A war of regression: how Trump bombed the US into a worse position with Iran

Analysts fear Iran has played a weak hand well and the US has blundered into a defining strategic failure

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Four weeks into a war that was going to take four days, and that has so far cost the US about $30-40bn and Israel $300m a day, Washington is further away from a diplomatic agreement with Iran than it was in May 2025.

Not only has the war failed to persuade Iran to agree to dismantle its nuclear programme in the comprehensive and irreversible way the US demanded in a 15-point paper that it tabled on 23 May last year, Washington is now having to negotiate to reopen the strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway that has been open ever since the invention of the dhow, with a short exception of a tanker war in the 1980s between Iran and Iraq.

Published: March 27, 2026, 11:10 am

‘I wrote The Sopranos to get over my mother wishing me dead’: David Chase on his mob masterpiece – and his new LSD epic

Will the great TV writer ever top his mega hit? He talks us through his new series about the CIA’s attempts to weaponise LSD – and reveals why James Gandolfini called him ‘Satan’

Last week, a plush London hotel became a temple to HBO Max. Pictures of Carrie Bradshaw lined the corridors, HBO Max cushions dotted every chair in sight, and a heaving roster of A-list talent – Lisa Kudrow, Noah Wyle and Steve Carell – were poised and ready to hustle for the streamer’s UK launch.

However, you could argue that this whole circus was constructed because of one man. A few decades ago, HBO was a little-seen backwater of sport and standup. One show propelled it to the forefront of prestige television. That show was The Sopranos. The man who created it is David Chase.

Published: March 27, 2026, 2:19 pm

A finance coach unpacks how she retired at 40 – and the money advice she finds ‘irresponsible’

Bernadette Joy says everyone should have their own vision worth saving for – and stay on budget

• ‘The dreaded B-word’: how to start budgeting

Before she said a word about paying off debt or investing, financial educator Bernadette Joy would ask her clients to draw a picture of themselves in retirement. “Where are you? Who are you with? What are you doing?” she would ask.

No one drew themselves on a megayacht or private plane, Joy said. Instead, she saw depictions of nature and time spent with family.

Create a detailed vision of your dream retirement so you have a clear goal to work toward.

Calculate your investment target by multiplying your yearly expenses by 25.

If you have access to a 401(k), contribute as much as you can – unless you have credit card debt!

Keep a budget and live below your means.

Published: March 27, 2026, 4:00 pm

Trump’s strategy to get his way: declare one fake ‘emergency’ after another | Steven Greenhouse

The US president’s tactic could put this fall’s elections at risk. A supreme court decision could go far to protect them

Hating legal constraints, Donald Trump has repeatedly taken unilateral actions for which he had zero legal authority unless he found some national emergency to declare. So Trump, no stickler for the truth, has conveniently invoked numerous national emergencies to justify his unilateral actions – whether imposing tariffs on dozens of countries or deporting immigrants without due process – even when there wasn’t anything close to a real emergency.

A recent example involves Trump’s anger at Spain. Early this month, Trump was so furious at Spain for not letting the US use its airbases to help his illegal war against Iran that he called for cutting off all trade with Spain. Trump said he would order a trade embargo, with his treasury secretary suggesting that he would invoke a national emergency under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).

Published: March 27, 2026, 11:00 am

‘At certain points, I had to stop entirely’: what I learned after a week of Hyrox classes

The popular fitness trend is all over social media, and curious, I tried a few classes – they left me totally out of air

I have spent years in and out of the gym, trying the latest fitness trends. Consequently, my social media feed often populates with shirtless, sweaty men promising to transform my workouts.

Then it started. First, it was the occasional video of athletes grinding through a series of herculean tasks: pushing plate-laden sleds, collapsing over rowing machines, sprinting laps and throwing weighted balls at a wall inside of what looked like an aircraft hangar. That trickle became an avalanche, and I became curious.

Published: March 27, 2026, 4:00 pm

Brendan Carr: is Trump’s FCC chair uniquely powerful or a paper tiger?

Broadcasting regulator has become one of the nation’s most prominent newsmakers – he seems to relish the spotlight

During a ceremony at the White House late last week honoring the US Naval Academy football team, Donald Trump gave a shoutout to the man he said was “perhaps the most powerful man in this room”: Brendan Carr, the Federal Communications Commission chairman.

“You are doing some job,” Trump said. “He’s trying to make the fake news real and respected again, which is not an easy job.”

Published: March 27, 2026, 12:00 pm

US expects Iran operation to end in ‘weeks, not months’, says Marco Rubio

Secretary of state speaks as Israel threatens to expand attacks on Iran while Tehran keeps firing missiles at Israel

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Washington expects its operation against Iran to conclude in “weeks, not months”, the US secretary of state has said, despite continuing violence across the region and a threat from Israel to “escalate and expand” its attacks against the Islamic republic.

“When we are done with them here in the next couple weeks, they will be weaker than they’ve been in recent history,” Marco Rubio told reporters on Friday after meeting G7 foreign ministers in France.

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:23 pm

Blink and miss: Trump’s tactic of threats first and U-turn later is proving stale in Iran war

President’s move, dubbed Trump Always Chickens Out, appears to have soured as he loses hold on situation in Iran

From Wall Street to the White House, the dish everyone’s talking about this week is the Persian Taco. It’s what’s served when Trump chickens out in Iran.

In the early hours of Monday morning, witnessing oil prices surge, stock futures plummet and bond yields climb due to his threat to pummel Iran’s civilian power infrastructure, the president hurriedly walked it back, announcing he would put off the bombing because talks with Iran were actually going great. After the bombast and bloodshed, it was time for Taco (Trump Always Chickens Out), a move he first put on display during the tariffs crisis last year.

Published: March 27, 2026, 2:00 pm

US stock market caps off fifth consecutive week of closing down

Dow fell 800 points as oil prices continue to climb, and markets are still on edge despite US pause on Iranian energy strikes

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox

The US stock market closed on Friday with a selloff that sent the Dow into correction territory, capping off the fifth consecutive week that markets closed down.

The Dow fell 800 points on Friday, pushing the index into correction territory, which occurs when an index falls 10% below its peak. The tech-heavy Nasdaq index, which entered a correction Thursday afternoon, dropped another 2% while the S&P 500 closed 1.6% lower.

Published: March 27, 2026, 8:11 pm

House Republicans reject Senate deal to fund DHS as officials say airport security staff to get paid next week – live

Speaker Mike Johnson says Trump supports House Republicans’ decision; DHS says TSA workers will get paychecks as early as Monday amid airport turmoil

• Sign up for the Breaking US News emails

Peter Ticktin, an 80-year-old Florida lawyer who has various ties to Donald Trump and represents some 2020 election deniers, has become an outspoken advocate for an emergency executive order on US elections that would overhaul voting rules and rights by ending machine and mail-in voting.

The exact nature and extent of Ticktin’s contact and influence with Trump and other administration officials is not clear. But election experts and analysts see Ticktin’s push for an executive order as worrying, and part of a broader drive by fellow election conspiracists who are now promoting similar and legally dubious emergency order plans to revamp voting rules this year in order to boost Republican fortunes in the fall elections.

Published: March 27, 2026, 9:21 pm

Hegseth reportedly cuts two Black men and two women from military promotion list

US defense secretary axed the four officers’ names from list to become one-star generals, the New York Times reports

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox

Pete Hegseth, the US defense secretary, is reportedly attempting to block the military promotion of four officers – two women and two Black men – to become one-star generals.

The remaining promotion list includes about three dozen officers, most of whom are white men, though a few women and Black officers are still included, according to the New York Times.

Published: March 27, 2026, 4:51 pm

Tiger Woods arrested on suspicion of DUI after rollover crash in Florida

• Tiger Woods arrested after Florida rollover crash

• Golfer charged with DUI after Jupiter Island incident

Golf star Tiger Woods was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence after a rollover crash in Florida on Friday afternoon, local authorities said.

Martin County sheriff John Budensiek said Woods was driving a Land Rover that overturned after attempting to overtake a truck on a narrow two-lane road shortly before 2pm near Woods’s residence on Jupiter Island. The vehicle clipped a trailer, veered off and came to rest on its driver’s side after sliding along the roadway.

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:30 pm

Member of Jill Biden’s security detail shoots self in leg at Philadelphia airport

Ex-first lady wasn’t near ‘negligent discharge’ and agent is now in hospital while Secret Service investigates incident

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox

A US Secret Service agent, working on security detail for the former first lady Jill Biden, shot themself in the leg at the Philadelphia international airport on Friday morning, an agency spokesperson said.

The Secret Service special agent suffered a “non-life-threatening injury” after they discharged their weapon at around 8.30am. Biden was not near the agent at the time and no one else was injured.

Published: March 27, 2026, 4:24 pm

US law enforcement foils plot to assassinate Palestinian American activist

Man was arrested in connection with plan to assassinate Nerdeen Kiswani, following sting by undercover NYPD officer

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox

Law enforcement officers foiled a plot to assassinate New York-based Palestinian American activist Nerdeen Kiswani and arrested a 26-year old man in connection with the plan.

Kiswani wrote in post on X that late on Thursday, the FBI joint terrorism taskforce informed her that a plot against her life was “about to” take place, and that agents had conducted an operation in Hoboken, New Jersey, in connection to it.

