The incredibly diverse array of creatures on our planet have one thing in common.

They all — from butterflies to polar bears — live in a world that's dominated by humanity.

That's why, in this collection of photos that Reuters editors have determined are the most captivating animal photos of the year, you'll see the way all these creatures live in or beside the human world. 

Many now find their homes in zoos. Other coexist with humans, or live in fragile reserves in the wild. 

Check out some of the most incredible animal photography from the past year.

A keeper feeds a four-week-old jaguar at a zoo in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.

Giant panda cubs are seen inside baskets at a giant panda breeding centre in Ya'an, Sichuan province, China.

A male baboon with a very rare light-colored fur gene is seen at the Safari Zoo in Ramat Gan, near Tel Aviv, Israel.

Work-life balance is good for the soul.

Even the wealthiest, most successful people need time to unwind and escape from their day-to-day responsibilities.

Taylor Swift bakes. Bill Gates plays tennis. Below, read more about what they, and nine other hugely successful people, do when they're not working:

SEE ALSO: 21 outrageous ways the super rich spend their money

Investor Warren Buffett plays the ukulele and online bridge to keep his mind sharp.

Estimated net worth: $61.8 billion

Legendary investor Warren Buffett is a man of many talents. Not only has he been playing the ukulele for decades, but he also plays online bridge on a weekly basis — sometimes with Bill Gates.

Source: Forbesand CNN Money

Oracle's Larry Ellison has been a sailor since his 20s.

Estimated net worth: $46.1 billion

Ellison started as a novice sailor at the age 0f 22, when he first enrolled in a sailing course taught at the University of California.

Today, he's a member of the yacht-racing team Oracle Team USA, which won the 2010 and 2013 America's Cup — a prestigious yacht race founded in 1851.

Source: Business Insider

Billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson's favorite sport is kiteboarding.

Estimated net worth: $4.9 billion

The Virgin founder has explored space, the deep sea, and flown in a hot-air balloon across the Atlantic Ocean. Branson loves doing anything active that will keep him fit and productive, so it's no surprise that his favorite sport is kiteboarding.

Source: Business Insider

In Europe, if you don't have a car, it's a choice. People ride bikes, walk, or take the trains around most cities. But in America? You're a certified, TLC-described scrub without a ride. That is, unless you live in one of a few select cities -- where having a car isn't a requisite to getting love.

Unsurprisingly, New York City is the best city in the US if you're into biking, bipedal motion, and trains. That is, according to Seattle-based company Walk Score, which analyzed the largest 3,000 American cities to find those easiest cities for commuting without a car. The composite score combined data on walking routes, cycle paths, and public transportation, generating scores from 0 - 100 for each mode of transport.

NYC scored high for having the most efficient public transportation in the country, with 24-hour service and a transit score of 81.2. The Big Apple also rated no. 1 for its walkability, thanks to the city's grid system. But for bike-friendliness, it came in only no. 9, proving that more New Yorkers need to hop on their bikes.

San Francisco came in second overall, with an overall score of 80.5, ranking second-best in both walkability and bike-friendliness. Boston took third place, with a score of 74.8, and came in third for walkability, and fifth for bike-friendliness.

Most surprising, LA (aka automobile hell) made the top 10, with a score of 49.9. But from the way Angelenos complain about traffic, you'd never know anyone had ever heard of public transportation there.

Before you move to NYC to ride the A train, here are the top cities for public transit, along with the scores for bike-friendliness and walkability in each (where available).

SEE ALSO: The most bike-friendly cities in the world

10. Portland

49.6 (cycling: 70.3, walking: 63)

9. Los Angeles

49.9 (cycling: 54, walking: 64)

8. Baltimore

56.9 (walking: 66.2)

While a dollar won't get you two movie tickets, 20 bottles of Coca-Cola, or six McDonald's burgers like it used to, you can still get quite a few fun and practical things out of it.

We surfed the internet and did some exploring in New York City to find the best options for your four quarters.

