Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl half-time show review – a thrilling ode to Boricua joy

The Grammy-winning Puerto Rican megastar delivered a powerful, detail-packed performance that paid tribute to his history and teased more greatness for his future

When the NFL announced in September that Bad Bunny would perform at the Super Bowl half-time show, the immediate expectation was that Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio would Make a Statement.

There was, of course, backlash from the people who think a performance in Spanish is un-American (all while Puerto Rico remains a US territory). But there was also criticism from those who argued that, post-Kaepernick, there is no performance on an NFL stage that could meaningfully challenge the power whose invitation into its center of capital and nationalism these artists accepted. And as we’ve reached peak Bad Bunny this week, Puerto Ricans have pointed out that many fans’ investment in the island ends with the artist.

Published: February 9, 2026, 4:09 am

Epstein was not ostracised for his crimes. To some powerful men, he became even more appealing | Moira Donegan

The latest tranche of files expose how he was viewed as a sexual svengali – and an expert on dodging the #MeToo movement

A new tranche of Epstein files has blasted its way through the worlds of media, politics, tech, academia, finance and Hollywood. High-profile individuals have once again been forced to explain their relationship with the billionaire financier – and why exactly they sent that email, or what they were doing in that photo, in that place, at that time. There have been resignations in Norway, Slovakia, France, the UK and on Wall Street. Each individual scandal matters. But take the files as a whole and a new picture forms: of Jeffrey Epstein as a man who was seen to survive a sexual abuse scandal, and who was then feted as a sexual svengali and a valuable ally in navigating allegations of sexual abuse amid the #MeToo movement.

The 3.5m documents that have thus far been released to the public – out of a reported 6m documents pertaining to Epstein in the US justice department’s possession – paint Epstein as someone for whom elites, and particularly elite men, often felt a sense of camaraderie and affection, maintaining intimate and friendly relationships long after his 2008 conviction on child sexual abuse charges. And their content implies that, in some cases, this was not simply a case of them turning a blind eye to their friend’s sexual crimes: the powerful actively approached Epstein for sexual and romantic advice, and saw him as a thrower of “wild” parties and a listening ear in whom they could confide their anxieties about the excesses of the #MeToo movement.

Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist

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Published: February 9, 2026, 11:00 am

‘Was I scared going back to China? No’: Ai Weiwei on AI, western censorship and returning home

He has been jailed, tracked and threatened by China’s government. What was it like pay a visit home? As he publishes a polemic about surveillance and state control, the artist relives a momentous trip to see his mother

Ai Weiwei is talking me through the decision-making process before his first visit to China in over a decade. The artist, known around the world as the most famous critic of the Chinese communist regime, had to do some fraught arithmetic before deciding to head back home.

Before boarding a flight with his son, who had never met the artist’s elderly mother, Ai thought back to his time in detention when his captors told him he would spend the next 13 years in custody on bogus charges: “They said, ‘When you come out, your son won’t recognise you.’ That was very heavy and really the only moment that touched me.”

Published: February 9, 2026, 5:00 am

Reshona Landfair on her life after R Kelly: ‘I had to rebuild my entire self’

She was just 14 when she was groomed by the R&B star, and filmed in an explicit video. She tells the extraordinary story of how she survived

Picture Reshona Landfair in 1996 at 12 years old, when she met the R&B superstar R Kelly (real name Robert Kelly). Her world, she says, seemed like “a buffet” spread out before her. She was a popular girl, a seriously talented basketball player and the youngest member – in her words, “the pint-sized girl rapper” – of 4 The Cause, the singing group she had formed with three cousins. They’d been signed to a record label, made the Top 10 in eight countries and toured much of Europe. Her large extended family from the West Side of Chicago was tight-knit. Life was filled with music, sport, church, Sunday lunch at Grandma’s, family road trips and everybody knowing everybody’s business. “That was a beautiful time,” she says. “I had love and good people all around me. I was living in my true light of who I wanted to become. I felt like I was on my way.”

Fast forward to Landfair at 26 years old, when she finally left Kelly’s orbit. By then, half her family weren’t speaking to the other half, and the relationships that survived were charged with guilt, unasked questions and terrible past mistakes. She had no friends left, as Kelly hadn’t allowed it. Her hopes of a musical career were also long gone – Kelly had made her leave 4 The Cause when she was just 15. She had no qualifications beyond high school and no idea what she wanted to do because, for more than a decade, she’d relied on Kelly to tell her. She couldn’t imagine a healthy relationship; she’d learned sex, she says, “through the lens of a paedophile”. Every element of her 12-year-old life, everything on that “buffet table”, had been destroyed by Kelly. Yet she is still told regularly by total strangers that she must be a “gold digger”, that she “rode the gravy train” and took Kelly for all she could get.

Published: February 9, 2026, 5:00 am

Winter Olympics 2026: Gremaud denies Gu for slopestyle title, more gold for Von Allmen – live

• Medal table | Live scores and schedule | Results | Briefing

• Team GB dream of Magic Monday | And email Daniel

Which of these events is most terrifying? This a question that reminds me of when a teacher asked five-year-old me which hand I wanted to be caned on, and I kept saying neither – yes, a real man would’ve said either or both – except the other way around, the answer being all of them. But for the less lily-livered, there must be an answer.

The slalom section of this competition is tomorrow, which is to say the downhillers go today, then the times of the two team members are added together, with the quickest taking gold. Germany now lead, having gone faster than Switzerland.

Published: February 9, 2026, 3:35 pm

‘We’ve lost everything’: anger and despair in Sicilian town collapsing after landslide

People in Niscemi struggle to comprehend loss of homes and businesses and feel disaster could have been avoided

For days, the 25,000 residents of the Sicilian town of Niscemi have been living on the edge of a 25-metre abyss. On 25 January, after torrential rain brought by Cyclone Harry, a devastating landslide ripped away an entire slope of the town, creating a 4km-long chasm. Roads collapsed, cars were swallowed, and whole sections of the urban fabric plunged into the valley below.

Dozens of houses hang precariously over the edge of the landslide, while vehicles and fragments of roadway continue to give way, hour by hour, under the strain of unstable ground.

Published: February 9, 2026, 5:00 am

Hundreds protested against this Venezuelan’s detention by ICE. Now he’s free after seven months

Case continues against those who protested Joswar Torres’s arrest, with prosecutors seeking six years’ imprisonment

A Venezuelan migrant whose detention by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) sparked a protest that involved nearly 2,000 people and led to 30 arrests is free after spending seven months in custody in Washington state, following a ruling from a federal judge who said his constitutional rights had been violated.

Joswar Torres, 29, was granted humanitarian parole in the United States and had an asylum application pending, but was nevertheless detained in June 2025 after a routine check-in at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) office in Spokane, Washington.

Published: February 9, 2026, 12:00 pm

Trump claims Bad Bunny’s historic Super Bowl show watched by millions was ‘affront’ to American ‘greatness’ – US politics live

Puerto Rican musician has been vocal critic of US president, who claimed performance held almost entirely in Spanish was a ‘slap in the face’

Ghislaine Maxwell, the convicted sex trafficker and longtime accomplice of Jeffrey Epstein, is set to attend a virtual deposition for the House oversight committee at 10am ET today.

This is part of the committee’s ongoing investigation into the handling of Epstein’s case,

Published: February 9, 2026, 3:39 pm

Files cast light on Jeffrey Epstein’s ties to cryptocurrency

Newly released documents detail convicted sex offender’s early backing of bitcoin and Coinbase

Millions of files related to Jeffrey Epstein have brought to light his ties to the highest echelons of the cryptocurrency industry.

Documents published last week by the US Department of Justice reveal Epstein bankrolled the “principal home and funding source” for bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, during its nascent stages; he also invested $3m in Coinbase in 2014, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the US, and cut a check that same year to Blockstream, a prominent bitcoin-focused technology firm. Both crypto startups accepted Epstein’s investments in 2014 – six years after his 2008 conviction in Florida for soliciting prostitution from a minor.

Published: February 9, 2026, 2:00 pm

Venezuela’s Machado says close ally kidnapped by ‘heavily armed’ men hours after prison release

Juan Pablo Guanipa was ‘violently’ taken from a residential neighbourhood in Caracas, according to opposition leader María Corina Machado

Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado said on Monday one of her closest allies was kidnapped hours after being released from prison.

The government had released several prominent opposition members from prison on Sunday after lengthy politically motivated detentions.

Published: February 9, 2026, 6:35 am

US not trying to dismantle Nato or undermine world order, says ambassador – Europe live

Matthew Whitaker, the US ambassador to Nato, responds to criticism in the Munich Security Conference report

• Jimmy Lai sentenced to 20 years in prison for national security offences

In its section on Europe, the Munich Security Conference report has also warned that the continent was entering “a prolonged era of confrontation, as Russia’s full-scale war of aggression and expanding hybrid campaign dismantle the remnants of the post-cold war cooperative security order.”

