In joint statement, Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin accuse ‘certain countries’ of trying to ‘tamper with the results of the victory of the second world war’
China and Russia pledged to further deepen their already “no limits” partnership in a joint statement published ahead of Russia’s military parade on Friday, as the two sides stressed the importance of maintaining the “correct view” of second world war history.
In a lengthy statement published during Xi Jinping’s visit to Moscow for the commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the end of the second world war, which Russia celebrates on 9 May as Victory Day, Xi and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin said “certain countries … are attempting to tamper with the results of the victory of the second world war”.
While staying on the northern Pelion peninsula in Greece we made our way by foot along the coast path to Paralia Fakistra beach, which is only accessible via a walk in from local villages along the coast. The white pebble beach is backed by a freezing cold waterfall, which cools you down after the dusty, challenging coast path route. The crystal-blue water is home to lots of sea life and snorkelling was joyous. One of the attractions that keeps visitor numbers down is that there are no cafes or bars or even shade, so I recommend taking a light parasol and some cool drinks, but keep your load light as the walk can get hot, especially along the coast path from nearby Damouchari, another great beach spot on the Pelion. Layla Astley
Alexander Skarsgård leads a funny AI sci-fi comedy, while a new documentary fills in gaps about the shockingly grotesque crimes of the notorious couple
Perfectly in tune with our current state of low-key but persistent AI panic, this sci-fi comedy stars Alexander Skarsgård as the titular, self-named security cyborg. Skarsgård’s bot has managed to hack itself, but having overridden its programming, it’s unsure of what to do with its freedom. After all, one false move and its semi-autonomous state will be revealed. The tone is wry rather than dystopian. Murderbot has been hired as security by a shambolic gaggle of space-travelling environmentalists – but while it does have the capacity to go on a killing spree, it really just wants to be left alone to watch soap operas and ponder its place in the universe. Dryly funny and existentially intriguing.
Apple TV, from Friday 16 May
The Send Nudes author’s follow-up conveys a profound message about the insufficiency of the nuclear family
To be selected for Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists list two years before your debut novel comes out must bring a certain amount of pressure. Saba Sams had already been named a rising star for her short-story collection, Send Nudes; one of the stories, Blue 4eva, won the 2022 BBC National short story award. Now comes Gunk, titled for the grotty student nightclub managed by the thirtysomething protagonist, Jules. The fried egg on the cover hints at a sleazy edge: expect hangover breakfasts with a dawn chorus soundtrack. It’s also a playful nod to more tender themes of fertility panic, unplanned pregnancy and young motherhood.
At the heart of Gunk is a not-quite-love-not-quite-triangle between Jules, her feckless ex-husband Leon, nightclub owner and irredeemable waster, and the young, mysterious nim – that lower case “n” is all part of her vibe. Nim arrives one night at the club and captivates both Jules and Leon with her shaved head, her alluring mouth (“big and wet and laughing”), and the sense that she’s on the run from her old life. Much of the novel is told through flashback. Before we encounter nim at the club, we know that she has had a baby, left him with Jules, and vanished. Jules is alone trying to comfort a newborn that “knew by smell, by taste, that I was not his mother”. The main narrative consists of Jules telling us how this state of affairs came to pass.
Ferdinand Marcos Jr, the president of the Philippines, where 80% of the population is Catholic, has congratulated Pope Leo on his election and said he prayed that he would “continue to bring the Church closer to the poor and disadvantaged”. In a statement carried by local media, he said:
On behalf of the Philippines, I congratulate Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost of the United States on his election as the successor of Pope Francis and leader of the 1.4 billion-strong Catholic Church
“As the new pontiff, who took the papal name Leo XIV, ascends the Chair of St. Peter and assumes the mantle of Bishop of Rome, I pray that he will continue to bring the Church closer to the poor and disadvantaged.
Prevost had been a leading candidate for the papacy since Francis tapped him to be head of the Vatican’s powerful Dicastery for Bishops, which vets bishop nominations around the world.