Here are 30 ways to spend your dollar: 

SEE ALSO: 15 things you're better off buying used

A new razor every month with the Dollar Shave Club.

Subscription startup Dollar Shave Club will give you two stainless-steel blades and five cartridges per month for just $1. Business Insider tried the service — check out our review.

A slice of pizza in NYC.

A meal will cost you a fortune anywhere else in New York City, but not at the dollar-pizza joints. Check out 2 Bros Pizza or 99¢ Fresh Pizza for an inexpensive and delicious slice. 

A song from iTunes.

If you're into the latest hits, you'll probably have to shell out $1.29, but you can still find songs for $.99 on iTunes. Blogger Len Penzo recommends sorting by song title instead of popularity to find the cheaper versions.

If you thought graffiti was limited to spray paint, think again. 

People around the world are growing their own moss graffiti as innovative way to create living, breathing artwork. To do this, blend moss, yogurt, beer, and sugar into a liquid that will be used as "paint." From there, just apply the concoction to a wall in the design of your choosing and wait for the moss to grow in. For more detailed instructions, head here.

If you're looking for moss inspiration, Instagram is a great place to start. Just look up the hashtag #MossGraffiti for a look at some incredibly detailed, green artworks from around the world. 

Here are some of our favorites. 

Check out this awesome piece of moss graffiti.

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Moss graffiti doesn't grow in over night.

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Detailed designs can take weeks to fully grow in.

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Lockheed Martin's F-35 has had a busy 2015.

In November, the plane tested its onboard cannon aerially for the first time. This came months after the plane first successfully fired its cannon in June.

Successes such as these led the Marine Corps to declare, in July, that the F-35B was ready for combat.

And internationally, the F-35 continued to be a focus on attention. As Canada was mulling over whether to pull out of the F-35 program, Norway acquired its first ever F-35 in September. Also in September, the plane made its first ever international flight over Galliate, Italy.

With so much media attention, there was bound to be an amazing number of incredible photos of the plane throughout the year. We have listed the 15 best below via Lockheed Martin.

SEE ALSO: 14 events that changed military history

An F-35A takes part in a nighttime aerial-refueling test.

An F-35 activates its afterburners over the Patuxent River, Maryland.

An F-35B is seen flying into the sunset after taking part in tanker-testing.

There are only 1,826 billionaires in the world and there are some common traits that majority of them share.

According to price comparison website GoCompare, which analysed data from Forbes between 1996 and 2015, there are some major factors that the world's richest people seem to adhere to.

From sharing the same star sign to the average amount of children they usually have, there are some pretty weird common traits.

Check them out.

6. They're married — 88% of the world's billionaires have a spouse. The most well-known example right now is Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who is worth over $35 billion and is married to lawyer Priscilla Chan. Both recently welcomed their daughter Max into the world.

5. They have children — only 21% of the world's billionaires are childless. According to the Forbes data, a huge 25% of billionaires have four children in total while 17% have five or more like Donald Trump — Ivanka, Tiffany, Donald Trump, Jr., Eric and Barron.

4. They have degrees — Although billionaires like Virgin founder Richard Branson and Microsoft founder Bill Gates are famous for making their empires without a university education, 77% of the world's billionaires have a degree from Bachelor level upwards. Mexican telecoms billionaire Carlos Slim, pictured, got his degree in engineering.

If you want to provide for your adult kids, you aren't alone.

A 2015 survey from the Pew Research Center of nearly 1,700 Americans found 61% of parents with grown children had helped them out financially in the past year. Largely, they don't consider this a burden: 72% felt they were expected to help their children "the right amount," and 89% found it rewarding.

But are you supposed to feed money to your grown children indefinitely? And if not, how do you know when to stop?

Below, we have outlined five signs it might be time to stop sharing, with the help of certified financial planner Katie Brewer, financial coach to Gen X and Gen Y with Your Richest Life.

SEE ALSO: How to make sure your wealth lasts a lifetime — or more

It puts your financial stability at risk.

