Lifestyle
Amber Glenn Is Carving a New Path for Figure Skaters
When Amber Glenn was named the top U.S. women’s figure skater for a second consecutive year in January, she collapsed in tears, releasing mountains of pressure that had been weighing on her chiseled shoulders.
This week, she is aiming to add another gold medal to her pile at the World Figure Skating Championships in Boston. If she pulls it off, Ms. Glenn would finish her season an undefeated champion and become the first American figure skater to claim the women’s World Championship title in almost 20 years.
It would be Ms. Glenn’s biggest win yet, but only the latest in a series of firsts for a woman who has landed the triple axel jump in all of her competitions this season — one that, for Ms. Glenn, has been filled with triumph and tragedy after a plane crash in January killed 11 figure skaters, some of whom she had shared the ice with just days before they died.
If Ms. Glenn wins or even medals at Worlds, she will be the first openly L.G.B.T.Q. woman to do so in a sport whose female athletes largely tend to mold their likenesses to that of a cookie-cutter ice queen.
Ms. Glenn, by contrast, has grown her profile by celebrating what makes her different.
She is a pansexual figure skater who jumps with the power of a pole-vaulter, models her hairstyles off those of brassy pop stars, collects lightsabers — and is primed to be America’s next big skating star at 25, an age when most of her peers have long retired.
A Story of Perseverance
On a Saturday evening in February, Ms. Glenn darted around the corners of the ice rink at Chelsea Piers in Manhattan at double-digit speeds as her short-program music — “This Time” by Janet Jackson — blared from loudspeakers. She was in New York to fine-tune some of her choreography before the World Championships this month.
Ms. Glenn’s girlish freckles were offset by graphic winged eyeliner and blond hair that trailed behind her like a parachute as she skated.
Earlier that day, Ms. Glenn said in an interview that the last eight months had “been a lot.” She began training for the current season last spring and won her first gold medal last September at the Lombardia Trophy competition in Bergamo, Italy.
She has not stopped winning since. Over the course of several weeks last November and December, Ms. Glenn traversed the globe numerous times, earning first place in three major competitions that included the Grand Prix Final in Grenoble, France, where on Dec. 7 she became the first American woman to be crowned champion in 14 years.
Two weeks later, she clinched gold at Nationals in Wichita, Kan., by a slim margin.
But Ms. Glenn’s career, which began more than two decades ago at an ice rink inside a shopping mall, has not been a linear ride to the top.
At 14, she became the U.S. junior women’s champion. About a year later, Ms. Glenn was hospitalized for depression and anxiety, which stopped her from skating for five months. At the time, she was also restricting her eating — consuming one or two Lean Cuisine meals a day. In more recent years, she has suffered multiple severe concussions and has been haunted by mistakes, like missed jumps, that she has attributed to anxiety. It has not helped that many of her injuries and stumbles have played out on live television.
Terry Gannon, an NBC sports commentator who has called nationally televised figure-skating events since the 1990s, attributed Ms. Glenn’s successes this season to perseverance.
“I feel like I have lived this journey with her and watched her through the years knowing she had the ability but coming up short,” said Mr. Gannon, who described Ms. Glenn’s story as emotionally satisfying to viewers. “Now we see her break through at the highest level,” he added.
Her winning season harks back to the time when American skaters like Dorothy Hamill and Michelle Kwan dominated the sport. As a rising star of women’s singles, figure skating’s marquee event, Ms. Glenn has created some fresh buzz in the run-up to next year’s Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics. “It’s hugely important to the success of American skating to have a star who has a chance to win” at the Olympics, Mr. Gannon said.
Sasha Cohen was the last American to do so, earning a silver medal at the Turin Winter Olympics in 2006. If Ms. Glenn’s winning streak carries into next year, when Team USA skaters are determined, the country may have its next best chance at an Olympic medal.
Mastering the Triple Axel
On the ice, Ms. Glenn has become known for certain hallmarks: Landing jumps with her arms stretched vertically in a dramatic V-shape, wearing the dark lipstick of a prima ballerina, performing with a mane of multiple ponytails that she says is inspired by the pop star Kesha.