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:17 pm

Faith Kates: the woman who introduced models to ‘dear friend’ Jeffrey Epstein

Former talent agency boss had closer relationship with sex offender than thought, and supported him after 2009 arrest

A female executive at the top of the modelling industry had a close friendship with Jeffrey Epstein and introduced him to women on the agency’s books, a Guardian investigation has found.

Until last November, Faith Kates ran Next Management modelling and talent agency, which has represented the likes of Alexa Chung, Milla Jovovich and Billie Eilish, a position she held for decades as the founder of the business. She stepped down quietly just weeks before the first major Epstein files were released, saying she intended to focus on charity work.

18 July 2009 10.18am

I am and will always be your friend...Unconditionally...will always be there for you.

5 September 2009 7.47pm

Thinking of you a lot and hoping you are finally enjoying some please [sic] and quiet..know you are always in my thoughts and prayers. You are a good friend my dear friend..

5 September 2009 7.54pm

thanks,, lets get back to work.

Published: March 27, 2026, 9:21 am

California sheriff seizes more ballot materials in defiance of state officials

Chad Bianco, running for governor, previously confiscated 650,000 ballots for baseless voter fraud investigation

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox

A Republican sheriff in California has confiscated additional ballot materials from a special election, escalating his conflict with state lawmakers who say he is conducting a baseless investigation into claims of voter fraud.

On Tuesday, Chad Bianco, the Riverside county sheriff who is running for governor, was already at the center of a legal controversy after seizing 650,000 ballots from last year’s special election. Earlier this week he ordered his office to seize 426 additional boxes of ballot materials as part of the alleged criminal investigation, prompting criticism from lawmakers including Rob Bonta, California’s Democratic attorney general.

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:33 pm

Five Guys CEO says he gave a $1.5m bonus to his workers so he wouldn’t get shot in the back

Jerry Murrell seemingly alluded to healthcare CEO killing when he explained giving bonus to workers after bungled promotion

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox

Five Guys’ chief executive officer, Jerry Murrell, said he gave a $1.5m bonus to employees of his US-based burger restaurant chain because “I didn’t want anybody shooting me” after the company recently “screwed … up” a buy-one-get-one-free promotion.

Murrell did not elaborate on the comment, which he gave to Fortune in an interview published on Wednesday – but it came a little more than a year after the UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot dead on a midtown Manhattan street in what was widely considered a murderous rebuke of the US health insurance industry’s profit-driven practices.

Published: March 27, 2026, 4:47 pm

Scientists film whale giving birth while other whales work together to help her

Female named Rounder surrounded by family members when about to give birth to her second calf

Scientists have managed to film a sperm whale giving birth while other female whales worked together to support the mother and her newborn.

A team from Project Ceti, an international effort seeking to understand how whales communicate, was in a boat near a pod of 11 whales off the coast of the Caribbean island of Dominica on 8 July 2023.

Published: March 27, 2026, 4:13 pm

What is Netanyahu’s endgame in Iran war? – The Latest

Could Israeli public support for the war in Iran give Benjamin Netanyahu a boost before this year’s elections? The vote will be the first chance for Israelis to have a say on their government since the Hamas-led attacks on 7 October 2023. Lucy Hough speaks to the Guardian’s chief Middle East correspondent, Emma Graham-Harrison

Published: March 27, 2026, 6:18 pm

ICE doubled its use of ankle monitors for legal immigrants in the past year: ‘A very harmful phenomenon’

Agency uses devices, which are uncomfortable and interfere with employment, to push people to self-deport, advocates say

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox

For five years, an asylum-seeking woman attended routine check-ins with immigration authorities without issue. At her most recent appointment in October, she was unexpectedly ordered to strap on an ankle monitor, according to her attorney, Deepa Bijpuria.

Bijpuria, a supervising attorney in the immigration unit of Legal Aid DC, described the client as a single mom who fled her home country because of severe domestic violence, escaping while pregnant with her young daughter.

Published: March 27, 2026, 3:00 pm

The third No Kings protests are expected to draw millions. Do they need clearer goals?

Anti-authoritarian rallies standing up to Trump have broad objectives and no leaders. Organizers say that is by design

More than 3,100 anti-authoritarian protests are scheduled across the US and at least 15 other countries on Saturday. All these events will take place under a single banner: No Kings.

Formally launched in June to fight back against Trump administration policies, the No Kings movement has grown with astonishing speed – its second and most recent mass protest in October drew an estimated 7 million participants. Organizers expect Saturday’s events to be the biggest protest in American history.

Published: March 27, 2026, 2:03 pm

Is foraging really feasible to feed myself?

This labor-intensive way of eating isn’t for everyone – and I’m not sure it’s for me. It requires planning and flexibility

When I called Robin Greenfield, an environmental activist and author, his assistant answered. “We’re stopped really quick,” Marielle said, adding “he is harvesting a ton of wild onions right now. He’ll be on in just a minute.”

I waited, curious to see his haul and bemused by his willingness to delay an interview for wild vegetables. I had called Greenfield, who wrote Food Freedom about the year he grew and foraged 100% of his food, to talk about how possible, or hard, it is to do just that.

Published: March 27, 2026, 11:00 am

‘Unapologetically schmaltzy’: how Love Story became Disney+’s most-streamed drama ever

Series about the lives and deaths of Carolyn Bessette and JFK Jr is ‘prestige television without the usual weight’

The plane vanishes. Families are told. Ashes are scattered. So ends Love Story, Ryan Murphy’s schlocky, glossy nine-part melodrama about the doomed marriage between Carolyn Bessette and John F Kennedy Jr. Yet one thing is clear: the myth of Camelot – or at least this version – still captivates.

This week, Disney+ confirmed Love Story is now the most streamed drama in the platform’s history. A rare sleeper hit, later episodes drew 50% more global viewers than February’s pilot, boosted by “social reach” and word of mouth.

Published: March 27, 2026, 6:24 pm

Less stuff, more joy: seven lessons from ‘enoughfluencers’ on how to live a happier, simpler life

Meet the influencers encouraging us to stop buying new

Anna Kilpatrick doesn’t have a bedroom. Or even a bed. The a 52-year-old content creator from East Sussex sleeps on a wide shelf in her hallway so that her two children, 21 and 18, can have their own rooms. And yet, she says, she has “enough”. She doesn’t hanker after a bigger house or shinier car. “Having fewer things is freedom,” she says. Kilpatrick, who shares such ideas with her 104K Instagram followers (@not.needing.new), is part of a small but growing community of “enough-luencers”. The concept is similar to deinfluencing – where content creators discourage followers from buying into trends – but is also about celebrating already having enough, and, crucially, feeling happier for it.

In her new book, Not Needing New: A Practical Guide to Finding the Joy of Enough, Kilpatrick lists the benefits of living with less: “An increased sense of calm, less anxiety through clutter, free time away from maintaining the home, a healthier bank balance and reduced debt, children who are learning how to manage delayed gratification.”

Published: March 27, 2026, 3:00 pm

The best Pfas-free rain jackets in the US

Ditch the ‘forever chemicals’ – we tested these jackets in torrential downpour, the shower and on hiking trails

• This little triangle scarf is suddenly everywhere. Here’s how to wear it

• Sign up for the Filter US newsletter, your weekly guide to buying fewer, better things

Rain jackets have evolved so far that a modern shell at any price point will keep you dry. But like non-stick pans, many of them accomplished this miracle with per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, more commonly known as Pfas or “forever chemicals”. Now that we understand the harm these chemicals cause in humans and the environment, manufacturers have had to scramble to invent new coatings that perform as well as the tried-and-true.

They’ve risen to the occasion. Every Pfas-free rain jacket we evaluated will genuinely keep you dry in the rain. The real differentiators come down to comfort, breathability and whether a jacket’s design makes sense for how you’ll be spending time in the rain.

Best Pfas-free rain jacket overall:
Peak Performance Trail HIPE 2.5L Shell

Published: March 27, 2026, 1:15 pm

Jimmy Kimmel on Mike Johnson’s new award for Trump: ‘You can almost feel his spine exiting his body’

Late-night hosts discussed the Republican party’s inaugural ‘America First’ award and a disturbing new animal story involving RFK Jr

Late-night hosts mocked the Republican party’s inaugural “America First” award for Donald Trump as he finally reveals the “present” he received from Iran.

Published: March 27, 2026, 3:34 pm

Week in wildlife: a flying rodent, a duty-free possum and an emerald viper

This week’s best wildlife photographs from around the world

Published: March 27, 2026, 8:00 am

Trump’s horrors keep accumulating. We need the No Kings protests more than ever | Moira Donegan

Thousands of No Kings events will be fueled by anger over ICE violence, the Epstein files released and a war in Iran. These protests have power

Things have changed since the last major No Kings protests, in October 2025. Back then, an estimated 7 million people poured into the streets to protest against the Trump administration; this Saturday, at more than 3,000 events planned nationwide, the crowds are likely to be even bigger. In part, that’s because the Trump administration keeps pursuing more and more unpopular agendas, often with a sadism and indifference to popular opinion that becomes prominent in the news.