If paying your child's bills means you're having trouble paying your own, it's time to cut the purse strings. 

"I've seen people trying to help out so much that they end up financing it onto their own credit cards," Brewer says. "The problem is that what comes in should equal what goes out — and hopefully more comes in. If you have more expenses than you have income, and you're putting those on credit cards, you're digging the hole deeper with high interest rates."

In fact, she has seen this situation go both ways: parents helping grown children in ways they can't afford ... and grown children helping parents beyond their means. 

You're putting off your goals to help them achieve theirs.

Tension around paying your monthly bills isn't the only sign you're compromising your financial stability. Putting off your own big-picture goals, like saving for retirement or buying a new house, until your kids are no longer in need is also problematic. 

"Financial planners like to say, especially when it comes to paying for tuition, your child can take out loans for college, but you cannot take out a loan for retirement," Brewer says. "If you haven't saved enough and aren't prepared, you're either going to live on cans of beans or won't be able to retire — which sometimes doesn't work as a plan. If your company lays people off, you might not have a choice."

They have a steady job and could pay their bills with a little budgeting.

If your kid could be self-supporting, but isn't, you might want to consider giving them a little shove.

Brewer says she sees parents managing their adult children's money, but there are more sustainable avenues available. "If parents connected their children with a resource and nudged them in the right direction, it might be more of an opportunity to teach kids to be self-sufficient," she says, "versus their parents still doing everything for them."

She says this nudge could be as easy as showing kids how to link their accounts to an online budgeting tool (Mint and Personal Capital are two popular options), or scheduling a basic information session with a financial planner. "I've had instances where parents set up a call with their planner and have their adult kid on the phone, and say, 'If my child wants to do a starter plan, I'm willing to pay for it as long as they're willing to go through with it,'" she says.

While paying for your child's financial planner is still giving them money, it's also a strategy to make them more financially self-sufficient. "The parent is paying, but it's a way to be like, 'Here's a third party that's going to help you,'" Brewer continues. "It's not coming from mom and dad, so it's cutting out the relationship aspect, where kids might not want to take their parents' advice."

Sifting through the millions of Instagram posts filed under #Christmas would take until next holiday season.

Thankfully, Instagram did the work for us.

The app's "Discover" section is a curated list of photos or videos all celebrating a specific theme. This weeks' feature? The best of the holidays! 

From the Star Wars in the White House to Nordic reindeer sledding, we've picked out some of our favorites featured in the app. 

Scroll down for Instagram-inspired holiday cheer, and don't forget to press 'play'!

Scuba Santa was spotted in a Canadian aquarium. The original caption read: "Please do not feed the Santa."

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And surfing Santa is awesome, but his dance moves are downright impressive.

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Zach King is a master of illusion videos on Instagram. This gingerbread house one is up to snuff.

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Pioneering American philanthropist Andrew Carnegie once set the standard for giving back: "No man can become rich without himself enriching others," he said. "The man who dies rich dies disgraced."

Scores of the world's wealthiest people have taken to his philosophy, donating their riches to hundreds of causes.

We worked with our friends at Wealth-X, a firm that does research and valuations on ultra-high net worth individuals, to compile a list of the 20 most generous people in the world, ranked by total charitable giving to date.

Since you need to have a lot to give a lot, Wealth-X also determined each person's Generosity Index, which is the ratio of theirlifetime donations to their current net worth. Some people, like retail magnate Chuck Feeney, known as the"James Bond of philanthropy,"have indices over 100% because they have given away more money than they currently have.

With a total combined donation amount of $106.8 billion, these 20 individuals are the top philanthropists in the world.

SEE ALSO: The 25 richest self-made billionaires

DON'T MISS: The wealthiest people in the world under 35

20. Dietmar Hopp

Lifetime donations: $1 billion

Net worth: $6.3 billion

Generosity Index: 16%

German IT entrepreneur Dietmar Hopp is the cofounder and former chairman and CEO of SAP, a multinational company that provides application and analytics software and software-related services for enterprises worldwide.