It also added that:

“Washington’s gradual retreat from its traditional role as Europe’s primary security guarantor – reflected in wavering support for Ukraine and threatening rhetoric on Greenland – is heightening Europe’s sense of insecurity and exposing its unfinished transition from security consumer to security provider.”

“Analysts widely view these operations as deliberate efforts by Moscow to probe Europe’s defences, sow division, intimidate publics, and weaken support for Ukraine by diverting attention toward domestic security. Europe now faces the challenge of proactively deterring further provocations while avoiding inadvertent escalation.”

“European leaders have long refrained from overt criticism of US policies. Instead, they have pursued a dual strategy: striving to keep Washington engaged at almost any cost while cautiously preparing for greater autonomy. …

Recent confrontations over Greenland, in turn, suggest that Europe’s strategy of accommodation may be reaching its limits.”

“Given the urgency of these tasks and the limits of consensus-based decision-making, progress will depend on courageous leadership coalitions.

Smaller avant-gardes, such as the Weimar Plus countries (France, Germany, Poland, and the UK) or the European Group of Five (the former plus Italy), will be essential to drive defense industrial consolidation, articulate a coherent European vision for Ukraine, and prepare the EU for enlargement. These steps will involve sharing costs and political risk.

Published: February 9, 2026, 3:18 pm

San Francisco teachers begin first strike in nearly 50 years

Thousands walk out after talks with district failed to reach agreement on wages, healthcare and resources for special needs students

Thousands of public schoolteachers in San Francisco went on strike on Monday, the first public schoolteachers strike in the city in nearly 50 years.

The strike comes after teachers and the district failed to reach an agreement over higher wages, health benefits and more resources for special needs students. The San Francisco Unified School District closed all its 120 schools and said it would offer independent study to some of the district’s 50,000 students.

Published: February 9, 2026, 3:14 pm

US federal contractor hired white supremacist leader for wildfire relief

Ian Michael Elliott of neofascist Patriot Front worked ‘crisis relief missions’ funded by Department of Agriculture

A federal security contractor that has been awarded millions of dollars by the Department of Agriculture hired a prominent white nationalist leader to work on its patrols last year.

Ian Michael Elliott, a longstanding senior figure in the neofascist group Patriot Front, was part of “crisis relief missions” undertaken on the US west coast by Knight Division Tactical, according to an image shared on LinkedIn in September by one of the company’s executives.

Published: February 9, 2026, 1:00 pm

Cabinet ministers rally behind Starmer after Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar calls for him to resign – UK politics live

David Lammy and Rachel Reeves among senior party members to express confidence in the prime minister

Tim Allan said he was standing down to allow Keir Starmer the opportunity to build a new team.

In a statement, he said:

I have decided to stand down to allow a new No 10 team to be built.

I wish the PM and his team every success.

Published: February 9, 2026, 3:28 pm

Sony Pictures chief calls racist Trump video ‘despicable’ in rare intervention

Tom Rothman, CEO of the major Hollywood film studio, described a clip depicting the Obamas that was posted on Truth Social as ‘regressive’

In a highly unusual intervention, Hollywood studio chief Tom Rothman has described Donald Trump’s posting of a racist video featuring former US president Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama as “despicable”.

The remarks were reported by the Hollywood Reporter, and were made when Rothman was speaking at the African American Film Critics Association awards ceremony, where he accepted the Impact award on behalf of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, of which Rothman is chair and CEO.

Published: February 9, 2026, 12:36 pm

Melania drops 67% at US box office as Rotten Tomatoes defends record-breaking audience scores

Depite an expanded release to some 2,000 screens, the gushing enthusiasm recorded on the vox pop Popcornometer is not powering a word-of-mouth hit

Melania, Brett Ratner’s authorised documentary following the first lady in the 20 days preceding Donald Trump’s January 2025 inauguration, has dipped 67% in its second week of release in the US.

The film outpaced expectations over its first weekend, taking in $7.2m domestically and leading Amazon to expand their rollout from around 1,500 venues to just over 2,000. But indications are that appetite had already been sated, with Sunday projections standing at $2.3m, meaning a drop from No 3 to No 10 in the US box office charts.

Published: February 9, 2026, 1:02 pm

Trump news at a glance: ‘This is going to be a free and fair election,’ says Hakeem Jeffries after Trump’s comments

Jeffries says Democrats will stop Donald Trump from trying to steal this year’s midterm elections – key US politics stories from Sunday 8 February at a glance

Democrats will stop Donald Trump from trying to steal this year’s midterm elections, Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic leader in the US House of Representatives said on Sunday.

Jeffries’ comments come amid widespread concern after Trump said Republicans should “take over the voting”. The US constitution gives states the power to set election rules and says Congress can pass laws to set requirements for federal elections. The constitution gives the president no authority over how elections are run.

Published: February 9, 2026, 3:03 am

‘Take the vaccine, please,’ Dr Oz urges amid rising measles cases in US

Health official’s endorsement comes as South Carolina faces hundreds of cases and US risks losing elimination status

A senior US public health official called on Americans to get vaccinated against measles as outbreaks continue in multiple states and concerns grow that the country could lose its measles elimination designation. Dr Mehmet Oz, a cardiothoracic surgeon, spoke in support on Sunday of the measles vaccine.

“Take the vaccine, please,” said Oz, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. “We have a solution for our problem.

Published: February 8, 2026, 11:52 pm

The Minnesotans trapped at home, too terrified of ICE to go outside: ‘Our house is like a jail’

The surge of federal immigration agents has forced many families to remain inside for weeks, living in fear of roving ICE patrols snatching people off the street

José hasn’t left his house in Saint Paul for 29 days – not to shovel the snow at his driveway, not to fix up the car.

When the car needed an oil change, he video-called his wife, Sara, from inside so he could walk her through it. “I’ve only been from the bedroom to the living room,” he said. He’s afraid to even get near the front door.

Published: February 9, 2026, 1:00 pm

‘We’re being turned into an energy colony’: Argentina’s nuclear plan faces backlash over US interests

Push to restart uranium mining in Patagonia has sparked fears about the environmental impact and loss of sovereignty over key resources

On an outcrop above the Chubut River, one of the few to cut across the arid Patagonian steppe of southern Argentina, Sergio Pichiñán points across a wide swath of scrubland to colourful rock formations on a distant hillside.

“That’s where they dug for uranium before, and when the miners left, they left the mountain destroyed, the houses abandoned, and nobody ever studied the water,” he says, citing suspicions arising from cases of cancer and skin diseases in his community. “If they want to open this back up, we’re all pretty worried around here.”

Published: February 9, 2026, 2:00 pm

Economic growth is still heating the planet. Is there any way out?

Rising GDP continues to mean more carbon emissions and wider damage to the planet. Can the two be decoupled?

During Cop30 negotiations in Brazil last year, delegates heard a familiar argument: rising emissions are unavoidable for countries pursuing growth.

Since the first Cop in the 1990s, developing nations have had looser reduction targets to reflect the economic gap between them and richer countries, which emitted millions of tonnes of CO₂ as they pulled ahead. The concession comes from the idea that an inevitable cost of prosperity is environmental harm.

Published: February 9, 2026, 8:00 am

Bad Bunny and jingoism lite: was this the Super Bowl where woke roared back?

The NFL appeared keen to welcome the sport’s non-Maga contingent back into the tent. But the theater and violence of capitalism was still there

Roger Federer smiling wolfishly to the crowd: a return to woke? Adam Sandler hangdog in the Levi’s Stadium stands, Jon Bon Jovi mooching on the sideline like a retired dentist on a cruise, Billie Joe Armstrong belting out American Idiot during the pre-game show under his motionless meringue of fogey-blond hair: were they a sign? A New England Patriots team who were neither favored to win nor widely reviled, then promptly repaid a grateful public by losing: was this the Super Bowl which proved that history really can move on, that America is not fated to remain hostage to the tremors and hatreds of the past? Well, yes and no.

A year after Donald Trump made American football’s showpiece all about him, Sunday’s game in Santa Clara always promised a sort of correction – a cooling of the mood, perhaps even an end to the manipulation of sport for political ends. As always the best way to gauge the success of this mission was as the gods intended: through a TV screen. Trump – saddled with historically low approval ratings, facing a massacre in this year’s midterms, and no doubt wary of risking a public appearance in the deep blue sea of the Bay Area – was absent on this occasion, and he kept the F-22 fighter jets that were scheduled to be part of the pre-game flyover away from Levi’s Stadium too. (Unspecified “operational assignments” were the reason offered for the jets’ withdrawal, which means there’s probably a low-ranking member of the Trump administration putting big money on a US military strike somewhere in Latin America as we speak.) And yet, the absent autocrat still weighed on proceedings, his curdling influence turning every moment and gesture on Sunday into a referendum on the prospects for a post-Trumpian sporting future. Could football be normal again?

