Time for part two where we transition from 2025 in film to 2025 in everything else starting with:
TV
Last year I mentioned that in my quest to grow and ultimately reached the optimal stable combination of various media I am comfortable reading, watching, and listening to in a given year, TV was the medium I was most comfortable falling by the wayside. My opinions on this still hold true, however, I will now list a series of statements that may or may not lead you to a conclusion. I will not verify any conclusions.
In 2025, I was required to transition from working from home to working in a basement in a remote facility away from any of my coworkers, with between 0 and 4 other people on any given day who report to different people, organizations, or agencies, with worse internet connection and overall capabilities, and all in the name of efficiency. The only streaming service I have access to is a Netflix subscription through my sister. It is very easy to watch Netflix on your phone. There are more TV shows on Netflix coming out than movies (at least interesting ones).
After making the statements above. I will say that I watched more TV in 2025. It's still not really a medium I want to write about in depth, but I will include the following recommendations:
A Shop for Killers
The Pitt
Study Group
Tastefully Yours
Typhoon Family
Pluribus
The Prisoner
Last Samurai Standing
Winning Try
Once again we have mostly K-dramas, and I am starting to find my niche within the sub-medium. I am sad that most seem to be cutting from 16 episodes to 12 or 8, and overall I think the standard structure is taking even fewer narrative or emotional risks than in the past. I can say that I am still drawn to shows where a quirky, uniquely charismatic lawyer (or doctor) saves the day one case at a time and death games. Episodes are getting shorter too, which is a bummer.
I don't have too much more to say here. So far in 2026, there are a lot of murder mystery, darker, procedural K-dramas, and I am definitely not having as much fun. Now on to:
MUSIC
This year, I listened to 227 albums and 83 EPs, which is about 2/3rds of 2024, and I definitely had way more albums left on the table. I hope I'll get to them one day, but I am not optimistic. My listening so far in 2026 has trended way down in favor of podcasts and audiobooks, which I hope to course correct on soon. Similar to last year, I am going to try and save all of my thoughts and opinions on music for those at Pierced Poets Productions. This year the Album of the Year event will be a write-up that I hope will be posted shortly, and I hope to include at least a few more pieces on the site before the end of the year. Pierced Poets Productions is a Northeast Ohio-based music and event venture founded by one of my closest friends, Austin “Jax” Amadio that I encourage anyone interested in music or in the music industry to check out and support. Without further or do, here are my albums of 2025.
Honorable Mentions
Tobi Lou - Diabolical <3
The Wonder Years - Burst & Decay Vol III
Jome - Somehow
Japanese Breakfast - For Melancholy Brunettes (&sad women)
Saya Gray - SAYA
Beach Bunny - Tunnel Vision
McKinley Dixon - Magic, Alive!
spill tab - ANGIE
Samia - Bloodless
Cautious Clay - The Hours: Morning
EDGEWOOD38 - BLU
EP of the Year: Jamee - Crawling Out the Deep End
The List:
10. Mina Okabe — Papaya
9. Saba & No ID — From the Private Collection of Saba & No ID
8. Arm's Length — There's a Whole World Out There
7. Lucy Dacus — Forever is a Feeling
6. Morat — Ya Es Mañana
5. Gordi — Like Plasticine
4. Tenblank — Glass Heart
3. Emma Goldman — all you are is we
2. Hot Mulligan — The Sound A Body Makes When It's Still
1. The Callous Daoboys — I Don't Want to See You in Heaven
I hope my music listening picks up a bit. It does not help that the proliferation of AI and scammers infiltrating the musicians I follow makes it hard to go through my new releases sometimes. I moved from Spotify to Qobuz as well. Spotify is an awful company run by an evil man and is actively making music worse, I recommend not giving them money. Qobuz seems like a decent-ish alternative with some caveats regarding their library, which I'd say has about 85% of the artists I followed on spotify, and their search algorithm, which leaves a lot to be desired. Now on to:
PROSE
Just like in 2024, I read eight works of prose in 2025, however, this time two of those were works of long-form serialized webfiction totaling well over 1000 pages each, and another work was a traditional novel also over 1000 pages long, so I will count that as progress. Most of my thoughts on these works will be saved for a separate criticism and creative project I am hoping to announce later this year, so I will provide brief thoughts on one and list the others.
