Thoughts on the Week's News: Michigan Senate, Trump Nominations, & Emilia Perez

It's been a long week, and so I'm treating myself to a little article today, talking about three major moments in the news that have been dominating my mind.  Let's talk through it, shall we?

Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI)

1. Gary Peters Retires from the Senate

The biggest electoral news of the week came in one of the country's most important swing states.  After two terms in office, Sen. Gary Peters is retiring next year and foregoing a third.  While it shouldn't be news that a 66-year-old man is retiring, in the Senate this barely counts as middle age (Peters is the 47th oldest member of the Senate to give you some perspective).

The goal today is going to be for me to give opinions, not necessarily a full lesson on each of these, so I'm going to state a few opinions as facts right now to get it out of the way.  I think that Peters retiring is a good thing.  2026 is likely going to be a good year for the Democrats, and we do, in fact, need to replace our aging senators with younger people so that, for example, if 2032 is a tougher cycle, we have incumbents who can win seats that we might've lost in open seat elections (Jacky Rosen & Tammy Baldwin probably saved us two seats in 2024 because they were established quantities and newcomers).  This is a good cycle for Peters to retire, and I hope other aging Democrats like Dick Durbin, Jeanne Shaheen, & Jack Reed follow his lead later this cycle.  I know some people like to take retirements as tea leaves of where the Senate is expected to land in 2026 (i.e. Peters doesn't think Dems will win a majority), but I'm more practical about these things, and getting senators a couple decades younger is a good investment for our party's future.

In terms of who should run to replace him, my first and last thought was initially Gretchen Whitmer.  Whitmer is a superstar, currently the person I most want to be our nominee in 2028, and I would love to see her in the Senate.  But she likely won't run because why run for the Senate when you clearly want to run for POTUS, and so we're left with a Plan B (she has already declined and I doubt she changes her mind).  Most Democrats focused on former Transportation Secretary (and 2020 presidential hopeful) Pete Buttigieg.  Buttigieg moved to Michigan a couple of years ago, and would be a moron not to run.  Buttigieg, like Whitmer, is certainly eying a 2028 presidential run as well, but he is also a decade younger than her, and has much less experience (his only electoral achievement is as a mayor of a small town...she's the wildly popular governor of one of the nation's most important swing states).  Buttigieg needs to prove that he can win a major office like the US Senate in order to be seen as a serious contender for the White House outside of DuPont Circle, and his aura won't last forever as an out-of-work politician.  He needs to make this move soon-he should run.

As a Democrat, though, my final thought is-I don't know if he is the right choice for our nominee.  Buttigieg has shown little appeal outside of a core Democratic constituency (namely, college-educated, affluent white voters, a coalition we don't have any trouble with), and while a campaign could show he does, I do think Democrats shouldn't coalesce around him without knowing if he can actually win a campaign.  State Sen. Mallory McMorrow, for example, has also shown herself to be an impressive future star in the Democratic Party that is in search of a higher office.  Her appeal feels broader than Buttigieg's to me, and ultimately the most important thing here is winning the seat (neither of these candidates' future presidential ambitions are worth more than that).  I personally think McMorrow might end up being the better candidate, but I hope both run (and honestly, I kind of hope no one else serious does because otherwise this just becomes the Buttigieg Show), so we can find out.

HHS Secretary Nominee Robert Kennedy, Jr.

2. Trump Confirmations Move Through

One thing you will absolutely not hear from me in the coming years is discussions about the policies of the Trump administration.  Quite frankly, I'm only checking in when I think I can make a difference.  The outrage cycles are going to exhaust us all...my focus is on 2026, 2028, and helping the people that I can through other actions (and holding my congressional delegation to task if they look like they're going off-track, which I doubt as they're all progressive Democrats).  But America made its bed, it deserves to suffer for a bit in my personal estimation.

But what I want to mention here is the electoral impact of the confirmations.  Matt Gaetz is obviously no longer in contention to lead the Justice Department, and Tulsi Gabbard's nomination weirdly seems the most in trouble so far (which honestly I did not predict given Gabbard is a relatively good public speaker and a former member of Congress...I figured that would give her some ability to grease the wheels on her own behalf).  But Pete Hegseth has now been confirmed, and it looks like Republicans will get Kash Patel and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. through at the rate.  The only Republicans who have indicated they might stray from these three (and we don't know if this will be uniform) are Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and Mitch McConnell, and thanks to Bob Casey's loss last year, they're not enough.

Which brings me to Thom Tillis.  With the exception of Susan Collins (who is her own unique unicorn of electoral calculation), Tillis is the only Republican senator from a swing state that is up in 2026.  He is also expected to face a very good candidate (former Gov. Roy Cooper) in the general election.  Yet his actions of being the deciding vote on Hegseth, and leading the charge on Patel (and so far indicating he is in favor of RFK Jr. leading HHS) are the actions of a man worrying about a primary more than a general election, and I'm going to be honest-that's a bad strategy.  Kennedy and Hegseth are not just unqualified & hold unpopular beliefs...they're also incompetent.  You can practically smell the future scandals about to erupt here, and while Trump might not pay a price for this, Tillis will.  These are the rare congressional votes that will matter, and I'll go so far as to say this-if Tillis backs Kennedy at the end of the day, I think he's the underdog next year to hold the seat.

Karla Sofia Gascon in Emilia Perez

3. Emilia Perez Oscar chances

We're shifting gears away from politics into the movies, and specifically the Oscar chances of one Emilia Perez.  I have not been shy on social media or Letterboxd about how I think this is a truly terrible film, but with 13 nominations, it was hard until about 72 hours ago to argue it had become the nominal frontrunner for Best Picture of 2024.  When you make Oscar predictions, you need to check your own taste at the door.  In fact, a few days ago, leading Oscar site NextBestPicture's pundits had Emilia Perez favored for five wins: Best Picture, Film Editing, Supporting Actress, International Feature, and Original Song.

But then the shit hit the fan.  An already polarizing film added to its count a director making xenophobic comments; Jacques Audiard talked about how Spanish was the "language of the poor and migrants."  This looks like small potatoes compared to what leaked about the nominated lead of the film Karla Sofia Gascon, who has years (though up to the shockingly recent present given how long Netflix has been pimping this movie) of racist, violent, and cruel social media tweets, attacking everyone from Muslims to the Chinese to Oscar-winning singer Adele.  Gascon has now become toxic (it's hard, in retrospect, to imagine why this didn't leak earlier given that Oscar favorites Nicole Kidman, Angelina Jolie, Kate Winslet, & Amy Adams were all in the running but got ignored by someone who is now virtually unemployable in Hollywood...AMPAS could've saved itself a lot of trouble by just thinking inside the box).  There was talk about having each of the nominees introduced by former winners, but I doubt any publicist is willing to go there for their clients (somewhere Conan O'Brien is nervously wondering why he didn't let Jimmy Kimmel go again).

