This year was jam-packed with firsts and must-watch experiences in streaming and on the silver screen. Yet, we creatures of comfort are wont to return to the devils we know: media artifacts that we can’t help but experience again to feel something. In the spirit of sharing and putting folks on to media we cherish enough to revisit, here are io9’s favorite replays, rewatches, and rereads of the year.
A Goofy Movie
I didn’t grow up on A Goofy Movie. I’d seen it a few times and thought it was cute. But, in recent years, it’s seen a bit of a resurgence so this year I took the chance to watch it again on the big screen. And man, is this a fun movie. Most people think of the music and dance sequences but there’s so much more here about a father and son, lies, betrayal, giant Bigfoot monsters, possum hats, and more. It’s a weird, wonderful film that deserves all the praise that has been heaped upon it of late. Plus, there’s a great Disney+ documentary about it and a wildly awesome episode of Atlanta too. – Germain Lussier
Bluey
Okay, so admittedly, this is because I now have a kid, but hey, I started as one of those childless millennials obsessed with the show. Seeing the Heeler family adventures over and over and over again to the point where my daughter’s third word after mama and dada was “Bwooey!” just hits different. Being a working parent is hard, but seeing the Heeler parents embrace the imperfect moments and make the most of their time with their kids through play is super inspiring. Also, they’re great role models new parents can aspire to be like, but even if we can’t be just like them, the show reminds us we’re doing great. – Sabina Graves
Borderlands
© Gearbox Software
There’s some franchises you just can’t walk away from, and for me, one of those is Borderlands. Before 2K put out a fourth main game this past September, I jumped back into Borderlands 3 and Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands for some good ol’ shoot-and-loot fun. Then, when Borderlands 4 finally came out, I did the exact same thing, but with new Vault Hunters, a new world, and new guns to blast enemies with, and I can’t wait for DLC to drop so I can do it all again. – Justin Carter
Critical Role
Even if the Mighty Nein animated series hadn’t recently dropped, I’d been meaning to re-listen to the Critical Role campaign of the same name for the first time since it ended back in 2021. The arrival of a new campaign in a new world with a larger cast is its own bit of fun, and I’ve had a good time listening—and in Nein’s case, watching—through them both. – Justin Carter
Final Fantasy IX
Final Fantasy IX is my favorite Final Fantasy game of all time, so between its 25th anniversary this year and my favorite little Black Mage Vivi managing to tear up Magic: The Gathering‘s meta for a few months, I knew I was due for a replay, no matter how far I ended up making it into the game (I don’t exactly have time for 100+ hour JRPGs on the regular like I did as a kid). It was a joy to envelop myself in its charming fantasy world again, to re-experience the arcs of characters like Freya, Zidane, and Dagger, and just sink into the whimsy of it all again. We might still be waiting for that long-rumored remake, but I’m more than happy to keep jumping over to Gaia now and then, just as it was on the original PlayStation. – James Whitbrook
Halo
Xbox’s shooter franchise will always have its hooks in me, even in its worst moments. I spent half the year playing through Halo Infinite off and on throughout 2025, jumping and blasting my way through Team Slayer, objective, and Firefight watches like it was the Xbox 360 days again. After my Game Pass sub ended, I got bit with the Red vs. Blue bug and rewatched portions of a key contributor to Halo’s continued existence. It’s been a short, but worthwhile return to formative parts of my childhood, and a trip down memory lane mostly worth taking. – Justin Carter
Hunter x Hunter
© Studio Madhouse/Crunchyroll
I’ve hit the point in my life where, with rare exceptions, I’m not likely to venture into new-age big tentpole shonen anime. I’m one of those who served their time watching the big three (One Piece, Naruto, and Bleach) when they came out and don’t have the time to add another sprawling, seasons-long epic into my rotation when I can otherwise check out newer, digetable (non-shonen) series. That being said, I’ve always got time to spin the block on an absolute classic like Hunter x Hunter when I can vicariously experience it for the first time through my friends (which is most certainly what I did this year). Rewatch Yorknew City and the Chimera Ant arc in the big 2025? Don’t mind if I do. – Isaiah Colbert
Kill La Kill
Second verse, same as the first: another anime series I’ve no problem adding to my queue year in and year out is Studio Trigger’s Kill La Kill. In a lot of ways, Trigger is arguably my favorite anime studio if I really sat and thought about it. A lot of that has to do with Kill La Kill reviving my love for anime, watching it in high school after the medium had become a passion of the past. Like Gainax’s Gurren Lagann was a celebration of the mecha genre, Kill La Kill is that and then some for the magical girl genre. It’s brash, goofy, bombastic, rebellious, and filled with a surprising amount of heart underneath all of its scantily clad visual gags. Plus, its soundtrack still bangs all these years later. – Isaiah Colbert
The Last Starfighter