In January, ICE agents in Minneapolis killed two protesters – first Renee Good on 7 January and then Alex Pretti on 24 January – who were in the streets trying to obstruct the agency’s kidnappings and voice their opposition to the Trump administration’s ethnic cleansing program. The two dead Americans were among the thousands who have become enraged at ongoing revelations of the extent and cruelty of Trump’s mass kidnapping, detention and ethnic cleansing program, which has swept up tens of thousands of men, women and children.

Published: March 27, 2026, 10:00 am

Ella Baron on Donald Trump and the Iran war – cartoon

Continue reading...

Published: March 27, 2026, 4:43 pm

At last, David has landed a double punch on the tech Goliaths. Now to hit them even harder | Jonathan Freedland

The US court verdicts declaring Meta liable for getting people addicted and ruining lives must be just the start of a global fightback

Good news is so rare these days, you don’t quite know how to take it. You want to celebrate, but a rival instinct tells you it’ll be pulled back somehow, the same feeling you get when your team scores a late winner, but you’re filled with instant dread that the goal will be overturned on a video replay.

I confess that is how I responded to the double legal blow dealt this week to Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, when two US juries on successive days found against it in a pair of landmark cases. First came a verdict in New Mexico, fining the company $375m (£280m) for enabling harm, including child sexual exploitation, on its platforms and for misleading consumers about their safety. Twenty-four hours later, jurors in California awarded $6m in damages to a young user who had argued that Meta (along with YouTube) had deliberately designed addictive products that had hooked her from childhood, causing her grave harm.

Published: March 27, 2026, 5:19 pm

The new Trump coin will have an eagle on the back. Here are some better options | Dave Schilling

The real defining image of this presidency should be the bank statement of the average American citizen

Shockingly, inexplicably, Donald Trump keeps finding new places to put his face. Also, his name. Or initials. Or one of those drawings of a turkey a kid does by tracing the outline of their hand. He’s got his ballroom, the Kennedy Center and a proposed 250ft arch that would become one of the tallest buildings in all of Washington DC – a city with longstanding height restrictions for development. His signature will be on US dollars later this year, in a first for a sitting president. I’d ask if he was getting tired of all the attention, but I think we know the answer to that. Up next is a commemorative gold coin – worth exactly $1 – featuring Trump’s scowling visage looming menacingly over the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office.

It’s a pretty classic Trump pose, designed to make a nearly-80-year-old man with a variety of mystery bruises who eats McDonald’s on a regular basis look physically intimidating. Beyond the president sporting a classic gen Z pout, the Commission of Fine Arts (a panel appointed by You Know Who) recommended this coin be “as large as possible”, which immediately makes me think of the giant penny Bruce Wayne keeps in the Batcave. Good luck trying to feed a parking meter with that.

Dave Schilling is a Los Angeles-based writer and humorist

Published: March 27, 2026, 12:00 pm

It is no fluke that social media platforms are addictive and causing harm. They were designed that way | Van Badham

The findings in two US court cases should embarrass anyone who claimed Australia’s social media ban was ‘boomer’ moralising

A disdain towards the notion of “consequence” somewhat defines the contemporary western moment of the powerful. So two recent US court decisions that are adverse to the interests of – oh my god, would you believe it? – tech companies should be heralded to the full height of every sky.

Within days of each other this week, a court in New Mexico and another in Los Angeles determined that social media platforms were legally responsible for harms caused to users.

Published: March 27, 2026, 2:00 pm

Governments controlling prices? It has long been unthinkable – but may now be inevitable | Andy Beckett

In Mexico and Spain, leaders who have capped public costs have been rewarded at the ballot box. As another cost of living surge arrives, it may be a policy our leaders are unable to resist

Politicians are not supposed to meddle with prices. Even though much of politics is about whether voters can afford things – especially in an era of recurring inflationary shocks – ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union’s planned economy four decades ago, the orthodoxy across much of the world has been that only markets should decide what things cost.

As the hugely influential Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek argued, in a complex modern society, information is too dispersed among potential sellers and buyers of goods or services for government to make informed and correct decisions about the prices of those goods. Hence, his disciples say, the inefficiency of state-run economies, from post-colonial Africa to the eastern bloc.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

Published: March 27, 2026, 8:00 am

Girlguiding didn’t have to do this to its trans members. There was another way | Zoe Williams

Girlguiding’s response to last year’s supreme court ruling is not the humane option – and changes the organisation’s identity

Great work, Guides; you’ve taken some members you had no idea even existed, and expelled them from your organisation with effect from September. This gives trans girls a humane half-year to extricate, because that’s definitely what kids want: to participate for six months in a uniformed, voluntary, social organisation that has explicitly kicked them out, while they look for somewhere more welcoming.

“Like every charity, we have to follow the law,” Girlguiding says in an online info pack whose FAQs are almost comically Stasi-lite. “Will volunteers be expected to carry out additional checks or ask for proof?” (The good news, folks, is that they won’t; the mind boggles at what those additional checks might be that didn’t breach at least some safeguarding protocols.) “How should volunteers check that trans girls have left?” (Some sort of dunking stool? In actuality, again, they won’t check.)

Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist

Guardian Newsroom: Can Labour come back from the brink?
On Thursday 30 April, join Gaby Hinsliff, Zoe Williams, Polly Toynbee and Rafael Behr as they discuss how much of a threat Labour faces from the Green party and Reform UK – and whether Keir Starmer can survive as leader.
Book tickets here

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Published: March 27, 2026, 10:00 am

The Guardian view on social media in the dock: tech bros move fast – society is trying to catch up | Editorial

Two court cases have shown how companies can be forced to take responsibility for their impact on public health

Debate about online harms has tended to focus on abusive and hateful content. But the form in which content is delivered is at least as important. That point is central to this week’s momentous decisions against Meta and YouTube, by two US juries. It will take more than these cases to loosen big tech’s tight grip on much of the world’s attention. But the fact that both companies were found liable in California, for deliberately designing addictive products that harmed a child, is a massive win for the coalition of campaigners aiming to use the US courts to force the platforms to change their products.

The second case against Meta, in New Mexico, found it liable over the use of Facebook and Instagram for child sex trafficking, with a Guardian investigation cited in the complaint. The jury ordered it to pay $375m in civil liabilities; the state’s attorney general is seeking platform changes and financial penalties.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Published: March 27, 2026, 6:11 pm

The Strong, silent type: UConn’s standout is making basketball stardom look easy

Sarah Strong has the most jump-off-the-page talent in the women’s game since Caitlin Clark, and UConn greats say she could be the best of them

Former WNBA All-Star turned Boston Celtics executive Allison Feaster was recently asked about the differences between high-level female and male hoopers.

“This is a very basic example,” the Celtics’ vice-president of team operations and organizational growth told the Far From the Tree podcast. “But most of the women have had exposure to different types of leadership. Most of the professionals have four-year degrees and even advanced degrees. Many of the professional women have lived outside of the US. Some of them are parents who are the primary caregiver. That is a very general observation, but I venture to say that’s not the same with the NBA players.”

Published: March 27, 2026, 9:00 am

Iran footballers hold school bags in memory of girls killed in bombing

• Team make gesture before loss to Nigeria in Turkey

• Attack on Iranian school killed more than 175 people

Iran’s players wore black armbands and held schoolbags as their anthem played before a friendly in Turkey on Friday in what a team official said was a protest over the killing of schoolgirls on the first day of the US-Israel war on Iran.

Iran were facing Nigeria in the resort town of Belek before the World Cup in the United States, Mexico and Canada, where their participation is in doubt over the conflict.

Published: March 27, 2026, 3:19 pm

Sudden center-back shortage offers USMNT a chance to try World Cup-style adjustments

• Chris Richards and Miles Robinson out for Belgium game

• Robinson to also miss Tuesday friendly v Portugal

• Richards arrived from Crystal Palace with knee issue

If the US men’s national team needed a test run for how a sudden injury crisis could affect preparations for games against top opponents at the World Cup, they have one now. Injuries to defenders Chris Richards and Miles Robinson have the US facing a sudden center-back shortage ahead of friendlies against Belgium on Saturday and Portugal on Tuesday – the final two games before head coach Mauricio Pochettino names his roster for this summer’s World Cup on home soil.

Richards, who is a presumed starter and unquestioned leader along the backline, was ruled out for the first friendly against Belgium with what Pochettino termed a “problem” with his knee, while Miles Robinson will miss both games after suffering a groin injury in training with the US earlier this week.

Published: March 27, 2026, 8:51 pm

George Russell: ‘I can’t spit my dummy out over something that I can’t control’

The F1 world championship leader on how he learned to channel youthful frustration at the back of the grid and the mental strength he gains from those closest to him

George Russell endured a baptism of fire, battling a recalcitrant Williams car at the back end of the grid in his debut Formula One season. Yet the then 21-year-old was perceptive from the off, observing at that season’s British Grand Prix: “In F1 it’s not just about driving, it’s about the whole package.” Seven years later, he believes the package is all but complete, leading the world championship standings and a strong favourite to go on to win his first title.

Russell heads into this weekend’s Japanese GP with a win and second place from the first two races and – thanks also to a sprint victory in China – has a four-point advantage over his teenage Mercedes teammate Kimi Antonelli. With their car thus far the class of the field, Russell has demonstrated the calm, assured control and execution long-promised by his talent. The attitude he takes into his title tilt was fashioned from that time at Williams and later Mercedes.

