Ranking the Summer Movies of 2025
General Reviews
It's been a good summer for movies. Technically, it's been my only summer of movies because until last year, I lived in the southern hemisphere, where the “summer blockbusters” actually release in the middle of winter. So when it came to my first summer movie season, I decided to embrace it and try to see as many of these tentpole films on the big screen as possible.
I gave it a good effort, but there are still some summer films I missed, like The Naked Gun, I Know What You Did Last Summer, Nobody 2, Elio and The Phoenician Scheme. I'll be excluding them from this list - although feel free to let me know where you'd rank them - and without further ado, here are my films of the summer on a scale of 'should've stayed home' to ‘would’ve paid twice'.
M3GAN 2.0
Listen, I liked the original M3GAN. It was fun, campy, and the birth of an icon. This was not the follow-up we deserved. M3GAN 2.0 brings back the killer robot doll to combat a rogue rival AI robot that is attempting to gain control of all technology. The franchise went quickly from what was a personal family story to end-of-the-world stakes.
Yes, M3GAN continued to slay and all that, but the heel turn into action comedy from campy horror just didn't land with me. Producer Jason Blum has actually publicly acknowledged that the genre switch may have been a mistake, so if by some miracle they do proceed with M3GAN 3 (M3G3N?) I hope that means it will return to its horror roots.
Eddington
Eddington was the latest film from Hereditary and Beau is Afraid director Ari Aster, starring Joaquin Phoenix as a small-town police sheriff who runs for office against Pedro Pascal's mayor after he disputes his pandemic safety precautions. Or at least that's the bare basics of what Eddington is about, because the full film gets much weirder.
Eddington is a divisive film by design. The plot is a rumination on how we're divided by rules, opinions, and ethics. It makes sense that the reception would also divide the audience. While I enjoyed a lot of the ideas that Aster was trying to explore, it just fell too far into mixed messaging and confusion for me to really enjoy it.
Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning
Mission: Impossible films aren't films at this point; they're just houses for death-defying Tom Cruise stunts, and that was no different in The Final Reckoning. The problem was that this was supposed to be the “final” reckoning, but it didn't feel like it came close to the heights that some of the previous instalments, like Fallout or Ghost Protocol, reached.
The stunts were incredible, don't get me wrong, I was on the edge of my seat when I saw Tom hanging off that plane, knowing all too well he was doing it for real. But a film can't survive on stunts alone, and it feels like the story comes second in these movies, which isn't enough for me to be invested anymore.
Jurassic World: Rebirth
I think everyone agrees that no Jurassic film has come even close to topping the original Jurassic Park, yet here we are, still making dinosaur films and apparently, we're all still watching them, because Jurassic World Rebirth is one of the highest-grossing movies of the year so far.
This soft reboot/sequel to Jurassic World Dominion stars Scarlett Johansson, Mahershala Ali, and Jonathan Bailey as a team of researchers and mercenaries who head to a secret island that houses three rare species of dinosaurs, from which they need samples for a high-paying contract job. The premise is simple, the action is fun, and dinosaurs are never not cool (although Rebirth feels the need to add mutants into the mix).
Lilo & Stitch
Lilo & Stitch gets by purely on nostalgia, which is what Disney is banking on with pretty much all of its live-action remakes. It's not a bad movie (it's hard to fail when the original was already so good), but it does feel like an unnecessary cash grab. Lilo & Stitch sticks pretty faithfully to the script, following the heartwarming journey of a lonely young girl and her mischievous alien pet. But the times that Lilo & Stitch does change things from the original, it only makes the film lesser, not better, which is a sign of a poor adaptation.
Freakier Friday
Speaking of nostalgia, we got a Freaky Friday sequel this summer - 22 years after the original! Freakier Friday isn't perfect but it's exactly the sequel fans have been waiting for. This time around, two extra bodies are involved in the body swap as Tess (Jamie Lee Curtis), her daughter Anna (Lindsay Lohan), and her daughter, Harper (Julia Butters) and soon-to-be stepdaughter Lily (Siphia Hammons) have their minds and bodies shuffled. Despite the silly shenanigans, Freakier Friday taps into some realistic themes about broken families and parenting pressures, and it's a great Friday night watch any time of the year.
Ballerina
I had way more fun with Ballerina than I had any right to. The passing of the John Wick baton to Ana de Armas' Eve Macarro was not as smooth as it could've been, and the film failed to stand on its own without the inclusion of Keanu Reeves' hitman. But it had all the trademarks of the John Wick franchise: the action, the secret societies, the interesting visual landscapes, and a badass protagonist. It wasn't a great story, but it was a good time.