There had long been a taboo on a US pope, given America’s superpower status in the secular world, but Prevost prevailed, perhaps because he’s also a Peruvian citizen and had lived for years in Peru, first as a missionary and then as bishop.
Francis, the first Latin American pope, clearly had his eye on Prevost and in many ways saw him as his heir apparent. He sent Prevost to take over a complicated diocese in Peru in 2014, then brought him to the Vatican in 2023.
Erin Patterson’s children ate the leftovers of her beef wellington lunch after their mother and relatives fell ill eating the same meal the previous day, a court has heard.
Videos of interviews the siblings gave separately to police on 16 August 2023 have been shown to the jury in Patterson’s triple murder trial.
April trade data comes the day before representatives from Washington and Beijing were set to meet to discuss Trump’s tariffs
Chinese trade with the United States slumped in April even as its total exports beat forecasts, official figures show, as trade representatives from both nations prepared to meet this weekend in the midst of a gruelling trade war between the superpower rivals.
Exports to the United States – one of China’s top trading partners – fell 17.6% in April, data showed. Against that backdrop, analysts polled by Bloomberg had expected exports to rise just 2% year-on-year last month. However they beat expectations, coming in at 8.1%.
Britain has ‘reset’ relations with the EU, but with Farage ascendant again, our politics must be cured of the Brexit virus
Not much about Britain’s post-Brexit relationship with the European Union is settled, but Keir Starmer can justifiably claim it has been “reset”. That word was artfully chosen before last year’s election to dress low aspiration as high diplomacy. There are 10 days of negotiation before the summit in London, where a new UK-EU partnership is due to be unveiled. It will be more outline than substance. But there is progress in the very fact that Britain’s ruling party sees Brussels as a partner, not a parasite.
Old-guard Eurosceptics will, of course, denounce any deal as a betrayal of Brexit. If there are plans for a time-limited, youth exchange visa, it will be decried as a return to free movement by the back door. If there is agreement to align regulations so that goods can more efficiently cross borders and the European court of justice is involved in adjudicating compliance, the high priests of sovereignty will anathematise it for heresy. Any commonality on carbon levies or renewed permission for the French to fish in British waters will be painted in shades of surrender.
Thanks to milk, cool coconut and a luxuriant glaze, these little green tea-laced cakes are a bit moister than your average madeleine
Delicate, shell-shaped madeleines are always irresistible, but their charm fades quickly, because these little cakes tend to dry out within hours. To counter that, I’ve taken an untraditional turn by incorporating a little oil and milk to keep them soft and spongy for a couple of days. Matcha, the finely ground green tea powder, comes in a range of grades; use the best you can afford, but don’t be tempted to add more for the appealing colour – the sweet, grassy notes can tip into bitterness in an instant.
About 270,000 people died in Liberia’s timber trade-fuelled civil war. I helped to rebuild and protect its forests. Now Europe is threatening to undermine all our hard work
It is sad when a ruthless military dictator funds his government by destroying ecologically important rainforest, logging tropical trees and displacing and robbing the people who live in and depend on the forests for their livelihoods and culture.
The US president’s plan for Hollywood is full of plot holes. But when it comes to the hidden propaganda baked into movies, he may have a point
As always with pronouncements by President Trump, once you had peeled away the xenophobia, removed the stew of resentment, ignored the sheer idiocy and asterisked the possible illegality, there was a small kernel of truth to his posting on Truth Social last Sunday. “The Movie Industry in America is DYING a very fast death,” he wrote, pointing to the nefarious tax breaks other countries gave film-makers as “a National Security threat” and proposing an 100% tariff on films made oversees. “It is, in addition to everything else, messaging and propaganda! WE WANT MOVIES MADE IN AMERICA AGAIN!”
How would a 100% tariff on films made oversees work? Just movies shot overseas? What about movies set overseas? And who would pay? How do you impose tariffs on goods without a port of entry? “Commerce is figuring it out,” said a White House official. In fact, movies are listed as an exception to presidential authority under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which gives the president authority to address national security threats, so it is likely the lawyers would end up figuring it out, if Trump’s plan went ahead. But, many executives in Hollywood are quietly nodding agreement. It is true that Los Angeles has seen feature movie shoot days plummet from 3,901 in 2017 to just 2,403 in 2024, a 38% drop. Many major franchises such as Avatar and Mission: Impossible are shot mostly overseas, where the lure of lucrative tax breaks offset such minor inconveniences as the incursion of some Derbyshire sheep into one of Tom Cruise’s paragliding set-pieces.
