Happy Friday and welcome back to The Daily Courant, your afternoon compendium of Puck’s best new reporting.

Today, we lead with Eriq Gardner’s scintillating roundup of unpredictable predictions for the biggest legal sagas in Hollywood and media in 2026: the CAA–Range Media finale; the inevitable aftershocks from the WBD bidding war; Trump’s defamation campaigns against legacy newsrooms; a potential Lively-Baldoni trial; the still-explosive NFL Sunday Ticket case; and more.

Plus, below the fold: Ian Krietzberg explains how Google officially surpassed OpenAI in the so-called A.I. race. John Heilemann connects with the Times’s Ezra Klein to discuss why he’s finally feeling optimistic about politics. On The Town, Matt Belloni and Julia Alexander debate who won (and lost) the past year in streaming. On The Grill Room, Dylan Byers and Julia consider the biggest media storylines of 2026. And on Fashion People, Lauren Sherman and esteemed costume designer Stacey Battat break down the latest trends in the profession.

We’re working to prevent disease before it starts.

Too often, patients face barriers in getting the care they need. UnitedHealth Group is helping to remove these barriers while prioritizing new preventive care approaches that help keep patients healthy.

A look ahead at the most consequential media lawsuits and legal crises that will come to their conclusion in 2026.

Over the past three years, Google has responded to OpenAI’s ascent by investing heavily in A.I. development, building a baffling amount of data center infrastructure, and placing bets across the A.I. startup ecosystem. In 2025, Google finally caught up—and then surged ahead.

The Times columnist, podcast impresario, and would-be Democratic Party uber-reformer recaps the past year in politics—and explains why, despite his ongoing sense of alarm, he’s closing out 2025 feeling moderately hopeful.

At UnitedHealth Group, we’re reshaping care with a new approach: Helping physicians focus on patients and prevention, instead of paperwork.

See how we’re helping patients live healthier lives with a new model for health care.

Matt is joined by Puck media correspondent Julia Alexander to recap the year in streaming and hand out awards for Streamer of the Year, Most Disappointing Streamer, Show of the Year, Biggest Surprise Hit, and highlight the most interesting trends in streaming.

Dylan and Julia forecast the media chaos to come, mapping out the storylines likely to dominate the year ahead—from the ongoing Warner Bros. Discovery drama to Disney’s Sora experiment, Instagram Reels invading connected TV, and the likely disruption of the ad market. They also predict CNN’s uncertain future, the waning influencer economy, the A.I. forces quietly rearranging everything, and much more.

Lauren’s guest is Stacey Battat, costume designer behind a ton of Sofia Coppola movies, including Somewhere, The Beguiled, Priscilla, and On the Rocks. (She’s also worked on several television series, including Becoming a God in Central Florida and The Better Sister.) They discuss what being a costume designer actually entails, the differences between film and TV, Cartier watches, Stacey’s life as a shopgirl at Marc Jacobs on Mercer in the early 2000s, curly hair, and plenty more.

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