From Famous Betrayers to The Brutalist Film via Bad Bunny – This Roundup of the Arts That Mattered in 2025

It’s time to cast our minds back on a year of Traitors and Sinners, of chart-toppers and daring comedies, with a now annual overview of the year’s most noteworthy culture. Traditionally, numerous rankings are currently compiled – of movies and LPs, television series, novels and interactive entertainment, stage, comedy and performance. A number of those already revealed their top picks, the rest will reach their respective summits in the next few days, so keep an eye.

Our list in contrast is entirely partial, and definitely not as all-encompassing as many extensive rankings: there are numerous records we did not have time to listening to, and TV shows we’re still only in the middle of. However hopefully it should offer a snapshot of a year that, despite multiple difficulties, was a pretty strong one for culture. Let's begin the show!

TV

Aside from scheming to transform the cinema-going experience, a leading platform was releasing TV series at its characteristic rapid clip. A great deal of its programming vanished from our shared memory shortly after hitting the front page. Yet, one Adolescence felt unforgettable, a exceptionally well-conceived and acted drama, not to mention a national conversation-starter. A platform series of the year however was The Eternaut, an from Argentina end-of-the-world tale that depicted the end times with striking clarity, all while grappling with the country’s turbulent history. Do watch it over the festive season if you can; it’s just six parts. Another global series that wowed was Mussolini: Son of the Century, a deeply compelling account of Il Duce’s ascent, which sought to “draw in” the audience into grasping Mussolini’s allure, before making them feel uncomfortably complicit when his grip strengthened.

It was a strong year for TV comedy. With How Are You? It’s Alan (Partridge), the lead actor and his writers succeeded to find one more rich avenue for the character to furrow, as he got involved in “men’s mental health” and much more elsewhere. In its follow-up series, Such Brave Girls cemented its status as the most brazenly unflinching show around, and many laughed at much of a industry satire The Studio, which has also felt more and more relevant with every real-world consolidation and concerning technological advance. Return show of the year, without a doubt, was South Park which, in its latest iterations, embarked on a hilarious scorched-earth assault of a recent political era. No one was spared, especially the president.

Alien: Earth featured its own surprising scene-stealer – a sheep with a horrific little octopoid creature embedded in its eye. Some connected with the showrunner's idiosyncratic take on the series, but it definitely creeped me out like no other series this year. However, there were moments that rivalled it in an latest mammoth video essay Shifty, a unsettling and sometimes very funny examination of the breaking apart of our shared reality. Lastly, it’s difficult to make a case for anything other than The Celebrity Traitors being the biggest show of the year, in the UK at least. It might have gone so badly wrong – overly chummy or scripted – but it felt as addictive as any of the civilian series.

And below are five notable TV installments to check out: LOL Last One Laughing UK; Louis Theroux: The Settlers; Pluribus – We Is Us; Severance – Cold Harbour; Slow Horses – Tall Tales

Albums & Songs

Two longstanding favourites released eagerly awaited new records in 2025, and they were both as impressive as expected. Cotton Crown by the Tubs built on the sharp, incisive guitar sound of the band’s debut with passages of tender reflection by singer about his late mother. And the delightfully unrestrained Getting Killed, by ascendant band Geese was nothing less than a phenomenon, earning the band fans from actors to legends almost instantly.

Meanwhile, an album nobody expected to ever be released – Let God Sort Em Out by long-dormant rap duo Clipse – did magically arrive and was perhaps even stronger than hoped, full of wonderfully sharp lines and featuring some of a legendary producer’s best work in a long time. If that album felt like a welcome throwback, the glitchy, frantic Stardust by Detroit’s finest, Danny Brown, sounded beamed in from some bizarre future, thanks to the rapper cannily collaborating with some of the most daring producers in hyperpop. Producer Blawan’s SickElixir was even more jarring, a collection of electronic tracks that sounded as if they had been put through a wood chipper and put back together – but, in a great way, obviously.

There were tons of great albums for those who like things on the crunchier end of the spectrum. Deftones are probably as popular as they’ve ever been, and their latest LP, Private Music, was as satisfyingly pummelling as anything in their back catalogue. Also impressive was Last Leg of the Human Table, the new album by band Cloakroom, which was described by most critics as atmospheric rock, but sounded more like classic indie backed by a doom-metal rhythm section. And Chrome Dipped, by Aussies Civic, pushed garage rock to its rawest, noisiest extremes. On It’s a Beautiful Place, duo Water From Your Eyes laced their experimental pop with electronic and rock influences, a combination that shouldn’t have worked but absolutely did. And Wolf Alice, now probably Britain’s biggest rock group, also progressed on the melodic The Clearing – an album that felt arena-ready.

And here are five standout songs to listen to: Bad Bunny – Nuevayol (music video of the year!); Bar Italia – Fundraiser; Model/Actriz – Cinderella; Turnstile – Birds; Underscores – Music

Film

It seems like several years ago now, but the first part of the year brought some great Oscar-season films to cinemas, in particular two films that contended with the nuances of the diaspora in wildly different ways: one hefty The Brutalist, about a survivor's difficult encounter with mid-century America; and an actor-director's funny, biting A Real Pain, where the star and a co-star played mismatched cousins embarking on a heritage tour around Poland. Completing the year is a director's Marty Supreme, starring a leading actor as a troubled ping-pong prodigy. A berserk adventure through mid-century Jewish New York, it also serves as the best film about competition of the year and will be a major awards contender.

Britain’s film industry