Mayor to make major policy shift and say scale of housing crisis requires breaking taboo
Sadiq Khan is announcing plans to build on parts of London’s green belt, in a dramatic shift in housing policy aimed at tackling “the most profound housing crisis in the capital’s history”.
In a major speech on Friday, the mayor of London is expected to say the scale of the challenge, which could need about 1m new homes built in the next decade, requires a break from longstanding taboos.
From rocks being thrown at cars to spectators being given the red cards, readers share their experiences of the most shocking scenes at children’s soccer games
The first manager my son had, when he was seven, got the parents together and told us how shouting could affect our sons’ development and behaviour, not only as players but as human beings. Usually, I don’t behave so badly. The worst I’ve done is to complain to the referee and I’ve sworn once or twice. But mostly I’ve been civil. There was one time, though, when a game was interrupted because the other team had fielded ineligible nine-year-old players. There was a lot of swearing and shouting from managers and dads. My wife decided enough was enough and took our son from the field to go home. He was the team’s only keeper so without him there was no game and several of the other team’s dads taunted us, shouting: “Are you running?”, “Are you scared?”. My wife ignored them and headed for the exit but one of the dads pushed her. Another guy punched me from behind and I completely lost it and punched back. Both teams were expelled from the tournament. André Pereira Leme Lopes, 53, Brazil
Jonathan Freedland and the senior Washington editor of Semafor, Elana Schor, discuss what the US president is choosing to make a priority, and what he’s neglecting in return
On Thursday, the White House announced a framework for a US-UK trade deal. Earlier in the week, when asked for his take on India’s missile attack on Pakistan, Donald Trump replied: “I get along with both.” But before all of that, on an otherwise quiet Sunday, the US president announced tariffs on foreign films and the reopening of Alcatraz. Throw in the White House posting another AI-generated image of Trump – this time featuring a lightsabre, muscly arms and two bald eagles – and you have one chaotic week.
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On a summer morning in 1990, the body of a young woman appeared in a small town close to the frontier. For those who saw her, finding her identity became an obsession that would last 30 years
The actor’s new travelogue with Charley Boorman is far from action-packed – and could do with fewer episodes. But watching them ride eventually becomes entrancing
They’ve gone Round, Down and Up, and now, for their fourth season, Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman are attempting to ride the Long Way Home. In 2020, the long-running blokes-on-bikes travel series was revived by Apple after a 15-year gap, and it set its stars the task of travelling from the southernmost tip of South America to Los Angeles on electric motorbikes. Not all fans of the previous seasons were enamoured with it, not least because it lacked the everyman appeal of their earlier runs. Having a big team at Harley-Davidson design and custom-build vehicles for the job, and getting a company to install charging points along the route for them, wasn’t quite the same as two old mates jumping on their bikes and camping wherever the mood dictated.
It makes sense, then, for Long Way Home to take it back to basics. It certainly seems as if a concerted effort has been made for McGregor and Boorman to be more relatable. We see more of them with their families and children, and it appears to be a more intimate operation. Instead of the fancy central London office and massive logistics team, there’s a big map pinned to the wall of McGregor’s garage, a small gathering of the original crew, and that should do it. Or at least, it’s made to look that way.
After a relationship breakup, rambling 700 miles from the Highlands to Dorset with Martin helped restore my faith in people
I’ve always had a keen sense of adventure. During the summer holidays, my parents would push me and my sister out of the front door and tell us only to come home to eat. I went from roaming the streets of Hackney in east London as a child, to trekking, wild camping and hitchhiking the length of the Americas in my late 20s.
