To say I’m chronically online is honestly an understatement. While my New Year’s resolution for 2025 was to cut down my electronics usage, I feel like I became even more dependent on my phone as the year went on. However, I’m proud to say that I became less reliant on TikTok and began investing my free time into other areas of media.
In my goal to escape the dreaded doom scrolling, I decided to expand my horizons to find new things to occupy my time: podcasts, books, movies, TV shows, etc. If you too want to put down the computer in your pocket, I’m introducing my media awards of 2025. Maybe one will strike your fancy!
Best Movie: Frankenstein (2025)
This film was the epitome of an English major’s dream book adaptation. I’m not exaggerating in the slightest when I say Jacob Elordi should win every award possible for his portrayal of the Creature. From the first scene with Captain Anderson to the final, cinematic shot of the Creature walking towards the sun, every moment was more captivating than the last.
Guillermo del Toro couldn’t have summoned a better adaptation out of my head. It was the perfect reimagination of Mary Shelley’s novel. I loved it so much that I need his immediate film adaptations of every other classic book I’ve ever read (The Phantom of the Opera must be first, please, I beg).
Every scene carried so much weight, and the iconic “Only monsters play God” lives in my head. The deliberate symbolism of Mia Goth playing two parts, both Elizabeth Lavenza and Claire, Victor’s late mother, is so striking. It was just such a fantastic movie, and a total must-watch as the winter months carry on.
Best Podcast: Shameless
I’ve been a long-time consumer of Shameless Media, an Australian media company that produces content for “smart people who love dumb stuff,” as its tagline says. Shameless Media was founded by two women, Michelle Andrews and Zara McDonald, who have together created an invaluable space for women to have both silly and serious pop culture conversations free of judgment.
Shameless Media has five podcasts: Shameless, The Shameless Book Club, Everybody Has A Secret, Style-ish, and Inherited. I’ve listened to all of them, but my overall favorites are Shameless and Everybody Has A Secret.
The Shameless podcast has been my favorite source of entertainment for a few years now, and I’m delighted to give it the spotlight it deserves. Despite the company completely residing in Australia, the content discussed is relevant to pop culture and society around the world.
I’ll be a Shameless Media consumer until it’s pried from my cold, dead hands. It’s for this reason that it’s, without a doubt, the best podcast I listened to in 2025. It’s perfect for long drives, walks to class, and just listening wherever you have a free moment.
Best Television Series: The Traitors (U.S.)
In mid-2025, I started watching the reality television show The Traitors (U.S.). The network of The Traitors is vast, with multiple versions of the show, including the U.S. version, The Celebrity Traitors (UK), The Traitors (UK), and coming soon, The Traitors (U.S.), but with normal civilians. There are also French, Australian, New Zealand, Canadian, German, and many more versions in various languages, featuring contestants from all over the world. So, basically, the franchise is huge, so much so that it’s even won an Emmy Award, and I’m late to the party.
In case you haven’t heard of it, The Traitors (U.S.) is a competition reality show where celebrities, politicians, previous reality show contestants, and influencers are cast to play the game of traitors. The players all stay together in a castle in the Scottish Highlands and are trying to win money.
The cast usually starts with around 20 players, and on the first night in the castle, the host, Alan Cumming, randomly and secretly chooses a small number of the cast (usually 2-4 people) to be “traitors” in the game. Everybody else is considered a “faithful.” Nobody knows who the traitors are, and the goal is for the faithful to figure that out.
The cast competes in missions to earn money, while the faithful try to vote out the traitors and the traitors “murder,” or send home, cast members every night. If there’s a traitor left at the end of the game, they take all of the money!
There have been some fantastic celebrities on The Traitors in the three U.S. seasons that I’ve watched, including Boston Rob from Survivor, Gabby Windey from The Bachelorette, Dylan Efron from Down to Earth, and Maksim Chmerkovskiy from Dancing with the Stars.
Since I began watching, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed bingeing every episode, and the cast of the new season will be even more stacked. Big names such as Rob Rausch from Love Island, Donna Kelce (Travis and Jason Kelce’s mom), Mark Ballas from Dancing with the Stars, Colton Underwood from The Bachelor franchise, and Love Island host Maura Higgins will be competing for the prize of a lifetime.
Best Book: Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid
The most difficult category for me to select a single winner for was best book. After much deliberation, I want to highlight Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid.
Carrie Soto Is Back scored one of my first five-star ratings of the year, and it stays in my head as one of my favorite reads. Carrie “Battle-Axe” Soto is a retired tennis player known as the best of all time, but as her last record is about to be broken by new tennis hotshot Nicki Chan, she decides to come out of retirement and maintain her title. At 37 years old, she seeks the help of her father to coach her for a final season, leaving it all on the line.
The story deals with love, loss, and the cost of being the best. I truly think about this novel at least once a week because of its fantastic writing and generally amazing storytelling. It’s even supposed to be getting a movie adaptation executive-produced by Serena Williams.
I could go on and on about my favorite pieces of media from digital ads (obviously the Katseye “Mikshake” GAP Jeans Ad) to albums (Tate McRae’s SO CLOSE TO WHAT??? (deluxe)). Everything I consume holds a special place in my heart, and I hope to keep the good vibes going into 2026. Maybe next year I’ll actually put my phone down more… another New Year’s resolution?
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