I wanted to take the opportunity of the New Year to log what I watched, played and listened to this year, but I was in a rush to write everything down around New Year. I’ll come prepared in 2026, and probably organize myself differently.
Watched#
TV Shows#
| Name | Comments | Rating (/10) |
|---|---|---|
| Severance (Season 2) | Great continuation from Season 1, although less surprising. Episode 7 (Chikhai Bardo) reminded me a lot of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and really deserves its award. | 9 |
| Pluribus (Season 1) | Much like Severance, this TV show is slow-paced. The plot is intriguing enough for me to continue. | 8 |
| Silo (Season 2) | Would you look at that! Another slow-paced, small-cast TV show that I liked! Like Severance S2, the novelty effect wore off, but their worlds still have stories to tell. Looking forward to watching Season 3! | 8 |
| Slow Horses (Season 5) | 5th season and still a blast: good cast, good plot, great writing! | 8 |
| Bref (Season 2) | Didn’t know what to expect 13 years after Season 1, which I still binge watch from time to time. Season 2 turned out to be really good! Episode 2 hits really hard emotionally, maybe too hard, which makes the following episodes less impactful. | 8 |
| Dandadan (Season 2) | Season 1 was really good. -1 point for the new opening, which sounds like any other anime opening to me, and -1 point for the plot that is slightly less crazy than the first season. However, the fight scenes are still solid, and the characters are well-written. | 7 |
| Mr Corman | Joseph Gordon-Levitt doing what Joseph Gordon-Levitt does, or at least I felt like Mr Corman and Tom, from 500 Days of Summer, were the same guy. A pleasant watch nonetheless. | 7 |
| A Man On The Inside (Season 1) | I really liked The Good Place, so I was hyped about this show. It’s not bad, but I’d say it’s a typical Netflix show that you enjoy watching, and then promptly forget. | 6 |
Movies#
| Name | Comments | Rating (/10) |
|---|---|---|
| Airplane | I had an itch for a ZAZ movie and went with Airplane: this one still holds up! | 8 |
| Another Round | Mads Mikkelsen seems like a nice guy, and I wanted to see him in a “modest” production (I know him from big budget productions such as Death Stranding, James Bond, Fantastic Beasts, Doctor Strange, etc.), and I was not disappointed: the pitch for this movie is great, and Mads Mikkelsen’s performance (and the rest of the cast) makes it even better. | 8 |
| Knifes Out: Wake Up Dead Man | I remember that I liked the first movie, cannot remember the second one. I think I’ll forget about this third entry pretty quickly. A pleasant moment nonetheless: the mystery is okay, and it seems like Daniel Craig is having a blast. Half of the cast are good, the other half are… there. | 7 |
| The Thursday Murder Club | Meh. Already forgot what this one was about. | 6 |
Listened#
2025 was a year of nostalgia and re-discovery of bands that I used to listen or hear when I was a teenager. I don’t know why tho. Everything in the world’s turning to shit, so I need a comfort zone perhaps? Anyway, here’s what was in my ears:
- Cocoon
Cocoon is a french band created by Mark Daumail alongside Morgane Imbeaud. They blew up in 2007 with the title On My Way. The lyrics are often dark, but the music ranges from upbeat to melancholic. Mark’s fingerpicking really got me into guitar. He’s like my main inspiration. Anyway, the band broke up in 2011, then Mark released two albums that felt less “Cocoon” to me.
In 2025, Mark released a “best-of” album called Bones for the Dogs where existing songs are re-recorded in raw acoustic version (voice + guitar or piano). This made me rediscover their discography, enjoy songs that I overlooked, and pick my guitar again.
- Placebo
One of the bands from my high-school years, with System Of A Down. The first album that I listened to was Sleeping with Ghosts, then Meds and I listened to their previous albums. This year I came across their last album Never Let me Go (2022) through Youtube’s algorithm and it sounded like how I remembered Placebo sounded like, which is not a bad thing per se: for instance, the band Muse lost me because they’ve changed too much. Listening to this album, I rediscovered the band and their albums that I missed since 2006.
- Radiohead
This one is more of a “re-discovery”. I came across the song Reckoner by reading comments below Sophie Hunger’s cover of Le vent l’emportera: someone wrote that the two songs sounded similar, so I checked and… yeah, the two use the same chord progression. Of course I listened to Radiohead’s Creep and Karma Police on the radio, when I was a teenager, and I had the album Hail to the Thief but it didn’t stick with me at that time (only the track “2+2=5” stood out). I read somewhere that you had to gaslight yourself into liking Radiohead before actually liking Radiohead, and I can understand that statement. I guess that at that time I was not in the right headspace for that. However, Reckoner felt like the right entry point for me in 2025. From there I watched In Rainbows - From the basement on Youtube and got hooked.