Published: March 27, 2026, 12:29 pm

US star Catarina Macario departs Chelsea for record $8m, five-year deal with San Diego Wave

• 26-year-old is set to join NWSL side immediately

• Forward has 16 goals in 29 appearances for USWNT

US international forward Catarina Macario has joined the San Diego Wave on a deal worth $8m that runs through the 2030 season. The contract is reportedly the largest by total value in women’s soccer history.

The Wave announced the move Friday. Sportico first reported that the Wave were nearing the acquisition last week. ESPN reported that Macario would join the NWSL side immediately rather than in the summer, on a transfer fee of about $300,000.

Published: March 27, 2026, 2:10 pm

Aryna Sabalenka sinks Rybakina to set up Miami Open final showdown with Gauff

• World No 1 wins semi-final 6-4, 6-3 at Hard Rock Stadium

• American beats Muchova 6-1, 6-1 to continue domination of rival

Aryna Sabalenka believes she is ready for the challenge of her rival Coco Gauff in the Miami Open final as she stands one win away from winning Indian Wells and Miami in the same year for the first time.

“She’s a fighter,” Sabalenka said of Gauff. “She’s a great player, of course. We played a lot of matches, a lot of tight matches, a lot of big finals. And, yeah, she’s a great player and I’m really excited to face her in the final. I think it’s going to be a great battle and I cannot wait to play that match.”

Published: March 27, 2026, 5:26 am

Jürgen Klopp believes Mohamed Salah will be irreplaceable for Liverpool

• Klopp tells former club to quickly move on from forward

• He calls his Anfield spell ‘a beautiful movie with a happy end’

Jürgen Klopp has described Mohamed Salah’s Liverpool career as “a beautiful movie with a happy end” and claimed the forward’s phenomenal output will be impossible to replace.

Klopp was in charge when Liverpool signed Salah for an initial £34m from Roma in June 2017 and, despite the occasional row, remains close to the 33-year-old. The pair exchanged messages on Tuesday after Salah announced he would be leaving Liverpool at the end of the season, 12 months before his contract is due to expire.

Published: March 27, 2026, 6:00 pm

Can Adam Freier’s California Legion solve America’s rugby problem?

CEO of a merged team in a US men’s competition shrunk to just six, the ex-Wallaby hooker is still at the sharp end – right where he likes to be

One day in March 2012, Adam Freier sat down to write a column for the Sydney Morning Herald. His Melbourne Rebels were on a losing streak and though he had 25 caps at hooker including a World Cup campaign for Australia, he was nearly 32 and staring at the end of a career at the coalface, 12 years in the front row of the scrum at the highest level. Describing a body breaking down, a struggling club, the agony of endless defeats, he imagined group therapy in front of “strangers in the local hall”.

“My name is Adam Freier, and I hate to lose.”

California Legion v Anthem RC kicks-off 6pm ET on Saturday, live on ESPN+

Martin Pengelly writes about rugby in the US on Substack, at The National Maul

Published: March 27, 2026, 10:00 am

Savannah Guthrie will return to Today show next month: ‘Joy will be my protest’

NBC host says returning is ‘part of my purpose’ nearly two months after her mother Nancy’s apparent abduction

After a two-month absence sparked by her 84-year-old mother’s apparent abduction, Savannah Guthrie will return to NBC’s Today show next month, saying in an interview that aired on Friday: “Joy will be my protest.”

Hoda Kotb said after her emotional interview with her former co-host aired that Guthrie will return on 6 April. Guthrie said it was hard to imagine returning to a place of joy and lightness. While she doesn’t know if she can do it or if she will belong any more, Guthrie said she wants to try.

Published: March 27, 2026, 4:39 pm

Social media influencer Clavicular arrested in Florida on battery charges

‘Looksmaxxer’ influencer and his girlfriend are suspected of involvement in attack on 19-year-old woman, officials say

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox

The social media influencer known as Clavicular has been arrested in Florida on battery charges.

Braden Eric Peters, who maintains a controversial online presence among “manosphere” circles as a so-called “looksmaxxer”, was taken into custody on a warrant issued by the Osceola county sheriff’s office, according to local jail records and media reports.

Published: March 27, 2026, 9:09 pm

United flight narrowly avoids US military helicopter in California

FAA investigating after plane carrying 162 passengers forced to change course to prevent collision

A United flight came within a few 100ft of a US military helicopter near John Wayne airport in southern California, triggering an alarm directing the airline pilots to change course.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said Friday that it was investigating the incident that happened at about 8.40pm Tuesday when a military Black Hawk helicopter returning from a training mission crossed into the plane’s path. The pilots of the passenger plane carrying 162 passengers and six crew members stopped their descent and leveled off to avoid a collision.

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:59 pm

Sony to hike PS5 prices by $100 as AI and Iran war push up memory chip costs

Updated prices of PlayStation 5 consoles to go into effect on 2 April as electronics makers face rising cost pressures

Sony is raising global prices of its PlayStation 5 consoles, including a $100 increase in the US, marking its second hike in less than a year as the entertainment giant grapples with rising costs of key components such as memory chips.

The tech industry’s race to build out artificial intelligence infrastructure has pushed memory makers to favor higher-margin datacenter chips, tightening supply for consumer devices like the ones Sony sells.

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:08 pm

Number of AI chatbots ignoring human instructions increasing, study says

Exclusive: Research finds sharp rise in models evading safeguards and destroying emails without permission

AI models that lie and cheat appear to be growing in number with reports of deceptive scheming surging in the last six months, a study into the technology has found.

AI chatbots and agents disregarded direct instructions, evaded safeguards and deceived humans and other AI, according to research funded by the UK government-funded AI Security Institute (AISI). The study, shared with the Guardian, identified nearly 700 real-world cases of AI scheming and charted a five-fold rise in misbehaviour between October and March, with some AI models destroying emails and other files without permission.

Published: March 27, 2026, 12:11 pm

Judge rebukes woman who denied driving while video-calling from car: ‘Do you think I’m that stupid?’

Kimberly Carroll ‘truly sorry’ after calling in to court hearing via Zoom from behind the wheel of a moving vehicle

A woman who dialed into a court hearing in Detroit while in her car this week was berated by the judge, who asked “Do you think I’m that stupid?” when she appeared on video apparently driving the vehicle.

Fox2 Detroit reported that defendant Kimberly Carroll called late into a hearing relating to a financial matter, and was asked by the judge, Michael K McNally, to turn on her camera.

Published: March 27, 2026, 1:42 pm

Three killed as tourist helicopter crashes on Hawaiian island of Kauai

Two others injured after sightseeing aircraft comes down on remote beach on Na Pali Coast

A tourist helicopter crashed on a remote beach on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, killing three people and injuring two others, authorities said.

The helicopter was carrying one pilot and four passengers when it crashed on Thursday afternoon at Kalalau Beach, the Kauai fire department said. The beach is on the Na Pali coast on Kauai’s north shore. The area is otherwise reachable only by hiking or boat.

Published: March 27, 2026, 11:20 am

Florida axes sociology as required class at state universities in latest attack on ‘woke’

Move by state education officials picked by Republican governor removes the course as a graduation component

Education leaders in Florida have removed sociology as a graduation component at state universities in Ron DeSantis’s latest attack on what the Republican governor sees as the “woke” indoctrination of students.

The move on Thursday by a majority of DeSantis’s hand-picked university board of governors effectively relegates the stand-alone Introduction to Sociology course to a makeweight elective instead of a core component subject that has been a popular choice for generations of students.

Published: March 27, 2026, 3:12 pm

How an election conspiracy theorist has Trump’s ear on voting laws and midterms

Peter Ticktin, a Florida lawyer, is promoting a legally dubious plan experts say could sharply restrict voting rights

Peter Ticktin, an 80-year-old Florida lawyer who has various ties to Donald Trump and represents some 2020 election deniers, has become an outspoken advocate for an emergency executive order on US elections that would overhaul voting rules and rights by ending machine and mail-in voting.

The exact nature and extent of Ticktin’s contact and influence with Trump and other administration officials is not clear. But election experts and analysts see Ticktin’s push for an executive order as worrying, and part of a broader drive by fellow election conspiracists who are now promoting similar and legally dubious emergency order plans to revamp voting rules this year in order to boost Republican fortunes in the fall elections.

Published: March 27, 2026, 1:00 pm

Trump EPA relied on industry science to weaken formaldehyde cancer rules, documents show

Papers reveal how chemical lobby influenced policy, reversing Biden-era limits on a common carcinogen

• Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox

A new trove of chemical producer and US Environmental Protection Agency documents reveal an elaborate industry operation that killed strong regulations around formaldehyde, a highly toxic carcinogen widely used in everyday goods from cosmetics to furniture to craft supplies.

The Biden EPA in late 2024 determined any exposure to formaldehyde increased the risk of cancer and other health problems. The Trump EPA in late 2025 moved to undo those findings and replace them with less protective figures.

