WBD had urged shareholders to reject $108.4bn hostile takeover bid from Paramount, which is controlled by the Ellisons, following $82.7bn Netflix deal
The tech billionaire Larry Ellison has agreed to provide a personal guarantee of more than $40bn for Paramount Skydance’s fight to gain control of Warner Bros Discovery, amid an extraordinary corporate battle over the entertainment giant.
WBD urged shareholders to reject a $108.4bn hostile takeover bid from Paramount – which is controlled by the Ellisons – last week, having agreed to sell its storied movie studios, HBO cable network and streaming service to Netflix in a $82.7bn deal earlier this month.
Our hanukiah is ridiculous. I love it precisely for its absurdity; a chunky, oversized piece designed by a dear friend and crafted from aircrete. It looks like a forgotten set piece from The Flintstones. In a family home that also contains challah covers, mezuzahs, kippot and Shabbat candles, our menorah is easily the most overtly Jewish thing we own. Its presence badges us immediately. Brash and proud. Up until last week, this never struck me as a problem.
In my many overlapping circles of friends and collaborators, I am one of the only Jews they know. I spend a lot of time explaining our traditions to film directors, musicians, editors and producers. Why we fast on Yom Kippur. How often we observe Shabbat. How kashrut works, even though I am partial to pepperoni pizza. Hanukah, by all accounts, is the fun one. When I was a teenager, Adam Brody’s Seth Cohen married it with Christmas on The OCand made it something everyone could get behind. Like all Jewish festivals, it is a celebration of survival in the face of annihilation. But it comes with candles, doughnuts and dreidels. Much joy, minimal fasting.
The documents are disturbing. But they seem largely to reflect information that has already been made public
After months of public outcry and pressure from within the Maga coalition, Donald Trump’s justice department released what it called The Epstein Files, with the Trump world’s typical fanfare. A media frenzy ensued. But the “files” that were released by Pam Bondi’s Department of Justice left many observers frustrated and confused. The release was partial and heavily redacted; much of the information had already been made public. Media figures were incensed, and members of Congress pledged to push the Trump administration for more. The episode left Washington watchers frustrated. It fueled speculation that Trump, who had long opposed the release of the documents, had something to hide.
That was on 27 February, when a group of 15 rightwing media figures who had taken a special interest in the Epstein case were summoned to the White House and given white binders labeled “The Epstein Files.” The release was meant to allay pressure from the president’s conspiracy-minded base and neutralize the Epstein issue, which has dogged Trump since the financier sex offender and former close friend of the president died in prison during his first term in 2019. But those who received the binders said that there was little new information in them. The episode only further inflamed tensions and increased the salience of the Epstein issue.
Online activity shows the Base, headed by alleged Russian asset Rinaldo Nazzaro, sees US and Ukraine as key centers
Amid high-profile arrests in its Spanish cell, the American-born and designated neo-Nazi terrorist group the Base – once a major preoccupation of FBI counter-terrorism efforts – has all but faded from US headlines. But a flurry of online activities shows the group is still active stateside and considers the US an operational nerve center.
Headed by Rinaldo Nazzaro, an ex-Pentagon contractor turned alleged Russian intelligence asset, the Base has been busy of late pursuing European expansion: besides its heavily armed members in Spain, its Ukrainian wing is linked to multiple acts of terrorism inside of the country and claimed the high-profile July assassination of an intelligence officer in Kyiv.
As number of lunar satellites soars, sites will be marked out where defunct hardware can be crash-landed
Patches of the moon are destined to become spacecraft graveyards where dead lunar satellites and other defunct hardware can be crashed into the ground, far away from sites of cultural and scientific importance, researchers say.
The number of satellites circling the moon is set to soar in the next two decades as space agencies and private companies build moon bases and dabble with mining operations and constructing scientific instruments on the barren terrain.
The bookshop chain said the bestselling author will ‘no longer be appearing’ at a Dundee event after HarperCollins announced it won’t publish new titles by him
David Walliams has been dropped from the Waterstones Children’s book festival following allegations of inappropriate behaviour. The decision comes days after his publisher, HarperCollins, cut ties with the author. Walliams has denied the allegations.
Walliams was set to appear at the Dundee leg of the festival on February 7. He has now been removed from the list of speakers on the festival’s website. A spokesperson for Waterstones told the Guardian: “HarperCollins have confirmed that David Walliams will no longer be appearing at our festival in Dundee.”
A fightback win over RB Leipzig before the Christmas break is just reward for coach who faced a thankless task
Leipzig might not be every Bundesliga fan’s idea of a weekend idyll but as the sun set on 2025, the venue for the final Saturday night Topspiel of the year might have been the scene of a minor Christmas miracle. It had already been a worthy showpiece to draw the curtains on pre-Christmas Bundesliga but the end result – achieved not without a smidgeon of controversy – left us with a satisfying tale to tell by an open fire over holiday season.