After returning to my home in Liverpool, I worked as a photographer and got into a relationship. When we broke up years later, I was distraught – but it led me back to the life of exploration that I’d put on the back‑burner. In the summer of 2016, I embarked on a solo 1,000-mile (1,600km) route through Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. Not wanting to feel sealed off from the wondrous environments around me, I did the majority of it on foot.
Pentagon will give other trans service members 30 days to self-identify while it enforces recently approved ban
The Pentagon is removing the 1,000 members of the military who openly identify as trans, and giving those who have yet to openly-identify as transgender 30 days to remove themselves, according to a new directive issued Thursday.
The memo is fueled by Tuesday’s supreme court decision allowing the Trump administration to enforce a ban on trans military members. The defense department has said it will follow up by going through medical records to identify others who haven’t come forward.
Spurs beat Bodø/Glimt and look for first trophy in 17 years
‘I know the lads have it in them to rise to the challenge’
Ange Postecoglou said it would be “massive” for Tottenham to win the Europa League after they set up an all-English final thanks to a resilient 2-0 win over Bodø/Glimt.
Spurs, who have gone 17 years without silverware, made it through to their first European final since 2019 after producing a streetwise display on a plastic pitch in northern Norway. Goals from Pedro Porro and Dominic Solanke sealed a 5-1 aggregate win, meaning the north London club will qualify for the Champions League if they beat Manchester United in Bilbao on 21 May.
Amid a gloomy season, pyrotechnics lit up Old Trafford and Mason Mount led United into the Europa League final
This match meant everything to Manchester United’s season, the one that could save it from oblivion. Amid the Sir Jim Ratcliffe penny-pinching, there was budget for pyrotechnics to complement the tifos and raucous chanting from both sets of fans to create a glorious backdrop for what could be one of the final great European nights at Old Trafford.
With plans in place to knock down the Theatre of Dreams and replace it with a 100,000-capacity stadium in as soon as five years and the current United squad going through a transition under Ruben Amorim, the prospect of reaching the final four in major competitions before the final brick is laid is not guaranteed.
Buoyed by supreme court ruling, Pentagon will remove as many as 1,000 service members. Key US politics stories from Thursday 8 May at a glance
“No More Trans @ DoD,” Pete Hegseth, the US defense secretary, posted after the supreme court allowed the Trump administration’s ousting of transgender troops to go forward. As of Thursday, the orders have been issued to identify and involuntarily force trans people out of service.
Department officials have said it is difficult to determine exactly how many transgender service members there are, but medical records will show those who have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria, show symptoms or are being treated. Those troops would then be forced out.
Residents – Catholic and non-Catholic – celebrate a ‘moment of joy’ as native son Robert Prevost becomes new pontiff
As white smoke billowed from the Vatican in Rome, yellow papal flags whipped in the crisp Lake Michigan breeze in front of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Academy on Chicago’s North Side.
Screams of “Habemus Papam!” echoed throughout the cafeteria at the Catholic school on Thursday afternoon, when news broke that Chicago’s Robert Prevost had become Pope Leo XIV.
Ukrainians record 734 attacks despite Putin’s claim of three-day halt to fighting; Britain further targets Russian oil ‘shadow fleet’. What we know on day 1,171
Donald Trump after a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for “ideally, a 30-day unconditional ceasefire”. “If the ceasefire is not respected, the US and its partners will impose further sanctions,” Trump posted. Zelenskyy said after the call on Thursday that he told Trump that Ukraine was ready for talks on the war with Russia “in any format” but first “Russia must show that it is serious about ending the war, starting with a full and unconditional ceasefire”.
The call between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Thursday went “very well”, said a senior Ukrainian official. The conversation lasted about 20 minutes and focused on diplomacy and the genuine ceasefire that the US and Ukraine are trying to establish, while the presidents also discussed the Ukraine-US minerals deal, ratified on Thursday by the Ukrainian parliament.
Ukraine has accused Russia of violating Vladimir Putin’s self-declared ceasefire 734 times within its first 12 hours. Kyiv’s foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, called it a “farce”. The Russian president’s unagreed ceasefire aims to protect parades and other proceedings on Russia’s biggest secular holiday, the 80th anniversary of victory over Germany in the second world war.
