It's World XV time!

15. Fullback

Leigh Halfpenny - Wales

Honourable Mentions: Israel Dagg (NZ), Ben Smith (NZ)

Leigh is a hero. No other word describes him quite as aptly. A man, not great in stature nor physicality, but willing to give everything to the cause, to sacrafice everything if it means Wales might scrape a win. Look at him knock himself unconscious twice in one season making tackles that could have saved the game in the last play. He's also got the spirit and mental steeliness to kick goals under any amount of pressure. Best kicker in the world. Best fullback in the world.

14. Right Wing

George North - Wales

Honourable Mentions: Tommy Bowe (IRE), Alex Cuthbert (WAL)

In years to come, geography students studying the unit on forces of nature, normally reserved for hurricanes, tornados and tsunamis, shall be looking closely at George North. An unstoppable force yet to meet an immovable object, he's got absolutely everything you could want in a winger. Power, pace, good feet, good hands, the ability to finish and, most importantly, a brain. Incredible.

13. Outside Centre

Conrad Smith - New Zealand

Honourable Mentions: Jonathan Davies (WAL), Manu Tuilagi (ENG)

The archetypal centre. Doesn't miss tackles, makes breaks, links well, runs good lines, offers supporting angles. You couldn't ask for more than what you get from Conrad Smith.

12. Inside Centre

Wesley Fofana - France

Honourable Mentions: Ma'a Nonu (NZ), Jamie Roberts (WAL)

Fofana is the best centre I've seen since O'Driscoll on the top of his game. He sprints through gaps that aren't there, and is always able to finish whatever he starts. He averages a try every other game for France, and in two of his caps he received less than 3 touches of the ball. He's amazing.

11. Left Wing

Bryan Habana - South Africa

Honourable Mentions: Julian Savea (NZ), Digby Ioanie (AUS)

He's still got it. Time was, I, along with seemingly everyone else, felt King Habana was past it. Overtaken by a barrage of youthful imposters. How wrong we all were. Bryan Habana still has what it takes to unlock defences the world over, and he's about to do so for rugby's own free-vending ATM, Toulon.

10. Fly Half

Dan Carter - New Zealand

Honourable Mentions: Aaron Cruden (NZ), Dan Biggar (WAL)

Oh come on, who else was I going to pick?

9. Scrum Half

Will Genia - Australia

Honourable Mentions: Kahn Fotuali'i (SAM), Aaron Smith (NZ)

Another no-brainer. Genia is sharper the worlds' best-trimmed set of pencils. Also hard to read as lead in a radiation scanner (That was tenious), hence why defences consistently struggle to close him down. He was the cause of any struggles the Lions had last month. One of the worlds' very finest players.

1. Loosehead Prop

Alex Corbisiero - England

Honourable Mentions: Thomas Domingo (FRA), Gethin Jenkins (WAL)

A dominant scrummager and a real handful in the loose, Corbisiero is a perfect blend of a proper prop and this kind of new dynamic thing Sky Sports and Stuart Lancaster both seem to love (Joe Marler, Cian Healy, whatever). Really improved his credentials on last months' Lions tour.

2. Hooker

Bismarck du Plessis - South Africa

Honourable Mentions: Andrew Hore (NZ), Tatafu Polota-Nau (AUS)

A player so good he forced his national captain to learn a completely new position in his thirties. Du Plessis is a handful in the scrum, a key cog in the best lineout in the world (Sorry Scotland) and full of enough beans to keep him bounding about the pitch, making tackles and carries for the full eighty.

3. Tighthead Prop

Adam Jones - Wales

Honourable Mentions: Nicholas Mas (FRA), Dan Cole (ENG)

I support Wales and the Ospreys, and I hate to think how many victories I've celebrated over the last five years would not have occurred had Adam not been playing. An unstoppable scrummaging force; bend over and push. That's a props job, and Adam does it better than anyone else in the world, and long may that continue.

4. Second Row

Paul O'Connell - Ireland

Honourable Mentions: James Horwill (AUS), Richie Gray (SCO)

There is no stopping Paul O'Connell. The man is a creature made of living concrete, unable to be stopped, harmed or destroyed. He goes until every inch of the magic beans used to turn him into a living creature is used up, at which point he returns to his more familiar statue form. The inspiration for the Weeping Angels. They had to be toned down in the scary stakes for a prime time audience.

5. Second Row

Alun Wyn Jones - Wales

Honourable Mentions: Eben Etzabeth (RSA), Sam Whitelock (NZ)

A team of fifteen Alun Wyn Joneses would win any World Cup. Not even just in rugby. Alun Wyn is the most driven, hardworking player anyone is likely to ever watch. He's a machine with a heart. The pride, the passion of representing Wales, the Ospreys and the Lions is so evident, and he more than lives up to it every time he takes the field. Hero.