Here's the reality though-the nominations are set.  The Oscars have rescinded nominations in the past, but that was over breaking of Academy rules, which neither Audiard or Gascon have done.  Anyone telling you that they might lose their nominations is not aware of Academy history (or of Oscar winners Roman Polanski, Harvey Weinstein, & Mel Gibson).  But what it could do is lose awards it was expected to win.  Best Picture & Editing, for example, it was only nominally leading at NBP, and I would imagine in the coming days the film will fall out of grace in both categories to films like The Brutalist and Conclave (some will quickly want to say that The Brutalist also has controversies, but honestly...the only controversy I see mattering this year is the one for Emilia Perez because it's very understandable, enough so that the public cares & Oscar doesn't want to be seen rooting for it).

The other three it is the decided frontrunner.  International Feature Film at least has an obvious second place (the surprise Best Picture nominee I'm Still Here), but Song and Supporting Actress it's harder to find a way to avoid an Emilia Perez win.  Best Original Song Emilia Perez has two nominations, so vote-splitting is theoretically possible, but none of the other nominees are obvious winners to compete with a Best Picture-nominated musical.  This would honestly be the perfect time to give the statue to Diane Warren, who has never won a competitive Academy Award, but will enough of the Academy get the memo?  In Supporting Actress you have Ariana Grande in second, but as a pop star they probably will make her pay some dues first (Lady Gaga and Cher also didn't win on their first acting nominations), and neither Felicity Jones nor Monica Barbaro have the sort of work that gets you a win.  Honestly, Isabella Rossellini would be intriguing (Best Picture frontrunner(?), well-liked film, longtime movie star who has never won, generally beloved as a celebrity, Old Hollywood glamour) if she could pull it off.  If she was in second place instead of Grande, I'd think Zoe Saldana was in more trouble...but I currently don't see a shut-out on the horizon for the combusting Emilia Perez

The State of the Senate

Senators Jon Tester (D-MT) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH)

We are finishing up my time back at the blog with one more time capsule article.  I will not be writing on the blog regularly, other than I think I might still do a single article when I finish a My Ballot or OVP which will be once a month, or if I feel I need to pipe in, so we'll go quiet again, though as has been indicated by the past week, I don't think I've finished with this completely (just that it'll never go back to being daily).  We're going to finish up this return with one last annual article.

It's become something of a tradition on the blog for me to posit a "way too early" State of the Senate here, guessing what the closest races for the next federal election will be two years ahead of time.  Or, one wonders if it's too early, to be honest, as we find below.  I've listed first what I initially predicted in January of 2023, and then what actually happened in November of 2024 in terms of the races "most likely to flip."  As you can see from the rankings, the four seats that actually flipped are listed #1-4 in the latter last.

Here's what I predicted:

1. West Virginia

2. Ohio

3. Montana

4. Arizona

5. Nevada

6. Wisconsin

7. Michigan

8. Pennsylvania

9. Texas

10. Virginia

And here's what actually happened:

1. West Virginia

2. Montana

3. Ohio

4. Pennsylvania

5. Michigan

6. Wisconsin

7. Nevada

8. Arizona

9. Nebraska

10. Texas

As you can see, I did staggeringly well here, getting 9/10 of the races correct.  The only race that I missed was Nebraska, which was a genuine shock.  Though Dan Osborn came closer than expected, Sen. Deb Fischer (R-NE) still won by an embarrassing margin.  Otherwise, this is exactly right.  My biggest mistake inside the rankings was Pennsylvania, where I thought Bob Casey would be stronger than he was (side note: I didn't write a post election article both because I'm not doing things like that on the blog anymore, and also because I was kind of numb afterward, though not in the same way that I was in 2016 because I had a lot more going on in my life at that point, but I will say that of all of the congressional races, Bob Casey losing felt like a sucker punch & will go down with Missouri 2018 and North Carolina 2014 as one of those Senate races I'll probably never get over).  Honestly, especially considering Virginia was #11 on this list, I feel really proud of myself over how well I did, though man did I wish I'd been a little wronger on some of these races (I do think that the Senate majority math is tricky to the point where I don't know how we get a majority before 2028, maybe even 2030, with the losses of Casey & Brown).

Looking ahead, history teaches us that Trump will probably be unpopular in his midterm (second term presidents usually have bloody second midterms...I doubt Trump will be an exception), so the below is predicated in at least some part on the races being left-leaning.  With the increasing lack of crossover voters, though, outside of the Big 7 swing states (all of whom went for Trump last year, and most of whom have Democratic senators already), I do think the Democrats will need 1-2 "Nebraska 2024" style races to be able to go into November 2026 with a straight face saying "we can take back the majority."  With that said, let's dive into this field.

Honorable Mention: Kamala Harris saw a significant decline in support in both New Jersey & New Mexico in 2024, and we don't know if that was unique to Harris (i.e. the Democrats will bounce back to Biden-level numbers) or if this is a canary in the coal mine of these states becoming more competitive as we move further into the 2020's.  I expect both Sens. Booker & Lujan to run for reelection, which should help them, but I would keep an eye on those races.  Same with Sen. Jack Reed, who will surely win if he runs again, but an open race in Rhode Island (where Harris lost 7-points off of Biden's margin) could portend a threat for the Top 10 if Reed retires, even if I don't think it's actually flippable.  If the Trump administration is wildly unpopular in 2026, states like Iowa & Kansas could be in contention, though I do wonder if there's any hope of Democrats attracting a quality recruit to take advantage of a bad environment in those states, since any good candidate will likely favor a run for governor.

Sen. Jon Husted (R-OH)

10. Ohio

The Ohio Senate race officially gots its incumbent this past-week as Gov. Mike DeWine (R) buckled under pressure from Donald Trump to replace JD Vance not with his favored choice (Trump allegedly wanted Vivek Ramaswamy), but instead DeWine loyalist Lt. Gov. Jon Husted got the nod.  This is a race where, like Iowa & Kansas, my expectation is that we'll have more heat in the governor's race (DeWine must step down, and already Ramaswamy is running there) than here in terms of quality Democratic candidate recruitment.  Already Sen. Sherrod Brown, Rep. Tim Ryan, & Supreme Court Justice Jennifer Brunner are being rumored for both contests, though it's an indictment of how bad things have been for the Ohio Democrats that all three of these candidates lost their last (very high profile) races.  If redistricting hurts Rep. Emilia Sykes, she could also be in the running (I would assume a much redder map for Ohio's congressional delegation in 2026 given the ballot initiative that would've outlawed gerrymandering there didn't pass last year), but unless Husted faces a primary challenge (a real possibility) I don't see a world where he actually loses...just that it could get close if things are bad for Trump.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH)

9. New Hampshire

This race will go higher on this list if we see a retirement from Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (which I anticipate we will given Shaheen will be 78 next week).  This was yet another state that Kamala Harris royally dropped the ball compared to Biden in 2020, winning it by less than 3-points, so it's another state we're trying to figure out if Harris hit the low point for Democrats, or if this is another state shifting right.  An open seat contest could attract some serious contenders on both sides, including Gov. Chris Sununu for the Republicans and Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas on the left.  Former Sen. Scott Brown (R) has also made waves about running, and it's hard to imagine Pappas would get the field totally to himself given there's room to run to his left here (if I were Maggie Goodlander, I'd seriously consider trying to jump ahead of him in line given his recent vote on Transgender Rights).  But the big question is around Shaheen-if she runs again, I would assume this stays off of Republicans' radars as they have bigger fish to fry.