Published: March 27, 2026, 11:00 am

Danger after disaster: why emergencies come with increased risks for women

After events such as Hurricane Beryl in the Caribbean, shelters offer refuge but no guarantee of safety to women and girls

The grandchildren called the shelter Final Destination, after a favourite film. Tedica Alexander, 61, a resident of Union Island in St Vincent and the Grenadines, recalls with pride – and a tremor in her voice – how her nine grandchildren supported her and others at the Ashton community centre when Hurricane Beryl hit the area in July 2024.

Alexander arrived after she was advised to seek shelter in Ashton, rather than at Clifton school as she had expected as it was closer. As the storm approached, the shelter quickly filled up. The building’s windows shattered, and flood waters rose above ankle height. “If it had lasted one more minute, the door would have given way,” she says.

Published: March 27, 2026, 2:00 pm

‘Tempolimit? Nein, danke!’: why German petrolheads won’t slow down – despite the energy crisis

Driving fast is in ‘the German DNA’, say lovers of the speed-limit free Autobahn, but support in the country for a restriction is growing

Death-defying thrills are not what draws Lutz Leif Linden to zip down the Autobahn faster than a plane taking off. Instead, the feeling of freedom and an appreciation of technological mastery play a part in his “almost loving relationship” with driving cars faster than most people can imagine.

The top speed he has reached on the road in Germany, the world’s only democracy without a blanket speed limit on motorways, is 400km/h (249mph). “It’s like an airplane,” said Linden, the president of the Automobile Club of Germany (AvD). “You are faster than an Airbus at start.”

Published: March 27, 2026, 1:00 pm

‘It helped me feed my six children’: how Africa’s first water fund supports farmers to protect Kenya’s biggest river

Conserving the watershed of the Tana and improving farming methods is securing water supplies and livelihoods alike in a changing climate

When in 2017 David Nyoro became one of the first farmers to partner with Africa’s first water fund to conserve the watershed of Kenya’s biggest river, he received 180 high-value avocado seedlings. The 67-year-old’s farming methods had been dominated by annual crops that left large sections of his five-acre piece of land bare, increasing soil erosion and contributing to river sedimentation. “We used to lose a lot of topsoil to the river. Such loss of soil nutrients and poor farming practices meant we had less farm produce,” he says.

The avocado seedlings enabled him to grow his farm income to close to 2m Kenyan shillings (about £11,500 at today’s exchange rates), with each mature avocado tree yielding 70kg (154lbs) annually. He introduced cover crops to improve soil health and reduce soil erosion and sediment loads.

Published: March 27, 2026, 10:00 am

Wily coyote? Urban canines take more risks compared with rural ones, study finds

Researchers believe behavioral gap, which may hold true across species, is probably product of less fear of harassment in cities

Anyone who has lived long enough in a city can tell you – with time, you just stop noticing strange new things. A unicycling bagpiper. A person changing clothes on the subway. Murals that transform streets into art.

Coyotes in cities seem to be bolder as well and less afraid of new experiences. That’s according to a new study that researchers conducted at more than a dozen sites across the US, comparing urban and rural coyotes’ reaction to new stimuli.

Published: March 27, 2026, 2:00 pm

Man who allegedly planted bomb at US airbase at large after fleeing to China

Alen Zheng, a US citizen, allegedly planted device that went undiscovered for a week at MacDill air force base in Florida

A man who allegedly planted a bomb that went undiscovered for a week in the visitors center of the Florida headquarters of US Central Command, which oversees the ongoing war in Iran, remained at large on Friday after fleeing to China.

Authorities charged Alen Zheng and his sister Ann Mary Zheng, both US citizens in separate indictments this week for their alleged role in planting the explosive device at MacDill air force base. Ann Mary Zheng was arrested in the US after a short trip to China, and was arraigned on Thursday in a federal court in Florida.

Published: March 27, 2026, 2:38 pm

$30 an hour by 2030: new pushes to increase minimum wage in New York and California

Oakland and New York campaigns for $30 minimum wage gain steam as workers battle high costs and pushback

Mark Dorsey, a lifelong East Oakland resident, works two jobs to make ends meet. The 35-year-old Californian relies on manufacturing and service work through temp agencies and tries to work overtime or 10- to 12-hour shifts because “that’s the only way you can see a paycheck that’s worth something”.

Dorsey often makes minimum wage or close to it. The city of Oakland’s minimum wage is currently $17.34 an hour, higher than the minimum wage for the state of California, currently $16.90 an hour, but still not enough to support Dorsey.

Published: March 27, 2026, 11:00 am

Alleged Long Island serial killer intends to change plea to guilty, sources say

Rex Heuermann, 62, who is accused of murdering seven women over 17 years, is due to appear in court next month

The man accused in Long Island’s infamous Gilgo Beach serial killings intends to plead guilty in the case next month, according to two people familiar with his decision.

Rex Heuermann, a former architect charged with murdering seven women over 17 years, is set to change his plea from not guilty at his next scheduled court hearing on 8 April, they said.

Published: March 27, 2026, 11:49 am

UN’s landmark slavery ruling energises African Union’s fight for reparations

• UN votes to describe slave trade as ‘gravest crime against humanity’

Despite resistance from states who had role in chattel slavery, many feel this is an idea whose time has come

John Mahama knows a thing or two about beating the establishment. On Wednesday, less than two years after completing a remarkable comeback as Ghana’s president with a landslide defeat of the ruling party candidate, he rallied the world to ratify a landmark vote against transatlantic chattel slavery, despite major opposition from the same western entities that drove it for centuries.

The resolution to declare the practice as “the gravest crime against humanity” passed with a decisive majority at the UN general assembly and has been largely welcomed across Africa. Yet the details of the tally reveal a world still deeply divided on the gravity of the sin of enslaving more than 15 million people as chattel over the course of 400 years.

Published: March 27, 2026, 1:07 pm

Man jailed for assaulting woman in London attack witnessed by Barron Trump

Matvei Rumiantsev, who became jealous of woman’s friendship with US president’s son, jailed for four years

A Russian man has been jailed for four years for assaulting a woman in an attack in London that was witnessed on a video call by Donald Trump’s youngest son, Barron.

Matvei Rumiantsev, 23, attacked the woman when he became jealous of her friendship with Trump, 19, after she met him through social media, a court heard.

Published: March 27, 2026, 12:44 pm

Polio virus detected in London days before ministers cut global eradication funding

Campaigner criticises ‘shortsighted and self-defeating’ decision and says it increases risk to the UK public

The polio virus was detected in London sewage for the second time this year, days before ministers withdrew funding for global polio eradication efforts.

Its detection reveals the spending cuts to be “shortsighted and self-defeating”, campaigners said. Polio is an extremely infectious viral disease, which typically affects young children under five. It can cause paralysis by damaging nerves in the spine and base of the brain, and can be life-threatening if it affects muscles used for breathing.

Published: March 27, 2026, 4:29 pm

Missing aid boats have safely reached Cuba, US confirms

Two convoy vessels that were supposed to get to Havana by Wednesday have made it to Cuba, says US Coast Guard

Two sailing boats that went missing while carrying humanitarian aid to Cuba have safely reached the Caribbean island, the US Coast Guard said on Friday.

Earlier in the day Cuba’s president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, had said his country would do everything it could to save the people on the two boats that disappeared while travelling to Cuba from Mexico.

Published: March 27, 2026, 3:19 pm

The week around the world in 20 pictures

Crisis in the Middle East, a Russian drone attack in Lviv, cherry blossom in Tokyo and the return of BTS – the past seven days as captured by the world’s leading photojournalists

Published: March 27, 2026, 6:19 pm

‘I didn’t think anyone would be into it’: Slayyyter turns midwest trash into pop gold

After a nine-year come-up, the self-described ‘worst girl in America’ is having a breakthrough

For the past several months, nothing has gotten me through this brutal New York winter quite like Crank, a fiendishly chaotic concoction by the electropop artist Slayyyter. The track is deliriously overstimulating; the singer tweaks out over record-scratches and squelches and ferociously barrels through a chorus that sounds – and I mean this as a sincere compliment – like a plane crash. In these times of global catastrophe, I have found this soothing.

Slayyyter’s new album Worst Girl in America scratches a similar anarchic itch. Immediate, vertiginous and diabolically cheeky, the after-hours record finds her channelling a ferality that feels rare in our slop-ified pop culture (cue the rock-tinged Cannibalism), and has garnered breathless hype among those in the know. All five singles released from the project to date have the jet propulsion of someone fueled on years of pop star study and frustrated by, as she bluntly puts it, “my ninth year on the up-and-coming list”.

Published: March 27, 2026, 9:00 am

Your Friends and Neighbours to Portobello: the seven best shows to stream this week

Jon Hamm is back as the charismatic banker-cum-cat burglar, plus an irresistibly strange show about the TV host accused of being a mafioso

No one does problematic but sneakily likable middle-aged man like Jon Hamm and his charisma carries this black comedy about financier-turned-burglar Andrew “Coop” Cooper. Despite being offered his old job back, Coop has decided to continue with his riskily enjoyable crisis. While he emerged from season one’s explosive climax smelling of roses, he’s soon on a collision course with his squeeze/nemesis Samantha Levitt. And worryingly, age is catching up with Coop as a back spasm curtails his latest robbing spree. Every now and then, the show edges towards a satire on jaded suburban overconsumption. But it is slightly too keen to have its aspirational cake and eat it, so remains a flimsy (albeit fun) romp.
Apple TV, from Friday 3 April

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:00 am

Hook, line and cinema: why boxing films are still a knockout

The BFI’s new season, The Cinematic Life of Boxing, shows how this captivating genre has endured for more than a century and celebrates its ability to inspire generations

Almost as soon as film was invented, it became apparent that boxing was a prime candidate for a spectacle to be showcased by the nascent artform – and to help develop it. Small wonder: as new technologies sought to capture high-stakes emotion, physical intensity, furious spectacle, rivalry and personal turbulence, boxingseemed uniquely capable of absorbing these narratives. That it straddled the class gap further expanded its appeal in this new entertainment – one which would itself foster fresh interest in the sport.