Published: February 9, 2026, 2:23 pm

‘If I didn’t write about him, I’m afraid I might become him’: the making of Taxi Driver at 50

Screenwriter Paul Schrader talks the inspiration and legacy of Martin Scorsese’s incendiary New York nightmare

If Travis Bickle were real and alive today, he would not be a taxi driver but more likely be sitting in his parents’ basement, exploring the dark, misogynistic depths of the internet.

“We call them incels now,” reflects Paul Schrader, who wrote the screenplay for Taxi Driver, released 50 years ago on Sunday. “‘Incels’ wasn’t a word at that time but it is these guys who are lonely, who see themselves unable to make contact with women, have a repressed backlog of anger and resentment and imagine some kind of glorious transcendent transformation through violence.”

Published: February 9, 2026, 11:03 am

Ultrarunners in secondhand trainers: the rickshaw drivers taking on the world’s toughest races – photo essay

Members of an athletics club in Madagascar formed by rickshaw drivers are now beating elite athletes in international endurance events

It is a fiercely competitive market, and one of the toughest physical jobs in Madagascar’s Antsirabe, but over the past five years cycle rickshaw driver Haja Nirina has honed his athletic prowess alongside his business.

In this city, about 100 miles (160km) south of the capital, Antananarivo, there are more than 4,000 rickshaws for a population of 265,000, the cheapest transport available for people and goods. Some are pulled by cycles, others by hand. Each day, Nirina makes between 10 and 15 trips, making 10,000 to 15,000 ariary (£1.70 to £2.60). Unlike 99% of drivers, Nirina doesn’t lose 5,000 ariary of his income paying a daily rental fee for the rickshaw. For the past three years, he has owned his, thanks to a programme run by his local athletic club.

The chaotic streets of Antsirabe, where the rickshaw drivers vie for trade

Published: February 9, 2026, 11:00 am

The Testament of Ann Lee with Daniel Blumberg and Amanda Seyfried review – yelps, bells and bruised beauty

Milton Court, London
Live on stage the Oscar-winning composer’s score is disorientating, ecstatic and strange. Its star, Amanda Seyfried’s pure voice is the anchor in a brief but absorbing set

A few days ago, Amanda Seyfried was on the Graham Norton couch alongside Margot Robbie and Johannes Radebe from Strictly. Tonight, the star of Mean Girls, Les Misérables and Mamma Mia is seated among a rather different set of luminaries: key figures from London’s avant garde jazz scene.

The link here is composer Daniel Blumberg. When he accepted an Oscar last year for his extraordinary score to The Brutalist, Blumberg namechecked Cafe Oto, the leftfield Dalston venue whose improvising musicians have long formed the bedrock of his work. While scoring The Testament of Ann Lee – a biopic starring Seyfried as the founder of the Shaker religious movement – Blumberg was struck by parallels between Shaker worship and free improvisation: a shared ascetic intensity, a cult-like devotion, and moments of wild, euphoric release. The speaking-in-tongues qualities of Shaker devotional singing, he realised, had uncanny echoes in the work of vocal improvisers such as Phil Minton and Maggie Nicols, both of whom feature in the film – and in this performance.

Published: February 9, 2026, 2:42 pm

My rookie era: on my first ski trip, I felt like a natural – then I was rapidly humbled by the mountain

I was a ski god. An avalanche. I was starting to think about the Olympics. Darude’s Sandstorm was playing in my head. Then wham, bam, stacked it

• Read more summer essentials

Twenty hot lesbians in a cabin in the snow. It sounds like a budget porn plot from the 70s, but it was the pitch my sister gave when she convinced me to try out skiing for the first time.

I am not a sports dyke. I am a like-to-read-books-and-sit-in-saunas dyke.

Published: February 9, 2026, 2:00 pm

How a decades-old video game has helped me defeat the doomscroll

Trading social media for Pokémon battles and evolutions in Kanto on a Game Boy Advance has been surprisingly serene

Cutting back on doomscrolling must be one of the hardest new year resolutions to keep. Instinctively tapping on the usual suspects on your phone’s home screen becomes a reflex, and vast quantities of money and user data have been specifically employed to keep you reaching for the phone, ingraining it into our work, leisure and social lives. You’ll get no shame from me if you love your phone and have a healthy relationship with your apps, but I’ve found myself struggling lately.

This year, I’m attempting to cut back on screen time – sort of. I’m replacing the sleek oblong of my smartphone with something a little more fuzzy and nostalgic. In an attempt to dismantle my bad habit, I’m closing the feeds of instant updates and instead carrying around a Game Boy Advance. I’ve been playing Pokémon FireRed, a remake of the very first Pokémon games, which turn 30 this month. Even this refreshed version is more than two decades old.

Published: February 9, 2026, 2:29 pm

A Minnesotan nurse saved my refugee family’s life. Four decades on, we watched the news together in horror | Rathana Chea

Alex Pretti’s death in Minneapolis reveals a painful contradiction – nurses are carers in times of crisis, often invisible, yet they carry our moral compass

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

Four decades ago, my parents were Cambodian refugees. As high school students, they were thrown into one of the darkest chapters of humanity’s history, surviving nearly five years in forced labour camps under the Khmer Rouge genocide. An estimated 2.7 million of my kin perished during that time. Fortunately for my family, they were accepted under Australia’s humanitarian program and arrived in Australia on 26 January, a date heavy with complexity for Australian identity, and our refugee story became another layer within it.

Our journey began when my mother discovered she was pregnant. Together with my father, they decided to flee on foot through landmine-ridden jungle toward the Thai-Cambodian border, carrying nothing but their lives and the hope that their unborn child might escape the suffering they had endured.

Published: February 9, 2026, 5:11 am

I asked AI to name my wife. To the hopelessly incorrect people it cited, my deepest apologies | Martin Rowson

Authors, a newsreader, a lawyer and an esteemed colleague: they’re all great – but I’m not married to any of them. Can we really depend on this technology?

Recently, the Rowsons accidentally invented a new game that anyone can play at home. I have yet to come up with a world-beating name for it, so for now let’s just call it “How bloody stupid is AI?” The playing of the game will change from player to player, depending on their circumstances – but essentially the rules remain the same. Ask AI a simple question about yourself, and see just how wrong it gets it.

In my case, all you need know is that while I, through the nature of my job, have a fairly large online presence, my partner (we married in 1987) has assiduously avoided having one at all. Which means that if you Google “Martin Rowson wife” in images, you may get a picture of me next to our then 14-year-old daughter or me with my friend and fellow cartoonist Steven Appleby, who happens to be trans but has kept her given first name.

Published: February 9, 2026, 10:00 am

The Mandelson I knew had a fatal flaw: he was a machiavellian who always cast himself as a victim | Andy McSmith

The UK’s first ‘spin doctor’ thrived because he was immensely valuable to those he served. But the strategist always felt entitled to more

Others will be shocked by his sleazy, self-regarding disloyalty and apparent lack of concern for Jeffrey Epstein’s victims, but something that will puzzle people who knew Peter Mandelson is: how could he be so stupid?

Should you be thinking of stabbing a colleague in the back, and betraying your country, your government and your party – to paraphrase the prime minister – a basic precaution is not to leave an email trail. During the 2008 expenses scandal, it was the MPs who left proof of their dishonesty in emails who went to jail. I suspect many others got away with it for want of written evidence. You might think a politician so deviously clever that they call him the Prince of Darkness would know that, and not end up with police searching two of his houses.

Andy McSmith was chief press officer for the Labour party in the 1980s, and spent almost 30 years as a political journalist based in the House of Commons. His latest book, Strange People I Have Known, includes a chapter on Peter Mandelson

Published: February 9, 2026, 1:18 pm

Middle seats on planes are unpopular – so what can we learn from those who pick them? | Emma Beddington

For people who love the middle seat, the attractions are many, from a taste of humility to ethical entitlement to the armrests to ‘strangermaxxing’

Embracing friction and inconvenience in our lives is a 2026 trend, but the New York Times has drawn my attention to individuals who are frictionmaxxing further than most of us might be able to fathom: travellers who choose the awkward, inconvenient middle seat on planes.

Airlines expect us to pay extra to choose our seat now, and refusing means becoming the filling in a stranger sandwich, but actively embracing that seems perverse. Some, I learned, claim middle seats offer the best of both worlds – you can see out of the window but enjoy a relatively easy escape – and you’re “ethically entitled to both arm rests” (good luck explaining that to your neighbours). Others treat it as an exercise in Zen humility. I suppose relinquishing main-character energy could make travel less painful? “Be grateful that you’re flying and that’s it,” as James Cashen, a middle seater, explained his philosophy on TikTok.

Published: February 9, 2026, 1:58 pm

Thinking of trashing a small business on social media? Please, think again | Gene Marks

Online pile-ons can destroy small businesses. Save the derision for big companies that can weather social media storms

A viral Reddit post mocks a $22 grilled cheese sandwich and helps to sink a Bay Area shop. A restaurant owner is forced to push back on a viral complaint. A small business owner in Maine faces a viral backlash after posting a “No ICE” sign. The owner of a furniture store mistakenly receives backlash after being confused with another store. An influencer calls out a South Carolina boutique in a TikTok video after a negative shopping experience.