Sen. Tina Smith (D-MN)

8. Minnesota

Though a decade younger than Shaheen, Sen. Tina Smith is also on retirement watch, and has not yet committed to running for a second full-term in 2026.  Smith would be a pretty safe option for reelection, especially in a Trump midterm, even though she is significantly more progressive than her state (with the loss of Sherrod Brown, Smith might be the most "left-of-her-state" senator in the Democratic caucus).  If Smith steps down, though, I think we'd have a free-for-all.  There's a real possibility that the DFL would go with a polarizing figure like Al Franken or Keith Ellison rather than someone safe like Angie Craig, and the Republicans have higher-quality candidates like Pete Stauber or (if he realizes he'll never be Speaker) Tom Emmer that could beat Franken or Ellison if the DFL is foolish enough to go that route (and as a Minnesotan, I could see us making that mistake).  But, like New Hampshire, this is all predicated on Smith retiring...which I'm 50/50 on if she will.

Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R-VA)

7. Virginia

Another spot where I'm waiting for a retirement, as Sen. Mark Warner (currently age 70) is not someone that I expected to become a Dianne Feinstein/Chuck Grassley style figure that never retires (he's spent too many times flirting about running for Governor again, and he's also insanely rich & has the mentality of someone who might want to try something else).  If he leaves, the Virginia GOP, which has had a decent past few years (Kamala Harris only won by 5-points after Biden won by 10-points, a pretty steep drop), has a great candidate in Gov. Glenn Youngkin, who is term-limited and will be out of office by next year (and with JD Vance now in the Naval Observatory), he's unlikely to ever get a shot at the White House, which was his dream.  Given how much he seems to love politics, I would assume he runs.  The Democrats are running their best candidate right now for governor in Abigail Spanberger, and while they have a bench (Reps. Eugene Vindman & Jennifer McClellan both come to mind), I'll be honest-it doesn't feel strong enough not to worry about Youngkin running here.  Hence why one of Kirsten Gillibrand's first jobs as DSCC Chair is to get Mark Warner to run again.

Rep. Mary Peltola (D-AK)

6. Alaska

We shift away from the groups of theoretical retirements to a race that is largely predicated on one person, and it isn't incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan, who is widely-expected to pursue a third term.  It's instead former Rep. Mary Peltola, who lost a very close race for reelection last year, and has hinted that she's not done yet with electoral politics.  Peltola may go for her old job, or she may go for Governor (it would certainly be the easier path given that Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy is term-limited and gubernatorial races are an easier lift if you're from the non-dominant party).  Peltola has already filed federal paperwork (i.e. she says, on paper, she's running for her old House seat), and that money can't transfer between a House and a Governor's race.  It can transfer to a Senate race, however.  And one wonders if Peltola, if she's going to go for broke, will actually go for a six-year term where she'd be afforded considerably more power (she'd quickly have the kind of position that Joe Manchin had when he was in office given how much more reliant Chuck Schumer was on her than the other way around).  But Sullivan is more popular than any Republican she's faced to date...will she want to risk it on what will be her only real shot at a comeback?

Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-TX)

5. Texas

Sen. John Cornyn is 72-years-old, and just lost his dream job (Senate Majority Leader).  Senators frequently come up with a Plan B, and he might just be content finishing his career as a backbencher, but it's not just retirement that Cornyn has to fear.  Rep. Ronny Jackson and Attorney General Ken Paxton, both polarizing in a general election but very popular with the MAGA base, are considering runs for this seat, and it's doubtful that Cornyn could rely upon President Trump against Jackson specifically, given his position as Trump's former chief medical advisor.  Democrats, especially after the work they put into Texas in 2024, are exhausted by the "Lucy-and-the-football" routine in the state, but if they care about a majority in 2026, and not just setting themselves up for a majority in 2028 or 2030, they have to actually win states that Trump won in 2020 like Texas & Alaska.  I won't postulate who might be a good candidate here (because after so many tries with such a variety of candidates, we still don't know the Democrat who can break Texas), but they have to try here, especially if it's against Paxton/Jackson, because that's a genuinely winnable race.

Rep. John James (R-MI)

4. Michigan

Sen. Gary Peters barely won reelection five years ago against (now-) Rep. John James, and the same can be said for Senator Elissa Slotkin last year.  Michigan races can be close and not always winning for Democrats (just ask Kamala Harris), and Peters will be in for a fight.  The big question is who the Republicans will put up against Peters.  Most of the high-profile Republicans in the state (Rep. James, Attorney General Mike Cox, Senate Minority Leader Aric Nesbitt, Ambassador Pete Hoekstra) are looking at the gubernatorial race), but my gut says that one of them would break and go after Peters even if the governor's race (after eight years of the now term-limited Gretchen Whitmer) is open.  Honestly...though he's something of a joke on Election Twitter, I have to say it-the best candidate is probably James going for a third time, and part of me wonders if he's the one to switch gears here given he already has federal experience.  Personally, I'd love to see Peters & Whitmer switch races, given Whitmer is (in my opinion) the single most effective politician the Democrats have right now and it'd be a waste to keep her out of office headed into 2028, but I doubt that happens.  Either way, this race will be one of the most-discussed of 2026...

Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA)

3. Georgia

...but not the most-discussed.  That will be the Georgia Senate race.  Sen. Jon Ossoff pulled off a massive upset in 2021 to win this seat, getting the Democrats the Senate majority.  Despite his celebrity as a poor candidate (who lost the then-most expensive House race of all-time that many thought would be the end of his career) he has been an impressive first-termer, and has done a good job acclimating to incumbency.  Ossoff is expected to face Gov. Brian Kemp, the outgoing governor whose general election bonafides are secure given Donald Trump hates him (but he's still somehow popular).  Early polling shows Kemp leading, but I'll be honest-that's kind of worthless right now.  Two years of Trump will make Kemp's fortunes even if the governor isn't closely-tied to the president, and Ossoff will be in a better position by then.  There's also the real possibility the Republicans blow the race by not backing Kemp in the primary.  The most vocal name in the race is Rep. Buddy Carter, who has already spoken out that he may run, but the biggest name is Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has not tamped down chatter that she is pursuing a promotion.  If Greene is the Republican nominee, Ossoff will win this race relatively easily, but against Kemp it'll be a race.  For all of the talk about Raphael Warnock for 2028, I'll be honest-I think people are sleeping on the potential of Ossoff being on the 2028 ticket at this point if he wins this race.

Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC)

2. North Carolina

If Kamala Harris had won the 2024 election, Georgia would've been the #1 race on this list.  I am assuming, though, that Donald Trump gets some blowback by 2026 (particularly given his economic policies are putting a recession very much on the table), and so I'm instead moving two Republican races onto the Top 2.  The Democrats have no shot at the majority without these two; their quest for a majority is slim even with them, but these are must wins.  That's why I assume that Kirsten Gillibrand is already working the phones with Gov. Roy Cooper here.  Despite his age (Cooper is 67), the former governor is the best option the Democrats have here, and he seems interested in running for the Senate seat after basically having to turn down VP consideration last year when he did appear to be interested.  Sen. Thom Tillis could face a primary challenge (former RNC Chair and presidential daughter-in-law Lara Trump has openly talked about it, and given Tillis may not back all of Trump's cabinet nominees, he could be vulnerable on that front), but I think we're looking at the other marquee race of 2026 here, with Tillis vs. Cooper, a contest that even in January 2025 you can safely say is a tossup next year.

Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME)

1. Maine

Don't look at me like that.  I'm aware that trying to beat Susan Collins in Maine is a lot like trying to achieve Blue Texas-it looks like a possibility every six years, but never happens.  But Collins has never faced an election like this.  This is the first GOP presidential midterm that Collins has run in since 2002, which was very different given George W. Bush's approvals were much higher than Trump's are expected to be next year.  In 2020, when the Democrats went after her, Collins was able to separate herself from Trump by literally having Trump on the ballot next to her-"vote for Biden, and then vote for me" was a strategy I didn't expect to work, but it did.  If Maine voters (who backed Kamala Harris last year) want to send a message to Trump next year, the only way to do so is by voting against Collins.  I expect Collins, who is famously indecisive, to resist retirement until the last minute, but given her perfect track record in Maine, I also suspect she'd rather retire than go for another six years & risk going out like her hero Margaret Chase Smith (who lost her last race).  Rep. Jared Golden & Secretary of State Shenna Bellows are probably the Democrats two best options, though both are currently favoring the gubernatorial race.  If Collins is out or vulnerable, though, I would imagine one of them gets into the contest.

2024 Oscar Predictions

The Oscars have moved their nominations date multiple times now, but as of today they're currently to be announced on January 23rd.  Regardless, I feel like I have enough information right now to make it official-here are my predictions of what I think will be nominated for this year's Academy Awards.  Enjoy and sound off in the comments!

Picture

1. Conclave

2. The Brutalist

3. Emilia Perez

4. Wicked

5. A Complete Unknown

6. Anora

7. Dune: Part Two

8. The Substance

9. Sing Sing

10. A Real Pain

Alts: Nickel Boys, All That We Imagine As Light

The Lowdown: The first 8 don't feel movable to me.  The Substance is certainly a weird Best Picture nominee, but the Academy has become far less stodgy about such things in recent years (and more prone to group think, and The Substance has dominated precursors).  The final two slots really feel between the four listed films (September 5 feels too late-breaking, Challengers too hip, and The Seed of the Sacred Fig too quiet).  I'm going with Sing Sing because it's a Best Actor lock and A Real Pain because it's a movie that I think most actors will like, though Nickel Boys, in particular has ardent fans & I wouldn't be surprised if it made it.

Director

1. Brady Corbet (The Brutalist)

2. Jacques Audiard (Emilia Perez)

3. Coralie Fargeat (The Substance)

4. Edward Berger (Conclave)

5. Sean Baker (Anora)

Alts: RaMell Ross (Nickel Boys), Denis Villeneuve (Dune 2), James Mangold (A Complete Unknown)

The Lowdown: The DGA gave their list to Corbet, Audiard, Berger, Baker & Mangold, but if your Oscar knowledge goes back to before 2008, you know that the DGA is not always carbon copy for this category, and indeed, it was historically a better marker for which five films would make Best Picture as the DGA is more populist than Oscar.  Due to this, I'm skipping Mangold, and putting in Coralie Fargeat, both because this would be a more daring choice (in line with the Directors Branch), and because there has been more openness in recent years to ensuring there's a female directing nominee.  If I'm underestimating Nickel Boys, this would be a decent place to put RaMell Ross, and Denis Villeneuve is always a threat (though Oscar has a tepid relationship with him), but Fargeat makes the most overall sense.

Actor

1. Adrien Brody (The Brutalist)

2. Timothee Chalamet (A Complete Unknown)

3. Ralph Fiennes (Conclave)

4. Colman Domingo (Sing Sing)

5. Daniel Craig (Queer)

Alts: Sebastian Stan (The Apprentice or A Different Man)

The Lowdown: Daniel Craig presents the biggest conundrum here.  The first four nominees feel fairly locked, with the Top 3 each feeling like theoretical winners (if there's a shock snub with Oscar, it'd be Domingo missing due to Oscar's collective amnesia about any films made before Labor Day, but I doubt it).  Craig got both the Globes & SAG, but somehow missed with BAFTA, instead with them preferring Stan (in this case playing Donald Trump in The Apprentice), as well as Hugh Grant's lauded turn in Heretic.  I think at the end of the day it's still Craig-Grant is in a genre they don't historically like (and they're already doing The Substance), and Stan is splitting votes with himself, while Craig is a longtime movie star who has never gotten an Oscar nomination (they love citing those).  But that fifth slot still feels in play.

Actress

1. Demi Moore (The Substance)

2. Cynthia Erivo (Wicked)

3. Mikey Madison (Anora)

4. Karla Sofia Gascon (Emilia Perez)

5. Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Hard Truths)

Alts: Fernanda Torres (I'm Still Here), Pamela Anderson (The Last Showgirl)

The Lowdown: Unlike Best Actor, I don't think the Top 4 is locked in here.  Moore feels pretty assured (and probably is going to win the Oscar), but Madison's film peaked too early, Erivo's been more lauded than her costars, and Gascon's turn has a lot of detractors.  The main reason I have more confidence in Domingo holding it together than these four is because there's way more competition here.  You have not just two critical darlings (Torres & Jean-Baptiste), but also a comeback bid (if Demi Moore wasn't in the running here, I'd guess Anderson makes it but their similar narratives makes it feel like Moore is sucking all of the "glad to see her again" energy here).  You also have a lot of Oscar favorites (Nicole Kidman, Kate Winslet, Angelina Jolie, & Amy Adams) who all have gotten citations this season and could make it like Annette Bening did last year for Nyad.  I'm going with Jean-Baptiste because I need at least one No Globe/No SAG prediction and she's peaking at the right time, but the fifth slot is so crowded that no one except Demi Moore should feel comfortable right now.

Supporting Actor

1. Kieran Culkin (A Real Pain)

2. Edward Norton (A Complete Unknown)

3. Guy Pearce (The Brutalist)

4. Yura Borisov (Anora)

5. Jeremy Strong (The Apprentice)

Alts: Stanley Tucci (Conclave), Denzel Washington (Gladiator II), Jonathan Bailey (Wicked)

The Lowdown: Another category with a lot of names, and the category I most think something wild is going to happen in on Oscar morning.  Culkin is so locked in as the season frontrunner that the rest of the nominees are mostly rearranging chairs, and that's when weird things happen.  I'm going with Norton & Pearce because those turns are very Oscar-adjacent, and Borisov has dominated all season even as a relative unknown.  Strong is really well-respected by actors (he's getting nominated at some point), but so are Tucci & especially Washington, the latter of whom basically always makes it when he has awards heat.  They could just toss their hands in the air and pick something crazy like Jonathan Bailey, everyone's collective crush at the moment...I expect a weird name here, but I'll own that I'm picking a pretty conventional quintet to play it safe.