While she skates with an easy elegance, her approach to the sport has often been described using words like “explosive” and “aggressive.” “That is usually a trademark of men’s skating, they are allowed to be aggressive and muscled,” said Kaitlyn Weaver, 35, a champion ice dancer and two-time Olympian who is now a choreographer for Ms. Glenn.
Ms. Glenn said she had leaned into athleticism rather than “conforming to look smaller.” This approach is embodied by her embrace of the triple axel, a feat in which skaters hurl themselves face-forward into the air and rotate 1,260 degrees before landing backward on a single foot. Ms. Glenn has been the only women’s skater of her level to land a ratified triple axel this season in international competition, according to the International Skating Union.
Ms. Glenn’s free skate program at last year’s World Championships began with a perfect triple axel — and ended in multiple spills onto the ice. She ultimately finished in 10th place, a result that she attributed to her anxiety flaring up during her program. “My brain didn’t know the difference between competing and having to fight a bear,” as she put it.
Last summer, Ms. Glenn began integrating neurotherapy into her two-hour practices as a way to mitigate her performance anxiety. She wires herself to a device that tracks her heart rate and brain waves, which helps visualize when her anxiety spikes.
Caroline Silby, a sport psychology consultant who works with skaters worldwide, suggested neurotherapy to Ms. Glenn. “Throughout her career, she’s always had moments of brilliance, it wasn’t like she wasn’t doing it.” Ms. Silby said. “She just wasn’t doing it consistently.”
She added, “When the whole world talks about how you can’t do the second half of your program, it’s about ‘OK, how can we get the brain to stay quiet?’”
Embracing Her Identity
Ms. Glenn’s mother, Cathlene Glenn, said there had always been hints that her daughter was different from other girls her age when she was growing up in Plano, Texas. Among them: Ms. Glenn, who began skating as a 5-year-old at the rink inside the nearby Stonebriar Centre mall, gravitated toward dinosaur toys over dolls, her mother said.
She added that, by the time Ms. Glenn had turned 8, coaches were remarking that she had exceptional talent. By 11, she had mastered every triple jump except the axel.
But in a sport in which an intermediate pair of skates can cost $800, the money required to keep Ms. Glenn skating at a high level became a source of friction for her parents. To save on lessons and rink fees, her mother worked as a nanny for a former coach of Ms. Glenn’s and at the front desk of the mall ice rink. Her father, Richard Glenn, a law enforcement officer, worked overtime and took outside jobs doing security at movie theaters and hospitals.
Ms. Glenn, for her part, said she did not tell her parents when she was outgrowing her skates. “I still have the bunions and scars to prove it,” she said.
These days, she wears pairs that can cost around $1,500 — and she gets them for free from Jackson Ultima, which uses her image in promotional campaigns.
At Chelsea Piers, her skates’ blades were pushed to the limit as she ripped into the ice with expansive lunges and razor-sharp turns. She typically practices at the Broadmoor World Arena, a U.S. Olympic training site in Colorado Springs, Colo., not far from her home in the city. Above the rink, a flag with Ms. Glenn’s name flies alongside others bearing the names of fellow American champions like Peggy Fleming.
Ms. Glenn’s reputation as a different kind of skater was bolstered in 2019, when she opened up about her pansexual identity in an article for Dallas Voice magazine. Months after it was published, she arrived at Nationals in 2020 to see dozens of fans in the stands holding the Pride flag in her honor.
Ms. Weaver, who at the time had not yet started working as a choreographer with Ms. Glenn, recalled watching the scene on TV and “weeping.” In 2021, Ms. Weaver became the first Olympic female skater to publicly come out as queer. “We work against a stereotype,” she said, likening openly queer female skaters to openly gay N.F.L. players.
Having learned to be more comfortable in her skin, Ms. Glenn now holds a pride flag when she skates a victory lap at competitions. Lately, she had been thinking about the ways she could help people like herself at a time in which Ms. Glenn said “identities are being erased.”
“Sometimes, I’m looking at the world where we are taking so many steps back,” she added. “I want to be part of the people who keep us moving forward.”