In its opening hours, Russian bombs struck north-east Ukraine, killing at least one civilian, said Ukrainian officials who added that artillery assaults took place across the 1,000km (620 mile) frontline, although with less intensity than in the previous 24 hours. Russia carried out 63 assaults along the frontline. Attacks took place near Chasiv Yar in the Donetsk region. Large-scale missile and drone attacks abated for a short time, the Ukrainian air force said. But Russian forces fired a missile in central Ukraine’s Poltava region, a top regional official said, damaging roofs of houses when air defences brought it down.
The Russian defence Ministry accused Ukrainian forces of attacking its positions and said Russian forces would continue to “mirror” Ukraine’s actions during the Kremlin’s ceasefire. The Russian regions of Belgorod, Lipetsk, Orenburg, Ryazan and Tambov issued drone alerts, but there were no reports of any drones being shot down or intercepted. Russia’s civil aviation authority Rosaviatsia briefly imposed restrictions on flights to and from the airport in Nizhny Novgorod.
Reuters journalists with a Ukrainian drone unit near the front in eastern Ukraine said a Russian infantry raiding party tried to advance on Thursday, but was stopped by drones. “The infantry are still coming,” said one of the soldiers in the unit, a 33-year-old who identified himself by his callsign Mikha. A second person who identified himself as Nazar said in the six hours since the Russian ceasefire started there had been three strikes on his section of the front: “The facts speak for themselves.”
Germany said Trump voiced support for European efforts to end the Ukraine war in a first phone call with the new German chancellor, Friedrich Merz. A German statement said: “Trump said he would strongly support Germany’s efforts, together with France, Great Britain, Poland and other European partners, to achieve lasting peace.” Merz assured Zelenskyy of his support and remained open to arming Ukraine with Germany’s Taurus cruise missiles, which the previous chancellor, Olaf Scholz, refused to do.
Britain has announced further sanctions targeting Russia’s shadow fleet of oil tankers. Keir Starmer, the prime minister, said his government was sanctioning up to 100 tankers responsible for carrying more than $24bn worth of cargo since the start of 2024. The UK also said the ships are damaging critical subsea cables in Europe.
Starmer is due to attend a meeting of the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) in Oslo on Friday where Ukraine and Arctic security are on the agenda. The British-led military alliance is expected to announce further support for Ukraine’s armed forces including intensive training exercises and efforts to counter disinformation. The JEF consists of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, the Netherlands, and Sweden, as well as the UK.
Director Joe Carnahan’s limply made thriller about an estranged couple of elite operatives is a lazy grab bag of exhaustingly familiar cliches
Maybe the new action movie Shadow Force is just deserts for film fans who complain when seemingly surefire big-screen hits such as Another Simple Favor debut as streaming-only releases. Shadow Force has a premise almost comically adherent to the fixations of so many big-budget streaming movies: elite operatives Kyrah (Kerry Washington) and Isaac (Omar Sy) must fight for their lives and their family when they defy the rules of their, yes, shadowy employers by falling in love and having a child. It shares familiar components including charismatic stars, spy action, domestic strife and semi-slapstick violence with projects such as Back in Action (Netflix), Role Play (Prime Video) and Ghosted (Apple TV+), among others. With director Joe Carnahan, it even has a once edgy stylist who used to deal in gritty grain, blown-out color and quick-cut aesthetics, now following in the footsteps of fellow 2000s-era action directors such as McG and Antoine Fuqua by eliminating all traces of color from his work – another streaming trademark. Somehow, it is nonetheless premiering in movie theaters.
This change of venue should be doing Shadow Force a great service. No action picture worth its salt will play better on a smaller screen. But blown up to theater size, Shadow Force doesn’t look any more epic or exciting. It’s working from such a greyish and muted color palette that when enemy combatants throw smoke bombs in order to conceal their attacks, you might find yourself thinking: what’s the difference, really? The whole movie looks like it’s waiting for smoke to clear.