Supporting Actress

1. Zoe Saldana (Emilia Perez)

2. Arian Grande (Wicked)

3. Felicity Jones (The Brutalist)

4. Jamie Lee Curtis (The Last Showgirl)

5. Isabella Rossellini (Conclave)

Alts: Margaret Qualley (The Substance), Monica Barbaro (A Complete Unknown)

The Lowdown: The first two nominees feel set, and then we get crazy here too.  Jones, after seeing the film, is the kind of role that Oscar goes for, and I feel increasingly confident in Jamie Lee Curtis-the BAFTA & SAG nods, plus an overall sense that The Last Showgirl is playing well with voters makes me assume an afterglow nomination is in the cards.  I'm going with Rossellini for fifth because (similar to Daniel Craig above) she's a longtime movie star who has never been nominated, and it's generally a good bet to make that the one woman in a Best Picture frontrunner dominated by men will get nominated (see also Felicity Jones).  Margaret Qualley could make it if they love The Substance, Monica Barbaro could make it if they love A Complete Unknown, Selena Gomez could make it if they extra love Emilia Perez, and there's always the chance of a late-breaker like Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor (if you can't tell, I have no sense of the standing of Nickel Boys, which I'm hoping to see later today)...but the Top 5 here feels very much like an Oscar-y lineup to me, and so that's where I'm landing.

Adapted Screenplay

1. Conclave

2. Emilia Perez

3. Sing Sing

4. Nickel Boys

5. A Complete Unknown

Alts: Dune: Part Two, Wicked

The Lowdown: As we move into the techs, I'll say it-I either have a bad sense of this year because it's genuinely competitive (which I think it is, at least for the nominations) or a lot of my Oscar-related tools (Twitter, my blog, Entertainment Weekly) have gone the way of the dodo or, in Twitter's case, become a giant dumpster fire.  So I anticipate I'll get more wrong beyond this category.  For example, I can't quite tell if Dune 2 or Wicked have the kind of stamina to take out a movie like Nickel Boys or Sing Sing or A Complete Unknown, all of which are also in the Best Picture hunt.  Dune and Wicked are in genres (SciFi and musicals) that do poorly here (particularly compared to biopics about Nobel Laureates and adaptations of Pulitzer Prize winners), but if one of them has more strength than expected, I could see it getting in...I just don't know over whom.

Original Screenplay

1. The Brutalist

2. Anora

3. The Substance

4. A Real Pain

5. Hard Truths

Alts: September 5, Challengers, All We Imagine As Light

The Lowdown: Best Picture is overrun with adaptations, so we know at least a few nominees will miss there.  I'm listing the four predicted Best Picture contenders as #1-4 (which means Jesse Eisenberg will join the short list of actors who have also been cited for writing), and then for the fifth choice I'm going with Mike Leigh, who has received five nominations to date for writing (along with two for directing), and at 81 is not going to have many chances to show up here again.  September 5, All We Imagine As Light, and Challengers are in movies with arguably more heat (certainly for Best Picture), but Leigh's long history with the Academy makes me think he's the best bet in a tight contest.

International Feature Film

1. Emilia Perez (France)

2. The Seed of the Sacred Fig (Germany)

3. I'm Still Here (Brazil)

4. Kneecap (Ireland)

5. Vermiglio (Italy)

Alts: Flow (Latvia), Girl with the Needle (Denmark)

The Lowdown: This is one of those races where the eventual winner is so firmly established (this, along with Song & Supporting Actress, is the category that Emilia Perez is pretty much guaranteed a win in), so the rest of the nominees are more of a "who's getting #2?" contest.  I included I'm Still Here with Torres in the hunt for Best Actress (similar to her mother 26 years ago, she could get cited for Best Actress for a Foreign Language Film nominee that won't win), and after seeing The Seed of the Sacred Fig, I don't buy the "waning interest" in the film that some have posited online as the big shock snub on Thursday (it's too good if you actually see it to ignore it).  The remaining four films feel like it'll be between Ireland, Italy, Latvia, & Denmark, though this category tends to love to throw in at least one movie no one has been predicting at all, so don't be surprised if at least one nominee isn't listed above.

Animated Feature Film

1. The Wild Robot

2. Flow

3. Inside Out 2

4. Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl

5. Memoir of a Snail

Alts: Moana 2

The Lowdown: It has become increasingly easy, especially with Disney ceding so much ground, to predict this category, making it downright dull if you're like me and dream of the days where The Secret of Kells could be the shock of the morning (I still maintain that it should only be three-wide...that would make it far more interesting).  As it sits, the only movie I could see making it in a surprise would be Moana 2, which just crossed $1 billion and you'd think on some level that would entice people to give Disney two slots.  But that's honestly it-this wasn't a very intriguing year for animation beyond these five pictures.

Original Score

1. The Brutalist

2. Conclave

3. Emilia Perez

4. The Wild Robot

5. Challengers

Alts: Wicked, Blitz, The Room Next Door

The Lowdown: The most insular branch in the Academy, the biggest concern I have right now is that I'm not picking a lot of longtime Oscar favorites save for Reznor & Ross (in fifth place).  8-time nominee Stephen Schwartz (Wicked), 12-time nominee Hans Zimmer (Blitz), and 4-time nominee Alberto Iglesias (The Room Next Door) are very much Oscar's speed, and I think one of them feels likelier than not to make it into the final nominees, but none stands out.  Wicked has the curse of musicals not being super popular to be nominated here (and they're already breaking that rule with Emilia Perez), and the other two might be their films only nominations.  Hell, I wouldn't even be surprised if 4-time nominee Danny Elfman (who hasn't been up for an Oscar in 16 years) is the shocker for the Beetlejuice sequel.

Original Song

1. "El Mal" (Emilia Perez)

2. "Mi Camino" (Emilia Perez)

3. "Kiss the Sky" (The Wild Robot)

4. "The Journey" (The Six Triple Eight)

5. "Harper and Will Go West" (Will & Harper)

Alts: "Compress/Repress" (Challengers), "Piece by Piece" (Piece by Piece)

The Lowdown: There are honestly a lot of Oscar bridesmaids that made the shortlist this year.  Lin-Manuel Miranda (Mufasa), Diane Warren (The Six Triple Eight), Pharrell Williams (Piece by Piece), and Nicholas Britell (also Mufasa) have spots on the shortlist and none of them have won despite multiple nominations, and one wonders if I'm under-estimating them by only picking the inevitable Warren for my Top 5.  That said, it's hard to see anyone other than Emilia Perez winning here (making including bridesmaids pointless since they ain't going to win this time either), and so I'm going with the tried-and-true Best Song tropes of an animated film, a Diane Warren film, & a documentary to finish this off aside from the Emilia Perez frontrunners.  Now the question is-will Selena Gomez & Zoe Saldana perform them live?

Sound

1. Wicked

2. Dune: Part Two

3. Emilia Perez

4. A Complete Unknown

5. Gladiator II

Alts: Alien Romulus, The Wild Robot

The Lowdown: With the devastating fires impacting Los Angeles over the past week, the Sound, Makeup, & Visual Effects bakeoffs have been cancelled, and while they are trying to do a proxy version of this online, I do wonder if this ends up favoring movies that are more top-of-mind (i.e. the Best Picture contenders) rather than movies that might've gained some cache from these presentations.  Alien: Romulus, specifically, felt like a movie that I assumed would make it until the bakeoffs were cancelled, and so instead I'm subbing in Gladiator II for that spot.  This category is weirdly dominated by musicals, which may make Dune's path to a victory considerably easier.