She was speaking on a video call in late February from her apartment in Colorado Springs, which Ms. Glenn shares with her dog, Uki, a schipperke who, like Ms. Glenn, has learned to spin on demand.
Tragedies Amid Triumphs
Around Ms. Glenn’s apartment are items that offer glimpses of her personality. There are lightsabers hung on a wall (she is a fan of “Star Wars”) and a cabinet filled with Magic the Gathering and Pokémon cards. Instead of real flowers, she decorates the space with Lego floral arrangements because of her travel schedule. “It’s nice to have ones that stick around,” she said.
She moved to “the Springs” in the summer of 2022, she said, to work with top coaches — and to take advantage of free physical therapy and personal training sessions offered by the area’s Olympic training site, which are subsidized by organizations including the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee. It’s also the first time Ms. Glenn has lived on her own.
Her main coach, Damon Allen, said Ms. Glenn’s newly independent lifestyle has helped shift her competitive course. Mr. Allen, 51, will accompany her to the World Championships. “The preparation is the same we have been doing all year,” he said. “We are keeping it simple.”
To earn the women’s singles gold medal, she will need to defeat Kaori Sakamoto, 24, the Japanese skater who has won it the last three years.
Skaters of Ms. Sakamoto’s and Ms. Glenn’s age have historically been rare sights atop the championship podiums in women’s figure skating, a sport in which the last three Olympic gold medalists were between the ages of 15 and 17 when they won. In the wake of a doping scandal involving a 15-year-old Russian skater that rocked the Beijing Winter Olympics in 2022, the minimum age for female skaters to compete in the games was raised to 17.
At Ms. Glenn’s training rink, she refers to herself as the “fun aunt,” Mr. Allen said. Her friend Gracie Gold, 29, a retired two-time national champion who has spoken about her own struggles as a skater, jokingly said that late bloomers in the sport like Ms. Glenn were “only weird to people in skating that need to go outside and touch grass.”
“I don’t think hockey or football would be as popular if the general public was watching 14-year-old boys do it,” Ms. Gold added.
She is one of many skaters whom Ms. Glenn has fostered friendships with. Through gestures like bringing flowers to fellow athletes at practices, Ms. Glenn has tried to bolster camaraderie in a sport known for a cutthroat culture, which has been embodied by instances like the Olympian Nancy Kerrigan being clubbed in the knee in a hit ordered by a man who was then married to a rival skater.
Ms. Glenn, who was home-schooled from the second grade through her senior year of high school, said she learned social cues largely by being around other young people at the mall where she started skating.
Her kind overtures to peers were motivated by Ms. Glenn’s experiences at competitions during her early days in the sport. “I remember feeling so scared,” she said. “I thought, I don’t want to feel like this. If one day I’m able to, I want to help everyone to be comfortable.’
When the recent plane crash killed a group of 28 athletes, parents and personnel affiliated with U.S. Figure Skating, “it broke my heart,” Ms. Glenn said — especially because of what she had told some of the young skaters while practicing with them about 72 hours before the crash.
“What hit me so hard is I told them to make friends that they would have for the rest of their life,” she said.
Earlier this month, Ms. Glenn participated in Legacy on Ice, a nationally televised event honoring the victims of the plane crash. Days before, her grandmother Barbara Glenn, a longtime rink-side presence at her competitions, died.
“She loves to skate with emotion,” Ms. Glenn’s mother said. “She wants to feel her feelings out on the ice. I think that skate was very therapeutic for her.” The death of Ms. Glenn’s childhood dog, Ginger, this month was another emotional blow.
In a phone interview on Saturday, Ms. Glenn said that the grief she had lately experienced had given her a new perspective going into the World Championships.
“I get upset about my mistakes,” she said. “But there are so many other things that are more serious.”
With the nation’s big 2-5-0 coming up next year, NPR staff and critics recommended a lot of U.S.-focused titles for Books We Love, our annual year-end reading guide. Below you’ll find 10 favorites — perfect for the history buff on your gift list, or anyone looking to learn more about how the U.S got to where it is today. Read on, or check out our full 2025 list here.
