Whether you find yourself in a snowstorm or on a sunny beach this December, the holidays present an opportunity to reflect on the past year. Continuing our annual tradition, The Logic’s staff have compiled the best movies, books, podcasts, music and TV for you to binge this break. 

From emergency rooms to outer space, to the Baltic and Puerto Rico, some of our picks relate to tech and business, and some don’t. All of our selections were published or aired this year. So sit back, relax and get ready to dive into our staff picks of 2025.

Television

Study Group
Lee Jang-hoon and Yoo Beom-sang, CJ ENM (streaming on Viki)

An absurd Korean comedy about a last-in-his-class student who is a nigh-invincible brawler at a fight-filled high school, but cares only about improving his terrible grades. His incredible determination doesn’t quite lead to academic excellence, but it does inadvertently clean up an implausibly corrupt school in a highly entertaining 10-episode series. Like its protagonist, Study Group is not much of a thinker, but it’s a canny adaptation that translates the energy of its webcomic source material to live action in a way that’s reminiscent of what The Matrix did for anime. – Brendan

The Pitt
Scott Gemmill, HBO Max

The Pitt and ER share some DNA, including star Noah Wyle as a careworn version of his character in the 1990s hit, but the 2025 medical drama is less soapy and infinitely more intense.

Unfolding over one long shift and never venturing more than a few yards outside the sprawling-but-claustrophobic emergency room where it’s set, the show tells patient and medical workers’ stories, and acknowledges that many ER cases don’t have happy endings (and even fewer that the staff there get to see). It’s a show about skilled, sometimes scared people giving their all amid chaos. As a bonus, the creator R. Scott Gemmill is Canadian. – David R.

Andor Season 2
Ariel Kleiman, Janus Metz and Alonso Ruizpalacios, Disney+

Political intrigue, espionage and rebellion… in space! The second season of Andor offers a dark and grounded window into a galaxy far, far away. In this chapter, stormtroopers aim to kill. Lifelong Star Wars fans like me will love the grim story behind the stories, which focuses on the troubled heroes who set the stage for Luke Skywalker. For the less nerdy among us, there’s still a thrilling and touching story about the rise of fascism and the costs of fighting tyranny, featuring incredible performances by Diego Luna and Stellan Skarsgård. – Laura

Fit for TV: The Reality of the Biggest Loser
Skye Borgman, Netflix

As someone who grew up during the early aughts, I found this a compelling watch because it revisits a cultural moment when openly chasing weight loss, dieting and a narrowly defined “ideal” body type was not only normalized but celebrated. The series digs into that whole zeitgeist, showing how The Biggest Loser dominated mainstream network TV and reflected a culture obsessed with weight loss—long before the body-positivity movement reshaped the conversation, and way before semaglutide weight-loss interventions hit the scene. It’s an eye-opening look at how widespread and harmful some of those restrictive eating and over-exercising practices were, both for participants and for viewers. And as a bonus, it’s a great chance to see Aubrey Gordon in her element—on screen and fabulous. – Victoria

Severance Season 2
Dan Erickson, Ben Stiller, Apple TV+

If you’ve not visited the Severed Floor before, you’re in for a treat. Severance’s first season was a whirlwind of compelling cinematography, humour and mystery that quickly turned from whimsical to dark. Season 2 builds on the mystery and the darkness while adding plenty of extra intrigue in what is starting to become a remarkably rich, complex world. No spoilers, but the finale is gloriously intense and will leave you frantically searching for details of the next season. Spoiler: that might not be until the middle of 2027. – James

Books

Drayton and Mackenzie
Alexander Starritt, Swift Press

The first novel to be longlisted for the Financial Times and Schroders Business Book of the Year in 15 years, Drayton and Mackenzie is a rare gem. It tracks two gifted Oxford grads who trade the safety of McKinsey for the chaos of a cleantech startup. Beyond the drama, it provides genuine lessons on the humility, patience and near-maddening drive required to be a “builder” in today’s economy. If you want a glimpse into the psyche of the world’s high-achieving elite, this is a fun and frighteningly realistic choice for your holiday break. – David S. 