Cinematography

1. The Brutalist

2. Dune: Part Two

3. Nickel Boys

4. Conclave

5. Nosferatu

Alts: Maria, A Complete Unknown, Wicked

The Lowdown: The ASC had seven nominees this year, which thus provided virtually no help.  A Complete Unknown got into the list, as did Maria, both of which I have kept as alternates because the former feels pretty generic (though they love Phedon Papamichael in this category) and the latter has no heat anywhere (though Edward Lachman is an Oscar favorite as well...this is a category so clique-y you have to go back to the early 1930's before you can find a lineup that didn't feature a previous nominee).  The biggest, scariest threat to this lineup is Wicked, the garish & ugly cinematography somehow getting into the relatively classy ASC lineup.  I also think it's weird we have no black-and-white options in the running, so don't be stunned if The Girl with the Needle manages to get in here, even if it misses Best International Feature.

Costume

1. Wicked

2. Dune: Part Two

3. Nosferatu

4. Maria

5. Gladiator II

Alts: Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, The Brutalist, Conclave

The Lowdown: We once again have a lineup where we have a longtime Oscar favorite (Colleen Atwood, winner of 4 Oscars & 12 nominations) in a movie that's not super hot elsewhere (Beetlejuice Beetlejuice).  The Oscars historically would've gone here, particularly given the film's gross, but I think they've become so "Best Picture or Bust" in recent years that I'm keeping Atwood out even if I think she's a legit threat.  This assembles a relatively predictable group of fantasy & period pieces for the nominees.  I'm weirdly less concerned about choosing Maria (this category loves this style of nominee, and doesn't really give a damn about box office), and more concerned I'm nominating too many sequels.  C'est la vie.

Film Editing

1. Conclave

2. Emilia Perez

3. Dune: Part Two

4. The Brutalist

5. The Substance

Alts: Wicked, Challengers

The Lowdown: The key to Best Film Editing is to have a very strong sense of what the "core five" Best Pictures are, and pick most of them.  I think if we were still in the 5-wide Best Picture nominees we'd have Conclave, Emilia Perez, The Brutalist, A Complete Unknown, and Wicked as the nominees, and I'm going with three of them (plus Wicked as an also-ran).  I'm keeping Dune in because they love Best Picture nominees with an action bent in Editing, and I'm also keeping The Substance because if you like it, you like it because of the editing.  Challengers is the weird film with a lot of heat here and not a lot in Best Picture, so I don't know what to make of that but I am listing it to cover my bases.

Makeup & Hairstyling

1. Wicked

2. The Substance

3. Nosferatu

4. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

5. Emilia Perez

Alts: A Different Man, Waltzing with Brando

The Lowdown: Our second lineup impacted by a lack of the Bakeoffs, and here I think that is going to specifically hurt two films: A Different Man and Waltzing with Brando.  A Different Man is under-seen, certainly compared to box office hits like Wicked and Beetlejuice, which may make a difference if the branch isn't doing their homework, while Brando's inclusion on the shortlist at all would've normally been a sign that this will get in (the Makeup branch loves giving "Oscar-nominated" to truly bizarre and oftentimes terrible movies...they are definitely that cousin in the family), but I doubt anyone sees it without the bakeoffs.  I'm therefore going to pick five nominees that I think most of the Academy will have seen, and this still feels pretty much in-line with what Oscar would normally pick without the wild card contender.

Production Design

1. Wicked

2. The Brutalist

3. Dune: Part Two

4. Nosferatu

5. Gladiator II

Alts: A Complete Unknown, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

The Lowdown: Another lineup where I can't quite tell what Beetlejuice's strength is (I could honestly see it getting anywhere from 0-4 nominations on Thursday), so I'm not predicting it and just going with it as an alternate.  Gladiator II, as well, has lost all heat in what was once assumed to be a sure thing.  The Top 3 I feel very confident about given the scale (and in the case of The Brutalist, the subject matter), while Nosferatu is catnip for this category.  The retro designs of New York City and the large-scale concert venues in A Complete Unknown would make this a good coattails spot if the film is as strong with Oscar as it has been with the precursors.

Visual Effects

1. Dune: Part Two

2. Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes

3. Wicked

4. Alien: Romulus

5. Twisters

Alts: Better Man, Gladiator II, Deadpool & Wolverine

The Lowdown: Our last category impacted by the bakeoffs is causing me to make maybe my boldest snub prediction in this article.  Better Man is the type of movie that gets nominated for an Oscar, and stands out in the bakeoffs.  This branch isn't afraid of nominating flops, but they also have to see the film, and Better Man has done terribly at the box office.  It's enough of a threat that, even though I have little interest in it, I'm seeing it tomorrow solely because I think it's a contender here, but I do think that we're overestimating its strength even though it has dominated all season as I get the sense that Hollywood would just like to move on from this fiasco.  It's worth noting that if Better Man and Gladiator II make it over Alien: Romulus & Twisters, 80% of this lineup will feature CGI monkeys as part of their nomination (too bad Godzilla x Kong didn't make the shortlist so we could assume it'd go 5/5...Planet of the Apes indeed!).

Ranting On...the Classics Debate

We're on our third article before I go back into hibernation and work onto some creative writing, and today we're going to do the only article that isn't related to a longtime The Many Rantings of John tradition.  We've done the $1 billion article & our "No Globe/No SAG/No Problem" article, and we've got two more, including my final Oscar predictions, but today we're going to talk about a debate that has been raging on social media recently.

A little over a year ago, I read James Joyce's Ulysses for the very first time.  Joyce's novel is considered one of the best books ever written, and the Modern Library named it the greatest work-of-fiction of the 20th Century.  I am working on getting through said Modern Library list as part of my book club, and so I knew this would eventually become a mountain I'd have to conquer.  As I was going, though, I was finding that I wasn't entirely understanding everything happening.  Joyce's novel is a take on Homer's Odyssey, which I've read (even though it's been a number of years since I tackled it), but it also relates back to a number of allusions to Irish politics and social taboos of the time, and it's a hard read.  The novel is regularly listed on "Banned Books" lists for school libraries, but my take after reading Joyce's magnum opus is if you're smart enough to understand which parts of Ulysses are dirty, you're old enough to read the book.  It was a challenge, and enough to make me think that Finnegans Wake (generally considered to be the most intellectually steep of Joyce's works) will be a good way to end this project rather than tackling it in the near future (for the curious about my current Modern Library progress, I just finished up Paul Bowles' The Sheltering Sky, which I loved, and will be reading Iris Murdoch's Under the Net next; I'm going out of order but I'm at 36 books at this point).

I read the book not just because it's part of a project, but also because I firmly believe that classic novels should be read.  There has been a lot of discussion in the past couple of decades about the value of the canon, not least of which because the most ardent defender of the Western Canon, Yale Professor Harold Bloom, was generally known to be a jackass in his personal life.  But I think foundational literature and cinema is important, enough so that I devoted one of my final posts before my hiatus to it.  You can debate what qualifies as a classic, but Ulysses is one of those texts that needs to be on the list regardless of how you define the parameters.  And even if it's tough to comprehend sometimes, to quote one of my friends who I texted about halfway through knowing that I might not make it, "just keep reading, because it'll be worth it...even if you don't understand all of it."  He was right-Ulysses was magnificent, the kind of book you could read 50 times and experience something new in its 700-pages every time.