I have had countless bad experiences at small businesses. I have eaten cold pasta and seen mice scurry behind a table. I don’t go back. Sometimes, when the experience is particularly great, I’ll give a quick good review on Google. But when I have had a bad experience? Never. Ever.

Published: February 8, 2026, 3:00 pm

Winter Olympian Gus Kenworthy says he has received death threats over anti-ICE protest

• British freestyle skier targeted on Instagram account

• ‘A lot of the messages have been awful – it’s insane’

The Team GB freestyle skier Gus ­Kenworthy says he has received death threats and messages hoping that he breaks his neck after posting an image apparently showing him urinating “fuck ICE” in the snow last week.

Kenworthy, who has lived in ­America for most of his life, also ­doubled down on his criticisms of the US immigration and ­customs ­enforcement agency, ­calling them “absolutely evil and awful and terrifying”.

Published: February 9, 2026, 10:52 am

Breezy Johnson embraces the beauty and madness of downhill to win Olympic gold

The 30-year-old from Wyoming has labored in the shadow of household names like Lindsey Vonn and Mikaela Shiffrin. On Sunday, she made history of her own

For years, Breezy Johnson was the other American alpine skier. The one with the near-misses, the injuries, the suspension and the unfortunate timing to exist in the same stable at the same time as Lindsey Vonn and Mikaela Shiffrin. On Sunday, three weeks after her 30th birthday in the shadow of the Dolomites above Cortina d’Ampezzo, she became an Olympic champion.

Johnson crossed first in the women’s downhill at the Milano Cortina Games by four-hundredths of a second – the slightest winning margin in the event’s Olympic history outside the dead heat in 2014 – to become just the second American woman to win the sport’s most dangerous race and prestigious title. The only other was Vonn, who took gold in Vancouver 16 years ago.

Published: February 8, 2026, 10:00 pm

Trump calls Hunter Hess ‘a real loser’ for skier’s ambivalence about representing US

• US president attacks freestyle skier in post

• Hess had said representing the US was ‘a little hard’

Donald Trump responded to Hunter Hess on Truth Social on Sunday, calling the Olympian a “real loser” and criticizing comments the US freestyle skier made in a press conference days earlier.

Hess was asked in a press conference on Wednesday what it was like to represent the US in the Olympics given the current situation in the country, which has included ICE raids in Minnesota and a number of geopolitical crises. Hess said representing the US at the 2026 Winter Olympics brought up “mixed emotions” and that it was “a little hard.”

Published: February 8, 2026, 7:20 pm

Ilia Malinin holds off resurgent Japan to seal repeat US team figure skating gold

• Malinin delivers to secure US Olympic team gold win

• Japan pairs skating brilliance pushes US team to limit

• Host Italy secure team bronze on home Olympic rink

The United States held off a late charge from Japan to retain the Olympic team figure skating title on Sunday, with Ilia Malinin delivering in the men’s free skate to secure gold after three days of competition. Japan finished with silver, while host nation Italy claimed bronze.

The United States survived a final-day surge from Japan to retain the Olympic team figure skating title on Sunday night, with Ilia Malinin delivering under intense pressure in the men’s free skate to secure gold at the Milano Cortina Games. Japan finished one point behind in silver, while host nation Italy claimed bronze after three days of tightly contested competition.

Published: February 8, 2026, 10:01 pm

Lindsey Vonn’s crash is violent but honest ending to an unprecedented Olympic bid

The gruesome finish to the US star’s comeback, at age 41 and with a ruptured ACL, is a reminder of skiing’s unforgiving nature

There was always a version of this story that ended in a single, violent instant. Lindsey Vonn was 13th to push out of the start gate on Sunday in Cortina d’Ampezzo knowing exactly what she was racing with: a fully ruptured anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee, a heavy brace wrapped around the joint, and the accumulated wear of a career spent flirting with speed and consequence.

Vonn barely made it out of the opening phase of the run.

Published: February 8, 2026, 1:46 pm

The flawed Patriots face a harsh truth: only the very best teams get a Super Bowl sequel

Successful reruns are rare in the NFL. And New England showed enough holes on Sunday to suggest making it back to the big dance soon will be tough

The greatest lie a fanbase tells itself is that there is always next year.

It is the softest landing spot in sport, a comfort blanket after a crushing defeat. Next year, we’ll be healthier. Next year, we’ll fix our offensive line. Next year, we’ll add that superstar receiver and retain all our guys. Next year.

Published: February 9, 2026, 3:27 pm

Lindsey Vonn airlifted to hospital after crashing out of Olympic downhill race

• US skier stable after surgery on broken leg

• Vonn’s US teammate Breezy Johnson tops podium

• Winter Olympics 2026: live news and updates

The Olympic career of Lindsey Vonn has ended in a sickening, split-second crash high on the side of the Tofane downhill run in Cortina d’Ampezzo. The American, one of the most successful skiers in history, had come out of a five-year retirement to compete in her fifth Games, and was hoping to become the oldest athlete, male or female, to win a medal in the downhill.

Vonn was just 12 seconds into the race when her legs gave way beneath her as she rode a bump. She twisted, fell, and tumbled and, after the first stunned screams and shouts, the crowd all around the mountain fell silent in shock and worry. The USA team confirmed later that she was in a “stable condition and in good hands” following surgery after breaking her left leg.

Published: February 8, 2026, 12:29 pm

Premier League: 10 talking points from the weekend’s action

Liverpool rue costly mistakes, Viktor Gyökeres builds up a head of steam and Rayan gets the hype train chugging

• Premier League top scorers: the latest standings

Arne Slot was close to landing a coup against Pep Guardiola, the coach he admires most. Then came more of the individual errors that have ruined Liverpool’s title defence. Aching weaknesses within Slot’s squad were exposed again. Dominik Szoboszlai playing Bernardo Silva onside for Manchester City’s equaliser was an error midfielders playing full-back will make. Szoboszlai’s late red card was, though, foolish. Alisson’s foul on Matheus Nunes for Erling Haaland’s decisive penalty was another rush of blood. Liverpool’s huge summer spend was motivated by their executives’ belief in buying the best individuals to unlock the Premier League’s tactical cages. City’s key individuals showed such a policy can pay off, with Silva inspirational, Gianluigi Donnarumma making the save that sparked the game’s chaotic final scenes, Marc Guéhi looking an astute defensive signing and Haaland supplying Silva’s goal. City had been unconvincing but their mentality held, allowing them to eventually profit from Hugo Ekitiké’s misses and the waning of Mohamed Salah. John Brewin

Match report: Liverpool 1-2 Manchester City

Match report: Brighton 0-1 Crystal Palace

Match report: Arsenal 3-0 Sunderland

Match report: Newcastle 2-3 Brentford

Published: February 9, 2026, 8:00 am

Erling Haaland admits ‘statement’ Manchester City win means more than three points

• He says his form must improve and there are no excuses

• Van Dijk reveals Liverpool failed to execute gameplan

Erling Haaland says Manchester City’s dramatic 2-1 win at Liverpool on Sunday meant more than just the points and represented a statement from the club in terms of the Premier League title race.

City had won only once at Anfield under Pep Guardiola – during the 2020-21 fan-free Covid season – and went there on a run of one victory in six in the league which had allowed Arsenal to pull clear at the top.

Published: February 9, 2026, 12:00 pm

‘We all on Kalshi now’: Giannis Antetokounmpo and the quiet collapse of sporting trust

The Bucks star has become a shareholder in one of the world’s largest prediction markets. It only ushers the NBA further into the fetid swamp of sports betting

Couldn’t he have just started a podcast? “The Internet is full of opinions. I decided it was time to make some of my own,” Giannis Antetokounmpo, one of the four best basketball players in the world, posted in a statement announcing that he was joining the prediction market Kalshi as a shareholder. “We all on Kalshi now.”

We are not, but doesn’t the tone sum it up? The universe’s ineffable forces have clearly decided that the ubiquity of sports betting companies is insufficient. There must be new companies, with which you can bet on any outcome – Kalshi competitor Polymarket has hosted markets tied to geopolitical outcomes, including scenarios related to Israel and Gaza, for instance – that incentivize people to treat life’s most important avenues as trivially as a sports game. Kalshi and Polymarket are prediction platforms rather than traditional betting companies. Users effectively bet (or “trade”) against others on the platform about the outcome of events, from familiar wagers such as the result of a sporting event, to the obscure, such as the color of a politician’s suit at an election appearance. Kalshi has enjoyed plenty of freedom under the second Donald Trump administration, and Donald Trump Jr is a “strategic advisor” for them and Polymarket. A Kalshi outcome taking bets until recently was “Giannis Antetokounmpo’s next team?” as rumors swirled that the two-time NBA MVP was about to leave the Milwaukee Bucks. Antetokounmpo will be involved in marketing and publicity for Kalshi, and is forbidden from trading on markets related to the NBA. The move is also in step with the NBA’s rules – players are allowed to endorse betting companies as long as they don’t gamble on the league itself. But that hasn’t prevented scores of fans across Instagram and Reddit, and media members on Twitter, from expressing their displeasure at the move and insisting there is a conflict of interest.