Baltic: The Future of Europe
Oliver Moody, John Murray Press

There are two reasons Canadians should take an interest in the nations that surround the Baltic Sea. One: Canada has placed some 2,000 troops in Latvia, and it’s not impossible that they could be called on to join a war between NATO and Russia. Two: nations such as Finland and Lithuania have learned to thrive in the shadow of menace, and their stories hold lessons from which we can draw now that we find ourselves in a similar situation. This book is an excellent overview of a part of the world that receives too little attention, especially here in U.S.-obsessed Canada. – Kevin

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This
Omar El Akkad, McClelland & Stewart 

Author and journalist Omar El Akkad pulls no punches in this moving account of gaining and losing faith in the West’s ability to live up to its ideals. A must-read for anyone invested in the future of journalism, El Akkad’s precision of language—and acknowledgment of its limits—makes for a page-turning story on how we write and revise the first draft of history, from someone who has lived it. – Emma

Hide and Sikh: Letters from a Life in Brown Skin
Sunny Dhillon, Wolsak and Wynn Publishers

In a series of emotional letters to his young daughter, Jaya, Sunny Dhillon reflects on growing up in Canada as a brown man with the quiet weight of otherness and systemic racism. Dhillon’s 2018 essay on leaving journalism and the lack of diversity in the Canadian industry gained widespread notoriety, and his latest offering guides readers through complex issues with humour and wit. In these letters, he hopes his daughter will inherit a country more willing to confront its own blind spots; a place where she can be proud to be herself. – Chaimae 

A Truce That Is Not Peace
Miriam Toews, Knopf Canada

Canadian novelist Miriam Toews is invited to a literary event in Mexico City, where she’s asked to answer the question, “Why do I write?” She works out the answer (which doesn’t satisfy the event organizers) in this memoir, structured as a loose collection of journal entries, quotes, stream of consciousness and slices of life. She writes to keep a connection with her sister, who, like their father, died by suicide years earlier, and to make sense of life’s pain without being rid of it. It’s heavy and funny and devastating and hopeful. – Catherine 

Who Better Than You?: The Art of Healthy Arrogance & Dreaming Big
Will Packer, Harmony

Blockbuster film producer Will Packer’s Who Better Than You? found me in Abu Dhabi on my birthday, fresh off a layoff and trying to remember who I was without a job title. Packer’s short yet chaotic parables of failure and boldness were the exact medicine I didn’t know I needed. In one story, the Ride Along and Girls Trip producer turns a moment of near-disaster—involving shenanigans with Kevin Hart—into the momentum for a long string of box-office-smashing hits. Packer’s mix of humility, delusion and audacity reminded me that ambition doesn’t require permission and confidence can be rebuilt, one unexpected setback at a time. – Tennile

Atmosphere: A Love Story
Taylor Jenkins Reid, Doubleday Canada

Atmosphere: A Love Story was an unexpected favourite that pulled me into a world shaped by hope, love and moments of quiet despair. Set in the early days of space exploration, when women astronauts were still a rarity, the story follows a fictional astronaut named Joan Goodwin as she searches for her place both on Earth and among the stars. In a time that often feels overwhelmingly chaotic, her journey is a gentle reminder that we’re never truly alone, and that we are, ultimately, here to hold one another up. – Kim

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil
V.E. Schwab, Tor Publishing Group; (Macmillan)

Readers eager to be swept into a rich fictional world would be hard-pressed to find a narrative as immersive as Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil, a novel that spans hundreds of years and gives you multiple lifetimes to uncover the secrets that connect main characters María, Alice and Charlotte. Despite living centuries and seas apart—16th-century Spain, 19th-century England and 2019 Boston—each protagonist must fight to be seen in a society that pushes women and queer people into the shadows. Along the way, each character pokes holes in the thin veil that separates good from evil in her society. The story defies genres, borrowing from historical and modern fiction, gothic horror and magical realism, with both thrilling twists and indulgent description. A companion for a long night by the fireplace, letting your cocoa get cold while your hand is busy turning page after page. – Anita

