Sam’s 2025 Media Diet
I might say this year was one for the history books, but like, not in a super fun way!
I wrote less than I wanted and the one thing I am proud of I hate that I had to write at all!
I read about as much as I did last year. (45 books, but maybe next year, I should count pages)
We saw more movies but went out less. (Is eating out Dead?)
TV continues to churn out a lot but not a lot that’s good? (Just because it’s on, doesn’t mean we have to watch it.)
Maybe the highs were high and the lows were mid.
I embraced the idea of simply not finishing things I didn’t like.
Life is too short and content is king.
What did you see, what did you read, what did you watch?
Films
Juror Number 2: I love Nick Hoult but the three lawyers in this film were bad. Maybe the guy from The Newsroom was okay.
Marnie: weird Hitchcock film that has not aged kindly. Connery is a creep. Marnie is troubled.
The Order: Nic Hoult as a white nationalist. Jude Law with a mustache. Who prevails is anyone’s guess.
Nightbitch: she turns into a dog and finds her tribe. Motherhood is hard.
Speak No Evil: don’t go back for the stuffy.
The Wild Robot: a good look at parenting and late-stage capitalism.
Red Rooms: Canadian model becomes court reporter.
Civil War: journalist huh. That’s who’s going to save us.
Cunk on Life: more facts, please.
The Brutalist: first half is effervescent. After the intermission, less so.
His Three Daughters: rent-controlled apartment drives sisters to being mean.
Sing Sing: jail stinks. But theater helps.
Daughters: jail still sucks. Dances don’t make it worse.
Godzilla Minus One: retribution for the kamikaze who never flew.
Dahomey: underwhelming doc.
The Godfather: Jim never saw it.
Soundtrack to a Coup d’État: fucking CIA but jazz.
Nosferatu: making lovin’ till the sun comes up, baby.
Mickey 17: needed an edit and some focus. Pattinson good.
One of Them Days: a series of bad events make for an eventful day.
Black Bag: anal clenching. Zurich. Spy craft and tense dinner parties.
Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping: Samberg, Lonely Island.
Sicario: this movie rips.
Companion: AI sex murder bot.
Friendship: The male loneliness epidemic.
Lilo and Stitch: never saw the original. Are aliens okay?
Mission: Impossible — Shoulda kept calling it Dead Reckoning.
Mountainhead: I don’t think rich people are inherently funny. Like sure, Succession was about the rich, but other stuff too. This though?
John Wick 4: I’ve got questions about those steps.
Fountain of Youth: Egpytologists rolling over in their tombs.
Travis Scott Doc: Astrowould not attend.
Led Zeppelin Doc: Rock docs rock.
In the Mood for Love: A real will they won’t they.
Copycat: Agorophobia deserves more attention.
Manhunter: Red Dragon but with a different name?
Eddington: Are you ready to discuss Covid politics?
Superman: The dog. Nick Hoult. That guy with the weird hair cut.
Sinners: Are the Irish the problem?
Happy Gilmore 2: No.
Gone Baby Gone: Yes.
The Amateur: No.
Witness: The Amish!
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny: Remember when Fleabag happened? That was wild.
The Assessment: You can do a lot in parenting but you cannot do that.
Ballad of Wallace Island: We should get more movies with her.
Phoenician Scheme: Benicio
Thunderbolts*: You can’t trick me into caring about these people.
Highest 2 Lowest: Probably better as a book. Absent plot.
K-Pop Demon Hunters: I was expecting my kids to like this.
September 5: Journalism loves to pat themselves on the back.
28 Years Later: Bone temples are a good idea.
Licorice Pizza: You didn’t need to make this about an age gap.
One Battle After Another (2x): Best Picture.
Bugonia: Is she an alien? TBD.
Materialists: Like flying to turkey for hair implants, but legs.
Three Days of the Condor: Handsomest man ever?
Train Dreams: Man grows old in the west.
Frankenstein: I think we made the monster too sympathetic bc he’s hot.
Sorry, Baby: Why being an English professor is never a good idea.
Zootopia 2: Land back.
Books
Baby X: the future of genetics, baby making, and celebrity. A twist albeit slight I didn’t see coming.
A Place of Greater Safety: honestly didn’t finish this book by the Wolf Hall lady. Uninspiring characters. Dense prose. Pre French rev. Not for me.
Dirt: Memoir about cooking in Lyon. Needed an editor.
March Violets: Life in pre war Berlin. Similar to now. Bernie Gunther. Going to be a series with Jack Lowden.
Ballad of a Small Player: Addiction to anything, vice or gambling in this case makes man see ghosts. Probably dead. Macau seems nice. Didn’t see the movie.
Mercy of the Gods: Lab politics on a planet I don’t care about with characters I won’t follow up with.
Severance: a book about pandemic, birth and identity — not the show.
