BEST FILMS & TV OF 2025

The best, new, movies I saw last year were (in no particular order):

• Fantastic Four: First Steps
• Superman 
• The Monkey 
• Frozen: The Hit Broadway Musical

I have to be honest, because of my medical issues last year, I haven't felt like watching/reviewing many new films - instead building up a healthy backlog of unopened Blu-rays to (hopefully) throw myself into in 2026.

On the other hand, I did watch an awful lot of TV shows, much of it being new.

My favourites for the year in this category (again, in no particular order) were:

• The Assembly 
• How The Wild West Was Won - With Ray Mears
• Dexter: Resurrection 
• Frieren: Beyond Journey's End

We also said goodbye to some great, long-running shows in 2025, including:

• Stranger Things - no notes.
• Cobra Kai - now that’s how you do a franchise! Fantastic and satisfying wrap-up for the series.
• Evil - we finally got closure on the greatest pulp horror show of the 21st Century. This one really breaks my heart because it was such an inventive genre programme, running through more outré ideas per episode than most shows conjure up in a season. And Katja Herbers.
• The Handmaid’s Tale
• Squid Games 
• The Sandman 
• My Hero Academia

I'm easily pleased!

Re-Opening The X-Files

Being rather immobile at present (having apparently slipped a disc, and am waiting for a treatment regime from my GP), I've been watching a lot of TV from a recumbent position, either in my lounger or in bed (I can't concentrate/focus enough to properly read, which means a growing backlog of novels and comics). 

As well as new (to me) shows, like Castle Rock, returning on-going favourites like Murdoch Mysteries, Dexter and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, classics like the BBC's Paranormal series and, of course, Ancient Aliens, I've also dug deep (thanks to Prime Video) and started watching The X-Files from season one, episode one.

By "sheer coincidence", the Amazon delivery guy turned up a few days ago with the first volume of this gorgeous X-Files tome, a stunning, hardback, faux replica of the titular X-Files themselves.

I'm a massive fan of "in-universe" books such as this, but The X-Files: The Official Archives is quite possibly the best-looking one I've seen to date.

This official book collates information (files, evidence, photographs etc) on 50 of the show's "most memorable" investigations relating to "cryptids, biological anomalies, and parapsychic phenomena". 

And if that wasn't impressive enough on its own, in May next year volume two arrives, dealing with "extraterrestrial activity and The Syndicate".

These are not only amazing reference books, but invaluable research material for an idea that's been scritching away at my brain since my serious, leg-related issues began and I realised I was (currently) unable to fulfil my gamemastering obligations for The Tuesday Knights. 

Honestly, I'm not sure how long I'll be out of action and our superhero campaign had already lost momentum and was faltering (for various real world reasons).

Pete has kindly offered to step in, when I feel like getting back to the table, as he has "an idea", which is always an exciting prospect as we had great fun with his 1950s GURPS game that segued into 1930's Hollow Earth Expedition. 

Perhaps, our characters will be "sliding" into the Victorian steampunk game he mentioned some time ago?

Or maybe it's something else entirely...

Quarantine (2008)

The chances are if you have similar tastes to mine you will have heard of the Spanish alt-zombie, shaky-cam, found footage, horror flick [REC] - well, Quarantine is the American remake for those who don't do subtitles.

While not a shot-for-shot remake, Quarantine is very, very similar to the original - even down to the look of the quarantined apartment building.

The lovely Jennifer Carpenter, from Dexter, replaces the elfin Manuela Velasco, as the TV journalist doing a "ride-along" piece with the Los Angeles fire brigade when they are called to a block where an elderly resident is apparently in trouble in her room.

When the police and fire brigade force their way in, the crazy old woman attacks them and things very rapidly go to Hell in an oversized handbasket.

The reporter, and her mostly-unseen cameraman, find themselves trapped inside the building with an assortment of residents - including Alan Harper's wife from Two And A Half Men (Marin Hinkle), the burnt guy from American Horror Story (Denis O'Hare) and Fish from Ally McBeal (Greg Germann) - some of whom are manifesting signs of a kind of super-rabies!

Quarantine, while sticking close to the visceral template established in [REC], appears to be playing down the supernatural left turn in the third act, yet remains uncertain as to which way it wants to take things as it heads towards the now infamous final shot (which is also, rather bizarrely, the DVD cover) that was so effective in [REC] that it has has become a cliché in lazy horror movie making.

So, yes, Quarantine is excellent fun, but mainly because [REC] was so good in the first place. I guess the makers of Quarantine should, at least, be applauded for not screwing up the material they were handed - which makes a change!

Both films, ultimately, are so similar that it really comes down to the mood you are in when choosing which to watch - Spanish or American?