In this week’s newsletter: Stranger Things’ climactic showdown is the latest pop culture spectacle to feel like its been ported straight from a console. The industries’ reciprocally influential relationship can be to everyone’s gain

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It had begun to feel like an endurance test by the end, but nonetheless, like the sucker I am, I watched the Stranger Things finale last week. And spoiler warning: I’m going to talk about it in general terms in this newsletter. Because approximately 80% of the final season comprised twentysomething “teenagers” explaining things to each other while using random 1980s objects to illustrate convoluted plans and plot points, my expectations were not high. After an interminable hour, finally, something fun happens, as the not-kids arm themselves with machine guns and molotovs and face off against a monstrously gigantic demon-crab. Aha, I thought – the final boss battle!

The fight was like something out of Monster Hunter, all scale and spectacle with a touch of desperation. For a very long time, video games sought to imitate cinema. Now cinema (and TV) often feels like a video game. The structure of Stranger Things’ final season reminded me a lot of Resident Evil: long periods of walking slowly through corridors, with characters exchanging plot information aloud on their way to the action, and occasional explosions of gunfire, screeching monsters or car chases. Those long periods of relative inaction are much more tolerable when you’ve got a controller in your hands. I am all for TV and film embracing the excitement, spectacle and dynamism of video games, but do they have to embrace the unnecessary side-quests and open-world bloat, too?

In this week’s newsletter: The year’s most popular stories reveal how play, power and politics collided in the past 12 months – and what you’re psyched for in 2026

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With the best games of the year duly noted (yours and ours), I’d like to highlight some of the work we’ve done covering them. Reviewing the top-performing articles that we published in 2025, I see a portrait of a conflicted year: plenty of great works and games that captured the imagination and the world’s attention, but also growing anxiety about their place in the real world, and the political circumstances they reflect. And a lot of (justified) hand-wringing over Roblox.

But first: I wanted to extend heartfelt thanks to everyone who reads this newsletter and the rest of our work at the Guardian. If you’ve enjoyed our coverage, do consider supporting us to do more of it – either through a recurring or one-off contribution. Without your support, none of the great journalism we produce would be possible. Thank you for being with us in 2025, and I hope you stick around to watch me slowly lose my mind working overtime in the buildup to Grand Theft Auto 6’s release in November 2026. (Finally).