The Blade Itself: a trilogy I don’t look forward to finishing.
Wolves of Fairmont Park: Drugs. Philly. Crime.
American Hippo: What if we domesticated hippos?
The Wolf of Sarajevo: the past is hardly the past. Bosnia ripped apart, or is it?
A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: nice knight romp. Going to be a series in 2026.
Gitchigami: good work Steffes.
Table for Two: one part short story, one part novel.
Hard Rain Falling: Crime, jail, redemption, love.
Rejection: Weird but funny stories about the worst people you don’t know.
Quarterlife: tale of modern India and moving home and strangers in a strange land. Started okay but then…
The Spy Who Came In From the Cold: George Smiley. Spies.
Appointment in Samarra: Story of a 1930s fall of a not so great man.
Libra: a bit too heady for my taste. JFK assassination.
American Tabloid: Another JFK but told like a pulp story.
Pokémon Chapter Books: Gotta read ’em all.
The Leopard: Italian reunification. Netflix show.
Death and the Penguin: Ukraine after the fall.
Wolf and the Watchman: Scandi noir.
Train Dreams: man grows old slowly in the west. Netflix movie.
Eurotrash: Nazi fortune, Swiss travel, eurotrash.
Nada: French crime. They don’t get away with it.
The Sheltering Sky: a Moroccan The Sun Also Rises but with a wild third act.
Sacred City: Timbuktu past and present.
Get the Picture: Art world.
Razor Girl: Florida sucks.
The Buried: Egypt post Tahrir Square.
She Rides Shotgun: Criminal kills other criminals. Who says no?
Perfection: Berlin, gentrification. Flattened world.
Anthropologists: Paris, wherein nothing happens.
Art Thief: Man steals. Woman scorns.
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay: Great reread in light of Annunciation circumstance. Salve.
Colored Television: Make it worse.
Small Mercies: Southie revenge.
Abundance: looks like we’re fucked.
The Religion: Always carry opium.
Fort Bragg Cartel: Taken with a grain of salt… but the Delta Force could be in trouble.
Beside the Syrian Sea: Spy craft and dads.
What Happens at Night: Adoption and ghosts in Northern Europe.
TV
American Primeval: Mormons still bad.
The Pitt: I’m still squeamish.
Severance S2: it’s a mystery but I don’t care much.
Love Is Blind S8: tough break, Monica.
Paradise: absurd life in a bunker.
Survivor 48: The one person I liked got eliminated too early.
Traitors S3: big win, guy.
The Agency: spies, but in English.
Prime Target: math.
Adolescence: boyhood.
Reacher S3: terrible.
The Curse: Nathan might not be for you.
Dope Thief: drugs in Philly.
The Studio: old-school Hollywood buffet.
Top Chef Canada: Canadian tuxedos but for food.
Abbott Elementary: I think high school is funnier.
Mobland: a guy who was James Bond, a guy who shoulda been. But pretty bad.
The Rehearsal S2: he really landed the plane.
Andor S2: perfection.
Friends and Neighbors: Don Draper but a white-collar thief.
Adults: Girls, but now.
Department Q: solving cases, healing hearts.
100 Foot Wave S3: brain damage. Big waves.
The Bear S4: open the restaurant. Close the restaurant. I dunno.
The Good Sister: what if no one is good?
Smoke: oh, he’s the arsonist.
Too Much: content I’m happy exists, but not for me.
Sirens: I wanted this show to be about mermaids and it just never was.
The Eternaut: get a mask and watch out for the snow in Argentina.
Eastern Gate: Russians, still the bad guys.
Black Rabbit: probably coulda been an okay movie. Also, what if Jason Bateman is just playing his AD character, but bad.
Task: Philly, drugs. Wait, didn’t we see this already?
Rainmaker: probably just read the book.
Slow Horses S5: Oldman’s feet.
White Lotus: tough beat for Duke basketball.
The Paper: I hope this comes back better. Save journalism.
The Lowdown: Ethan Hawke in Tulsa.
The English Teacher S2: if a show comes on and gets canceled and no one talks about it, is it funny?
Nobody Wants This S2: admittedly, I didn’t finish this. Do I want this?
The Asset: spy shows are always in style.
Haha You Clowns: I don’t watch a lot of animation, but maybe I should.
Death by Lightning: marvelously four episodes. The book, after he gets shot, is painful to read.
Survivor 49: the only person I liked got sent home before they should have.
Pluribus: could I save humanity? Probably not.
Diplomat S3: it’s called The Diplomat, not The Politician.
The Girlfriend: I’ll follow Robin Wright pretty far, but this was maybe too far.
On Call: Troian Bellisario as a cop. Big glow-up after being a Pretty Little Liar.
The Chair Company: honestly gotta sit down to process this.
Live Music
1. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
2. Ben Kweller
3. Danny Go
4. Dijon
5. Destroyer