Published: February 8, 2026, 1:00 pm

The world heard JD Vance being booed at the Olympics. Except for viewers in the US | Bryan Armen Graham

The real risk for American broadcasters is not that dissent will be visible. It is that audiences will start assuming anything they do not show is being hidden

The modern Olympics sell themselves on a simple premise: the whole world, watching the same moment, at the same time. On Friday night in Milan, that illusion fractured in real time.

When Team USA entered San Siro during the parade of nations, the speed skater Erin Jackson led the delegation into a wall of cheers. Moments later, when cameras cut to US vice-president JD Vance and second lady Usha Vance, large sections of the crowd responded with boos. Not subtle ones, but audible and sustained ones. Canadian viewers heard them. Journalists seated in the press tribunes in the upper deck, myself included, clearly heard them. But as I quickly realized from a groupchat with friends back home, American viewers watching NBC did not.

Published: February 8, 2026, 2:19 am

Duke coach says staff ‘got punched in the face’ during UNC court-storming

• Jon Scheyer bemoaned the behavior of some UNC fans

• North Carolina AD Cunningham apologizes

Duke coach Jon Scheyer said he had staff members “that got punched in the face” as North Carolina fans stormed the court to celebrate a late winning shot in the famed rivalry Saturday night, prompting UNC athletic director Bubba Cunningham to publicly apologize.

The 14th-ranked Tar Heels stunned the fourth-ranked Blue Devils 71-68 on Seth Trimble’s 3-pointer with 0.4 seconds left, a shot that originally appeared to come as time expired and had jubilant fans rush the court in a chaotic celebration. Officials reviewed the play and determined time was left, so fans had to be cleared for Duke to get one final play before storming the court again when the clock officially hit zero.

Published: February 8, 2026, 3:59 pm

Global economy must move past GDP to avoid planetary disaster, warns UN chief

Exclusive: António Guterres says world’s accounting systems should place true value on the environment

• Economic growth is still heating the planet. Is there any way out?

The global economy must be radically transformed to stop it rewarding pollution and waste, UN secretary general António Guterres has warned.

Speaking to the Guardian after the UN hosted a meeting of leading global economists, Guterres said humanity’s future required the urgent overhaul of the world’s “existing accounting systems” he said were driving the planet to the brink of disaster.

Published: February 9, 2026, 8:00 am

UK, UN and EU deplore ‘monumental injustice’ of Jimmy Lai’s 20-year jail sentence

Son says Hong Kong media figure, 78, fears dying alone while legal team say Lai is now world’s highest profile political prisoner

The UK, the UN, EU and rights groups have condemned the sentencing of the pro-democracy activist and publisher Jimmy Lai, a British citizen who has been jailed for 20 years in Hong Kong for national security convictions that critics say are politically motivated.

Yvette Cooper, the UK foreign secretary, said: “For 78-year-old Jimmy Lai, 20 years is an effective life sentence, following a politically motivated prosecution under a law that was imposed to silence China’s critics. The Hong Kong authorities must end Jimmy Lai’s appalling ordeal and release him to be with his family.”

Published: February 9, 2026, 2:35 pm

Iran arrests leading reformists close to the country’s president

Detentions of senior Reformists Front figures follow criticism of the authorities’ handling of recent protests

The head of Iran’s Reformists Front, the organisation instrumental in securing the election of the country’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, has been arrested by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) in a move that is likely to exacerbate tensions over the handling of recent street protests.

Azar Mansouri, the secretary general of the Islamic Iran People party, had expressed deep sorrow at protesters’ deaths, and said nothing could justify such a catastrophe. She had not in public called for the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, to resign.

Published: February 9, 2026, 3:41 pm

US chemical giant to stop producing herbicide called ‘toxic cocktail’ by critics

Corteva will discontinue a mixture of Agent Orange and glyphosate, but another of its herbicides will still use Vietnam war-era defoliant

The chemical giant Corteva will stop producing Enlist Duo, a herbicide considered to be among the most dangerous still used in the US by environmentalists because it contains a mix of Agent Orange and glyphosate, which have both been linked to cancer and widespread ecological damage.

The US military deployed Agent Orange, a chemical weapon, to destroy vegetation during the Vietnam war, causing serious health problems among soldiers and Vietnamese residents.

This article was amended on 9 February 2026 to add comment from a Corteva spokesperson.

Published: February 9, 2026, 12:00 pm

Experts sound alarm over UK exports to firm linked to Russian war machine

Exclusive: Multimillion-pound contract raises concerns about controls designed to prevent firms unwittingly aiding destruction of Ukraine

The government has been urged to re-examine a British company’s contract to export hi-tech machinery to Armenia, after the Guardian uncovered links to the supply chain for Russia’s war machine.

Sanctions experts and the chair of the House of Commons business committee questioned the government’s decision to award an export licence to Cygnet Texkimp.

Published: February 9, 2026, 10:33 am

Ebo Taylor, Ghanaian highlife pioneer and guitarist, dies age 90

Taylor, who did for Ghanaian music what his friend Fela Kuti did for Nigeria, has been called the greatest rhythm guitarist in history

Ghanaian musician Ebo Taylor, a definitive force behind the highlife genre, has died age 90.

His son Kweku Taylor announced the news on Sunday: “The world has lost a giant. A colossus of African music. Ebo Taylor passed away yesterday; a day after the launch of Ebo Taylor music festival and exactly a month after his 90th birthday, leaving behind an unmatched artistry legacy. Dad, your light will never fade.”

Published: February 9, 2026, 1:44 pm

Chinese technology underpins Iran’s internet control, report finds

The technologies include facial recognition tools used on Uyghurs in western China, say experts

Iran’s architecture of internet control is built on technologies from China, according to an analysis published by a British human rights organisation.

The report by Article 19 says the technologies include facial recognition tools used on Uyghurs in western China and a Chinese alternative to the US-based GPS system, BeiDou.

Published: February 9, 2026, 1:30 pm

‘To live a normal life again, it’s a dream come true’: UK’s first climate evacuees can cast off their homes and trauma

Forty-odd residents of Clydach Terrace in Ynysybwl, south Wales, relieved by council buyout after years in fear of fast flooding

When Storm Dennis hit the UK in 2020, a wall of dirty, frigid water from a tributary of the Taff threw Paul Thomas against the front of his house in the south Wales village of Ynysybwl. He managed to swim back into his home before the storm surge changed direction, almost carrying him out of the smashed-in front door.

“I was holding on to downpipes to stop myself being dragged out again. It was unbelievably strong, the water,” he said.

Published: February 9, 2026, 6:00 am

EU urged not to roll back green agenda in effort to revive faltering economy

Campaigners say industrial issues cannot be solved by watering down climate and environmental policies

• Europe live – latest updates

• Business live – latest updates

EU leaders have been warned against a rollback of the green agenda before a summit focused on reviving the bloc’s waning economy.

Campaigners from the Climate Action Network, a pan-European group of NGOs, said European industry was “under real pressure” from “high energy prices, ageing assets, global overcapacity and delayed investments”, but these issues could not be solved by watering down climate and environmental policies.

Published: February 9, 2026, 12:47 pm

These US states want polluters to pay for the rising insurance costs of climate disasters

Proposals by California, Hawaii and New York lawmakers aim to hold fossil fuel industry accountable for soaring rates

As climate disasters drive up the price of home insurance, three US states are considering empowering their state prosecutors to sue major polluters for their role in those rising costs.

Lawmakers in California, Hawaii and New York have introduced measures which would authorize their attorneys general to sue fossil fuel companies on behalf of residents whose insurance premiums have soared amid climate disasters.

Published: February 8, 2026, 2:00 pm

Rightwing critics blame Mamdani as New York snow fails to melt

Murdoch tabloid leads charge as big freeze persists – could the mayor please do something about the weather?

It snowed two weeks ago in New York. Since then, the temperature has barely risen above freezing – a temperature science naturally dictates is necessary to melt snow and ice.

But science isn’t enough for some US political critics, however, who have instead blamed Zohran Mamdani, New York’s new socialist mayor, for the snow not having melted and still clogging up some of the city’s streets.

Published: February 8, 2026, 1:00 pm

US companies accused of ‘AI washing’ in citing artificial intelligence for job losses

While AI is having an impact on the workplace, experts suggest tariffs, overhiring during the pandemic and simply maximising profits may be bigger factors

Over the last year, US corporate leaders have often explained layoffs by saying the positions were no longer needed because artificial intelligence had made their companies more efficient, replacing humans with computers.

But some economists and technology analysts have expressed skepticism about such justifications and instead think that such workforce cuts are driven by factors like the impact of tariffs, overhiring during the Covid-19 pandemic and perhaps simple maximising of profits.