Atomic Habits — James Clear Everyone makes fun of this book and people who read self-help books, and it's largely for good reason. If more than 10% of your reading per year consists of these type of books, please step outside and talk to someone. Still, sometimes you have to foray into the world of the masses. Most of the country isn't reading, but a lot of the country is reading this. Atomic Habits is the cousin book. I have so many cousins in their early 30s recommending this book or proudly displaying it on their book shelves.
Friends and readers, it's fine. I would hope that most people are formally taught a lot of this skills summarized in Atomic Habits, but I know that not to be the case. I did not find a whole lot to be revelatory. There are a lot of neatly summarized concepts I appreciated; a lot of coinable terms. I liked its highlighted importance of experiences. Clear is good at giving specific and persuasive examples and easily distilling important habit-building concepts. You could probably do a lot worse in the self-help sphere than this book, and it wasn't a complete waste of my time.
Baby with the Bathwater — Christopher Durang
Arcadia — Tom Stoppard
Worth the Candle — Alexander Wales
Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint — singNsong
The Death of Ivan Ilyich — Leo Tolstoy
The Romance of Tristan and Iseult — Retold by Joseph Bédier
Infinite Jest — David Foster Wallace
That's it for prose in 2025. I think it was a slight improvement over the year prior. I read one 1000-page, high-priority novel. One day I'll finish Cryptonomicon, hopefully this year. For reasons that may or may not relate to the series of statements I made at the beginning of the TV section, I am off to a fantastic start in 2026. I've already read 5 books and 1 short story! What a pace.
I'm going to end with comics, and unfortunately my comics consumption in 2025 was abysmal, and I fear my writing on the medium only continues to atrophy. Nonetheless, I am most concerned with getting this post out the door at this point, so here we go.
COMICS
I read 18 titles of various lengths, some 20 volumes, others a single trade paperback. I still hold the same fears and burnout as last year, and I still have the same desire to broadcast. I hope I can fall in love with the medium again this year, and things are already off to a decent start. I'm going to list a few honorable mentions and then talk about my favorite four comics I read last year in greater detail.
Heart Gear — Tsuyoshi Takaki (Story & Art), Jennifer J. Ward (T & L)
Akane Banashi Vol. 10 — Yue Suenaga (Story), Takamasa Moue (A), Stephen Paul (T), Snir Aharon & Vanessa Satone (L), Keiki Hayashiya (Rakugo Supervision)
Witchcraft TPB — Sole Otero (W & A), Andrea Rosenberg (T)
Hirayasumi Vols.4-5 — Keigo Shinzo (W & A), Jan Mitsuko Cash (T), Elena Diaz (L)
Wistoria: Wand & Sword Vols. 1-14 — Fujino Omori (S), Toshi Aoi (A), Makana Folger (T), Kyle Ziolko (L)
Fool Night Vols. 1-3 — Kasumi Yasuda (S & A), Casey Loe (T), Snir Aharon (Touch-up Art & Lettering), Kam Li (Design)
*4. The Bugle Call: Song of War Vols. 1-3 — Mozuku Sora (S), Higoro Toumori (A), Caleb Cook (T), Annaliese "Ace" Christman (Touch-up Art & Lettering), Alice Lewis (Design)
The Bugle Call: Song of War is a fantasy shounen manga anchored by it's design and its straightforward coolness. That may seem basic, but ti does enough to stand out amongst the oversaturated crowd. Luca has the relatively simple, but lofty, dream of playing his bugle in the symphony. Unfortunately, he comes from nothing in a nation at war, so his only bugle-playing practice comes from organizing the troops on the battlefield. After almost dying, he manifests fantastical powers as he learns he's part of a special group of branch-hexed, horned individuals. His powers involve using his bugle to create extraordinary formations across vast battlefields and telepathically direct the soldiers through music.