I’ve written about this 1984 cult classic a lot but, in that time, it was mostly based on watching it at home. In 2025, I was fortunate enough to see The Last Starfighter on the big screen for the first time in probably 40 years. And what was already one of my favorite movies ever didn’t just solidify that spot, it showed how imagination and ingenuity in Hollywood are long forgotten. This story was so ahead of its time, so brilliant, so fun and exciting, that it just gave me hope for everything movies can and should be. – German Lussier
Neuromancer
The hype around Apple TV’s upcoming Neuromancer adaptation reminded me I hadn’t picked up the book in years and barely remembered anything that happens in it. First released in 1984, the edition I reread was the 2000 release featuring a foreword by author William Gibson that wryly comments on the book’s legacy. His pioneering work of what we now know as “cyberpunk” still feels audacious and original. The high-tech heist and surrounding mystery that propels Neuromancer’s storyline is undeniably thrilling, but the real delight comes in its worldbuilding, which crafts a grimy, unsettling version of the future that feels ever more eerily within reach. – Cheryl Eddy
Stand By Me
© Columbia Pictures
The year 2025 had a bunch of great, new Stephen King adaptations (The Long Walk, The Life of Chuck, etc.) but this year I also found myself revisiting arguably the best one ever. This 1986 Rob Reiner masterpiece is a film we’ve all seen and probably all love. But watch it again. It’s shocking just how beautiful and emotional the film is, and what Reiner and his cast were able to get away with all those decades ago. It’s a raw, vulgar film, that uses those things to build an authenticity that still rings true. – Germain Lussier
Star Trek: Voyager
Rewatching a Star Trek show is one of my favorite past times, and with Voyager celebrating its 30th this year, going back to its early seasons for both work and pleasure earlier this year was a delight. Perhaps more than any other Trek show, Voyager has the struggles of trying so hard to communicate the potential of its captivating premise in those first few seasons—when it hits, it hits, delivering some top-tier Trek, but more often than not, Voyager‘s a show where there’s charms in its mishaps or this sense of never managing to quite live up to the strength of its ideas. That’s kind of why I love it so much though: much better a show that tries, than one that doesn’t try at all. – James Whitbrook
Stranger Things 3
The Battle of Starcourt really solidified Stranger Things as this generation’s show. The kids were coming of age, the action was thrilling, and the supernatural stakes were so high in the summer that Netflix dominated. I remember the Fourth of July it dropped, going to Baskin-Robbins for the U.S.S. Butterscotch (still better than the official branded one that came out later) and heading home to binge. The year 2019 was a time, and what a turn we took that mirrored our world heading into an Upside Down of its own. I think that’s why re-watching it before season five really hit, as that season mirrored the high hopes we once had and how we are going into a time where, like Hawkins heroes, we might have to band together more tightly to overcome what’s next. – Sabina Graves
Thirst
© Focus Features
With my love for vampire media and my goat Park Chan-wook coming back with No Other Choice this Christmas, I felt the annual pull to go back down memory lane to an oddity in his filmography: Thirst. Unlike his hallowed Vengeance Trilogy, Thirst is a rare swing into the supernatural, in which a priest (played by Song Kang-ho) is turned into a vampire and strikes up a romance with the wife of his best friend (played by Kim Ok-bin, of The Villainess fame, which you should also watch). I adore the film. It’s deliciously catty, carnally horny, and poignantly meditative on the thrills and pitfalls of feeding one’s cravings. – Isaiah Colbert
Thriller
My household picked up a box set of Thriller this year, a show I’d never heard of prior that aired in the UK from 1973 to 1976. Not every entry is supernatural—devil worshippers do pop up on occasion—but many are, and as the title implies, every episode puts its main character (either hapless or deserving, depending on the setup) in grave danger. Serial killers, evil twins, stalkers, certified weirdos… you meet all manner of fun folks in Thriller, which has very “movie of the week” production values—including jarring breaks that let you know when you’ve reached the end of act one and two—but also surfaces all manner of recognizable stars. That includes a young Helen Mirren, who pops up as a woman with an elaborate scheme to unmask a dastardly murderer, and Denholm Elliot as a man who turns the tables on a pair of escaped convicts who pick the exact wrong house to break into. – Cheryl Eddy
Turn A Gundam
The release of GQuuuuuuX this year has had me more up to my eyeballs in Gundam than I usually am as a mecha addict, but while that did get me to go back for a lightning-quick rewatch of the 1979 classic between the GQuuuuuuX movie compilation and the show’s release, for the rest of the year my heart belonged to Turn A. While I adore Universal Century Gundam, for all its fascinating commentaries and political machinations, my heart will forever belong to Turn A, for its gorgeous Syd Mead designs contrasted against the turn-of-the-20th-century aesthetic setting, for its compelling protagonist in Loran, one of the franchise’s most staunch pacifists, just for what it is trying to say about Gundam as a series as much as it’s saying about Gundams as weapons of war. It was a fun contrast to have GQuuuuuuX‘s fannish remix of the UC timeline sit alongside with rewatching a Gundam show that pushes the franchise in a way so few other entries in the series ever have. – James Whitbrook
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