‘A long time coming’: table tennis world hails Marty Supreme-fueled boom

Once dismissed as a basement game, table tennis is enjoying an unlikely US revival as the Oscar-tipped biopic Marty Supreme collides with a wave of new players

For decades in the US, table tennis has lived a double life: one of the most widely played sports in the country, yet still dismissed by many as a basement pursuit. Now, unexpectedly, it is having a cultural moment.

The release of Marty Supreme, a film steeped in obsession and myth, and loosely based on postwar American table tennis champion Marty Reisman, has pushed ping-pong into the pop-culture mainstream – just as US Major League Table Tennis sells out matches, clubs report growing interest, and younger players pick up paddles for the first time.

Published: January 24, 2026, 8:00 am

High on ... mustard? Cannabis industry teams up with chefs in push to stand out

US legal cannabis industry seeks new ways to incorporate weed into meals after a tough year for business in 2025

Food and stoner culture have always gone together, but these days chefs and cannabis professionals are working together to find thoughtful, new ways to incorporate weed into meals.

For National Hot Pastrami Day on 14 January, a celebrated Jewish deli in Chicago teamed up with a local Illinois dispensary to give customers free pastrami sandwiches garnished with cannabis-infused mustard.

Published: January 24, 2026, 12:00 pm

Delroy Lindo: the Sinners Oscar nominee who could make Spike Lee’s secret British weapon rather less secret

Lining up for best supporting actor in the year’s most hotly-tipped film, the Lewisham-born actor has long been a favourite of the Malcolm X director and is poised for brighter limelight

In the aftermath of the Oscar nominations, Wunmi Mosaku was heralded as Britain’s saviour after her best supporting actress nod at Hollywood’s most prestigious awards. The UK had been facing its first nomination-less year in the acting categories since 1986.

But the Sinners star was joined by a fellow cast member, Lewisham-born, Delroy Lindo, who will also be representing Britain on the big night on 15 March.

Published: January 23, 2026, 12:35 pm

Lajuana is 89, with the body and mind of someone decades younger. What are the secrets of the superagers?

Why do some people age better than others? Five extraordinary individuals – who scientists are studying – share their tips

Lajuana Weathers is determined to be the healthiest version of herself. She starts each day with a celery juice, is always trying to increase her step count, and meditates daily. Weathers is also 89 years old. And she has no plans to slow down. “I wake up in the morning and feel blessed that I have another chance at a day of life,” says the grandmother of six, and great‑grandmother of six more, who lives in Illinois in an independent living facility for seniors. “I look at my life as a holistic entity, and in that life is my physical, social, emotional and spiritual wellbeing. I have to take care of all of those. That’s what I like about the ageing process. All the clutter of raising children is out and I can concentrate on the wellness of me.”

Weathers is a superager. This isn’t a self-proclaimed label, but one backed up by science – she is part of the SuperAging Research Initiative at the University of Chicago. To qualify for the study, you have to be over 80 years old and have memory performance that’s at least as good as the average 50- to 60-year-old. There are about 400 superagers enrolled across North America.

Published: January 24, 2026, 6:00 am

My fellow gen Z have spoken: these 22 products still scream ‘2016’

Beats headphones, army green jackets and ‘blinding highlights’ – I asked my fellow gen Z to name the 2016 fads they can’t let go of

• ‘Put a rubber band on your phone’: I asked experts how to reduce screen time – here’s what they said

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

At the ripe age of 24, I didn’t believe I was old enough to feel nostalgic for my youth. But the internet thinks otherwise.

Overnight, my TikTok feed went from dewy makeup, six-seven memes and Heated Rivalry fan edits to blinding highlights, matte lipstick and mannequin challenge videos.

Fifteen nostalgic gifts in the US that will take you back to simpler times

What’s in your ‘analog bag’? Unpacking the viral trend – in a stuffed tote

Published: January 23, 2026, 3:15 pm

Donald Trump doesn’t want us to believe our own eyes | Steven Greenhouse

Renee Nicole Good’s killing is the latest example of the president’s outrageous – and blatant – assaults on the truth

With Donald Trump back in office for a year, it seems increasingly clear what his motto should be: “Who you gonna believe, me or your lying eyes?” Whether about grocery prices, January 6, Ukraine or actions by ICE agents, Trump keeps making astonishingly false statements that contradict what we can see with our own eyes.

In recent weeks, Trump has once again sought to bamboozle us into not believing what we saw – the most egregious recent example involved the ICE agent who killed Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis. Within hours of her death, Trump smeared Good on Truth Social, saying that the 37-year-old mother of three belonged to “a Radical Left Movement of Violence and Hate” and that she “viciously ran over the ICE officer”. Trump added, “It is hard to believe he is alive, but is now recovering in the hospital.”

Steven Greenhouse is a journalist and author, focusing on labour and the workplace, as well as economic and legal issues

Published: January 23, 2026, 1:00 pm

‘Massive’ Russian strikes on Ukraine hit negotiation table as well as people, Kyiv says – Europe live

Ukraine’s foreign minister accuses Vladimir Putin of sabotaging peace talks

India and Europe hope to strike the “mother of all deals” when EU chiefs meet prime minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi next week, as the two economic behemoths seek to forge closer ties, AFP reports.