Twenty years ago, Hopp established Dietmar Hopp Stiftung, a foundation that supports local education, sports, and health causes in his hometown in Germany, including the Heidelberg Institute for Stem Cell Technology and Experimental Medicine (HI-STEM), University Hospital Heidelberg, and the Nathalie Todenhofer Foundation.

Source:Wealth-X

19. Pierre Omidyar

Lifetime donations: $1 billion

Net worth: $6.2 billion

Generosity Index: 16%

Paris-born, Iranian-American Pierre Omidyar is cofounder and current chairman of eBay.

In 1998, he and his wife, Pamela, established the Omidyar Foundation, an organization that now includes Omidyar Network, HopeLab, Humanity United, and Ulupono Initiative. The organization donates to a diverse range of causes, including entrepreneurship, human rights, food and energy, and games and technology. In 2012, Omidyar and his wife joined the Giving Pledge initiative started by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, promising to donate most of their wealth to charities. 

In August 2015, Omidyar reportedly sold 10% of his shares in eBay to undisclosed charities — a stock gift valued at nearly $270 million.

Source: Wealth-X

18. Michael Dell

Lifetime donations: $1.1 billion

Net worth: $18.9 billion

Generosity Index: 6%

Michael Dell is the chairman and CEO of Dell computer company. Since 1999, he's been the director of the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation, which gives primarily to education, social and human services, arts and culture, and community-development causes.

Earlier this year, the foundation pledged to donate $25 million to fund the construction of a new teaching hospital in Austin, Texas.

Source: Wealth-X

It's Christmas Eve. That means that all over the world families are gathering together around dinner tables to celebrate.

But here in New York, we have our own tradition: eating at a Chinese restaurant. 

In the beloved tradition of eating Chinese food on Christmas, we've found the best Chinese restaurants in Manhattan.

SEE ALSO: Inside New York City's most festive bar, where they spend more than $60,000 a year getting ready for Christmas

DON'T FORGET: Follow Business Insider's lifestyle page on Facebook!

Big Wong

67 Mott Street

Don't let the silly name fool you: Big Wong is a favorite among fans of classic small-plate, Hong Kong-style fare.

It's a bit of a dive, but it's worth it for the congee (a rice porridge served with a variety of meats and sides).

Grand Sichuan

21 St. Marks Place

There are several branches of the local Grand Sichuan chain, but the one on St. Marks Place is arguably the best in the city.

The menu of traditional Sichuan dishes is so extensive that you may have trouble choosing.

Han Dynasty

90 3rd Avenue

215 West 85th Street

The beloved Philadelphia restaurant chain opened its first outpost in New York's East Village in 2013, and it quickly became a favorite with New Yorkers. An Upper West Side outpost followed in April 2015.

Items on the menu are scored one to 10 based on spiciness, with 10 topping out at mouth-scorching. Order the famed dan dan noodle appetizer, and follow it up with a hot pot or one of the dozen or so other options on the entree section of the menu.

Healthcare and tech are among the fastest-growing sectors of the US economy, and several well-paying jobs in those industries are primed to expand dramatically in the next decade.

The US Bureau of Labor Statistics recently released its biennial projections for job growth across hundreds of occupations between 2014 and 2024.

We took those projections and combined them with BLS estimates of the 2014 median annual earnings of those jobs — using the geometric mean of the two numbers — to come up with a ranking of the best jobs of the next decade. To focus on good, high-paying jobs, we restricted our list to those with salaries higher than the 2014 median annual wage of $35,540.

Read on to learn about the best jobs of the future, including the typical level of education required and what people do on a daily basis, according to O*NET descriptions of the jobs.