American Grammar: Race, Education, and the Building of a Nation, by Jarvis R. Givens
In this deeply researched book, Harvard University professor of education and African American studies Jarvis R. Givens locates 1819 as a “crossroads” in the history of education in the United States. That year, Congress passed the Civilization Fund Act, providing funding for assimilative boarding schools for Native American children, and the governor of Virginia signed an anti-literacy law that made it a crime to teach enslaved people to read and write in schools. Amid the Trump administration’s effort to dismantle the Department of Education, Givens’ clear-eyed assessment of American education offers an opportunity to reflect on the long-standing relationships among race, power and schooling in the U.S. — Kristen Martin, book critic and author of The Sun Won’t Come Out Tomorrow: The Dark History of American Orphanhood
The Fate of the Day: The War for America, Fort Ticonderoga to Charleston, 1777-1780, by Rick Atkinson
I’ve been eagerly waiting years for this book! This is the second volume of Rick Atkinson’s trilogy on the American Revolution. Atkinson makes good use of letters and diaries. You feel like you’re in the middle of a battle, with all the sights, sounds and tragedy. Harrowing tales of hand-to-hand fighting, scalping and desperate evacuations. Fine detail: the waxed mustaches of the Hessian forces, the number of rum barrels distributed to weary and ill-clad troops, the dull thud of cannonballs smacking into ships. The stench of makeshift hospitals, with piles of limbs stacked outside. He carefully lays out how the battles began, and the successes, mistakes and missed opportunities – on both sides. — Tom Bowman, Pentagon reporter
History Matters, by David McCullough, Dorie McCullough Lawson (contributor), and Michael Hill (contributor)
If history can be a comfort read, this is it. David McCullough’s daughter Dorie McCullough Lawson and his longtime researcher, Michael Hill, assembled this posthumous collection over two years. Some of the historian’s old manuscripts and files were kept in a New England barn, so the occasional acorn and nest turned up along with the historian’s glorious observations about Americans and their history. The essay subjects are diverse – painter Thomas Eakins, Harriet Beecher Stowe in Paris, “A Book on Every Bed” (it will melt your heart). One theme emerges that you might find reassuring in its own way: There was no “simpler time.” — Shannon Rhoades, supervising senior editor, Weekend Edition
Last Seen: The Enduring Search by Formerly Enslaved People to Find Their Lost Families, by Judith Giesberg
In 2017, historian Judith Giesberg and her team of graduate student researchers launched a website called the “Last Seen” project. It now contains over 5,000 ads placed in newspapers by formerly enslaved people hoping to find family members separated by slavery. The ads span the 1830s to the 1920s and serve as portals “into the lived experience of slavery.” In Last Seen, her book drawn from that monumental website, Giesberg closely reads 10 of those ads placed in search of lost children, mothers, wives, siblings and comrades who served in the United States Colored Troops during the Civil War. — Maureen Corrigan, book critic, Fresh Air
Medicine River: A Story of Survival and the Legacy of Indian Boarding Schools, by Mary Annette Pember
Mary Annette Pember, a citizen of the Red Cliff Band of Wisconsin Ojibwe and a national correspondent at ICT News, grew up in the 1950s and 1960s as her mother’s “secret confessor,” listening to fairy-tale-like stories of the horrors she endured at an assimilative boarding school. In Medicine River, Pember traces the repercussions of her mother’s maltreatment, situating her family’s story within the United States’ systemic use of education to eradicate Native cultures. Through an approach that is “part journalistic research, part spiritual pilgrimage,” Pember provides a cuttingly personal account of the history of federally funded Indian boarding schools and a moving look at how Indigenous traditions and rituals can light the path for healing. — Kristen Martin, book critic and author of The Sun Won’t Come Out Tomorrow: The Dark History of American Orphanhood
Mother Emanuel: Two Centuries of Race, Resistance, and Forgiveness in One Charleston Church, by Kevin Sack
There was great symbolism when a white supremacist targeted Charleston’s Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, killing nine Black worshippers as a means to ignite a race war. As we learn in this deeply researched history, the congregation has been involved in the struggle for racial justice ever since it was founded in an “act of bold subversion” by enslaved and free African Americans in the 1800s. I am struck by the stories of clergy and members who fought against seemingly insurmountable odds at nearly every turn of history, truly living out their faith and believing in a better America. — Debbie Elliott, correspondent, National Desk