Movies

One Battle After Another
Paul Thomas Anderson, Warner Bros. Pictures

Cinemagoers wait all year-round for that one movie that will stick with them. A piece of art that grips your senses. One Battle After Another is just that: cognitively thrilling, politically charged and aesthetically brilliant. I went in knowing nothing except the big names involved in the film, and I was blown away from the first minute. This movie strikes a careful balance playing with the tensions of race, revolution and family, while being one of the most organically funny movies you’ll see. Even after a runtime of nearly three hours, you are left yearning for more. James Baldwin once said, “Love is a battle, love is a war.” This movie is just that. – Mashal

The Perfect Neighbor
Geeta Gandbhir, Message Pictures, Park Pictures and SO’B Productions (Distributed by Netflix)

As a journalist, it is hard for me to watch a documentary film without thinking about the process of gathering news and crafting a compelling story. This film about the 2023 shooting death of Ajike “AJ” Shantrell Owens, a Black mother, by her white neighbour in Ocala, Fla., was made almost entirely using pre-existing police footage, including from body-worn cameras. The result is a surprisingly intimate portrayal of a tight-knit community grappling with an unusual assault by an outsider during a deceptively calm and steady descent into tragedy. It also raises tough questions about systemic racism in Florida’s stand-your-ground laws. – Joanna

KPop Demon Hunters
Maggie Kang, Netflix

This movie is perfect. The plot, about a demon-slaying K-pop girl group and their demon boy band rivals-slash-love interests: perfect. The introductory scene where said girl group slurps ramen noodles, jumps out of a plane, battles their demon adversaries and lands on stage to deliver the performance of a lifetime: perfect. The songs: absolutely perfect, no notes, I sing them with my kids on the car ride to school every morning and am not yet sick of them. The fact it was created by a Torontonian, was an unexpected summer Netflix smash and has the first movie soundtrack ever to have four songs simultaneously in the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100: you are doing too much. Stop it. The perfection is so perfect, it’s sickening. – Claire

Music

Debí Tirar Más Fotos (I should’ve taken more photos)
Bad Bunny, Rimas Entertainment

This album is a cultural milestone, which, with every track, reinforces that language and heritage are not barriers but strengths. With one of the broadest and most diverse fan bases in the world, the Puerto Rican rapper and “King of Latin trap” shows that music rooted in cultural identity can resonate globally without losing where it comes from. And now that Bad Bunny (a.k.a. Benito Ocasio) is the headliner for the 2026 Super Bowl halftime show, Debí Tirar Más Fotos has become a statement on how much is possible when we celebrate difference instead of ignoring it. – Armita 

No More Skulls
Gregory Pepper, Self-released

This year I found myself reaching for comfortable, nostalgic tunes, so I was grateful when Guelph, Ont.-based Gregory Pepper put out a new release. No More Skulls is like a curio cabinet full of short and catchy pop tunes that cheerfully delve into the weird, macabre and bittersweet. At 16-minutes long, the album is just a sample of Pepper’s signature style, which I got hooked on after his 2009 release With Trumpets Flaring. The tunes “No More Skulls” and “Lean On” captured that wistful feeling I was looking for this year, but the upbeat “God Made You Weak” is one that I can’t get out of my head. – Laura 

Songs from the Gang: A Celebration of Joel Plaskett
Various Artists, Turtlemusik

My favourite new Joel Plaskett album is one he did not even know about until after it was released. This tribute album was a secret gift to celebrate the 50th birthday of the beloved singer-songwriter from Dartmouth, N.S. (Try not to cry watching Plaskett discover the surprise at a record shop in Victoria, B.C., especially when his own tears start falling.) Each of the creative covers of his tunes is reimagined in the style of the artist who took it on. “Lying On A Beach,” sung by Jenn Grant, for example, would be right at home on one of her own records. As a bonus, Plaskett counts everyone on the star-studded roster of 22 Canadian musicians as friends and colleagues. There’s a reason why I love this country. – Joanna