Surge of departures – mostly fleeing a weak economy - fuels concern over the longer-term impact on the country as some small towns scramble for survival
She considers herself a diehard South Island girl, but Harriet Baker, 33, won’t be raising her children in the city where she’s spent most of her life.
“When we bought our house I said, ‘You’ll be taking me out of here in a casket,” she says, of the Dunedin home she and husband Cameron Baker, 33, sold last month.
There’s a gap between what you want to do and what you do, advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith writes. Thinking about how it affects others might help
I recognise myself to be very contrarian, to the point of reacting in this fashion in every situation, regardless of what it is. How can I change this?
Eleanor says: It sounds as though there’s a gap between what you want to do and what you do. You can see you’re being contrarian, you want to change that, but that’s not enough to mean things actually change.
There are high stakes at St James’ Park, City could yet nab second and will Forest cope with playing on the front foot?
Antonee Robinson has been one of the best full-backs in the league this season. He flies up and down the left flank, defends well and whips in crosses. However, the Fulham defender was not at his sharpest during his side’s defeat to Aston Villa last weekend. He found it difficult to contain Morgan Rogers and his crossing was not up to its usual high standards. The concern is whether Robinson, who had missed Fulham’s previous game, is in peak physical condition. It has been a long campaign but Marco Silva needs the USA international to be ready to go when Everton visit Craven Cottage on Saturday. Robinson’s raids are a key part of Fulham’s attacking set-up. Jacob Steinberg
Vice-president says US will seek to de-escalate but cannot force either nuclear power to ‘lay down their arms’
JD Vance has said that the US will not intervene in the conflict between Pakistan and India, calling fighting between the two nuclear powers “fundamentally none of our business”.
The remarks came during an interview with Fox News, where the US vice-president said that the US would seek to de-escalate the conflict but could force neither side to “lay down their arms”.
The election of Pope Leo XIV has been celebrated across Latin America, where many hailed him as the second pontiff from the region, after his Argentinian predecessor, Francis.
The news prompted particular elation in Peru, where he lived and worked for more than 20 years and was granted citizenship in 2015. In the capital, Lima, the bells of the cathedral rang in celebration.
In his first appearance from the Vatican balcony, Leo XIV briefly switched from Italian to Spanish to address the faithful “from my beloved diocese of Chiclayo, in Peru”, where he served as bishop for more than a decade.
Arsenal need seven points to finish second in league
Mikel Merino has vowed Arsenal’s young squad will learn from being eliminated in the Champions League semi-finals and is convinced they will “be back stronger” next season.
They say you cannot win a two-legged tie after just 90 minutes but Sheffield United took a giant step towards the Wembley playoff final showpiece after surging towards a 3-0 victory over 10-man Bristol City. For the Blades, who also had an early goal questionably chalked off, their task was made easier after the City defender Rob Dickie was sent off on the verge of half-time, allowing Harrison Burrows to strike from the penalty spot and give Chris Wilder’s side a leg-up. In the second half the substitutes Andre Brooks and Callum O’Hare clinched victory.
This time the billowing red smoke on the pitch came from the delirious United away end, where the injured homegrown Blades midfielder Ollie Arblaster was thought to be enjoying himself. Suddenly City’s pitch invasion only last weekend felt an awful long time ago. For all of the talk of the gulf between these teams, the 22 points which separated third-placed United and sixth-placed City, ultimately the sending-off transformed this match. Now City’s only hopes of reaching the final hinge on an unthinkable – and sizeable – victory at Bramall Lane.
Who are you and what have you done with Ange Postecoglou? There was a messy goal from a set piece, another from a mishit cross, a plan with pragmatism at its core and a team able to find beauty in the kind of ugly performance that has so often left Postecoglou cold.
All the cool came from Tottenham Hotspur in the Arctic Circle. They were robust rather than flimsy on the infamous plastic pitch at the Aspmyra Stadium, serious rather than spectacular, and they did not mind turning this Europa League semi-final against punchy, determined Bodo/Glimt into a grind. Postecoglou, the manager with supposedly no clue how to kill a game, came up trumps. Spurs were dogged, streetwise and smart in unpleasant conditions in northern Norway and, after a season of such strife in the Premier League, their reward is an all-English final against Manchester United later this month.