Published: February 8, 2026, 4:00 pm

'We will pay,' Savannah Guthrie says in desperate video plea to potential kidnappers of her mother

Today show host tells potential kidnappers of mother Nancy that family is prepared to pay for safe return

Savannah Guthrie told the potential kidnappers of her mother, Nancy Guthrie, on Saturday that the family is prepared to pay for her safe return, as the frantic search for the 84-year-old entered a seventh day.

“We received your message, and we understand. We beg you now to return our mother to us so that we can celebrate with her,” she said in a video posted on social media, flanked by her siblings. “This is the only way we will have peace. This is very valuable to us, and we will pay.”

Published: February 8, 2026, 12:50 am

Portugal elects socialist as president but far-right rival takes record vote share

António José Seguro scores resounding win despite André Ventura’s populist Chega party securing 33.2% of votes

The moderate socialist António José Seguro won a resounding victory in the second round of Portugal’s presidential election on Sunday, triumphing over his far-right opponent, André Ventura, whose Chega party still managed to take a record share of the vote.

Seguro won 66.8% of votes to Ventura’s 33.2% in the election, which went ahead despite weeks of disruption caused by deadly storms. The vote to elect a successor to the outgoing president, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, was marked by a cross-party push to head off the prospect of a Chega victory, with some senior rightwing figures throwing their weight behind the centre-left candidate to keep Ventura from entering the presidential palace.

Published: February 9, 2026, 8:16 am

Christchurch gunman seeks to appeal convictions and withdraw guilty plea

Australian white supremacist tells NZ court he was suffering from ‘nervous exhaustion’ when he entered his guilty plea in March 2020

The Australian white supremacist who murdered 51 Muslim worshippers at two mosques in Christchurch in 2019, in the worst mass shooting in the New Zealand’s history, has asked a court to discard his guilty pleas, claiming harsh prison conditions had affected his mental health and compelled him to admit to the crimes.

Brenton Tarrant pleaded guilty in March 2020 to 51 counts of murder, 40 counts of attempted murder and a terrorism charge, after initially saying he would defend the charges. In August 2020, Tarrant became the first person in New Zealand under current laws to be sentenced to life in prison without the chance of ever walking free.

Published: February 9, 2026, 3:17 am

Starmer in fight to reassert control over Labour party after McSweeney exit

Allies hope aide’s departure can quell anger over Mandelson scandal but others say it leaves PM dangerously exposed

• Profile: Labour election guru undone by poor judgment

• ‘Only honourable course’: resignation statement in full

Keir Starmer is fighting to reassert control over his party after accepting the resignation of his closest adviser, Morgan McSweeney, amid anger over the appointment of Peter Mandelson as US ambassador.

After days of pressure over the scandal, his departing chief of staff said on Sunday he took “full responsibility” for his advice to send Mandelson to Washington despite his ongoing relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, which McSweeney conceded had undermined trust in Labour and in politics itself.

Published: February 8, 2026, 8:08 pm

Japanese shares hit record high as Sanae Takaichi wins landslide election victory

Prime minister’s Liberal Democratic party to be pressed on promised tax cuts and fiscal stimulus plans

• Business live – latest updates

Japan’s stock market has hit a record high after Sanae Takaichi’s Liberal Democratic party (LDP) secured a comprehensive victory in Sunday’s election.

The LDP won 316 of the 465 seats in the country’s lower house – the first time a single party has secured two-thirds of the chamber since the establishment of Japan’s parliament in 1947.

Published: February 9, 2026, 9:29 am

Most Indians don’t read for pleasure – so why does the country have 100 literature festivals?

With their carnival atmosphere, music and Bollywood stars, books often take a back seat. But that doesn’t mean writers and their works won’t make a lasting impression

Sounding amused, publisher Pramod Kapoor recalls the reaction of the Indian cricketing legend Bishen Singh Bedi when he learned Kapoor was printing 3,000 copies of his autobiography. “Only 3,000?” he protested. “I fill stadiums with 50-60,000 people coming to see me play and you think that’s all my book is going to sell?”

Kapoor, the founder of Roli Books, explains that Bedi’s legions of admirers were unlikely to translate into book buyers. “That was in 2021. Nothing has changed. The average book in English sells only around 3-4,000 copies. If it tops 10,000, it’s counted a bestseller.”

Published: February 9, 2026, 5:00 am

‘Reconciliation across difference’: why Practical Magic is my feelgood movie

The next entry in our ongoing series of writers highlighting their favourite comfort films is a journey back to 1998 with Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman

The VHS of Practical Magic was kept at the back of the cabinet, where the not-quite-child-appropriate films lived. The cover transfixed me: the ethereal faces of Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman, surrounded by burning candles. At eight years old, I was instantly drawn to something I didn’t yet understand. One day, I’d be ready.

Despite opening at No 1 at the US box office, Practical Magic failed to recoup its budget and was dismissed as tonally confused. Variety called it “part comedy, part family drama, part romance, part special-effects mystery-adventure … a hodgepodge”.

Published: February 9, 2026, 10:00 am

What We Hide review – opioid-crisis thriller sees sisters pick up the pieces and hide their mother’s dead body

Both the leads are good value in Dan Kay’s movie in which Jessie and Spider hide conceal a corpse to avoid being separated in the care system

A fatally overdosed mother called Jacey is unceremoniously bundled into a trunk at the start of this southern US-set drama; the uncredited actor who plays her should probably have a word with her agent, as the role is surely in contention for a world record as the least likely to boost your career. Jacey is just one of the drug casualties littering director Dan Kay’s underpowered film about the US’s super-strength opioid crisis, as her two bereaved daughters desperately tread water in the aftermath.

While 11-year-old Jessie (Jojo Regina) steps up with loving words in the face of tragedy, 15-year-old Spider (Mckenna Grace) has a practised indifference. All too accustomed to dealing with her mother’s addiction, her attention is on what happens now – notifying the authorities of the death would mean the sisters would be separated by the care system. So she steps up to run the household and fend off Jacey’s junkie boyfriend Reece (Dacre Montgomery), while she tries to find a solution.

Published: February 9, 2026, 9:00 am

Stitch Head review – animated adaptation of hit Frankenstinian tale hangs loosely together

Asa Butterfield leads a cast of freaks looking for acceptance and love in a harsh and uncaring world in this rather melancholy version of Guy Bass’s kid-lit series

Perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of this middling Brit-populated, European-financed, Indian-manufactured animation is the radical change of career trajectory it represents for its pinballing director, Steve Hudson. Hudson broke through with 2006’s Loachian social drama True North, a migrant movie starring Peter Mullan – now, having witnessed how the other half lives while directing episodes of primetime TV’s Cranford, he pivots to pixels with a big-screen adaptation of Guy Bass’s kid-lit books. Stitch Head feels like a tentative first step into a heavily crowded field, sutured together from ideas and images previously encountered in far more confident and accomplished entertainments.

Bass’s eponymous hero is rendered here as a boy with Bowie-esque heterochromatic eyes, a baseball-like head and the voice of Asa Butterfield; his home is a castle overlooking small town Grubbers Nubbin, where a mad professor (Rob Brydon) carries out Frankenstinian experiments. If the lead character design is solid – accompanying adults may wind up knitting replicas of Stitch Head’s onesie – the surrounding menagerie seems a bit too Pixar for comfort; Stitch’s furry cyclops pal Creature (Joel Fry) is conspicuously a hybrid of Monsters, Inc’s Mike and Sully. Once this pair abscond to join a travelling freak show, Stitch Head ventures a rather melancholy and misshapen showbiz story – that of a boy who, much like the film, just wants to be loved.

Published: February 9, 2026, 11:00 am

‘People keep reinventing the same damn movie’: cinematographer Roger Deakins on 50 years behind the camera and his fears for film’s future

This master craftsman’s work has lit up everything from Bond to Blade Runner 2049. But as he publishes his memoir, why does he believe the artform he made his name in is in such decline?

Roger Deakins – cinematographer to the Coen brothers, Martin Scorsese and Sam Mendes, whose work has earned him 14 Oscar nominations and two wins, five Baftas, a knighthood and a reputation for being the greatest practitioner of his craft alive – is struggling to explain just exactly what he does. “Argh!” he exclaims, when confronted by the question: what is cinematography?

“Well, I started off trying to be a still photographer, someone like Don McCullin. And it’s been a whole arc through cinematography. Now what is cinematography? I don’t know. It’s very different from still photography. But the essentials are the same. You’re trying to tell a visual story.” It is “very much a collaboration”, he continues; working with “hundreds of people” on films can be a “wonderful experience … I suppose I’m not answering your question, because actually I’ve got no idea,” he says. “The cliche is visual storytelling, but it’s much more than that.”