Wood
Taylor Swift, Republic Records

“She wrote a song about Travis’s WHAT?!” was the reaction heard around the world upon release of Taylor Swift’s blockbuster album The Life of a Showgirl, featuring the track “Wood” detailing her… appreciation… for her fiancé, football star Travis Kelce. It takes three or four additional listens to really grasp the song’s cleverness. The lyrics are all double entendres, with a theme of superstition granting plausible deniability to the track’s R-rated side for the benefit of children, grandmothers and the prudish of all ages and genders. It’s also a bop, with a bouncy Jackson 5-inspired accompaniment. I would never have guessed I would be expressing my appreciation for a song about Kelce’s redwood tree (“it ain’t hard to see”), but I suppose “his love was the key” that opened my mind. – Claire

Lux
Rosalía, Columbia Records 

In Lux, Spanish artist Rosalía breaks out of the traditional pop box, producing an album in 13 different languages and drawing inspiration from cultures including Arabic, Ukrainian, Hebrew, Chinese—something I particularly appreciate as a multilingual person. Rosalía may have formally studied flamenco in university, but that’s never stopped her from fearlessly diving into other genres and making them her own. In this album, she blends symphonic classics and operatic vocals while exploring themes of female mysticism, faith and romantic relationships. Feelings this complex transcend any language and culture—and Rosalía truly understood the assignment. (Personal favourites are: “La Yugular” and “La Perla.”) – Chaimae

OurVinyl Sessions – EP
John Moreland, OurVinyl

You may have heard about John Moreland because of his recent Instagram feud with country singer Zach Bryan. Please ignore it and just listen to the man—a huge, bald, tattooed southerner whose voice is the sound of hurt itself. In this EP, only Moreland and his guitar are left to sketch out four songs from his remarkable career. The results are sparse, almost whimsical meditations on knowing better but acting otherwise. “I should be dealing with my demons / But I’m dodgin’ them instead,” he sings on “Break My Heart Sweetly,” which is a gorgeous way of saying the worst pain is almost always self-inflicted. – Martin

Podcasts

WorkLife by Adam Grant
Adam Grant, TED

Organizational psychologist Adam Grant explores how to make work fun and meaningful by interviewing experts and professionals and applying social science to also tackle topics like burnout, procrastination, toxic workplaces and more. He uses engaging storytelling and interesting guest speakers that help make these somewhat mundane topics so much more interesting. – Asritha

Newsroom Robots
Nikita Roy, Newsroom Robots Lab 

There are enough reasons to worry about the impact that artificial intelligence is having on the media industry. This podcast, launched in 2023, dives into how it can shape and even strengthen the craft of journalism itself—and it’s not all bad news. Nikita Roy, who founded training and advisory firm Newsroom Robots Lab, interviews media and tech leaders to learn about the practical ways they are using AI in their newsrooms and beyond. Episodes this year feature interviews with Cheryl Phillips of Big Local News at Stanford University, which helps local journalists investigate public records with AI-powered tools, and Vilas Dhar, president of the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, on why he believes humans will still be the ones driving the future of journalism. – Joanna

Allison After NXIVM
Natalie Robehmed, Vanessa Grigoriadis, CBC Podcasts

Smallville actor Allison Mack went to jail for her role in the NXIVM wellness cult, in which leader Keith Raniere used his perch to scam and sexually abuse hundreds of victims, a story documented in 2018’s Escaping NXIVM podcast. I went into Allison After NXIVM thinking the seven-part podcast was going to be a whitewashed bit of Mack’s redemption arc. Spoiler: it isn’t. While producers Robehmed and Grigoriadis let her explain, they certainly don’t excuse—and neither does Mack herself. In taking responsibility for the abuse she visited upon fellow NXIVM members, Mack shows the cult’s all-encompassing effect, and how it gave a plainly mediocre man near-god-like levels of power. – Martin