There Is No Place for Us: Working and Homeless in America, by Brian Goldstone
In this paradigm-shifting, immersive book, journalist and anthropologist Brian Goldstone follows five families in Atlanta who, despite working full time, struggle to stay housed amid gentrification, a lack of tenants’ rights and low wages. These families, all Black, fall into a “shadow realm” – they are not considered officially homeless by the federal government, but lack a fixed living place as they double up with friends and family, sleep in their cars, or pay exorbitant rates at extended-stay hotels. Woven throughout their stories is a trenchant exploration of how America’s disinvestment in public housing and relentless pursuit of free-market growth have fueled housing insecurity for poor working families. — Kristen Martin, book critic and author of The Sun Won’t Come Out Tomorrow: The Dark History of American Orphanhood
The War of Art: A History of Artists’ Protest In America, by Lauren O’Neill-Butler
This book is about the creative – if often short-lived and not always successful – ways in which artists have fought for social change in the U.S. since the 1960s. Personal favorite: a chapter on how the scrappy video collective, Top Value Television (TVTV), changed the public’s view of political conventions. With artist-led protests once again becoming a thing – from the thousands of actors and filmmakers who recently pledged to boycott the Israeli movie industry in response to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, to the presence of a 12-foot statue depicting President Trump and the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein frolicking on the National Mall, this book about the past provides a powerful frame for thinking about artist-led actions today. — Chloe Veltman, correspondent, Culture Desk
We the People: A History of the U.S. Constitution, by Jill Lepore
As the U.S. approaches the 250th anniversary of its founding, it feels like an appropriate time to reflect on where we’re at as a country and how we got here. We the People, by Jill Lepore, a history and law professor at Harvard University, helps satisfy that impulse. It tells the story of the U.S. Constitution, which is among the world’s oldest constitutions. Lepore focuses on battles over amendments, which were fought not just by politicians but by ordinary Americans. The founders designed the Constitution to be amended, but it has become much more difficult to do so over the years. As the Constitution becomes harder to amend, Lepore writes, the risk of political violence becomes greater. — Milton Guevara, producer, Morning Edition and Up First
Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service, by Michael Lewis (editor)
Thousands of unsung heroes in the government are making life better for Americans. But because of bureaucracies being made up of bureaucrats, we rarely hear those stories. This book showcases them. Like a coal-mining safety official who helped the U.S. reach zero mine-collapse deaths. Or the man who has led the National Cemetery Administration to the top of the American Customer Satisfaction Index. As the federal government is in its biggest shake-up in a generation, it’s worth learning about where the bright spots are. — Darian Woods, host, The Indicator from Planet Money
This is just a fraction of the 380+ titles we included in Books We Love this year. Click here to check out this year’s titles, or browse nearly 4,000 books from the last 13 years.
Brown University
School Not To Blame For Shooting
… Masters Students Say
Published
A group of second-year master’s students at Brown University says the school should not be blamed for the on-campus shooting that killed two and injured several others.
The students, who live on and near campus and work on the east side of Providence, RI — near Brown — tell TMZ … they don’t agree with one narrative being spun that the Ivy League school is somehow to blame for the mass shooting.
AP
Instead, the students say gun control and lack of access to mental health services are the real issues here … and they say there’s nothing Brown can do to control those things.
What’s more, the students say there are overarching problems that need to be dealt with at the federal level … and they feel they weren’t the only school or group of students that’s feeling the brunt of gun violence and mass shootings.
Fox News
The students say there needs to be tough conversations about gun control policies … and they want to see investments made into making mental health facilities more accessible.
Law enforcement says former Brown student Claudio Manuel Neves Valente was the gunman … and the students we talked to say Brown shouldn’t be held at fault for a former student who harbored hate in his heart for those alongside him.
