Should Canada’s legal cannabis age really be 25?

Quebec says 21. Most provinces say 19. Alberta says 18. Same science on everybody's desk — three different answers. So what does the evidence actually support?

Our launch film, Episode One, opens that file honestly instead of pretending to close it. The concerns about the developing brain are real and worth taking seriously — and so is the public-health argument that a legal age of 25 would simply hand the 18-to-24 market, the heaviest-using cohort in the country, back to the illicit market with zero quality control and zero ID checks. Every age line is a trade-off between neuroscience and reality; the provinces just drew it in three different places.

The deeper point of Episode One is the deal this desk offers: Canada legalized cannabis and never built the communications layer — so we are building it, in public, with the receipts showing. You rank the stories on the board, and the best viewer takes get read on the next show. This question is Open File No. 1, and it stays open.

News, not promotion. Nothing here is for sale, and nobody funds the verdict. 19+ (18+ AB, 21+ QC). Educational journalism under s.16 of the Cannabis Act.