Published: February 8, 2026, 10:00 am

Poem of the week: To Wordsworth by Percy Bysshe Shelley

The radical young poet’s backhanded tribute to the older writer is a stern judgment on his lapsed political idealism

To Wordsworth

Poet of Nature, thou hast wept to know
That things depart which never may return:
Childhood and youth, friendship and love’s first glow,
Have fled like sweet dreams, leaving thee to mourn.
These common woes I feel. One loss is mine
Which thou too feel’st, yet I alone deplore.
Thou wert as a lone star whose light did shine
On some frail bark in winter’s midnight roar:
Thou hast like to a rock-built refuge stood
Above the blind and battling multitude:
In honoured poverty thy voice did weave
Songs consecrate to truth and liberty, —
Deserting these, thou leavest me to grieve,
Thus having been, that thou should cease to be.

Published: February 9, 2026, 10:00 am

Female, Nude by Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett review – a seductive drama of art and rivalry

Tensions simmer when a struggling artist joins her wealthy friends for a hen week on an exotic Greek island

It is the summer of 2019, and Sophie Evans, the reckless protagonist of Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett’s unsettling second novel, has arrived on an idyllic island in the Cyclades with her university friends Helena, Iris and Alessia to celebrate Helena’s forthcoming marriage. Helena doesn’t want it called her “hen … Like we’re dumpy little featherbrains going cluck, cluck, cluck”, but all the same, the men – including Sophie’s curator boyfriend of six years, Greg – will not arrive for another five days.

She may be on holiday but Sophie is not at ease in the villa’s atmosphere of “almost offensive” good taste, with luxurious meals, cocktails on tap and endless sunshine. In the 10 years that have passed since they first met as students, the differences between the women have become more pronounced: money has “made itself known”. Elegant, chilly Iris, whose parents have bought her a place in Peckham, works in publishing; the family of spoilt, patrician art dealer Alessia seem practically to own the island on which the women are holidaying; and Helena’s aspiration is to be a trophy wife with a house full of “nice things”.

Published: February 9, 2026, 9:00 am

‘I’m the psychedelic confessor’: the man who turned a generation on to hallucinogens returns with a head-spinning book about consciousness

With the Omnivore’s Dilemma and How to Change Your Mind, Michael Pollan transformed our understanding of food and drugs. Can he do the same for our sense of self?

Several years ago, Michael Pollan had a disturbing encounter. The relentlessly curious journalist and author was at a conference on plant behaviour in Vancouver. There, he’d learned that when plants are damaged, they produce an anaesthetising chemical, ethylene. Was this a form of self-soothing, like the release of endorphins after an injury in humans? He asked František Baluška, a cell biologist, if it meant that plants might feel pain. Baluška paused, before answering: “Yes, they should feel pain. If you don’t feel pain, you ignore danger and you don’t survive.”

I imagine that Pollan gulped at that point. I certainly did when I read his account of the meeting in his latest book, A World Appears. Where does it leave our efforts at ethical consumption, if literally everybody hurts – including vegetables?

Published: February 8, 2026, 9:00 am

Want to stop Trump bullying your country? Retaliate

Faced with economic coercion, Europe has trodden carefully. My experience tells me that’s not enough

In February of last year, Donald Trump convened the first full cabinet meeting of his second term in the White House. He proudly announced his intention to impose sweeping tariffs on the US’s closest allies in Europe. When asked by a reporter whether Europe might retaliate, Trump sounded confident. “They can’t,” he said. Pressed to explain, he continued: “We are the pot of gold. We’re the one that everybody wants. And they can retaliate, but it cannot be a successful retaliation.” As Trump saw it, Europe was weak and feckless – a minnow compared with the American economic juggernaut. When confronted with a US president prepared to throw his country’s weight around, Europe would certainly cave.

In the year since, Trump has repeatedly wielded America’s economic might against Europe, from coercing the EU and the UK to swallow lopsided trade deals to pressuring Denmark to sell him Greenland. And time and again, his assessment of European countries – that they would scurry to him, hat in hand, eager to make a deal – has been vindicated.

Published: February 8, 2026, 12:00 pm

In your face: Close-up Photographer of the Year Awards 2026 – in pictures

Animals, insects, flora and fauna – the world photographed in close-up in the annual competition dedicated to micro and macro photography. Cupoty 7 was won by underwater photographer Ross Gudgeon, triumphing over 12,000 entries from 63 countries

Published: February 8, 2026, 9:00 am

‘The music could not stop for three days’: how Sirāt went on a road trip to the dark heart of rave

Club culture is notoriously hard to capture on film. Oscar-tipped director Oliver Laxe explains why he had to organise his own music festival in the Moroccan desert to find deeper meaning in dance-floor ecstasy

In the opening scene of Oliver Laxe’s existential mystery thriller Sirāt, a crowd of partygoers stack up a sound system for a rave in the southern Moroccan desert, where the paths of the film’s protagonists cross for the first time. Crucially, Laxe explains, the revellers were no ordinary extras. Most of them were committed, lifelong ravers who had travelled to the makeshift festival from across Europe. One of the DJs who played, Sebastian Vaughan AKA 69db, was a core member of Spiral Tribe, the pioneering British “free party” collective of the 1990s.

“In film, reality is usually made to adapt to the rules of cinema,” the French-born Spanish director tells me when we meet in Berlin. “But we do the opposite: we adapt cinema to reality.” When negotiating with the ravers how to best represent them in the film, he recalls, “they told us that the music cannot stop for three days. And we were really pleased with this idea”.

Published: February 9, 2026, 7:00 am

‘I don’t have to create his legacy, I just have to protect it’: Chadwick Boseman’s widow Simone on grieving a global star – and guarding his secrets

Black Panther made him a megastar, but in private the actor and his wife Simone Ledward Boseman were dealing with his terminal cancer diagnosis. In a rare interview, she talks about the shock of losing him, and how a revival of one of his plays has helped her heal

Simone Ledward Boseman is reflecting on the five years that have passed since the death of her husband, actor and writer Chadwick Boseman. “The edges of grief get less sharp over time,” she says. “Five years definitely feels like a marker. I’ve had to gradually figure out how I talk about Chad. What do I want to share, and what do I feel comfortable sharing? Can I find something that I might want to share in the midst of something I don’t want to share?” We meet on a video call across time zones – it’s 9am in California, where she lives. “Except for my mom, I’m not talking to anybody before 10am,” she laughs. She’s made an exception to give a rare interview ahead of the UK premiere of her late husband’s play Deep Azure, which is currently in previews in London at Shakespeare’s Globe.

When Boseman’s death was announced at the end of August 2020, the shock reverberated across the globe. He was devastatingly young – only 43 – and the world was just getting to know him. The release of the movie Black Panther two years earlier, in which he played the eponymous character also known as T’Challa, had skyrocketed his fame. Before then, he had been a successful Hollywood actor. Now? He was a global megastar – the first Black superhero in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). The news was doubly shocking because the family had not previously revealed that he had been suffering with colorectal cancer.

Published: February 8, 2026, 6:00 am

The pet I’ll never forget: Mishka, the surly but beloved raccoon

She hated water, attacked our Christmas tree, destroyed our wallpaper – but everyone who met her was won over

Mishka was about eight weeks old when we got her. It was 2004, we were living in Dibden, New Forest, and I was looking to buy some guinea pigs. I saw an ad for a raccoon on the secondhand site Preloved. My husband, Graham, and I lived in Florida in the 90s and had a raccoon that would come into the yard. It had a bad leg, and we nurtured it, so I was very interested in raccoons.

I met someone who bred them after researching on Google, and we ended up with three, one after the other – we bought two, Nigel and Casey, and later, Mishka was given to us.

Published: February 9, 2026, 11:00 am

A new start after 60: I became a wrestler, 50 years after falling in love with the sport

After a career in accountancy, Sally Goldner decided to get in the ring – as Zali Gold – and live out her childhood dreams

On the night of her 60th birthday, Sally Goldner climbed on to the top rope of the wrestling ring, to the roars of the crowd, and launched herself on to her competitors with a missile dropkick. The crowd roared. For a second, she was completely airborne, before landing on her opponents.

“‘Wow, I’m doing this,’” she thought. “Exhilarating. I couldn’t think of anything I’d rather be doing on my birthday.” She had seized her moment in an Alpha Pro battle royal, a multi-competitor elimination match. As her opponents – all men – threw her out of the ring, they wished her a happy birthday.

Published: February 9, 2026, 7:00 am

Valentine’s Day ideas from romance novelists: ‘I always want books. I want chocolate. I want a scented candle.’

Looking for Valentine’s Day gift ideas? Creative gift ideas for him and sentimental gifts for her

• This story was originally published in the Filter US newsletter on buying fewer, better things. Sign up here to get early access to it

Each week we cut through the noise to bring you smart, practical recommendations on how to live better – from what is worth buying to the tools, habits and ideas that actually last.

When it comes to Valentine’s Day, I’m nostalgic for candy hearts and childhood crushes. But like many facets of adulthood, the holiday becomes more complicated as I grow older.

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Published: February 8, 2026, 6:15 pm

I spent years meeting strangers for masochistic hook-ups. Was I a sex addict?

After a sexually frustrating marriage led to divorce, I chased increasingly extreme BDSM encounters. But I never felt truly satisfied. Had I been looking for the wrong thing all along?