Chelsea’s status as London’s prime European trophy hunters remains inarguable. Winning this season’s Conference League would add to a set of two European Cups, two Europa Leagues and having twice been winners of the old Cup Winners’ Cup.
If Uefa’s minor competition is not meant for global super-clubs, more clubs such as Djurgården, swept aside easily over two legs, Blues fans can look forward to an eighth European final, having won six of seven. It is a haul Arsenal fans licking painful wounds from Paris can only dream of.
The Mason Mount strike that sealed Manchester United’s Europa League final berth was as sublime as Ruben Amorim’s team were slipshod until the substitute took charge.
With 72 minutes gone, Leny Yoro prodded the ball to Mount who, with the sweetest touch of his right instep, swivelled, then bent the equaliser past the helpless Julen Agirrezabala.
Our crime-solving heroine is utterly charming, it’s stuffed with A-list stars and some episodes are just great. If only the cases were a bit more clever
This tribute to case-of-the week crime dramas is so nearly a brilliant TV show. Starring Natasha Lyonne (Orange Is the New Black, Russian Doll) as Charlie Cale, a woman with a foolproof ability to tell truth from falsehood, the series follows in the footsteps of classic story-of-the-week crime dramas; each episode features a tranche of excellent guest stars and a freshly covered-up misdeed for our thoroughly charming citizen-detective to uncover. With her gravelly-chipmunk New York tones – or “voice like a rusty clarinet”, as one character has it – Lyonne ensures Cale is an idiosyncratically charismatic protagonist you can really get behind. She’s cool: her catchphrase is “bullshit” and her aesthetic is 1970s-hued indie sleaze; shades, spray-on jeans, biker boots, shrunken T-shirts, wild, matted hair. She’s chaotically good, too: mischievous enough to bend the rules but essentially golden-hearted, in possession of an old-timey garrulousness and an inability to let things lie. What’s not to love?
The mysteries themselves, mainly. Most episodes of Poker Face – which was created by Knives Out director Rian Johnson, although he is not a credited writer on this second season – involve a 10ish-minute Cale-free opening, during which the viewer bears witness to a crime, usually a murder. Afterwards, we discover how our hero came to be acquainted with both the perpetrators and victims. Since the end of the very first episode, Cale has been on the run: first from a shady casino boss who wanted her dead (she was involved in the destruction of his business and the suicide of his son); then, as of the start of this new season, another shady casino boss who wants to exploit her lie-detection skills. To evade capture, she zigzags across the States at random – and into the path of a host of inadvertent murderers.
The internet exploded with humor and Chicago pride on Thursday following the historic announcement that Robert Francis Prevost, a 69-year-old American clergyman from Chicago, has been named the new pope.
Now known as Pope Leo XIV, Prevost has become the first clergyman from the United States to lead the Roman Catholic church, ending the Vatican’s longstanding opposition to the idea of a US pontiff.
The home favourite Luke Humphries continued the feelgood factor in Leeds by winning night 14 of the Premier League, beating Luke Littler in the final. Littler, a Manchester United fan, had earlier mocked Leeds fans in his opening match
The city has been celebrating the football club’s promotion from the Championship this week and the buoyant supporters got to watch their adopted favourite book his place in the playoffs later this month.
The film-maker, whose credits also included many Madonna music videos, died of brain cancer
Director James Foley, whose credits included Glengarry Glen Ross and the Fifty Shades sequels, has died aged 71.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, his death was confirmed by his representative who said he died “peacefully in his sleep earlier this week following a years-long struggle with brain cancer”.
US agency will no longer update major weather database in latest showing of Trump’s influence on climate resources
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) will no longer track the cost of climate crisis-fueled weather disasters, including floods, heatwaves, wildfires and more. It is the latest example of changes to the agency and the Trump administration limiting federal government resources on climate change.
Noaa falls under the US Department of Commerce and is tasked with daily weather forecasts, severe storm warnings and climate monitoring. It is also parent to the National Weather Service.
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