Period drama parody has some decent and often smart gags and benefits from a game cast including Damian Lewis and Thomasin McKenzie

Perhaps it’s the feeling of end times in the air: after years of inactivity, spoofs are making a comeback. This summer saw the resurgence of the lighthearted genre, which at its best sends up the pretensions of overly serious genre with a barrage of pitched cliches, sight gags and stupid-clever puns. The Naked Gun, starring Liam Neeson and Pamela Anderson in a spoof of a buddy-cop spoof, opened to moderate box office success; the hapless rock band dialed it back up to 11 in Spinal Tap II: The End Continues. Reboots of horror spoof gold-standard Scary Movie and the Mel Brooks Star Wars rip Spaceballs were greenlit, and rumors of a return for international man of mystery Austin Powers. Unserious times, it seems, begets appetite for knowingly unserious, joke-dense, refreshingly shallow fun.

The latest of these goofy parodies, which premieres, on the beyond-parody day that Fifa awarded Donald Trump an inaugural peace prize and Netflix announced its plan to buy Warner Bros, is Fackham Hall, a Downton Abbey spoof that pokes at the very pokeable pretensions of gilded British period dramas. (Yes, Fackham rhymes with a crass kiss-off to the aristocracy.) Written by British Irish comedian and TV presenter Jimmy Carr and directed by Jim O’Hanlon, Fackham Hall has plenty of material to work with – the historical soap’s grand finale just premiered in September, 15 years after Julian Fellowes’s series started going upstairs-downstairs with ludicrous portent – and wastes none of it. From ludicrous start (servants rolling joints for the household and responding to calls from the “masturbatorium”) to ludicrous finish (someone manages to marry a second cousin rather than a first!), this enjoyable silver-spoon romp packs all of its 97 minutes with jokes and bits ranging from the puerile to the genuinely funny, proving that there may yet be more to wring from eat-the-rich satire.

Britain’s briefest PM kept her fans waiting before launching her latest plea for Maga attention in the form of a ham-fisted YouTube talk show

In the lead-up to the launch of The Liz Truss Show – the hot new YouTube series from Britain’s shortest-serving prime minister – one phrase was repeated time and time again: “They tried to silence her.” Turns out they didn’t need to, because Truss was perfectly capable of doing that herself.

Episode 1, she tweeted, would be available on Friday at 6pm. Except, on Friday at 6pm, it was nowhere to be seen. By 6.05, with still no sign of it, her faithful began to grow itchy. “Where’s your show?” they tweeted at her. A few more minutes passed. “FFS Liz get your act together,” sighed another.

Hundreds driven into Rwanda as M23 militia battles Congolese army and Burundian soldiers for border town of Kamanyola

Fresh fighting in eastern DR Congo has forced hundreds to flee across the border into Rwanda, a day after a peace deal was signed in Washington DC.

Thursday’s agreement was meant to stabilise the resource-rich east but it has had little visible effect on the ground so far, in an area plagued by conflict for 30 years.

England manager happy to ‘focus on what we can influence’ after a draw that will live long in the memory and not for the right reasons

At the end of an extraordinary day in the US capital and a World Cup draw that lurched between the ridiculous and the sublime (with a greater emphasis on the former, if the truth be told), Thomas Tuchel and England now know. Croatia in Toronto or Dallas. Ghana in Boston or Toronto. Panama in New Jersey or Philadelphia. And that is just the group games.

With the excitement running wild and, well, England being England, their determination to bring it home to the fore, it was not long before the permutations were being scrutinised. It could be Mexico at the Azteca in the last 16 – the scene of the Hand of God in 1986. It could be Brazil in Miami in the quarter-finals. Tuchel pulled a face as if to say: “Wow.” There had been a lot to process. And that is before we talk about the Honourable Donald J Trump and his Fifa peace prize glory.

How each team qualified for the tournament, who will be favourites to progress and which games to look out for

The opening game in the Azteca will be a repeat of the opener in 2010 when South Africa drew 1-1 with Mexico in Soccer City, Soweto. Mexico have won one knockout game at the World Cup, beating Bulgaria last time they hosted, in 1986. Their manager, Javier Aguirre, was a forward in that side and will be targeting their third quarter-final as hosts. South Africa, coached by the veteran Belgian Hugo Broos, qualified for their first World Cup since hosting, finishing above Nigeria and Benin, despite having a game against Lesotho they appeared to have won awarded against them for fielding a suspended player.

‘Mutual’ decision follows controversy over relationship with presidential candidate and claims of ethical breaches

Vanity Fair is ending its association with Olivia Nuzzi, who had briefly been the magazine’s west coast editor, as the publication distances itself from controversy tied in part to her relationship with the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr.