The first sports film was an 1894 short of a six-round match between Mike Leonard and Jack Cushing. Only 23 seconds survive, yet its impact still smarts, 132 years on. Scores of directors have since been drawn to pugilistic stories: everything from prize fights to amateur spars to bare-knuckle brawls. In fact, no sport has been rendered cinematically to quite the same degree, whether through dramas, biopics or documentaries. The British Film Institute’s new season, The Cinematic Life of Boxing, studies this long, symbiotic fascination, and how film has successfully tapped into the sport’s psychological, sociological and political dimensions.

Published: March 26, 2026, 4:20 pm

William Shakespeare’s Romeo+Juliet review – Baz Luhrmann’s joyful tragedy is still extravagantly full of life

The 1990s love tragedy starring a young Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes is a tonic and a delight

Thirty years ago, Baz Luhrmann reinvented Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet as a gangbanger love tragedy of the present day, with Mexico City standing in for an imaginary urban place called Verona Beach. The result was a terrific success, more of a success, I suspect, than Luhrmann ever had again; it was irreverent and questioning in just the right way, a sunburst of energy, but instinctively respectful to the story, with Luhrmann cutting the original text with co-screenwriter Craig Pearce but not changing or modernising it. It is full of life, extravagantly joyful, then passionately sad, and its lurid 90s crime-chic design doesn’t look dated. And in this Romeo and Juliet, Luhrmann never suspended the forward momentum to indulge campy musical setpieces, perhaps because Shakespeare’s language is the music and the dance; the text keeps the interpretation grounded.

The 21-year-old Leonardo DiCaprio, yet to have his massive breakthrough in Titanic (another story of starcrossed lovers), plays young Romeo Montague, whose family is locked into an unexplained Sicilian-style blood feud with the Capulet family. Romeo is a young idler and would-be poet, scribbling lines of verse into a notebook, and at this stage dreamily moping over a young woman called Rosaline, whose silent offstage existence is the play’s minor incidental mystery. (Brian Dennehy and Christina Pickles play his parents and they have much less of a role than the elder Capulets.)

Published: March 26, 2026, 11:00 am

Will Stephen Colbert’s Lord of the Rings film be Tom Bombadil’s time to shine?

The US talkshow host’s script will focus on chapters three to eight of Tolkien’s first volume – a section Hollywood originally thought disposable but is now circling back to monetise

As I write this, there are at least five days to April Fools’ Day. Yet the news that Stephen Colbert, the American late night host, is about to write a new Lord of the Rings movie based at least in part on some (more) bits of the JRR Tolkien tome that didn’t make it into Peter Jackson’s Oscar-winning trilogy certainly feels like a prank.

We already knew we are about to get an entire film, directed by and starring Andy Serkis, titled Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum, and based on a sequence that was told in brief flashback during 2001’s The Fellowship of the Ring. It’s due out next year. And there were rumours that more movies would be coming. The Scouring of the Shire, perhaps, based on the bit at the end of The Lord of the Rings when the hobbits go home and discover Saruman has set himself up as King of the Hobbits? Something centred on long forgotten segments of The Silmarillion or The Book of Lost Tales that have somehow not been covered by Amazon’s megabudget Rings of Power TV show? Perhaps an action adventure based on Farmer Giles of Ham?

Published: March 26, 2026, 2:23 pm

‘A broken heart can turn somebody into a bad Casanova’: breakout R&B star Leon Thomas on defiance, D’Angelo and his ‘doggie’ persona

Winning two Grammys last month cemented the New Yorker’s transition from producer for the likes of Drake to guitar-soloing superstar. Now he has Stevie Wonder calling him up – though he’s conscious of living up to the greats

Forget viral hits or sold-out shows: you know you’ve reached the big time when the godfather of funk gives you custom-made headgear. Last spring, Leon Thomas was backstage at California’s Coachella festival and due to join Ty Dolla $ign, his label boss, for a performance alongside George Clinton. The cosmic crusader said to Thomas: “‘You’re the kid who does the dog song, right? I made something for you,’” Thomas recalls. “He gave me this cool white hat with a foxtail on it.”

Thomas wore it to play Mutt, his 2024 breakthrough single, followed by a rendition of Clinton’s 1982 P-funk anthem Atomic Dog. But not before Clinton hot-boxed the trailer. “I don’t really smoke weed any more, but I was in the dressing room with him and Ty,” says Thomas, 32. “They both were smoking so much – when I was on stage, I realised, ‘Ohhh, I’m a little buzzed right now!’” A spiritual baton had been passed. “We went up there and rocked the crowd,” Thomas continues. “It was like 12, 13,000 [people] out there, the energy was crazy. I don’t know if you can tell, I’m still buzzing.”

Published: March 27, 2026, 5:00 am

Add to playlist: the coffee-shop pop of Gianna and the week’s best new tracks

With her acoustic guitars and trip-hoppy beats, the London musician recalls a particular era of polished 00s boho-pop, from Nelly Furtado to Corinne Bailey Rae

From London
Recommended if you like All Saints, Frou Frou, Nelly Furtado
Up next EP out now; on tour with After in May

The first time I heard Gianna’s Shadow of a Bird, I was instantly transported to a place that smelled of Impulse body spray. It is a track that has perfectly nailed the polished boho-pop of early 00s Nelly Furtado, All Saints and Corinne Bailey Rae – the sort that features arpeggiated acoustic guitar, vaguely trip-hop beats and a gently distinctive voice swooping through them.

Published: March 27, 2026, 12:00 pm

Flea: Honora review – Chili Pepper turns piper, taking up trumpet for a soulful jazz odyssey

(Nonesuch)
Imaginative interpretations of Funkadelic and Frank Ocean sit alongside starry collaborations and gorgeous instrumentals on the bassist’s brassy side project

While some rock musicians fill the boredom of long tours with nefarious activities, bassist Flea spent Red Hot Chili Peppers’ global jaunt of 2022-24 practising the trumpet, an instrument he first played as a child before funky rock pulled him away. Now, the 63-year-old’s daily routine and open spirit has produced his own deeply meditative and groovy jazz odyssey.

Named after a family member, Honora brings together a star-studded cast of peers and LA jazz and experimental luminaries for 10 tracks spanning Flea-penned instrumentals, chanted mantras and imaginative reinterpretations. The bassist doubles as narrator for spirited track A Plea, a yelled call for sanity (“Live for peace! Live for love!”) amid global madness and takes his trumpet to Eddie Hazel’s famous guitar solo on a beautifully plaintive remodel of Funkadelic’s Maggot Brain.

Published: March 27, 2026, 8:00 am

Paul McCartney: Days We Left Behind review – this wistful, lovely song is as McCartney-esque as it’s possible to be

(MPL/Capitol)
This nostalgic new single suggests a convincing mature style, without the unnecessary straining for relevance that marred some recent solo releases

• Paul McCartney announces 18th solo album, The Boys of Dungeon Lane

At 83, Paul McCartney remains one of rock’s most dependable arena-fillers, still packing out multiple nights in the biggest venues of whichever country he chooses to visit. But his recent solo albums have proved a decidedly mixed bag. There are always lovely songs that only Paul McCartney could have written: Seize the Day, Hosanna and I Don’t Know all offered compelling evidence that the extraordinary melodic instincts of the Most Successful Songwriter in the History of Popular Music were entirely intact as he stared down his ninth decade.

But they coexisted alongside ungainly lurches for contemporaneity that you rather wish he had left out: thumpy post-Mumford folk on 2013’s Everybody Out There; what appeared to be a Queens of the Stone Age pastiche in the shape of 2020’s Slidin’; a dreadful collaboration with pop songwriter for hire Ryan Tedder called Fuh You that even its co-author seemed to have misgivings about. “This doesn’t amount to anything – y’know, I wrote Eleanor Rigby,” he protested, which was a fair point but raised the question of how it still made the tracklisting of 2018’s Egypt Station.

Published: March 26, 2026, 3:00 pm

Benjamin Wood: ‘John Fowles’s The Magus was so frustrating I threw it at the wall’

The author on the Steinbeck novel that moved him to tears, how becoming a father inspired him to reread Marilynne Robinson, and the culinary comforts of James M Cain

My earliest reading memory
When I was eight, my mother bought me Stanley Bagshaw and the Short-sighted Football Trainer by Bob Wilson. I grew up thinking he was the same Bob Wilson who played in goal for Arsenal and presented sport on ITV. That wasn’t true, but it has never dampened my appreciation of this brilliant rhyming picture book, which ought to be reissued to inspire more kids to read. My sons adore it.