The story wouldn't work without Sora and Toumouri's ability to balance scale and dimension. The artist needs to pull off both intimate, individual moments of these branch-hexed individuals facing-off or enjoying their calling, with large-scale military strategy and tactics battles. The branch-hexed have extremely unique powers accompanied by a large drawback. Luca's drawback is primarily that his power is quite useless in actual combat. Meanwhile Zoe is able to borrow and magnify strength from her future-self, but she falls asleep for a proportionate amount of time afterwards. As a result of a traumatic incident when she was nine, she used 18 years worth of strength and fell asleep for that long afterwards, meaning that she now carries the mind of a 9 year old in a 27-year-old's body. Miura has super speed, but he cannot see where he is going when he runs. These are extremely weird and fascinating drawbacks to incorporate into military strategy. It's a shounen, so nothing's that deep, but there are sinister undertones behind the machinations of the war, mysterious figureheads leading the squads, and dreams each of the branch-hexed are fighting for that are all compelling.
The core narrative loop consists of large-scale battles between armies of thousand's of soldiers where the branch-hexed individuals can certainly turn the tide of the war, but also are not all powerful. In between these battles are private mercenary missions and quieter moments where the branch-hexed reflect on their dreams, why they're fighting, and the horrors of war. There are better military or war manga, but The Bugle Call's weirdness and unique design choices make it stand out. The squad leader has a whistle for a head. Is it his helmet? probably, but I don't know yet.
3. Call of the Night — Kotoyama (S&A), Junko Goda (T), Shaenon K. Garrity (A), Annaliese "Ace" Christman (Touch-up Art & Lettering), Alice Lewis (Design)
I'm a mark for manga that can showcase the beauty of the night sky. Orb: On the Movement's of the Earth showcased its beauty in 2024, and in 2025, Call of the Night displayed the beauty of the night sky as a backdrop for an impressive number of genres across the manga's run. What starts as a curious coming-of-age slice-of-life about a young boy unable to fit in with the monotonous routine of going to school falling for the allure of the night traverses through romance, murder mystery, and even battle shonen before its bittersweet conclusion. It's a story defined by what its characters lack and are searching for, or what they choose to fill their live with instead, and there is plenty of humor and heartwarming moments along the path to maturity.
2. Ultra Heaven — Keiichi Koike (S&A), Ajani Oloye (T), Evan Hayden (Lettering, Touch-up Art, Design)
I have an extreme aversion, perhaps even a slight fear, of substances. Even though things like screens, and even sugar, have proven to have similar effects, something about an external agent affecting the brain in potentially unknown ways has always been enough to convince me to stay away. When something like Euphoria or The Substance comes along, I watch with an unknowing a curiosity and slight disgust. The same holds true for Ultra Heaven, which essentially depicts one man going through the most intense, and dangerous trip of his life with some of the most breathtaking art you've ever seen. There really isn't much more to it than that. I mean just look at this:
It's definitely worth checking out.
1. Witch Hat Atelier — Kamome Shirahama (S & A), Stephen Kohler (T), Lys Blakeslee (L)
At ten or eleven years old, Coco has to, no, chooses to take responsibility for a colossal mistake she made, but that was ultimately caused by societal machinations by a magical ruling class using its powers to manipulate the memories of the proletariat. Who is anyone to decide that the majority cannot use a wondrous, powerful, but potentially dangerous tool? It's because of the secrecy and forbidden nature, that the most dangerous of magic presented itself to young Coco first.
Still, naive and knowing none of this, she enrolls in an apprenticeship to try and conventionally accomplish her way to accessing a library anyone ranked high enough could probably just take her too, but society has rules or something. This perhaps sounds like criticism, but it's actually praise for a manga that teaches young aspiring witches class consciousness as they try to master what is perhaps the best and most expressive magic system I've ever seen in fantasy manga. It's simple, elegant, and entirely visual. One only need to view its use in a few panels to understand its rules, although they do explain it for readers anyway. There's an anime airing now, but I highly recommend the manga instead or in addition.
It's now April 13, 2026. If things seemed rushed there at the end, it's because they were. I just needed to get this one out and move on at this point. A year ago I said we were speedrunning towards the end of empire and somehow things have sped up even further. Now at a time when there's so many issues on my mind, a mono diagnosis to worry about, and an even more unstable state of he world, broadcasting feels farther aay than ever. I echo the sentiments that for anyone whose signal has been weakened, anyone who has been even further suppressed and harmed by a fascist and discriminatory administration: You matter. Way more than any of the art that I talked about above or the fiction that I share. I feel your broadcasts, and I will always do what I can to ensure their and your preservation.
Resist the monster. Embrace what you love
I hope to send another signal soon.