“Vanity Fair and Olivia Nuzzi have mutually agreed, in the best interest of the magazine, to let her contract expire at the end of the year,” publisher Condé Nast said in a statement on Friday shared with the New York Times.

Home security videos shows Jacelynn Guzman, 23, telling masked federal agents following her to ‘leave me alone’

A US citizen who was seen on home security video being chased by masked federal agents outside New Orleans amid the Trump administration’s sweeping immigration crackdown says she surmises that she was pursued because “I’m brown”.

“I have no idea why they targeted me,” Jacelynn Guzman told the Guardian reporting partner WWL Louisiana on Thursday, a day after the video in question was taken and subsequently went viral online.

He has a 12-point lead before Sunday’s Abu Dhabi GP but the British driver vows to ‘crack on’ if the title goes elsewhere

The atmosphere at a season-deciding finale in the Formula One world championship is like no other. The paddock positively hums with a febrile, pulsing excitement and sense of expectation that is impossible to ignore. Amid all of which the title favourite, Lando Norris, finds himself at the moment he has dedicated his life toward, destiny lying in his own hands.

After a gruelling 23-race trek around the world, the conclusion of all the work, sacrifice and effort will be decided in just an hour and a half on Sunday afternoon in Abu Dhabi.

As Premier League’s most in-form side prepare to host Arsenal their experience is beginning to look like a superpower

In a parallel universe somewhere, Unai Emery is still wrestling with his black puffer coat in his dugout at the Amex Stadium, trying to force his hands through the sleeves, fresh from hurling it to the ground in wild celebration. The adrenaline of Aston Villa’s 4-3 comeback win at Brighton on Wednesday has probably only just faded. He made cinematic viewing and triggered memories of Mario Balotelli struggling to put on a warm-up bib and Tim Sherwood, while Villa manager a decade ago, launching his club-branded jacket towards the turf after Christian Benteke equalised against QPR.

By the end, Emery was hoarse and Villa had chalked up an eighth victory in nine Premier League matches, 12 out of 14 in all competitions. Across the past 10 league matches, Villa have accrued a division-high 25 points and in that time only Manchester City have scored more goals and Arsenal conceded fewer. This is the same team that failed to win any of their opening six matches and took three points from their first five league games. At that point Emery was concerned and shared his feelings with his squad, insisting his players raise their performance levels at training and in matches. Belief within an experienced squad – at 27.4 years, the average age of players selected in the league this season is the joint-oldest, with Fulham – did not waver.

Ruling compels unsealing of documents from 2006-2007 federal investigation into Epstein in Florida

A federal judge in Florida ordered the release of grand jury transcripts from the Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell sex-trafficking cases on Friday, citing the recently enacted federal law that overrides traditional secrecy protections.

US district judge Rodney Smith ruled that the Epstein Files Transparency Act, signed into law last month by Donald Trump, overrode federal rules prohibiting the disclosure of grand jury materials.

• Steve Clarke’s side also drawn with Haiti in Group C

• Fifth time Scotland and Brazil will meet at a World Cup

Scotland face a mouthwatering reunion with Brazil in their first World Cup campaign since 1998 after being drawn in Group C at Friday’s ceremony.

Steve Clarke’s players will also face Morocco and Haiti on their return to the big time, opening their campaign against the latter on 13 June. That curtain raiser will be played in either the Boston area or the MetLife Stadium near New York City.

The architect, whose work included the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in LA, died after a brief illness

From Bilbao to Las Vegas: Frank Gehry’s incredible architecture – in pictures

Frank Gehry, one of the most influential and distinctive talents in American architecture, died on Friday at his home in Los Angeles following a brief respiratory illness, his chief of staff confirmed. He was 96.

Gehry, the most recognizable American architect since Frank Lloyd Wright, was one of the first to embrace the potential of computer design, and pioneered a distinctively exuberant style of bravura power, whimsical and arresting collisions of form. His most famous work remains the Guggenheim Museumin Bilbao, a fantastical, titanium-clad composition on the Nervión River which received international acclaim upon its opening in 1997, heralding a new era of emotive architecture.

• England to play Croatia, Panama and Ghana in Group L

• France joined by Senegal and Norway in Group I

• Trump awarded inaugural Fifa peace prize

England will face a rematch of their 2018 semi-final in the opening fixture of their World Cup campaign next summer, after they were drawn alongside Croatia in Group L.

England will also play Panama, another side they faced at the Russia World Cup, and Ghana. Venues and kick-off times will be announced from 5pm GMT on Saturday but the group’s matches are split across four US cities – Dallas, Boston, New York/New Jersey and Philadelphia – and Toronto.