For Bayer Leverkusen can enjoy their brief break with a rosy glow of satisfaction with their win against a direct competitor a clear measure of how far they have come; or, if you like, a measure of how far Kasper Hjulmand has taken them. Leverkusen sit third over the bridge to the new year which, if we were to return to the closure of the summer transfer window, looked a long way off.
Move made after first phase of anti-subsidy investigation widely seen as retaliation for bloc’s EV tariffs
China will impose provisional duties of up to 42.7% on certain dairy products imported from the EU from Tuesday after concluding the first phase of an anti-subsidy investigation widely seen as retaliation for the bloc’s electric vehicle tariffs.
The tariffs will range from 21.9% to 42.7% – although most companies will pay about 30% – and target products such as milk and cheese, including protected origin brands such as French roquefort and Italian gorgonzola.
Up to 80% of league and 20% of union claims face strike-out
Appeal over medical record disclosure denied on all grounds
Two appeals launched by the legal firm representing former players in rugby league and rugby union have both been denied in a significant blow to the ongoing legal action about brain damage caused by the sport. It means that after five years of legal arguments a large number of the claimants in both codes face the risk of having their cases struck out before they come to trial.
The appeal judge, Mr Justice Dexter Dias, ruled that the judge presiding over the management of the case, Senior Master Jeremy Cook, had been right to find that the claimants firm, Rylands Garth, had failed to fulfil its obligations to disclose necessary medical material to the defendants, World Rugby, the Wales Rugby Union, and the Rugby Football Union in one case, and the Rugby Football League in the other.
The world record holder on his remarkable year, that viral kiss and why he’s serious about music
Plenty of sports stars strive for perfection. In 2025, Mondo Duplantis achieved it. He broke the pole vault world record four times. Retained his world indoor and outdoor titles. Won all 16 competitions that he entered. Was voted World Athletics’ male athlete of the year. And, for good measure, was named the BBC’s overseas personality of the year too.
“There’s not necessarily such a thing as a perfect season,” Duplantis says on a bright December day in Monaco. He pauses. “But that’s as perfect as it can get.”
Crucial tonal shifts mean the film asks harder questions than the series ever has before. Share your thoughts in the comments below • This article contains spoilers for Avatar: Fire and Ash
For more than a decade now, James Cameron’s Avatar films have been built on the reassuring idea that the universe is alive, connected and spiritually pure. Part of the pleasure of making it to the end credits of one of them is the comforting feeling that we are nothing like all those evil humans who want to destroy Pandora’s gorgeous bioluminescent utopia of giant blue cat people and navel-gazing whale creatures. Cameron wants to remind us that if we only spent less time chasing profit and more listening to nature, everything would probably be fine.
Fire and Ash is where that reassurance starts to curdle. It is still recognisably an Avatar movie: the tech is absurd, the sincerity remains weaponised, and the creatures appear to have been designed by a benevolent god with a doctorate in marine biology. But something has shifted. Harmony is no longer guaranteed; nature does not reliably pick a side. What emerges is a threequel that feels oddly argumentative, sometimes with the audience, sometimes with itself. The saga that once promised balance now seems fascinated by fracture. Avatar has started asking much harder questions than it ever has before.
Research shows 97% of band’s streaming revenue comes from 1973 single I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday
If you listen closely to the start of Wizzard’s yuletide standard I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday, you’ll hear the kerching of a cash register.
The sound might have been “a winning speck of cynicism in the tinselly facade” of 70s consumerism, according to the Guardian’s Alexis Petridis, but five decades on it has proved prophetic – the song accounts for nearly all of the band’s streams on Spotify.
Medetomidine has extreme and fast-acting withdrawal symptoms – and the detox centers that help patients are struggling with how best to cope
The staff at harm reduction hub Sunshine House in the middle of Kensington, a neighborhood in north-east Philadelphia home to the most notorious open drug scene in the US, often reverse at least one overdose per day.
But the mutating illegal drug supply is regularly conjuring new drugs with novel sets of potentially deadly risks. For the past 18 months, there has been a new drug in circulation, the veterinary sedative medetomidine, also known as “rhino tranq”. It has perhaps the most extreme and fast-acting withdrawal symptoms of all known street drugs.
It was 1995, and I had spent the evening carousing and drinking neat vodka. Now I was trapped in a friend’s flat in Paris, with no phone – and he had flown to New York
Winter 1995: I wake to the sound of a vacuum cleaner repeatedly striking the door near my head. I’m in a small bed in a tiny room. Wherever I am, I’m hungover.
I remember: I’m in Paris, after a big night out. Just the one night – I’d arrived on the Eurostar the previous afternoon with a friend. We’d gone out for drinks, then to a cool restaurant, then somewhere to drink more. The rest was blurry, but we ended up back at this apartment – owned by the company my friend worked for – drinking neat vodka until my friend remembered he was catching an early plane to New York.