But something has happened in the classics debate that I think is really disturbing: the debate over what constitutes essential reading has laid a path for people just to find it acceptable to not read at all.  This was discussed in-depth online in the wake of Christopher Nolan's decision to make his next film an adaptation of Homer's The Odyssey (which, of course, is what Ulysses is based on...see the method to my madness there?).  So many people, particularly younger people, had no concept of what The Odyssey was, and they were receiving public shaming from posters who were stunned they knew so little about one of the building blocks of literature.  This received a backlash, with those who initially didn't know about The Odyssey proclaiming anything from "that isn't taught in my country" (which is a lie if you had a European or North American education, which most of these posters did-even if it's not taught directly you're going to get allusions to Homer's work in at least one class if you're paying attention), and that it was "too difficult" for them to understand.  This led to more reveals of people using AI to understand it, dumbing down the story to simpler language (not just Homer, but everything from Dickens to Shakespeare) to the tried-and-true method of "there are no universal classics" so this isn't "essential" reading.

I'm not going to champion Harold Bloom, who is a blowhard even if I've got one of his books directly behind me right now, but I am going to say this: The Odyssey is a classic of literature.  Bloom's approach, and much of 20th Century studies of creative fiction, oftentimes precluded women, persons of color, and authors who were not from the United States, Canada, or Europe from "the canon."  That's just a fact.  But it's also foolish to backtrack so badly in trying to correct that to pretend that something like The Odyssey shouldn't be considered a classic-most of literature is in Homer's shadow...most of art is in Homer's shadow.  It's influential in a way only The Bible & Dante's The Divine Comedy can manage to trump in cultural conversation.  If you haven't read it, you can own up to it (even more so than movies, everyone has a classic book they've never gotten around to-my copies of Moby Dick and Ivanhoe have done nothing but collect dust since I bought them), but to pretend it's not important or that you can call yourself educated without having at least a cursory understanding of its story is, well, laughable.

Homer's Iliad and the Odyssey are unique in most cultural conversations because, of course, no one is exactly sure if anything their reading in terms of plot and certainly in terms of verse is actually linked with Homer's original story.  Very little is known about his life (and what is is based on people like Herodotus, who lived centuries after Homer), and his poems were carried forward through oral tradition before being published, first in Greek in the 15th Century.  So if you're reading it in English, you are reading a translation.  Same with The Bible and The Divine Comedy.

But other figures that got brought into this conversation online, like Charles Dickens, were written in a very readable language for people who speak English.  People like Dickens have long been translated into baser editions of their books; when I was in 4th and 5th grade, I read the "Great Illustrated Classics" installments of A Tale of Two Cities, David Copperfield, and Great Expectations as a way to learn more about these stories.  But those editions, I cannot stress enough, are for children.  They are not intended to be read by adults as definitive editions of these works.  Dickens is an accessible writer-he is not Joyce or even Dante...he is writing for the masses.  I read A Christmas Carol recently for the holiday season, and was struck by how similar it is to the many movie adaptations of it...it shouldn't be hard to read his novels.  If you are struggling with that and you're out of high school...it might not be that these books are "super challenging" for most people.  It's more likely that you are just not a practiced or strong reader.

These debates spark up constantly in the past few years, which is terrifying coupled with the rise in fascist rhetoric from right-leaning parties in the United States and Europe.  Anti-intellectualism is a key component of most rises of fascist regimes through history, one of the reasons that book burning became so synonymous with the Nazis.  But even taking politics out of it, the rise of AI to "do your thinking for you" and skipping the thinking for you, particularly for students who need to have the practice of academic rigor to, well, learn anything (you can only get by with not doing the reading for so long before you've actually not done anything), is also terrifying.  ChatGPT is opening the door to a world of people who aren't smart enough to understand books that have been taught to people much younger than them for over a century.  Reading is meant to be enjoyable and pleasurable-that's why it's a leisure activity.  But as I've said before on here, if you don't occasionally challenge yourself with what you're reading or watching on TV or watching at the movies or seeing on a stage...when are you?  Critical thinking is a skill, and if you don't use it (or let someone else, or some thing, do it for you) you'll lose that skill.

What Will Be the Next $1 Billion Movie?

We are continuing our brief "annual articles" run on the blog (where I'm taking a sabbatical from my hiatus to do five articles I really want to write, and then will go back into hibernation) with one of my absolute favorite articles to write annually: the $1 billion movie prediction.  Box office in 2024 was down 3% compared to 2023, which is honestly surprising given the number of tentpole franchises in 2023 (there were three Marvel films in 2023 compared to just one this year, for example) and so I thought it'd be a larger dip.  This was driven by larger-than-expected box office in North America (much of the downside was in China), and resulted in at least two $1 billion movies (Inside Out 2 and Deadpool & Wolverine) with Moana 2 almost certain to clear $1 billion sometime next week, giving us three movies in total to reach that milestone.

It has become an annual tradition on the blog for us to predict for the upcoming year which films are likeliest to hit $1 billion.  The first $1 billion movie came in 1997 with Titanic, and since 2008's The Dark Knight, every year (save for the pandemic-impacted year of 2020) has had at least one movie that crossed the threshold.  I actually did really well with predicting last time-I called both Inside Out 2 and Deadpool & Wolverine in my Top 5, and while I didn't predict Moana 2, to my credit it hadn't been announced yet (I have confidence that I would've guessed it in my Top 5 given the first one's success on Disney+).  Two of the other three contenders I guessed (Despicable Me 4 and Wicked) were enormous successes, and there's a decent chance Wicked will upset Dune 2 to get into the Top 5, meaning I'll have called 80% of the Top 5 (the fifth film I guessed, Joker 2, I definitely missed but then so did all of Hollywood in their assessment of that movie).

I have listed below the five films I think are most likely to make it to $1 billion, listed chronologically by their current release dates.  I have confidence that 2025 will have at least a couple of $1 billion movies (we've been averaging about 2.5 since the quarantine lifted, I don't see that changing), though I do wonder if we're ever going to totally get back to pre-pandemic theater returns or if 2019 might've been a high-water mark for ticket dollars.  Without further adieu, let's dive in!

Honorable Mention: I'll name-check a few contenders below that also should be in the running here, but two films that don't neatly fit into comparisons to the below films but deserve a shout-out in an article likes this are Minecraft and Wicked 2.  Minecraft is a global phenomenon movie in the vein of Mario and The Last of Us, both of which were gargantuan successes.  The trailers do not inspire confidence, but if this clicks, I would imagine that we're going to see a lot of people talking about video game movies the way we talked about comic book movies in the 2010's.  Wicked 2 could follow in the footsteps of Inside Out, Dune, and Moana, where an increased audience at home causes the movie to outgross its predecessor, but I have my doubts.  The second half of the musical is much darker than the first, and it won't have as much time to grow in only a year's time.  Both will probably be hits, but I don't think $1 billion hits which is why they aren't below.

