I admit I’m biased, since Paris is my favorite city in the world, but these were probably my favorite games I’ve watched.

I’ve watched every Olympics, summer and winter, since Beijing 2008, and Beijing and London 2012 were the only ones that came close. (The Vancouver winter games were very nice too.) 2014 was a lavish vanity project for Putin, 2016 Rio was colorful but marred by corruption and national instability, 2018 Pyeongchang was fine but a little unmemorable. 2020 Tokyo was unfortunately marred by Covid, as were the rather eerie 2022 Beijing winter games. The Paris games were brilliant, though, from beginning to end. I loved the boats on the Seine, as it was the first time since I was a kid that I actually cared about the parade of nations, and the boats docking across from the Eiffel Tower in the pouring rain was so dramatic and mystifying.

There was a real commitment to imaginative artistry throughout the opening ceremony, from the galloping metal horse across the Seine to the Gojira performance with the headless Marie Antoinettes. I adored the cauldron lighting in the Tuileries in the hot air balloon. There were all these lovely little touches too, like Ravel on piano in the rain or the ringing of the bells in the Notre Dame for the first time since the fire. There are sadly not many moments from the Rio 2016 or Tokyo 2020 opening ceremonies I remember, but I’ll remember this one. I’m at least as much an arts guy as a sports guy, so I really treasure every opening ceremony, and this one is right up there with London 2012. (Beijing 2008 was great too, but a little too authoritarian-y for my tastes.)

But what really made the games the most beautiful for me were the venues. Fencing in the Grand Palais, horseback riding in Versailles, the beach volleyball by the Eiffel Tower. They made so many ambitious promises these games–to integrate the historic cultural venues into the city, to have boats floating on the Seine for the opening ceremony, to have the swimming events in the Seine. Remarkably, they managed to fulfill all these promises (yes, the water quality could have been better, but that they could even have people swim in the Seine at all is remarkable considering how filthy it used to be). The organizers gave us the city, interspersed with dazzling Olympic venues.

Hopefully, LA can match it–I’m planning to go to the LA games in 2028 as a spectator. But these games had a special kind of magic–beauty, wonder, unity-- for me that I haven’t felt in a very long time.