AwardsWatch Podcast Ep. 322 – Predicting the Critics Choice Awards Winners

Erik Anderson December 26, 2025

On episode 322 of the AwardsWatch podcast, Editor-In-Chief Erik Anderson is joined by Executive Editor Ryan McQuade and Mark Johnson, aka The Awards Alchemist, to give their predictions for the upcoming Critics Choice Awards taking place on January 4, 2026.

Recording the day after Christmas, the trio give a short version of their holiday experience (wine, so much wine) and then jump right into predicting who they think will be the winners of the 31st Critics Choice Association Awards, as well as reveal what some of our own votes were, including some races that feel very close. With Critics Choice happening a full week before the Golden Globes, will the group rely on being Oscar predictors or tastemakers as the first televised org of the season?

While it feels like it’s a head to head fight between One Battle After Another and Sinners in many categories–all of which is great for Warner Bros–some categories could be the beginning of a season-long coronation, like Amy Madigan vs Teyana Taylor in Best Supporting Actress and Jessie Buckley vs Rose Byrne in Best Actress. Best Actor could be a threeway race between Timothée Chalamet, Leonardo DiCaprio and Michael B. Jordan, although we’re seeing Chalamet triumph here.

You can listen to The AwardsWatch Podcast wherever you stream podcasts, from iTunes, iHeartRadio, Soundcloud, Stitcher, Spotify, Audible, Amazon Music, YouTube and more.

This podcast runs 1h26m. We’ll be back soon with a Best of 2025 wrap-up. Till then, let’s get into it.

Music: “Modern Fashion” from AShamaleuvmusic (intro), “B-3” from BoxCat Games Nameless: The Hackers RPG Soundtrack (outro).

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Critics Choice Association (CCA), San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle (SFBAFCC) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.