Fox News
The students say the response from university administration and officials is making them feel safe and heard … and they’re more proud than ever to be part of the Brown University community.
Aisha Harris’ pop culture superlatives include (clockwise from top left) Hedda, Marty Supreme, Serena Williams at the Super Bowl, Sabrina Carpenter’s lyrics, Love Island USA and Friendship.
Amazon, A24, Getty Images, Peacock/Photo illustration by Emily Bogle/NPR
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Amazon, A24, Getty Images, Peacock/Photo illustration by Emily Bogle/NPR
Well, 2025 has been a year. A year women on reality dating shows got fed up with “apolitical” men; a year a pair of filmmaking brothers both released solo projects about semi-famous athletes; a year a series finale ended in fecal waste. So much happened, and frankly, much of it feels like a blur.
For better or for worse, these cultural moments stood out.
Film’s nerdiest moment: “Aspect Ratios with Sinners Director Ryan Coogler”
YouTube
This Kodak video is a most perfect union of art and commerce, just like Sinners itself. In his distinctive, soothing Bay Area drawl, Coogler got super technical about the differences between each of his movie’s available formats, while breaking things down in easily digestible layperson’s terms. At a time when theater attendance continues to struggle, he made the best case for big screens, and he didn’t need existing IP to do it.
Best running joke at an awards show: “Thank you, Sal Saperstein!” The Studio
YouTube
In retrospect, host Nate Bargatze’s dreadful Boys & Girls Club donation bit at this year’s Emmys only made The Studio‘s parody of running gags on awards shows that much funnier. The bit starts when Adam Scott, playing himself, accepts a Golden Globe and impulsively thanks the guy who let him crash on the couch before his career took off: studio exec Sal Saperstein (Ike Barinholtz). Soon, every other winner – Quinta Brunson, Jean Smart, Aaron Sorkin, Zoë Kravitz – is thanking Sal, too. Most of them have no idea who Sal is. But even better is how each iteration of the corny, beaten-to-death joke eats away at Seth Rogen’s spotlight-seeking studio head Matt Remick.
Best Safdie brother feature: Marty Supreme
Josh Safdie (left) and Timothée Chalamet on the set of Marty Supreme.
A24
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A24
Benny Safdie’s The Smashing Machine is … fine: Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson, in a naked play for artistic credibility, barely has to stretch to play MMA champion Mark Kerr (the wig is doing much of the “transformation”). So in the matchup of solo Safdie bro sports movies, Josh’s Marty Supreme is the clear if imperfect victor. Timothée Chalamet’s wannabe table tennis champion is absolutely insufferable from beginning to end, but the movie bucks the typical narrative and turns out to be the frenetic tale of a cocky hustler who needs — and to a point, gets — a swift ego check.
Most awkward breakup: Huda and Chris, Love Island USA
Chris Seeley (left) and Huda Mustafa in Season 7 of Love Island USA.
Peacock
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Peacock
It was obvious to everyone with eyes that chaotic “mamacita” Huda Mustafa and blasé sleepyhead Chris Seeley were never going to happen; even they knew it. So the setting for their inevitable ending could not have been more magnificent or fitting: a romantic dinner in the middle of a candlelit pond, cordial vibes quickly descending into an exchange of various grievances. (“Why won’t you cuddle with me at night?” “Why won’t you let me get my sleep?”) Then, right in the middle of their breakup, with Huda on the verge of tears, an unnamed woman in an evening gown appeared out of nowhere, waved hello, and proceeded to serenade them with “Moon River.”
Most satisfying breakups: Sara and Ben; Virginia and Devin, Love Is Blind
Ben Mezzenga (left) and Sara Carton in Season 8 of Love Is Blind.
Netflix
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Netflix
The whole premise of Netflix’s bizzarro pod-based “social experiment” is inherently political, but Season 8 was the first in which political conflict played such an unambiguous part of the dating process that the producers presumably couldn’t downplay it through clever editing. Progressive-minded Sara Carton and Virginia Miller both spent much of their on-screen time trying to get their respective fiancés, Ben Mezzenga and Devin Buckley, to discuss issues including abortion, racial justice, and queer rights. Both men repeatedly deflected and refused to take a clear stance, any stance. It took the women far too long to heed all those “apolitical” red flags, but when they finally did and ended their relationships, it felt like a triumph.
