Nevertheless, I have put a talking dog video at number two on my list of the best of 2011. You’ve probably seen this video already (it has over 98 million views to date, according to YouTube), but at less than a minute and a half, it’s easily worth another look.

Who’d'a thunk it — a talking dog video is number 2 on my top videos of the year. What can I say? It’s a pretty damn revolutionary variation on the genre. I can’t have been the only one of the 98 million-plus viewers to have wondered “voice-over! Why didn’t I ever think of that?!?”

Any video that makes me have to remind myself that it’s make-believe, and the dog isn’t really being teased, deserves proper respect. Need more reassurance? Here’s the original video of what the dog said. Now give that doggie some treats.

At number 9 on this year’s list is a choice installment of Puddin’, a YouTube series described as follows by its creator:

Monday thru Friday I upload a live action cartoon. Racist, self hating, morbid, yet ironically very family friendly.

I have yet to see an episode of Puddin’ that struck me as having a racist intent. I assume he means that it’s racist in the same way that it’s “family friendly” — i.e., it’s not. At all. This particular installment is relatively tame, with only a single word rendering it NSFW. The description of Puddin’ continues,

The setup is simple. Guy sits in an office break room eating a pudding cup. Eddie Pepitone enters, or is already there. He does something. You react by laughing, wincing, asking for your 20 seconds back, or watching over and over. Easy.

Puddin’ is most obviously a showcase for Eddie Pepitone, at least at first glance. I first discovered Pepitone’s brand of New York-tinged comic umbrage on the podcast WTF with Marc Maron, where he is regularly featured as the closing guest on live-audience episodes recorded in Los Angeles.

The auteur of Puddin’, however, is Matt Oswalt, a.k.a. the guy sitting in the break room eating the pudding cup. He writes all the material, and in every episode performs the silent “slow burn” in response to Pepitone’s outrageous antics. That’s no easy feat; as you may have noticed in the video above, Oswalt appears to just barely maintain a straight face.

Recent episodes of Puddin’ have featured various others as third (or fourth) occupants of the break room, including Andy Richter, Laura Silverman, James Urbaniak, and the creator’s brother Patton Oswalt. The only comment by Matt Oswalt I have seen on the subject of his increasingly famous brother was this:

Speaking of which, the number 11 video on my top ten is one that surfaced only days ago. It is the work of Alex Karigan and Zac Hammer of the Amy Marshall Dance Company, none of whom I’d heard of before… but oh, I have now. I’m not sure how to preface this video other than to say that it caught me off-guard.

What can I say? I find it both cheese-tacular and totally irresistible. Right down to the goofy socks, raspberry leotards with the little rosettes at the neck, and the no-holds-barred lip-synching to a Mariah Carey holiday jingle that I had previously thought was annoying.

On the dancers’ YouTube channel, TheYahsInitiative, I read several well-meaning comments advising them to procure a Steadicam. I actually think the slightly-shaky-but-I’m-doing-my-best handheld camera technique is part of the video’s charm. Especially when the camera itself pirouettes, seemingly caught up in the terpsichorean reverie of it all.

So bravo, Alex and Zac. Don’t go changing to try and please me.