To everyone else, it probably looked like a regular summer’s evening. Couples and families enjoying the beer garden, people playing cricket on the green – and I was being handcuffed in the passenger seat of a 4x4 by a man I barely knew.

My name is Leesa, and I’m a recovered sex addict.

Published: February 8, 2026, 12:00 pm

We offered my friend a room to help her out, but four years later she’s still living with us

You need to check where you stand legally, but I fear you’re being taken advantage of and will have to ask her to leave

In spring 2022, my husband and I were lucky enough to sell our house for a profit and, with help from my parents, bought a much bigger home. At the time, my friend was going through a tough time, so I asked if she would like to move in with us and our two children. There was no written agreement, but the plan was that she would either quit her job and retrain, or save for her own place and move out in six months to a year. She pays us £350 a month, which goes towards energy bills, bar a three-month period when she wasn’t working. I also gave her money towards taking a course.

She hasn’t retrained, got a new job or saved for a new place. And she doesn’t have the money to move out. I feel trapped and resent all I have to do as a working mum while she’s here, but that’s compounded by guilt as I know I’m very privileged to have a big house and a well-paid job. I hate that she sees me at my worst (rowing with my husband/sorting out arguments between the kids) and I feel as if I’m constantly keeping my emotions in check around her. Our friendship feels warped into a parent-child dynamic.

Published: February 8, 2026, 6:00 am

This is how we do it: ‘Having sex with other people brought us closer, but also exposed insecurities’

Amber feared having sex with other women had ruined the best thing in her life, but Todd says exploring together has ultimately strengthened their partnership
• How do you do it? Share the story of your sex life, anonymously

The first time we had sex with a couple, I didn’t anticipate how destabilising it would feel

Published: February 8, 2026, 11:00 am

The troubling rise of longevity fixation syndrome: ‘I was crushed by the pressure I put on myself’

This unofficial diagnosis describes the anxiety-driven, compulsive obsession with living as long as possible. While it might seem healthy to monitor your diet, exercise and biomarkers, it can come at a huge emotional cost

It was a pitta bread that finally broke Jason Wood. It arrived with hummus instead of the vegetable crudites he had preordered in a restaurant that he had painstakingly researched, as he always did, weeks before he and his husband visited. “In that moment, I just snapped,” he recalls. “I hit rock bottom, I got angry … I started crying, I started shaking. I just felt like I couldn’t do it any more, like I had been crushed by all this pressure I put on myself.”

Today, Wood, 40, speaks calmly. Neat and groomed, he seems orderly by nature. But at that time, his attempts to control every aspect of his life had spiralled. He painstakingly monitored what he ate (sometimes only organic, sometimes raw or unprocessed; calories painstakingly counted), his exercise regime (twice a day, seven days a week), and tracked every bodily function from his heart rate to his blood pressure, body fat and sleep “schedule”. He even monitored his glucose levels repeatedly throughout the day. “I was living by those numbers,” he says.

Published: February 8, 2026, 2:00 pm

The sneeze secret: how much should you worry about this explosive reflex?

It is one of the most powerful involuntary actions the human body can perform. But is a big sneeze a sign of illness, pollution or something else entirely?

How worried should we be about a sneeze? It depends who you ask. In the Odyssey, Telemachus sneezes after Penelope’s prayer that her husband will soon be home to sort out her house-sitting suitors – which she sees as a good omen for team Odysseus, and very bad news for the suitors. In the Anabasis, Xenophon takes a sneeze from a soldier as godly confirmation that his army can fight their way back to their own territory – great news for them – while St Augustine notes, somewhat disapprovingly, that people of his era tend to go back to bed if they sneeze while putting on their slippers. But is a sneeze an omen of anything apart from pathogens, pollen or – possibly – air pollution?

“It’s a physical response to get rid of something that’s irritating your body,” says Sheena Cruickshank, an immunologist and professor at the University of Manchester. “Alongside the obvious nasal hairs that a few people choose to trim, all of us have cilia, or microscopic hairs in our noses that can move and sense things of their own accord. And so if anything gets trapped by the cilia, that triggers a reaction to your nerve endings that says: ‘Right, let’s get rid of this.’ And that triggers a sneeze.”

Published: February 8, 2026, 10:00 am

Is it true that … hair grows faster when you cut it?

Does a good trim really make your locks longer and thicker – or is it more complicated than that?

‘That’s not true,” says Desmond Tobin, professor of dermatological science at University College Dublin. Hair grows from follicles – tiny structures in the scalp sitting 2-4mm beneath the skin. Inside each follicle, the hair fibre is formed long before it becomes visible at the surface of the scalp. By the time it emerges, the hair that you’re cutting is dead, hardened tissue.

“Cutting what’s above the surface has no effect on what’s happening in the follicle below,” says Tobin.

Published: February 9, 2026, 8:00 am

Mystery plaintiff challenges Karl Lagerfeld’s will – but pampered cat can rest easy

Relatives shut out of €200m fortune reportedly receive letters from executor saying will could be overturned

The late German-born Chanel designer Karl Lagerfeld was famously precise, exacting and known to hold a grudge, but his final wishes concerning the beneficiaries of his vast fortune could now be overturned beyond the grave in a looming court battle.

Seven years after Lagerfeld’s death from cancer, an unnamed plaintiff has come forward to challenge the haute couture titan’s last will and testament.

Published: February 8, 2026, 12:45 pm

The kindness of strangers: my teenage son was on a date at a fancy restaurant when a fellow diner helped pay the bill

She made a special night even more special for these two young people – and gave me something special too

• Read more in the kindness of strangers series

Adolescence leaves its mark on everyone but for my son the marks have been particularly obvious. I’ve lost track of how many casts he’s had. He loves electric bikes and at various times this has led to a broken arm, a broken hand, a broken leg, a wide variety of cuts and grazes, and terrifyingly close calls with much worse.

It also led to him getting a job as a delivery rider for the local Domino’s Pizza, which valued him for his speed (another broken wrist) and his ability to be cheerful in the face of unhinged customers. Once, after getting no answer when he buzzed a flat and phoned, he left a woman’s pizza on her doorstep. She called him “the scum of the earth” and promised he would lose his job and never get another one.

Published: February 8, 2026, 11:04 pm

Social media companies are being sued for harming their users’ mental health – but are the platforms addictive?

Experts say the term ‘addiction’ is be overused and, for social media use, could be difficult to prove

Forthcoming legal proceedings against Meta and YouTube are frequently referred to as the “social media addiction trials”, but whether these platforms are truly addictive is still the subject of scientific debate.

The lawsuits were brought against Meta, YouTube (Google), Snap Inc and TikTok by plaintiffs alleging these platforms severely damaged their mental health when they were children. Snap and TikTok settled the first case to go to trial, brought by a woman known as KGM, now about 20. The remaining defendants, Meta and YouTube, were set to go to court this week, but the trial was delayed because Meta’s senior attorney became ill.

Published: February 8, 2026, 3:00 pm

In the decade since my sons left home, walking has brought us together

The exodus of grown children mostly happens without fanfare. For Lisa Walker, hiking the Camino turned into both a goodbye and a glimpse at the future

• Read more summer essentials

Don’t let them push you around, my youngest son said halfway through the Camino de Santiago. You don’t have to get up early if you don’t want to.

I didn’t know that was an option, replied his brother from his bunk.

Published: February 8, 2026, 1:00 am

The best women’s lingerie: 22 favourites for every mood and budget

Whether you want everyday comfort or a special set for Valentine’s Day, our fashion writer rounds up the styles that’ll have you hooked – from skimpy to supportive, recycled to racy

• The best Valentine’s Day gifts for 2026

Lingerie isn’t about dressing for someone else. The best lingerie will feel comfortable, supportive and genuinely good to wear, whether that’s an everyday staple or an investment piece.

The design of lingerie has never been better, with a wide variety of brands focusing on comfortable materials, breathability and support, as well as style. From ultra-soft lace that moves with the body to wireless bras that actually stay up, sometimes the best lingerie is all about subtle design details rather than extra frills.

Published: February 8, 2026, 7:00 am

As goes the Washington Post: US democracy takes another hit under Trump

Jeff Bezos’s axing of more than 300 jobs at the storied newspaper has renewed fears about the resilience of America’s democracy to withstand Trump’s attacks

The email landed in Lizzie Johnson’s in-tray in Ukraine just before 4pm local time. It came at a tough time for the reporter: Russia had been repeatedly striking the country’s power grid, and just days before she had been forced to work out of her car without heat, power or running water, writing in pencil because pen ink freezes too readily.

“Difficult news,” was the subject line. The body text said: “Your position is eliminated as part of today’s organizational changes,” explaining that it was necessary to get rid of her to meet the “evolving needs of our business”.

Published: February 8, 2026, 6:00 am

A forest of incense sticks and football in Gaza: photos of the day – Monday

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

Published: February 9, 2026, 2:29 pm