SEE ALSO: The 27 jobs that are most damaging to your health

21. Elementary school teachers, except special education

Projected new positions by 2024: 78,300

Median annual earnings in 2014: $54,120

What they do: Teach young children basic skills in schools

Typical educational requirements: Bachelor's degree

20. Nurse practitioners

Projected new positions by 2024: 44,700

Median annual earnings in 2014: $95,350

What they do: Treat and diagnose patients' illnesses

Typical educational requirements: Master's degree

19. Financial managers

Projected new positions by 2024: 37,700

Median annual earnings in 2014: $115,320

What they do: Direct financial activities at organizations

Typical educational requirements: Bachelor's degree

The retail industry is slowly devolving into its death, and there's proof: more and more shopping malls are closing.

The malls are primarily those that are not high-end or low-end.

Earlier this year, D.J. Busch, senior analyst at Green Street Advisers, said to the New York Times, "It is very much a haves and have-nots situation." 

"Middle-level stores in middle-level malls are going to be extinct because they don't make sense," Howard Davidowitz, chairman of Davidowitz & Associates, Inc., a retail consulting and investment banking firm, said last year.

The White Flint Mall in Bethesda, Maryland opened in 1977.

Source: The Washington Post

It closed early this year. In February, only Lord & Taylor remained.

Source: The Gazette

The upscale mall was home to stores like Bloomingdale's and I. Magnin. Even Elizabeth Taylor was reported to appear at a department store at the mall.

Source: Washington Post

If you felt that some of the biggest movies this year were very familiar to those you’d seen in your youth, you’re not alone.

Four of the most gigantic blockbusters in 2015 heavily extracted movie plots and characters that were popular decades ago to create hits that are hard to define — a relatively new, unique, and apparently successful breed in Hollywood.

Some have called them “legacyquels” or “remakequels.” They're ostensibly sequels, but ones that closely follow the models of their franchises' origins, and "Star Wars: The Force Awakens," already clearly the biggest movie of the year, is a prime example.

However you want to label them, Hollywood sees their worth — so expect more.

But let’s look back on why we had a sense of deja vu watching these four movies.

SEE ALSO: RANKED: The 10 best movies of 2015

“The Force Awakens”

Global box office: $766 million (and counting) 

After years of going through prequels in which George Lucas attempted to show us the rise and fall of Anakin Skywalker aka Darth Vader, director J.J. Abrams and writer Lawrence Kasdan decided to delve back into the original trilogy to make “Episode VII: The Force Awakens.” And I don’t just mean bringing back familiar faces like Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and Luke. The structure of “The Force Awakens” feels like you’re watching a hyped-up version of “Episode IV: A New Hope.” Everything from an attack on a giant globe-like space station to the lead character being a loner from a desert planet who has a special talent — it's designed to take us back to our first encounter with this universe.

“Jurassic World”

Global box office: $1.7 billion

Director Colin Trevorrow and writing partner Derek Connolly also geeked out on the past, with a blessing from Steven Spielberg himself, to bring the “Jurassic” franchise back. In “Jurassic World," the legacy of Jurassic Park is seeped in the storyline. A technician can’t help but show off his vintage t-shirt with the park’s old logo. And when kids Gray and Zach find themselves stuck inside the park with the dinosaurs, it’s coming across the welcome center from the old park that gets them out of trouble. Not to mention that the hit of “Jurassic Park,” the T-Rex, shows up in grand fashion at the end of the movie.

“Creed”

Global box office: $97.6 million

To bring life back into the “Rocky” franchise, director Ryan Coogler moved the focus to the Creed family, specifically an illegitimate son named Adonis Creed (Michael B. Jordan) who dreams to one day be as great as his father, Apollo. Like “The Force Awakens” does with "A New Hope," Coogler uses a similar arc from the original “Rocky” to tell the story. An underdog — this time, though, with a pedigree surname — who trains his butt off, yes, even sprinting down the streets of Philly, as he prepares for a fight that will make or break his career. And then there’s Rocky Balboa being Adonis’ manager, an obvious homage to Mickey managing Rocky in the earlier films.

2015 wasn't a great year for tech IPOs. 

Some companies like Fitbit and Atlassian made splashes with above-average performance and a ton of enthusiasm from Wall Street. 