How to Train Your Dragon
The second instance of “why are we remaking this again” this summer (along with Lilo & Stitch), but How to Train Your Dragon surprisingly worked. It was basically a shot-for-shot remake of the animated film, but the source material is so good that it couldn't really go wrong. The casting was faithful, the music remains amazing, and How to Train Your Dragon is still one of the most charming stories on screen, whether it be animated or live-action - it's just hard to get past the idea that it was all a ploy to sell theme park tickets.
Superman
Superman's placement on this list will probably get me roasted alive, but it was simply not my film of the summer. Don't get me wrong, I think it was a great Superman film, the best we've gotten to date, but it was just too silly, campy, and cringeworthy, for me to fully enjoy it. I think David Corenswet and Nicholas Hoult make for an excellent Superman and Lex Luthor, and that the earnest vibe is something that was much needed for this DC franchise, but it still suffers from the same comic book movie tropes.
Thunderbolts*
On the opposite end of the scale from Superman is Thunderbolts, an antihero-focused comic book film that explores the mental health issues and loneliness that come with being a superhero. I'm a sucker for the found family vibe, and I liked seeing some of the forgotten heroes of the MCU get more to do in Thunderbolts. That being said, this Marvel film had the chance to be so much more, particularly in its final act, but it fell into the same stuck superhero tropes as Superman and instead fell back on the overbearing world-ending final act that I wish we could move on from. Overall, it's a solid watch, but not a perfect one.
The Life of Chuck
The Life of Chuck is one of those films that is best enjoyed going in blind. Without giving away too much, the movie is about a man named Chuck at various stages in his life, who reflects on the lessons life has taught him. It's a surprisingly emotional and inspiring film from Mike Flanagan (who is known for his horror projects). While The Life of Chuck doesn't fully nail its complex premise, I did leave the cinema smiling and genuinely moved.
F1
F1 is not an accurate film - it breaks the rules of motorsport in the name of a classic heroic journey and spectacle. However, if you're unfamiliar with the specifics of F1 (like me), then this is one hell of a ride. F1 is a classic Hollywood blockbuster; it has Brad Pitt in the lead as the lone wolf Sonny Hayes, who is drawn out of retirement to help mentor an arrogant up-and-coming driver on an underdog team. Hans Zimmer's soundtrack is epic, the races are thrilling, and the story is fun enough that if you just want to switch your brain off and have a good time, F1 is the film for you.
Weapons
Possibly the surprise hit of the summer, Zach Cregger's horror movie Weapons is a mystery best unravelled without knowing anything beforehand. All you do need to know is the film has a great cast, is full of unnerving cinematography, and has one of the best wigs you'll see all year.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps
The Fantastic Four: First Steps isn't a particularly groundbreaking superhero movie, but it is refreshing, particularly for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Freed from the constraints of having everything happen in the same universe, Fantastic Four leans heavily into a retro-futuristic style that allows its heroes to actually be heroes, and for the themes of family, space-age adventure, and out-of-the-box ideas to really shine. I was particularly fond of the chemistry between the four leads - Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, and Joseph Quinn - and fully accept them as my family thanks to this movie.
28 Years Later
Even though 28 Years Later is a continuation of a franchise, we've had a few decades of stale zombie takes in the time between instalments, and it was nice to come back to Danny Boyle's eclectic filmmaking with an apocalyptic film that felt like it still had style and something to say. 28 Years Later is a ride through a harsh zombie-filled world, it's true, but the emotional relationships at the heart of this film really make it stand out as one of the best.
Materialists
Celine Song's follow-up to the poignant relationship drama Past Lives is probably not at all what most people expected. Materialists is a glitzy romantic drama about the importance of material values versus love in relationships. It stars three of the biggest stars in Hollywood (Pedro Pascal, Dakota Johnson, and Chris Evans), and was marketed as a return to classic rom-coms. It doesn't always live up to all of these expectations, but it speaks to a generation whose values regarding money and dating are constantly in competition in modern society, and that felt refreshing. Paired with Song's POV, Materialists is one of the most emotional and affecting romantic movies of this era.
Bring Her Back
Little did I know back in May that a film, whose trailer I was terrified to even watch, would go on to be my pick of the Summer. Bring Her Back is the next horror from the Philippou brothers after Talk to Me, and while I am slightly biased in supporting my fellow Aussies, there's no denying this film slaps. Bring Her Back is dark and gory, fuelled by a personal family story about grief that is raised by brilliant performances.
Like Weapons, Bring Her Back feels like it's leading a wave of new-age indie horror that doesn't need to rely on big setpieces, A-list stars or franchise IP to succeed, and that's an incredibly exciting prospect for this industry and for us as audiences.
Like I said, it was a great summer for movies of all shapes and sizes, to the point I've changed around this ranking about six times before I hit publish (and probably will mentally continue to do so). Let me know whether you agree or not, and what your top film of the summer was!
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