While the country’s capital is loosening regulations, the Catalan city is strengthening social housing. Their outcomes will affect all our futures
In Spain, two cities face the same crisis, but are responding in fundamentally different ways. Over the past decade, the cost of housing in Madrid and Barcelona has soared – with rents rising by about 60% and sale prices by 90% – leaving young people, working families and retired people struggling to stay in their homes or even find one.
Yet, while one city is betting everything on construction and giving free rein to big investors, the other is cautiously trying to steer the housing market towards the public good, despite political and institutional constraints.
Jaime Palomera is a researcher on housing and inequality, author of The Hijacking of Housing, and co-founder of the Barcelona Urban Research Institute (IDRA) and the Tenants’ Union
Guardian analysis of 20 major companies in UK and US shows mentions of Pride on social media have fallen substantially in past two years
The UK’s biggest businesses are rolling back their public support for Pride celebrations, Guardian analysis suggests, prompting warnings that “clear signals” are needed in the face of growing global LGBTQ+ hostility.
Analysis of social media posts by the country’s biggest companies found mentions of Pride had plummeted by 92% since 2023, mirroring a trend seen in large American firms.
Major incident declared as 50-metre-long breach opens up and discharges water on to surrounding land
Ten people have been helped to safety after a sinkhole opened up in a Shropshire canal, pulling in boats and discharging large volumes of water on to surrounding land.
Emergency services declared a major incident after the 50-metre-long sinkhole breached the canal in the West Midlands, leaving boats teetering on the edge of a steep drop or stuck at the bottom of the cavity.
“Anything I can do to help?” If ever a line was guaranteed to incense the person in charge of cooking for a crowd, it is this one: uttered in seeming innocence by a guest roused by the sound of clattering pans, and who wants to seem polite but in reality hopes the answer is: “No, thank you.” This was drilled out of us from a young age by a mother who firmly believed that those who are serious about helping need not look far to find vegetables to chop or pots to wash up. But for guests who can’t “read” kitchens – or minds, for that matter – there are some principles that might prove helpful at this time of year. And, for hosts who hate delegating, there are a few ways to share the load (and increase the fun) without losing your sanity.
The easiest and perhaps most obvious job at Christmas is to pour drinks: for the principal cook first, and then for others. Not only does popping a cork or shaking a cocktail make a cook feel less like a caterer and more like part of the party, the sound has the effect of drawing in other helpers. “If you make a cocktail and divvy out jobs, even peeling vegetables is fun,” says Wahaca founder and Guardian regular Thomasina Miers, who enlists everyone in preparing for festivities.
Firms agree deals with Beijing-based Baidu to take self-driving cabs to UK capital
Chinese robotaxis are due to be on the streets of London next year after the US ride-hailing companies Lyft and Uber announced tie-ups with Beijing-based Baidu to deploy its self-driving technology.
Lyft is the third firm to announce plans to introduce self-driving taxis to the UK capital next year, after Uber and Waymo, the main operator of robotaxis in the US.
In a match mercifully on Spanish soil, Villarreal bombarded Barça but were undone by profligacy and ill-discipline
Marcelino García Toral came bounding down the steps like an excited schoolboy when the bell goes. He flew past the substitutes and staff, skidded left, and sprinted up the line all wide-eyed and excited, shaking his fists and beaming. He had gone 15 or 20 metres, maybe 25 when he realised – just a fraction later than everyone else – that something had gone wrong again. So Villarreal’s manager put the brakes on and his head down, and turned back towards the bench feeling almost as silly as this was getting. This, he already suspected, was going to be one of those days.
They had been playing 16 minutes and the goal Villarreal had scored, the goal Jules Koundé scored for them, wasn’t a goal at all. Just as the chance they made after 80 seconds wasn’t, Nicolas Pépé putting wide from a yard out. Just as Ayoze Pérez’s opportunity on six minutes wasn’t a goal, Tajon Buchanan’s effort on 13 wasn’t, and Raphinha’s on nine minutes was. One moment – a dash, a tumble and a penalty – and from nowhere Villarreal trailed Barcelona. Now they were level again only for a raised flag to halt the manager’s run as suddenly, the oh neatly summing up the afternoon when La Liga’s best teams met on the Mediterranean, not in Miami, and Barcelona beat Villarreal 2-0.
Researchers have realised the records are a ‘goldmine’ to study changes in environmental conditions
Yangang Xing had never heard of organ-tuning books, but his colleague Andrew Knight often played the pipe organ at churches as a teenager.
When the pair, who are researchers at Nottingham Trent University, set out to study how environmental conditions in churches had changed over time, Knight explained that all over the country many organs had notebooks full of data tucked away in their recesses.
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