Pettiest cameo: Serena Williams at the Super Bowl Halftime Show
Serena Williams performs onstage during the Super Bowl Halftime Show on February 9, 2025.
Emilee Chinn/Getty Images
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Emilee Chinn/Getty Images
In a most pathetic move, Drake filed a lawsuit in January against Universal Music Group, the label he shares with Kendrick Lamar, for “defamation” over “Not Like Us.” Of course, Lamar performed the song at the Super Bowl anyway — but to rub salt in the wound, he brought out fellow Angeleno (and Drake’s alleged former paramour) Serena Williams, who was briefly spotted crip walking with a cool vengeance. Surely, Drake wept. (And then wept again, when a judge dismissed his suit.)
Most ridiculous mathing: Materialists
Dakota Johnson (left) and Pedro Pascal in Materialists.
A24
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A24
Credit where it’s due: Unlike most movies, Celine Song’s romantic dramedy about a matchmaker torn between a wealthy suitor and her working-class ex isn’t interested in painting wealth and class abstractly – her script engages with actual numbers to contextualize it. (Pedro Pascal’s character’s penthouse is worth $12 million!) But one data point just doesn’t add up, and that’s Lucy’s (Dakota Johnson) matchmaker salary of $80K a year before taxes while living in a spacious one-bedroom in New York City, without parental help. How?
Best Lonely Island album: Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend
YouTube
If her 2024 album Short n’ Sweet was notably cheeky and teasing, like a burlesque performance by way of a pop star, Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend went for the broad humor of a Lonely Island-era SNL Digital Short. Nearly every track seems calibrated to be taken un-seriously, from the chintzy disco-flavored “Tears” to the yacht-rock-y “Never Getting Laid.” But the Loneliest track has to be “When Did You Get Hot?”:
Congratulations on your new improvements
I bet your light rod’s, like, bigger than Zeus’s
Hey, wait, can you lift my car with your hand?
You were an ugly kid, but you’re a sexy man
Most depressingly apt series finale: And Just Like That…
Cynthia Nixon in And Just Like That…
Craig Blankenhorn/HBO Max
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Craig Blankenhorn/HBO Max
With less than 10 minutes remaining in the conclusion of a beloved decades-long franchise, a bathroom toilet overflowed with excrement. This was caused by a very minor character who’d appeared in just five episodes total (played by Victor Garber, his talents wasted). Poor Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) spent her final full scene on her hands and knees, cleaning it up. Pretty much sums up most of the AJLT viewing experience.
Sickest musical number: Mr. Milchick and his marching band, Severance
Tramell Tillman in Severance.
Apple TV
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Apple TV
I could hardly tell you anything about the plot points in Season 2 of one of the most opaque shows currently on TV, but the pure pleasure derived from watching authoritarian manager Mr. Milchick celebrate Mark’s (Adam Scott) completion of the “Cold Harbor” file cannot be denied. It’s as if a more sinister Carlton Banks joined an HBCU marching band. Tramell Tillman earned that Emmy, and this moment is a huge reason why.
Best best friend: Nikki, Dying for Sex
Jenny Slate (left) and Michelle Williams in Dying for Sex.
Sarah Shatz/FX
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Sarah Shatz/FX
When Molly (Michelle Williams) is diagnosed with terminal cancer, she’s inspired to end her unsatisfying marriage and pursue sexual pleasure for the first time. But as much as Dying for Sex is about Molly’s journey, it’s also very honest about being a full-time caretaker, through the eyes of her best friend Nikki (Jenny Slate). Nikki’s commitment to Molly becomes a full-time job, to the point that she neglects her own career and emotional wellbeing, and the strains become evident. Slate’s performance is tremendously raw and empathetic, and the friends’ unshakable bond under the worst of circumstances is the heart of the series.