6. Blindside Flanker

Dan Lydiate - Wales

Honourable Mentions: Sean O'Brien (IRE), Willem Alberts (RSA)

The most difficult position. Were I selecting a XV to play Mars, I'd shift Lobbe, Parisse, Warburton or McCaw across. However, I'm picking the best in each position in the world, and nobody fulfills a No. 6's job better than Danny Jonathan Lydiate, a farmer from east Wales. Makes a stupid number of tackles and misses very few.

7. Openside Flanker

David Pocock - Australia

Honourable Mentions: Richie McCaw (NZ), Sam Warburton (WAL)

Nobody else in the world is quite as destructively efficient at the breakdown as David Pocock. Every ruck, he either turns the ball over, or costs the attacking team two or three forwards in clearing him out. He also links superbly. The engine of McCaw and Warburton and the skills of Tipuric cannot, however, be underappreciated. Such a difficult position to select, but Pocock nicks it, just. JUST.

8. Number Eight

Kieran Read - New Zealand

Honourable Mentions: Sergio Parisse (ITA), Juan Martin Fernandez Lobbe (ARG)

Lobbe. Parisse. Picamoles. Faletau. Morgan. Heaslip. Spies. There are more world-class players in the number eight position than any other, so it'd have to be a pretty special player who sits proudly atop them all. Read is just that. For my money, at the moment, the very best player in the world. There's nothing this man can't do. Every game he plays is a masterclass in not just backrow play, but rugby in general. He lords it over the whole pitch. A colossus of the modern game.

Discuss the similarities between the theme of friendship between Frances Ha and The Worlds End (30 marks)

This is, to all intents and purposes, a lengthy essay on the themes portrayed within both films. Hence the mock-exam question-title-joke-thing. As such, there are massive spoilers for both films, so please don't read it unless you've seen both. And please see Frances Ha. Please. It's brilliant.

Edgar Wright's Three Flavours Cornetto trilogy is, rightly so, commonly held up and praised for being the most consistently funny 315 minutes of cinema in recent history, if not all of history. However, the most remarkable thing about the three films is Wright's ability to smuggle soul in under the jokes. Every line acts to build character, and we pretty quickly come to care for the people we see on screen- It's a trick also on show in Scott Pilgrim Vs The World and Spaced. All three are relationship movies at heart. Shaun of the Dead is a romcom with a secondary look at male friendship seeping alongside the social satire and zombie-horror homage. Hot Fuzz is a buddy cop movie with the emphasis very strongly on the 'buddy', with the relationship between Simon Pegg's Nicholas Angel and Nick Frost's Danny Butterman a joy to behold as it begins to kindle over the course of the film. The Worlds' End is the other end of the friendship spectrum- it's about loyalty, and lifelong bonds, and trust. It's about how relationships twist and bend over time. The use of an ensemble cast of five leads, as opposed to the two, allows for a deeper analysis of this theme, as we can examine the relationship between each of these, rather than just between Pegg and Frost, as we'd expect.

Also leaking in cinemas for those willing to hunt out the more interesting films is my very favourite film of 2013 so far, Frances Ha. An honest and self-aware portrait of female friendship, it's a film that dips and twists as the characters begin to work out who they are, by their own admission too late in their life.  It focuses on just the two characters, really, although a larger ensemble is at play, in Frances (Greta Gerwig) and Sophie (Mickey Summer), as they put it "The same person with different hair". Their relationship is charming and glistens through the film. However, as the film develops, the relationship twists as circumstances develop. Frances and Sophie begin to drift apart, but something always seems to be tying them together, be it past experience or something more metaphysical. The thematic similarities between Frances Ha and The Worlds' End are bountiful, both studies of human relationships and friendships that run deeper than the respective films would have you believe.

Frances Ha, the film of the year

Happy, joyous, blissful, chipper, elated, cheerful, ecstatic, sparkling, sunny, gleeful, upbeat, thrilled, merry, gay. This is how Frances Ha made me feel.

Just an insistent bombardment of joy from minute one through eighty-six. No film has ever made me feel as happy as the perfect string of celluloid projected so beautifully upon the cinema screen this morning. Hell, I haven't felt this happy, generally, all year. Even when the film is melancholic or cold, even when the tone of what's happening on screen isn't as feverishly joyous, the film manages to portray a thread of optimism; it shows a way through, always looking at the light at the end of the tunnel, rather than the blackness that surrounds us. Not since It's a Wonderful Life, my very favourite film, have I seen this particular theme portrayed on screen with such success.

It's a film about a character, and it's a character I love. Frances' best firend, Sophie, becomes quite an unsympathetic character for a number of reasons, but more than anything for me, through jealousy. I wanted to be Frances' best friend. I'd never seen Greta Gerwig act before, and I kinda hope Hollywood don't notice her stella turn, because in my mind she is Frances, and I couldn't take seeing her do anything else, so perfect is her character.

Frances Ha is so upbeat it's actually offputting. It made me feel so happy I had to put aside an entire day to bouncing, to skipping down the streets, to grinning at every passer-by. All I want to do is run around trying to find the closest ATM and to shout "Ahoy Sexy!" at everyone I know. Frances Ha is magnificent, film making at it's very best. Everyone, whoever you are, please see it.