My favourite book growing up
The Red Pony by John Steinbeck had a profound effect on me in secondary school. I was amazed by how vividly a writer could evoke a landscape in words. It was also the first novel that moved me to tears, and stories that can do that will always stay dear to me.

Published: March 27, 2026, 10:00 am

Love Lane by Patrick Gale review – a homecoming tale with echoes of Brokeback Mountain

This kindly and companionable story of a man returning to 50s England after living in Canada offers a colourful evocation of the times

Towards the end of Love Lane, elderly protagonist Harry Cane becomes a figure of twinkly-eyed mischief. Gossiping with his granddaughter Pip, he advises her that “people without secrets … are like people with very tidy houses: usually not worth knowing”.

Dangerously buried secrets are very much the order of the day in Patrick Gale’s 18th novel. We start as we mean to go on: Love Lane opens with a recounting of the clandestine relationship between widower Harry and his bachelor brother-in-law Paul Slaymaker, Englishmen who separately emigrated to Canada around the turn of the last century. We first meet them as homesteaders in the unforgiving Saskatchewan wilds; Gale aficionados who encountered Cane in 2015’s A Place Called Winter remember the dark cloud of scandal that hastened his departure from Britain. The “steady tenderness” between Harry and Paul, which is passingly reminiscent of Annie Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain, gives the men succour as their neighbouring farms weather the bitter economic vicissitudes of the 1920s and 30s, but their wordlessly powerful bond is for ever altered by the arrival of Dimpy, a woman down on her luck, and her hard-hearted son, Davy.

Published: March 27, 2026, 9:00 am

No New York by Adele Bertei review – a vivid, vibrant, musical coming of age

1970s and 80s New York are viscerally evoked in this potent memoir of the ‘no wave’ scene

You won’t necessarily have heard of Adele Bertei: she was a member of experimental jazz-punk band the Contortions from 1977 and recorded the pop-house single Build Me a Bridge. But her memoir is an essential slice of New York’s bohemian pizza pie, and works in part because she is a relative unknown, not weighed down by her own cultural baggage.

Following a troubled, itinerant upbringing, she arrives in Manhattan in 1977 to find a city on its knees. The big apple was in the red, both literally (fires were a regular occurrence) and monetarily (there was a municipal debt crisis). But pre-Aids and post-Warhol’s avant garde grip, it was also a place that was creatively open.

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:00 am

Daunting, inspiring, comforting, terrifying: the writers who can make silence as eloquent as words

From the hush of medieval lullabies to striking poems about Grenfell, great authors know how to deploy the power of silence

On a snowy Sunday morning in February 1808, the poet William Wordsworth was walking along Fleet Street in London. He’d just been to visit his friend, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, in his lodgings on the Strand. Coleridge was at a low ebb: stuck in an unhappy marriage, weighed down by perennial financial difficulties, mentally blocked from writing, in poor health and addicted to opium. The visit had a lowering effect on Wordsworth’s own spirits. Walking along Fleet Street, eyes downcast, “ear sleeping”, feet moving automatically, he was absorbed in sombre thoughts.

But then something made him look up. A vision lay before him: Fleet Street blanketed with snow, “silent, empty, pure white”, and, at the end of it, the “huge and majestic form” of Saint Paul’s Cathedral. It was a spellbinding moment: the great thoroughfare temporarily devoid of carts and carriages, the cathedral looming blurrily out of the still-falling snowflakes – a real-life snow globe. “I cannot say how much I was affected at this unthought-of sight,” Wordsworth told his friend and patron, Sir George Beaumont, in a letter he wrote a few days later. “What a blessing I feel there is in habits of exalted imagination.” The great London silence was another piece in his accumulating pile of evidence that intuiting something beyond yourself is the route to becoming morally magnificent.

Published: March 26, 2026, 2:25 pm

Stop the world, I want to get off and run a video rental store in the 1990s | Dominik Diamond

Retail sims aren’t my thing, but the tactile, nostalgic pleasures of hit indie title Retro Rewind have me yearning for the era of physical media, smoking indoors and uncomplicated geopolitics

It’s early doors, but 2026 may be the biggest bin fire of a year in my lifetime. Wars starting, then ending, then starting again in the course of a week. People running their cars on hopes and dreams because a tank of petrol costs more than the vehicle. Manospheric morons making millions. Several depressing celebrity deaths before I’ve so much as eaten my first Creme Egg of the year.

I had no idea that the antidote to my anxiety and rage would be a cheap little title, made by two French blokes, in what I usually regard as the most turgid gaming genre. Retro Rewind is the moment’s indie darling, selling more than 100,000 copies on Steam in a week. In it, you run a video rental shop in the 90s. You need to buy videos. Display them well. Drop flyers. Serve your customers. Buy more stuff. It’s no different from any other retail sim out there, and I normally shun them because I play video games to escape the boring world of work and into an exciting one of dragons, aliens, and being brilliant at sports.

Published: March 27, 2026, 10:00 am

‘The violence of racist tyranny’: African Guernica goes on display alongside Picasso masterpiece

Piece by late South African artist Dumile Feni is part of new series History Doesn’t Repeat Itself, But It Does Rhyme

On the second floor of the Reina Sofía, in the very spot where Picasso’s Guernica was first exhibited when it arrived in the Madrid museum 34 years ago, there now hangs a smaller, near-namesake of the Spanish artist’s most famous work.

While African Guernica, which was drawn by the late South African artist Dumile Feni in 1967, may lack the scale of Picasso’s masterpiece, its depth, anger and unnerving juxtaposition of man and beast, light and dark, and innocence and cruelty, are every bit as disturbing.

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:42 am

C-3PO head used in Star Wars sequel The Empire Strikes Back sells for more than $1m at auction

Memorabilia from Jaws, Cast Away and The Lord of The Rings also went under the hammer

A light-up C-3PO head used in Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back has fetched more than US$1m at an auction.

The prop was part of a collection of film and TV memorabilia that went under the hammer on Wednesday as part of the Spring Entertainment Memorabilia Live Auction at Propstore auction house in Los Angeles.

Published: March 26, 2026, 11:36 pm

Halle Bailey: ‘It’s a vulnerable place to be – a young woman cast as a Disney princess’

The singer and Little Mermaid star answers your questions on ‘cool auntie’ Beyoncé, Bridgerton – and being confused for Halle Berry

After your experience in two major romance projects – The Little Mermaid and You, Me & Tuscany – how do you know if you’ve found the right Prince Charming? EmmaTseng
I think each character has a different version of their Prince Charming. For Ariel, I love that she wasn’t all about looking for a prince and that she only went above water because she was curious for life and her future. Anna, my character in You, Me & Tuscany, is also going after her own heart with her impulsive decisions, because you only live once. Both characters are bold and headstrong, and when they stumble upon their Prince Charmings – who are reassuring and affirming and bring out the best in them – it’s just the cherry on top.

Your You, Me & Tuscany co-star Regé-Jean Page plays the Duke of Hastings in Bridgerton. Did his English charm rub off on you? And if you could be any character in Bridgerton, who would it be? MrSOBaldrick
Regé is so funny. He’s such a warm, kind-hearted guy. I feel his English accent really comes out now that we’re here in London. When we’re in my home – LA – it goes in and out. I hope some of his English charm rubbed off on me. I love Bridgerton, yes. I would want to be the queen, because she is amazing, gets to choose the diamond of the season, matchmake and watch people fall in love.

Published: March 26, 2026, 2:00 pm

Protect ya neck! Wu-Tang Clan as they’ve never been seen before – in pictures

Eddie Otchere spent 10 years photographing the New York hip-hop stars and other musicians. Here are the highlights of his thrilling new photozine

Published: March 26, 2026, 7:00 am

Experience: I’ve spent decades collecting over 260 postboxes

It started with an obscure railway postbox that had been thrown in a skip – now my museum has pieces from Scotland, Ireland and Hong Kong

Back in 1994, I went to north Wales to see the miniature steam trains – I was a fan of railways. On a platform at Rhyl station, I noticed the painted outline of a postbox – it was all that remained of one that had stood there since the late 1800s.

It turns out it had been vandalised, set alight and chucked in a skip. I asked the station manager if I could see it and he jokingly said: “Give me 20 quid and you can take it away with you.”

Published: March 27, 2026, 5:00 am

Would you use cadaver fat for a boob job or butt lift? Some people already do

Cadaver fat from organ and tissue donors is being used for cosmetic procedures – and yup, it’s legal in the US, writes advice columnist Jessica DeFino

Hi Ugly,

I recently became aware of new cosmetic injectables derived from cadaver fat – as in, made of dead people. Apparently the fat is harvested from organ and tissue donors and used for procedures like Brazilian butt lifts and boob jobs.

Why is this column called ‘Ask Ugly’?

How should I be styling my pubic hair?

How do I deal with imperfection?

My father had plastic surgery. Now he wants me and my mother to get work done

Published: March 26, 2026, 4:00 pm

This little triangle scarf is suddenly everywhere. Here’s how to wear it

The humble triangle scarf is spring’s easiest outfit upgrade. Here are six ways to style one – including as a belt and a bonnet

• Sign up for the Filter US newsletter, your weekly guide to buying fewer, better things

It’s a bonnet. It’s a belt. It’s a bandana. Actually, it’s a triangle scarf.