Best bromance: Dennis and Roman, Twinless
Dylan O’Brien (left) and James Sweeney in Twinless.
Roadside Attractions
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Roadside Attractions
The circumstances that allow for the budding friendship between prickly gay man Dennis (writer and director James Sweeney) and dim-yet-compassionate himbo Roman (Dylan O’Brien) are knotty and uncomfortable when eventually revealed in the movie Twinless. Yet watching this unlikely duo bond over similar traumas is a sweet and funny experience; in one of the year’s best scenes, Sweeney deploys a split screen during a house party, underlining their differing personalities while drawing them even closer together. It’s complicated but they’re connected, for better or worse.
Most diabolical bromance: Craig and Austin, Friendship
Tim Robinson (left) and Paul Rudd in Friendship.
A24
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A24
Alas, the bromance between meteorologist Austin (Paul Rudd) and marketing exec Craig (Tim Robinson) in Friendship is extremely short-lived, but the fallout is catastrophic. Cringey. Awful. Dying-from-secondhand-embarrassment. Because men like Craig — men lacking any shred of social EQ or self-awareness but still desperate to forge strong friendships, like any human — can’t handle rejection. Writer-director Andrew DeYoung has crafted one of the weirdest and most apt depictions yet of the current “male loneliness epidemic.”
Most vindictive ex: Hedda, Hedda
Tessa Thompson in Hedda.
Prime
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Prime
Given all Hedda (Tessa Thompson) is up against as a mixed-race woman born to a white father out of wedlock in mid-century England, her naked ambition to maintain a high social status can be understood. But the lengths she unabashedly goes to are ice-cold, nasty, and truly unforgivable. In one lavish evening, she tries to destroy several people’s lives, but perhaps her most humiliating deed is allowing former lover and now-rival Eileen (Nina Hoss) to enter a room full of peers — all men — while Eileen is experiencing an, *ahem* wardrobe malfunction. Thompson’s commitment to Hedda’s delicious depravity is everything.
Sweetest prayer: Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery
Josh O’Connor (left) and Daniel Craig in Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery.
Netflix
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Netflix
If you’ve seen it, you know: This is the scene. After the murder of controversial firebrand Msgr. Wicks (Josh Brolin), his noted rival Rev. Jud (Josh O’Connor) is a prime suspect and looking to clear his name. While chasing a lead, Jud ends up on the phone with a chatty construction company employee (Bridget Everett), and what begins as a mildly annoying interaction becomes a tender expression of compassion when she asks him to pray for her and a sick relative. Time to solve the murder is ticking by, but Jud is called to his duty, and he beautifully serves.
Most haunting ending: It Was Just an Accident
YouTube
The past is never dead, as the saying goes, a sentiment felt acutely throughout Jafar Panahi’s timely film about Vahid (Vahid Mobasseri), a former political captive who kidnaps someone he believes was one of his tormentors. The temptation for vengeance abounds, but Vahid and others wonder, to what end? Can past trauma be overcome or just merely subdued? The final quiet moment, after much has happened and been said, is the image of the back of Vahid’s head as he pauses in his tracks, having sensed the eerie presence of an all-too familiar sound. With the news that Panahi, a vocal critic of the Iranian government, has been given a year-long prison sentence and a two-year travel ban based on charges of propaganda, the ending echoes even louder.
And still more
A few honorable mentions for my 2025 pop culture yearbook:
Most charming misanthrope: Carol Sturka (Rhea Seehorn), Pluribus
Best inevitable death: Erik (Richard Harmon) and Bobby (Owen Patrick Joyner) via an MRI machine, Final Destination: Bloodlines
Breakout performers: Tonatiuh, Kiss of the Spider Woman; Miles Caton, Sinners
Best movie about an artist dad trying to reconnect with his estranged children: Sentimental Value
Worst bad show: All’s Fair
Doing the most with the least: Teyana Taylor, One Battle After Another
Best (and ok, only) “truthstorian”: Lee Raybon (Ethan Hawke), The Lowdown
Greatest show-within-a-show: “Teenjus,” The Righteous Gemstones
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