Striking colors saturated pop culture in 2024.
Lime green splashed across the cover of Charli XCX’s “Brat” and Vice President Kamala Harris’ marketing campaigns. Red, white and blue adorned Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter” and the uniforms of Team USA during the Summer 2024 Olympics. Glittery pinks sparkled on the wardrobes of pop star Chappell Roan and Glinda the Good in the blockbuster adaptation of the musical “Wicked.”
We didn’t predict this cultural kaleidoscope in last year’s pop culture preview, but that won’t stop us from taking our dusty crystal ball out for another spin this year. From a killer robot doll dressed in business casual to a historic look at a presidential assassination plot, here are the movies, TV series and music we recommend checking out in 2025.
“M3GAN 2.0”: June 27
Helen of Troy may have had the face that launched 1,000 ships, but M3GAN was the murderous, artificially intelligent robot doll that launched 1,000 memes in 2023. With the style of a business casual American Girl Doll and an eerie and somewhat ironic dance routine, the titular star of the 2023 horror film “M3GAN” took the internet by storm and drew about $181 million at the box office.
Beyond the memes, “M3GAN” was a surprising highlight of 2023 with its self-aware tone and deft blend of humor, horror and social commentary on artificial intelligence. The same is bound to be true for 2025, as M3GAN is set to make her return to the silver screen this summer in the sequel “M3GAN 2.0.” Little is known about the plot of the sequel, but the modern horrors of AI are sure to spiral further out of control as M3GAN took control of a smart home device at the end of the 2023 film.
“The White Lotus” Season 3: Feb. 16
Mike White — the creator of the HBO dramedy series “The White Lotus,” which follows the guests and employees of a fictionalized luxury resort chain — has an unparalleled knack for casting. Since the series’ debut in 2021, beloved supporting actors have found their star turns as the privileged and dysfunctional jet-setters who stay at the resorts, like Jennifer Coolidge, who won two Emmys for her role as Tanya McQuoid.
The third season of “The White Lotus,” which is set to premier in February, will deliver a cast just as stacked as the ones that led seasons one and two, with a return from series veteran Natasha Rothwell. From the 1990s’ “Queen of the Indies” Parker Posey to “Sex Education” standout Aimee Lou Wood, the actors leading season three are poised to pack the series’ signature dark humor for their journey to Thailand’s White Lotus resort.
Japanese Breakfast’s New Album: March 21
Indie rock band Japanese Breakfast’s 2021 album “Jubilee” was a love letter to joy wrapped up in distinct cover art that featured frontwoman Michelle Zauner surrounded by persimmons. But for their next venture, Japanese Breakfast appears to be pivoting to a darker tone. Their upcoming fourth album is titled “For Melancholy Brunettes (& Sad Women)” and features cover art of Zauner sitting distraught at a table laden with food, flowers and a skull that looks like it fell out of a Northern Renaissance painting.
Ahead of the album’s March 21 release date, the band put out the lead single “Orlando in Love” last week. A nod to the unfinished Renaissance-era poem by Matteo Maria Boiardo, the track is lush and dreamy with a symphony of string instruments. If this tune is any indication of what’s to come, Japanese Breakfast’s fourth album is sure to please music aficionados — even if you don’t identify as a melancholy brunette or a sad woman.
“Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning”: May 23
May 2025 is the end of an era for GW seniors: They’ll be graduating, entering into the workforce full time and starting “real adult” life. But all of that pales in comparison to the massive conclusion coming the weekend after Commencement: “Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning,” the conclusion to Tom Cruise’s 20-year run of madcap stunt spy adventures.
While there’s probably some story threads that’ll get tied up in the franchise’s eighth installment, the reason to get pumped for the film comes from the anticipation of what insane danger Cruise will put himself in this time. Maybe he’ll finally reveal the secrets of Scientology — it would seem to be the only act more dangerous than scaling the Burj Khalifa.
“Death by Lightning”: TBD 2025
In Stephen Sondheim’s “Assassins,” a musical about presidential assassins that’s just as delightfully odd as it sounds, the assassin of 20th President James A. Garfield, Charles Guiteau, sings a ballad where he resolves to “look on the bright side” as he’s sentenced to death because he’ll be remembered in history.
And lucky for Guiteau, director Mike Makowsky did remember him, as he brings one of the most under-the-radar perplexing presidential assassinations to Netflix in the upcoming series “Death by Lightning.”
The show follows the lead up to the assassination, prompted by a crazed Guiteau thinking that Garfield had screwed him over by not offering him a job in his administration — which eventually led to the creation of the civil service system as it exists today. “Death by Lightning” features a murder’s row of recognizable faces, if not superstar actors, playing mildly notable historical figures: “Succession’s” Matthew McFayden as Guiteau, Michael Shannon as Garfield, Nick Offerman as Chester A. Arthur, even Shea Whigham as Rep. Roscoe Conkling. If nothing else, all the historically minded dads will be watching.