But this was also the year that so-called "unicorn" startups like Box, Square, and Apigee went public with market caps well below their last private valuations of more than $1 billion.

The tech IPO pipeline was pretty anemic, too, with lots of companies opting to stay private longer and raise more venture cash, rather than weather the chilly winds of the public markets. Next year is looking better, IPO-wise, but this year was slow.

Here's how some of the hottest and most-watched companies in tech did with their IPOs in 2015, calculated by comparing their initial price offering to their market close price on December 23rd, 2015. 

SEE ALSO: The 9 startups that secretly run the Internet

No. 11 Apigee: -49.35%. Apigee which helps developers build smarter apps, listed its April IPO at $17 per share, well below the $22.16 investors paid per share in its last private funding round. At close yesterday, Apigee was trading at $8.61.

No. 10 Etsy: -44.25%. Handmade goods marketplace Etsy priced its April IPO at $16 per share. Now, it's trading for $8.92, amid increased competition from the likes of Amazon.

No. 9 Pure Storage: -1.06%. In June, enterprise storage company Pure Storage priced its IPO at $17 per share. It's stayed pretty flat, trading at $16.82.

For many students, a college degree puts you on the direct path to a certain career, such as a doctor, teacher, or journalist. 

But for many others, the future isn't as clear-cut.

Maybe you want to go to med school, but don't necessarily want to be a doctor. Maybe you love maps, but aren't sure how to incorporate that passion into a career. Or perhaps you just haven't found anything that sounds appealing yet. 

Luckily, there are tons of great career options out there that many college kids have no idea even exist. In this helpful thread, Reddit users shared some of these under-the-radar occupations that most students probably haven't heard of. And they pay fairly well, too.

Here are 18 of our favorites, including salary data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, for those who need some inspiration finding their dream job.

SEE ALSO: 15 of the toughest interview questions you'll hear on Wall Street

Air traffic controller

Average annual salary: $118,780

"After school and training it pays an average of 100k a year, but there is an age limit to get accepted."— Kate1320

"My father is an ATC at Pearson. 200k a year with brilliant benefits. He provided a great quality of life for my family."— 1stOnRT1

Court stenographer

"It's a three-year program (on average — took me four to finish), but if you're proficient in grammar, have strong language skills, have solid finger dexterity from playing an instrument or video games, and are able to work independently, it's an incredible career.

"You work from home most of the time, lawyers very rarely schedule depositions before 10:00 am, you can make your own schedule, and the pay is great. Your pay reflects how hard you want to work and the jobs you're getting, but I made 65k my first year and nearly 80k my second."— Bad_Karma21

Dental hygienist

Average annual salary: $71,970

"I'm starting dental hygiene school in the fall and I would have never looked into it while in college. It's only after I graduated and realized that I had absolutely no idea what I wanted to do that I started seriously doing some research. Most dental hygiene programs only require a certain amount of prerequisite courses and a standardized test score for admission. Most are also bachelors degree programs as well, so mom and dad are pleased and you're spending the minimal amount of time you would earning a traditional university/college degree. Plus, salary starts at 50-60k a year with ridiculous benefits, at least in my area. Dentists treat their hygienists well!"— WinnifredBurkle

People are flocking to live in cities and enduring hellish commutes in the process, and architect Clive Wilkinson is tired of it.

Well, sort of.

As part of a collaboration between his architecture firm and Flaunt Magazine, Wilkinson's team came up with an all-rooftop set of communal workspaces — known as The Endless Workspace.

Designed for a cityscape that's a hybrid of Silicon Valley and London, the Endless Workspace lets people take elevators from their bedrooms straight up to a communal rooftop office.

The designs are satirical — not actually for implementation — but oh, how we wish they were real.

Wilkinson was tasked with coming up with an urban environment that drew inspiration from London and Silicon Valley, two places where busy commutes are the norm.

Wilkinson took to the London rooftops to rebuild the working world out of everyone else's way.

It makes sense, especially since communal workspaces are quickly becoming a more prominent fixture in major cities around the world.