Gen Z has officially ditched the classic long scarf, opting for a smaller style beloved by celebrities like Zoë Kravitz and trendy corporate gals alike.

Published: March 26, 2026, 7:17 pm

I asked AI about God. It asked me about myself instead

In week four of Rhik Samadder’s diary, our resident AI skeptic turned to HolyGPT to ask the ultimate question of why we are here

• Sign up for AI for the People, a six-week newsletter course, here

I remember my very first online search, back in 2001: “What is the meaning of life?”

I remember clicking through to a mysterious minimal website that told me all points of consciousness were facets of the divine wishing to perceive itself.

Published: March 26, 2026, 11:00 am

Marriage over, €100,000 down the drain: the AI users whose lives were wrecked by delusion

One minute, Dennis Biesma was playing with a chatbot; the next, he was convinced his sentient friend would make him a fortune. He’s just one of many people who lost control after an AI encounter

Towards the end of 2024, Dennis Biesma decided to check out ChatGPT. The Amsterdam-based IT consultant had just ended a contract early. “I had some time, so I thought: let’s have a look at this new technology everyone is talking about,” he says. “Very quickly, I became fascinated.”

Biesma has asked himself why he was vulnerable to what came next. He was nearing 50. His adult daughter had left home, his wife went out to work and, in his field, the shift since Covid to working from home had left him feeling “a little isolated”. He smoked a bit of cannabis some evenings to “chill”, but had done so for years with no ill effects. He had never experienced a mental illness. Yet within months of downloading ChatGPT, Biesma had sunk €100,000 (about £83,000) into a business startup based on a delusion, been hospitalised three times and tried to kill himself.

Published: March 26, 2026, 10:00 am

You be the judge: should my partner keep his ashtrays outside?

Rita wants Martin’s novelty ashtrays to stay in the garden. He likes to give them pride of place on the shelf. Whose argument is a smokescreen? You decide

• Find out how to get a disagreement settled or become a juror

Martin says his novelty ashtrays are decor and will spoil in the rain, but ash in our home is gross

I’ve already compromised and cut down on smoking – plus they’re more like collector’s items

Published: March 26, 2026, 8:00 am

When a ​football manager’s ​wardrobe ​says ​more ​than ​his​ tactics

From flannel shirts to herringbone tailoring, Pep Guardiola’s stylistic pivot hint​s at a man renegotiating his identity ​in the twilight of ​his footballing era

• Don’t get Fashion Statement delivered to your inbox? Sign up here

Last Tuesday, Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola lost to Real Madrid in a £270 shirt.

The grungy flannel number from the cult Swedish menswear brand Our Legacy was so noteworthy it consumed more post-match oxygen than the news that Manchester City had been dumped out of the Champions League before the quarter-finals. Never mind that Guardiola is beginning to look bereft of ideas for the first time in his career. All anyone cared about was whether he’d hired a stylist.

Published: March 27, 2026, 7:00 am

‘You go in bald and walk out with the best hair you’ve ever had’: the remarkable return of the toupee

Hair transplants have never been more widespread or more affordable. So why do so many balding men prefer glued-on hairpieces? And are the best really undetectable?

When you hear the word toupee, certain images spring to mind. Older men with suspiciously thick hair, say; or a poorly colour-matched partial wig covering a bald patch, perhaps flying off in the wind. These are the toupees of old.

Toupees are distinct from wigs in that they cover only part of the scalp, but both have a long history. While humans were wearing hairpieces as far back as ancient Egypt, toupees originated in the 18th century, the name developing from the French toupet, meaning “tuft of hair”. They became particularly prominent in the mid-20th century, with Time magazine estimating that more than 2.5 million men across the US were wearing toupees by 1970. But concerns about how obvious the pieces were, hammered home by ridicule in popular culture (see Monty Python’s Toupee Department sketch) combined with the gradual acceptance of shaved heads in fashion, led to their decline.

Published: March 26, 2026, 5:00 am

I was paid to write fake Google reviews – then my ‘bosses’ tried to scam me

Undercover reporter gets a taste of the sprawling fraud industry in which cryptocurrencies play a crucial role

• Five firms including Autotrader and Just Eat investigated over fake review failings

The holiday flat near(ish) the Roman ruins of Pompeii was “disgusting”, and smelled of “a mix of dampness and sewage”, according to one reviewer on Google Maps. I never visited, but I gave it five stars.

I did the same for a DoubleTree by Hilton hotel across the River Thames, an Ibis budget hotel in east London that is part of the Accor group, a central Travelodge and the nearby Hyatt Place – some of the best-known hotel brands in the world. Scattered in there were requests for reviews for hostels and B&Bs in Genova, Naples, Maastricht, Krakow and Brussels. For a few days I had a new job: writing fake reviews on Google Maps in exchange for cryptocurrency.

Published: March 27, 2026, 8:31 am

‘She broke the rules, fearlessly’: exhibition explores Vivienne Westwood’s revolutionary work

Show draws almost entirely from collection of Lancashire schoolteacher Peter Smithson, a fan since he was 10

Peter Smithson’s wife, Belise, has never minded when he receives a corset from Japan or a pair of fur-trimmed knickers and they are not for her.

“No, she’s never seen it as strange,” said Smithson, a chemistry teacher and Vivienne Westwood supercollector. “She has never judged it. She gets it. She knows it is part and parcel of who I am.”

Published: March 27, 2026, 6:00 am

‘Even Beyoncé is still learning’: 10 expert tips on how to become more musical

Listen to an album each morning, pick an easy instrument, don’t be afraid to write bad songs … you’ve got this!

There are many benefits to making music, whether you are one or 100. But how should you approach choosing an instrument to play? And what are the best choices for a complete novice? We asked musicians for advice on how to live a more musical life, at any age.

Published: March 26, 2026, 11:43 am

From basil to pistachio and peas – in praise of pesto, whichever way you make it

Whether on pasta or pizza, in soup or even in a tart, this classic Italian sauce is one of your most versatile ingredients

• Sign up here for our weekly food newsletter, Feast

It was not without satisfaction that I found my 14-year-old son making pesto the other week – for the first 13 years of his life he referred to it as either “pesto-the-bogey-man”, or “gross”. To avoid interfering and sabotaging the moment, I didn’t look too closely, so I didn’t clock the shallow bowl and immersion blender combination. I did hear the noise – a blunt churn – as the blade hit the leaves and nuts. Acting more like a leaf blower than cutter, it sent green and white oily fragments up the cupboards and over pretty much every pot, utensil and tool nearby. Impressively unfazed, he managed to scrape a good proportion of the elements into the food processor and make an extremely tasty pesto, which was mixed with linguine, green beans and potatoes. Less effective was his clearing up (mine too, for that matter), and I am still finding dried green flecks stuck to slotted spoons.

Like mash and crumble, the word pesto comes from an action, in this case pestare, which means to pound or bash repeatedly with a pestle. In much the same way, though, that mash was wedded to potato, and crumble set up home and had kids with apples, pesto came to be associated with basil, pine nuts, pecorino, garlic and olive oil. This happy combination of ingredients occurred in Genoa, in the region of Liguria, hence the name pesto alla Genovese. Such was its popularity, that the pounded sauce joined Cher, Prince and Sade in becoming a one-name celebrity. It is so beloved that some fans have suggested that other pestos are impostors.

Published: March 26, 2026, 12:45 pm

Motherhood, makeup and Zumba: the rehabilitation of one of Mexico’s most dangerous prisons

In Modulo 2, a renovated wing of a high-security facility in Cancún, female prisoners find moments of solidarity, pride and creativity in their confinement

At the end of a road in the city of Cancún, in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, a tall watchtower rises behind barbed wire and perimeter walls closely monitored by the army. This is where the Cereso stands, a high-security prison complex housing a men’s facility as well as a section called Modulo 2 that is reserved for females. A total of 284 women are held there.

Inside, time moves slowly. Days unfold according to a strict schedule, structured around chores and workshops organised by the prison administration.

A morning Zumba session in the yard of the Cereso. Physical activities are part of the facility’s daily routine

Published: March 27, 2026, 6:00 am

Flatterers out in force to fill Trump’s head with Venezuelan statue dreams

President’s popularity top of mind at another weird and wild cabinet meeting – riff on merits of Sharpies included

They have become so notorious for displays of flattery and obsequiousness that critics have drawn comparisons with North Korea. Thursday’s cabinet meeting at the White House was no different.

Doug Burgum, the US interior secretary, outflanked his fellow praise singers by saying he believes that Venezuela – which the US attacked in January – intends to honour the president with a statue.

Published: March 26, 2026, 8:37 pm

A smile and a handshake as Maduro case drags Venezuela crisis to New York court

The deposed Venezuelan president and his wife appeared in a Manhattan courtroom as rival protests took place outside

The deposed Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro had a smile on his face as he walked into a Manhattan court with shackles around his ankles and affably shook hands with attorneys at the defense table.

But though he appeared at ease on Thursday, Maduro, who was captured in Caracas by US special forces on 3 January, faces a “narco-terrorism” indictment that could land him in federal prison for life.

Published: March 26, 2026, 8:43 pm

Taylor Swift, a cloned sheep and China fashion week: photos of the day – Friday

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Published: March 27, 2026, 9:59 am