Remember When?: GQ covers, Part II: 2008 and 2009.

Getting right on with it, Part II to our Remember When?: GQ covers series will take a look at 2008 and 2009, where we see the emergence of a trend towards catering to teeny boppers and the "let's put half naked women on the cover in a desperate attempt to raise sales while giving no regard to our integrity" syndrome.  Some of these must have sold quite well, because as we saw in Part I, there are a fair number of repeats in a short period of time (see: Tatum, LBJ, LaBeouf, Franco...all dudes who appeal to young people...coincidence?).  Enjoy.

Remember When?: GQ covers, Part I: 2010 and 2011.

Tonight we start a new series, remembering the glory days of men's fashion.  Our initial focus will be on GQ cover models.  Remember when GQ actually put stylish men on the cover?  No, I don't either.  The past few years has seen the proliferation of cover models whose style sense is, shall we say, questionable.  There are exceptions, of course; Lebron James comes to mind, for example.  But for the most part the world's most popular men's fashion magazine seems intent on prioritizing sales over substance; preferring subjects who are 'of the moment' (often fleetingly), regardless of their value to or impact on the fashion world, and then simply dressing them up.  Gone are the days when the man on the cover would be sporting his own wares; we instead see pop stars and teen icons wearing the most cliche and mainstream of labels.  It's hard to blame GQ; they are, after all, running a business, and if readers prefer pop stars to men with class (so often mutually exclusive), then I guess they have to give the people what they want.  So sad.