US politicians and Hollywood guilds have voiced concerns against the proposed $83bn purchase of the studio

The news that Netflix has agreed to buy Warner Bros in an $83bn deal has led to backlash among figures in and out of the entertainment industry.

Elizabeth Warren, a Democratic senator, called it “an anti-monopoly nightmare” in a statement released soon after the announcement.

Justices to take up case amid legal fight over order to heavily restrict right to birthright citizenship in US

• US politics – live updates

The US supreme court agreed on Friday to decide the legality of Donald Trump’s order to heavily restrict the right to birthright citizenship, the long-held constitutional principle that individuals born on US soil are automatically United States citizens.

The justices will hear the president’s request to uphold his executive order on birthright citizenship, issued just hours after Trump took office for his second term and immediately blocked from taking effect.

Russian airstrikes in Kyiv, floods in Colombo, the cold moon in Gaza and Trump at the World Cup draw: the past seven days as captured by the world’s leading photojournalists

Hundreds of videos on TikTok and elsewhere impersonate experts to sell supplements with unproven effects

TikTok and other social media platforms are hosting AI-generated deepfake videos of doctors whose words have been manipulated to help sell supplements and spread health misinformation.

The factchecking organisation Full Fact has uncovered hundreds of such videos featuring impersonated versions of doctors and influencers directing viewers to Wellness Nest, a US-based supplements firm.

Perplexity AI also faces lawsuit from Murdoch-owned Dow Jones and New York Post for its use of copyrighted content

The New York Times sued an embattled artificial intelligence startup on Friday, accusing the firm of illegally copying millions of articles. The newspaper alleged Perplexity AI had distributed and displayed journalists’ work without permission en masse.

The Times said that Perplexity AI was also violating its trademarks under the Lanham Act, claiming the startup’s generative AI products create fabricated content, or “hallucinations”, and falsely attribute them to the newspaper by displaying them alongside its registered trademarks.

These deadly US boat strikes are the latest example of a president corrupting both the law and morality

The Trump administration looks ever more like a criminal enterprise – and now it seems to have added war crimes to its repertoire. Though even that may be too generous a description.

On Thursday, word came that the US military had launched yet another deadly strike on a small boat moving through international waters. This time the attack killed four people, bringing to at least 87 the number of people the US has killed in a series of 22 such strikes on what it says are drug boats – vessels carrying illicit narcotics in the Caribbean or eastern Pacific.

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist

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Exclusive: Yinka Bankole says he felt compelled to speak out after Reform leader’s attempts to ‘dismiss’ hurt of alleged targets

• I’ll never forget the look of hatred Nigel Farage had for me at school, simply for existing

A former Dulwich college pupil who claims a teenage Nigel Farage told him “that’s the way back to Africa” has said he felt compelled to speak out after the Reform leader’s attempt at “denying or dismissing” the hurt of his alleged targets.

Yinka Bankole, who claims he had just started at the school when a 17-year-old Farage singled him out for abuse, said he had decided to tell his story in full after watching the Reform leader’s press conference on Thursday.

The largest House Democrat ideological caucus has called for the defense secretary to ‘resign immediately before his actions cost American lives’

• Pentagon announces it has killed four men in another boat strike in Pacific

Lauren Gambino and Melody Schreiber

After a delay and an unusually contentious meeting, a federal vaccine advisory panel is expected to vote today whether to change the longstanding recommendation that all newborns be immunized against hepatitis B.

• Trump praised by Infantino at DC ceremony

• President’s peace claims disputed by critics

• Follow the live blog of the World Cup draw

Donald Trump has been named the first winner of the newly created Fifa peace prize, claiming “the world is a safer place now” as he received the award at the draw for the 2026 World Cup in Washington DC.

Gianni Infantino, the Fifa president and one of Trump’s closest sporting allies, presented the honour onstage at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on Friday, saying Trump had been selected “in recognition of his exceptional and extraordinary actions to promote peace and unity around the world”.

Word from the top-tier press conferences, including Maresca singling out Adarabioyo’s gaffes and Paquetá expecting an instant West Ham return

Exclusive: Billionaire is claimed to be anonymous figure behind $70m of wins in US legal case. He denies betting on his own teams

Tony Bloom, the billionaire owner of Brighton & Hove Albion FC, is facing questions over claims he was an anonymous gambler behind $70m (£52m) in winnings – which allegedly included bets on his football teams.

Bloom – one of the world’s most successful professional gamblers – is claimed to be the “John Doe” referred to in a US legal case that tried to unmask who has benefited from the lucrative winning streak.