The web of rooftop workspaces features hollow circular green spaces that look to the city below as well as courtyards that receive ample sunlight.

According to the architecture firm, the elevator system solves the problem of marathon-long commutes without creating a second problem of isolating people in their homes. 

The result: You work with people you know in your neighborhood, coming together throughout the day.

With the new concept, people go back to collaborating with people in disparate fields — a practice often referred to as "cross-pollination," the company said in a statement.

Meanwhile, without the flood of commuters each morning and evening, the underground rail systems are free to operate more smoothly.

People will be perched on their rooftops while the rest of city hums below.

I'll admit it: I can be a very stressed out person from time to time. Just don't try to interrupt me when I'm on deadline, or running late, or when I'm getting ready in the morning, or right when I come home from work...

So, I decided to try out the Spire, a wearable stress-tracking device that supposedly uses your breath to help monitor how tense, focused, or calm you are. 

The logic is simple: When you're stressed, your heart rate tends to picks up, so taking deep breaths can often be a good way to get that heart rate to slow down.

Here's what I learned from wearing the Spire for a week:

UP NEXT: I tried Fitbit for a month, and taking it off was the best decision I've made

CHECK OUT: Scientists made an online calculator that tells you your ‘fitness age' — and you can try it right now

My Spire arrived in the mail last Friday. The box came with the device, its charging dock, and instructions about how to get it set up.

The device picks up its charge by a sleek pad, which hooks up to your computer using a USB port. The device holds its charge for about 3 days, and since I chose not to wear the device overnight, it was easy to make sure it stayed charged throughout the day.

The device is pretty small, and clips underneath your shirt or onto your pants. I opted to put it under my shirt to make sure it was accurately tracking my breath, which took some getting used to.

Like horror movies in October, December is the only time you absolutely must watch your favorite holiday classics — no exceptions.

Some of these movies, like the holidays themselves, are very warm. Others are darker than you might expect.

We've come up with a list of what to watch while you are spending the holidays with your family, from the classics to a few choice curveballs.

These are the 12 best holiday movies to catch up on or enjoy all over again:

SEE ALSO: The best shows to binge-watch over the holidays

12. Yes, Seth Rogen's raunchy ensemble comedy "The Night Before" was just released this year, but it already feels like something that people will watch for years to come. It's a hilarious, dark, and surprisingly sweet Christmas movie for people who just can't connect to the Christmas Spirit.

11. Based on the classic children’s book, "The Polar Express" has CGI wizard Robert Zemeckis bringing to life a boy's magical ride to the North Pole. Tom Hanks is along for the ride as the voice of numerous characters. If you're a fan of the book, the visuals in the movie go beyond anything you imagined.

10. In "Bad Santa," Billy Bob Thornton plays an alcoholic conman who poses as a mall Santa every year to make out with all the money, jewels, and clothes he can get his hands on. But things change this year as he befriends a troubled kid. If you want to be anti-holiday (while also still being pretty holiday) this year, there's no better movie to watch.

Boyan Slat is not your typical 21-year-old.

At an age when most people are still trying to figure out what they're going to do with their lives, the Dutch innovator is the head of The Ocean Cleanup, a nonprofit that's raised millions of dollars to put into action a plan that Slat devised.

His goal is to help clean up the Pacific garbage gyre — an enormous area of the ocean where swirling currents cause plastic from around the world to converge in huge patches.

This plastic isn't just ugly. Animals like sea turtles, seals, and birds eat it, which poisons them. And as it breaks down into little particles called microplastics, the debris ends up in fish that often enter our own food supply.

Here's the story of why Slat thinks he has a plan that could clean up much of this floating trash, despite some serious questions from scientists. 

Slat tells Tech Insider a diving trip he took when he was 16 years old inspired him to fight plastic in the ocean.

"I was diving in Greece, and I realized there were more plastic bags than fish, and I wondered why we couldn't clean it up," he says.

Back at school, Slat saw a presentation showing how currents take litter from all over the world and build it up in massive patches.