Among other things, 2008 will be remembered as the year that professionally produced Web video finally trumped amateurs with webcams. Although YouTube continued to attract a huge number of viral video viewers, the Internet celebrities of 2007 were overshadowed by real celebrities, as television segments enjoyed a legal (and almost profitable) life on the Internet, and professionally produced shorts popped up on smaller sites all over the Web. But despite Andy Samberg's best efforts, and Sarah Palin going viral like a case of the measles, people still couldn't get enough animal videos. We'll begin with one of our favorites, about a very special feline named Christian.
In 1969 two young men, John Rendall and Ace Bourke, bought a lion cub from the exotic pet department at Harrods in London; they named him Christian. When the cub grew too big to keep in their apartment, they reintroduced him to his natural habitat. In 1972 Rendall and Bourke returned to Kenya to find their lion. The video captures the emotional reunion. The lion wraps his paws around his old friends while Whitney Houston's "I Will Always Love You" swells in the background. This particular YouTube clip (one of several) surfaced in July 2008 and was viewed more than 17 million times -- it is one of the most magical cinematic meetings of animal and human ever.