- Bôa
Like many, I first heard about this band through the anime Serial Experiments Lain where their song Duvet played for the opening credit. I was like 12 at that time. This song got me interested (an English rock band for a Japanese anime?), and I listened to their two albums for a while. Then, about 20 years later, I heard that they’ve released a new album. Turns out that their sound hasn’t aged a bit. It feels like they’ve picked up where they left off (and again, in music, I have no problem with that). I am happy that they seem successful, getting support from old listeners who are mostly people like me, and new listeners. Great comeback!
I also had two songs on repeat for the whole year:
- Le vent l’emportera, Sophie Hunger’s cover of Noir Désir
This one is a tough one. I honestly think it’s one of the best songs ever written, but the writer turned out to be an abuser, and a murderer. To me, Sophie Hunger’s cover is better than the original and the only version that I listen. So, is it morally ok to listen to this song, even if it’s a cover sung by a woman? I don’t know, but I like this song.
- Idées noires, Bernard Lavilliers & Catherine Ringer
Is this it? Am I old now that I appreciate artists and songs released when I was not born yet? Songs that my parents listened to? French songs and artists even: Michel Berger, Alain Bashung, Daniel Balavoine and Bernard Lavilliers. I’m simply gonna focus on the latter. Idées noires from Bernard Lavilliers was written in 1983 as a duo with Nicoletta, but I find the acoustic version performed with Catherine Ringer much more impactful. All the artists that I’ve mentioned earlier have in common timeless and layered lyrics, and great musical arrangements.
Still, I discovered new artists in 2025… Well, maybe one, because the other is basically Radiohead in disguise.
- Laufey
Laufey managed to make jazz and bossa-nova accessible to a wide and “young” audience, which is quite an achievement! I don’t remember how her music got into my ears, but I thank the algorithm: I’ve learned quite a few new guitar chords with her songs!
- The Smile
2/5 of Radiohead (Thom Yorke & Jonny Greenwood), with the drummer Tom Skinner from Sons of Kemet. It sounds like Radiohead, but… jazzier? Math-rockier? In any case, I felt like their songs are easier to get into, compared to Radiohead’s. My favorite one is Skrting on the surface.
Played#
| Name | Comments | Rating (/10) | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 | My 2025 GOTY, and the well-deserved “Game of the year” award from the industry. I stumbled upon the trailer by chance, and preordered right away (something I don’t do often). The music has some Nier Automata vibes, the story has some Final Fantasy bits, the combat gameplay reminded me of Persona 5: what’s not to like? | 10 | Main path completed |
| Hades 2 | Liked the first one, and this sequel is even better! More things to do, more gameplay options, consistent writing, great OST. Although, the ending was kind of a letdown, but it’s hard to close the loop for the story of a narrative-heavy rogue-lite. | 9 | Main path completed |
| Sifu | Not a game that I started in 2025, but I still play it on a regular basis trying to 3 stars all the challenges. | 9 | Main path completed |
| Doorkickers 2 | Same as Sifu: those 2 games are about mastery and doing the perfect run. I come back to it often. I hoped that Ready Or Not would scratch my SWAT 3 itch, but turns out Doorkickers 2 is the one doing the job. | 9 | |
| Blue Prince | An impressive game filled with mysteries. So much that I know that I still have many left to solve. But I’ve accepted that I should make room for other games. Maybe the only game where I felt the need to have a physical notebook to write down some clues and riddles. | 8 | Main path completed |
| Marvel Rivals | Sorry Apex, I have a new friend! Or, “had”. The gameplay is solid even though I play public matches, but the constant battle passes and events pushed my FOMO too far, to the point that I felt the game was trying too hard to keep me interested with cosmetics, when I just wanted to play unbothered. | 8 | 100+ hours |
| Lies of P | As someone who cannot be fully invested in a Souls game anymore, Lies of P was a good alternative with its difficulty settings, and fair save point placements. Other than that, it felt like a Souls game (Steampunk Bloodborne?) | 8 | 3/4 completed I’d say |
| Death Stranding 2 | I wish it was my 2025 GOTY but (1) it’s basically Death Stranding 1 all over again minus the element of surprise / weirdness gone - I even felt like the core loop made the traversal easier, which softens the argument that only our protagonist can do what needs to be done; the writing is weaker, especially Sam who is really not relatable as a father figure given the circumstances - (2) Expedition 33 happened. All in all, I don’t think Death Stranding needed a direct sequel. | 7 | Main path completed |
Played (other games played)#
Here are other games that I played this year, but won’t write a review about… for now.
| Name | Rating (/10) |
|---|---|
| Sword of the Sea | 7 |
| Against the Storm | 7 |
| Children of the Sun | 7 |
| Shogun Showdown | 7 |
| Session | 7 |
| Is This Seat Taken? | 7 |
| Intraveinous 2 | 7 |
| Robocop | 7 |
| Ravenswatch | 7 |
| Absolum | 6 |
| Ready or Not | 6 |
| Viewfinder | 5 |