Mission Impossible - The Final Reckoning

Release Date: May 23, 2025

Reasons It Will Hit $1 Billion: Tom Cruise showed in 2022 that he has what it takes to make a nostalgic throwback into a surprise $1 billion phenomenon in Top Gun: Maverick.  The final installment of the Mission Impossible franchise, which in some ways also feels like it could be the final action film in Cruise's career (he seems to be signaling this is the end of an era for the quintessential 1990's movie star) will have a lot of people turning in to see how he goes out.  Finality has been a draw in a universe where movie franchises never seem to end-Guardians of the Galaxy 3, for example, was able to hang on when other MCU films were faltering in large part due to people realizing it was the "last" movie in the franchise...could that be the case here?

Reasons It Won't Hit $1 Billion: For starters, none of the movies in the franchise have done this.  The closest that any has come is Fallout, which couldn't even hit $800 million, and was getting an extra push because it was at the height of the MoviePass craze.  This will need audience members who have largely eschewed the last movie in the franchise, which didn't even make $600 million.  Harrison Ford nostalgia wasn't enough to get people to Indiana Jones 5...can Tom Cruise nostalgia get them to Mission Impossible 8?

What It Could Mean for the Rest of the Year: There are several action-adventure franchise extensions out in 2025, with new movies in the Predator, Tron, Karate Kid, Naked Gun, and 28 Days series premiering later this year.  Mission Impossible is the biggest (by far) of those options, and so if it isn't making it, it's hard to see these having much cache. 

Jurassic World: Rebirth

Release Date: July 2, 2025

Reasons It Will Hit $1 Billion: I mean, all of the other ones did?  If you consider Jurassic World as its own series (separate from Jurassic Park) it's the only series ever to have all of its movies hit $1 billion.  People love dinosaurs, specifically in this franchise (others they largely eschew).  There's also not a lot of other really big blockbusters this year, and they cast global movie star Scarlett Johansson AND star-of-the-moment Jonathan Bailey as the leads.

Reasons It Won't Hit $1 Billion: Chris Pratt has left the franchise, and while the dinosaurs are the true stars, Pratt's box office prowess (even Garfield was a hit last year) is enviable, and not necessarily duplicative.  I think the bigger problem is that they continually churn out terrible movies on the memory of one perfect one...how long can that actually last?  The last one just BARELY made $1 billion.

What It Could Mean for the Rest of the Year: One of the biggest reasons I'm worried about the 2025 box office picture is that there's not a lot of films like Jurassic World: Rebirth this year.  Star Wars, Harry Potter, Fast & the Furious...we aren't seeing anything new from the most beloved franchises other than Jurassic World (and #5 on this list), which leaves little room for error if one of the big tentpoles crumble (particularly given there's not a lot of obvious contenders for *gasp* something original to succeed!).  As a result, if Jurassic World falters, it's less about a group of films that might matter and more that we might just be having a long year.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps

Release Date: July 25, 2025

Reasons It Will Hit $1 Billion: Deadpool becoming the first superhero film in three years to hit $1 billion proved that there's still juice in the can for the comic book genre even if it's not as consistently lucrative as it once was.  There are four major comic book movies coming out in 2025, none with the box office guarantee of uniting Hugh Jackman & Ryan Reynolds, but all with potential.  Of the four, my bet for the likeliest winner is Fantastic Four, which stars Pedro Pascal (who is coming off of the major successes of The Last of Us, The Mandalorian, and Gladiator II right now), and honestly feels like a Marvel bet that will work (i.e. this feels like one that Disney is putting so much attention into, I kind of get the vibes that it will be genuinely good).

Reasons It Won't Hit $1 Billion: Fantastic Four is something of a running joke in terms of quality, as every big-screen attempt at the franchise has failed in the past, and I say this with great sadness as it's my all-time favorite comic book series (I used to rush with my brother to buy editions of it at our local Pamida).  It's possible that people are over comic books, and even if they aren't, post-pandemic the biggest successes have been Spider-Man, Deadpool, & Batman at the box office...all more established as a fan favorite than the Fantastic Four.

What It Could Mean for the Rest of the Year: Hollywood takes a long time to catch a trend on the decline (just look at how long it took action films to fall out of fashion in the 1990's), but they will eventually catch it.  After the major failures of The Marvels, Madame Web, & Aquaman 2, it's hard not to see the writing on the wall-comic book movies need a hit (and not a guaranteed one like Deadpool 3).  Captain America 4, Thunderbolts, & Superman are also ambassadors (for the record, Superman, which had a well-received trailer, was my #6 entry for this list as I do think it has a lot of potential) of the genre, but if none of them click...are we going to start to see this fade from relevance?

Zootopia 2

Release Date: November 26, 2025

Reasons It Will Hit $1 Billion: The formula is simple-after Inside Out and Moana, getting an animated film from the mid-2010's, one that has been playing regularly on Disney+ screens, as well as still fresh enough for Gen Z to feel a nostalgia for it as one of their own formative movies, it makes sense that Disney would try for a third.  Zootopia is the only other movie of this time frame that could pull off this type of appeal, and unlike the other two, it makes the most sense for a sequel.  It's possible it might not just be a hit, but given its November release date, it might also end Disney's current drought with winning the Oscar for Animated Feature (if Inside Out 2 loses as expected, it'll be their longest ever).

Reasons It Won't Hit $1 Billion: Zootopia is well-loved, but it doesn't have the same lasting pop culture cache of Inside Out or (especially) Moana.  That's honestly the only thing I can think of though-this makes total sense as a greenlight, and were it not for the guarantee of the last film on this list, it'd be the one movie I was absolutely confident would make the $1 billion club.

What It Could Mean for the Rest of the Year: Disney got all three $1 billion movies last year (the first time ever that we've had 100% of the 3+ $1 billion movies from the same studio).  They've got other opportunities if people are back into their live-action fare (Mufasa won't hit $1 billion, but it'll paw past $500 million this weekend, and almost certainly $600 and maybe $700 million in the coming weeks after a slow start), as both Snow White and Lilo & Stitch are opportunities to revitalize that avenue.  Other animated movies like Elio and The Bad Guys 2 don't have the same calling-card that Zootopia 2 has, but I'm watching (and hopeful especially for Elio, the rare original thought from the Mouse House recently).

Avatar: Fire and Ash

Release Date: December 19, 2025

Reasons It Will Hit $1 Billion: Not only has the first two films crossed the $1 billion mark...they've also crossed the $2 billion mark.  Avatar is a guaranteed "must see in theaters" for audiences, given Cameron's groundbreaking special effects & his ability to bring a quality to his work that few other directors are able to maintain (he also is the only filmmaker who can convince lay audiences to wear 3-D glasses in mass, adding to his box office totals).  The movie could make less-than-half of what the last one made and still qualify for this list, so I'm absolutely confident we'll get at least one $1 billion movie in 2025.

Reasons It Won't Hit $1 Billion: If Avatar 3 doesn't hit $1 billion, the entire industry needs to unplug and reboot.  The only way I don't see this making at least $1 billion is if it wasn't released in 2025 and James Cameron delayed it again.

What It Could Mean for the Rest of the Year: Again, there's no comparison to Avatar.  I do wish that this was the end of the series, so that Cameron might have the chance to do at least one more original idea before he makes his own journey to Pandora (he's 70 and makes 1-2 movies a decade...I worry we might only get Avatar from him going forward), but nothing else in 2025 compares to this.