Bullshit." Sometimes, the filmmakers feel like they have to lie and make up stuff to make the story more interesting -- but it turns out that other times, they actually have to cut stuff that really happened because it's all so awesome that no one would believe it.

Here are some mind-blowing moments from real life that Hollywood decided were too fantastic, even for their movies.

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Related: 5 True Stories Cut from Movies for Being Too Unrealistic

2 14 Photographs That Shatter Your Image of Famous People

When you step out the door, you're playing a role. Whether you're a hippie, stock broker, police officer, or biker, you dress the way the world expects you to dress, you act the way the world expects you to act. So you can imagine how much more intense this is for celebrities, whose very careers depend on managing a public image down to the molecule.

1 6 Harsh Truths That Will Make You a Better Person

2013, motherfuckers. Yeah! LET'S DO THIS.

"Do what?" you ask. I DON'T KNOW. LET'S FIGURE THAT OUT TOGETHER, MOTHERFUCKERS.

Feel free to stop reading this if your career is going great, you're thrilled with your life, and you're happy with your relationships. Enjoy the rest of your day, friend, this article is not for you. You're doing a great job, we're all proud of you.

For the rest of you, I want you to try something: Name five impressive things about yourself. Write them down or just shout them out loud to the room. But here's the catch -- you're not allowed to list anything you are (i.e., I'm a nice guy, I'm honest), but instead can only list things that you do (i.e., I just won a national chess tournament, I make the best chili in Massachusetts). If you found that difficult, well, this is for you, and you are going to fucking hate hearing it. My only defense is that this is what I wish somebody had said to me around 1995 or so ...

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