Facing challenges from China and the United States, India and the European Union have been negotiating a massive free trade pact – and talks, first launched about two decades ago, are nearing the finishing line.

Published: January 24, 2026, 12:19 pm

Minnesotans strike in protest against ICE surge: ‘No work, no school, no shopping’

Organizers demand ICE leave state and agency be investigated for constitutional violations

Tens of thousands of Minnesotans marched in Minneapolis and otherwise participated in an economic blackout on Friday to protest against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) surge in the state.

About 100 clergy members were arrested by police during the action, video footage showed.

Published: January 23, 2026, 10:12 pm

US immigration agents detain two-year-old Minnesota girl: ‘depravity beyond words’

DHS detain a toddler and her father on Thursday and fly them to Texas before returning child on judge’s order

Federal immigration agents detained a two-year-old girl and her father in Minneapolis on Thursday and transported them to Texas, according to court records and the family’s lawyers.

The father, identified in court filings as Elvis Joel TE, and his daughter were stopped and detained by officers around 1pm when they were returning home from the store. By the evening, a federal judge had ordered the girl be released by 9.30pm. But federal officials instead put both of them on a plane heading to a Texas detention center.

Published: January 24, 2026, 1:38 am

‘Disheartening’: US justice department slashes funding to programs combating child sex trafficking

Prosecutors say cuts to funding and training limits their ability to bring child predators to justice

The US Department of Justice has slashed funding and training resources for law enforcement working on investigations and prosecutions of sex crimes against children under the Trump administration, which limits their ability to carry out this work.

Major cuts include the cancelation of 2025 National Law Enforcement Training on Child Exploitation, due to be held in Washington DC in June. The conference is an annual event that provides technical training to prosecutors, state and federal law enforcement officers on investigating online crimes against children.

Published: January 24, 2026, 12:00 pm

Monster winter storm threatens half of US with at least 16 states declaring emergencies

Snow, sleet and freezing temperatures are forecast for the south, midwest and east coast over the weekend

The dangerous monster storm threatening half of the US was on Friday bearing down, with 16 states and Washington DC already declaring emergencies and areas typically unused to prolonged Arctic temperatures bracing for power failures and supply shortages.

At least 230 million people are likely to be affected by the huge winter weather system as it forms in parts of the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains and surges across southern and midwestern areas from Friday, blowing up the east coast on Saturday and as far north as Maine by Sunday.

Published: January 23, 2026, 11:05 pm

US military says it struck vessel in eastern Pacific, killing two people

Since September, military has carried out more than 30 strikes against boats that it alleges smuggle drugs

The US military said on Friday that it carried out a strike on a vessel in the eastern Pacific, killing two people.

“Intelligence confirmed the vessel was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the eastern Pacific and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations,” the US Southern Command said in a statement.

Published: January 23, 2026, 11:48 pm

‘Repatriate the gold’: German economists advise withdrawal from US vaults

Shift in relations and unpredictability of Donald Trump make it ‘risky to store so much gold in the US’, say experts

Germany is facing calls to withdraw its billions of euros’ worth of gold from US vaults, spurred on by the shift in transatlantic relations and the unpredictability of Donald Trump.

Germany holds the world’s second biggest national gold reserves after the US, of which approximately €164bn (£122bn) worth – 1,236 tonnes – is stored in New York.

Published: January 24, 2026, 8:00 am

Pentagon to reduce its role in deterrence of North Korea

US policy document suggests South Korea take primary responsibility, as Pentagon prioritises defending US homeland

The Pentagon foresees a “more limited” role in deterring North Korea, with South Korea taking primary responsibility for the task, a Pentagon policy document released on Friday said, in a move likely to raise concern in Seoul.

South Korea hosts about 28,500 US troops in combined defence against North Korea’s military threat and Seoul has raised its defence budget by 7.5% for this year.

Published: January 24, 2026, 6:18 am

Is the supreme court ready to stand up to Trump over Federal Reserve attack?

Conservative majority appears eager to hand president greater power – with one exception: the US central bank

Donald Trump has tried his usual tactics when it comes to getting the US Federal Reserve to lower interest rates: bully when persuasion doesn’t work, and then fire when bullying doesn’t work.

In an unprecedented assault on the central bank, the president has called the Fed chair, Jerome Powell, “stupid” and threatened to fire him for not cutting interest rates as quickly as Trump would like. Most recently, the justice department instigated a criminal investigation against Powell for testimony he gave about renovations at the Fed’s headquarters. Even so, the Fed has not budged.

Published: January 24, 2026, 12:00 pm

Trump news at a glance: Starmer rebukes Trump for ‘diminishing’ British soldiers who fought and died in Afghanistan

Starmer suggested Trump should apologise for claiming Nato troops stayed ‘a little off the frontlines’ – key US politics stories from 23 January at a glance

The UK prime minister Keir Starmer has accused Donald Trump of “diminishing” the sacrifice of fallen British soldiers, as the US president faced a fierce backlash from UK political leaders and families of veterans over his comments about Nato troops.

In an interview with Fox News on Thursday, Trump said: “[Nato will] say they sent some troops to Afghanistan … and they did, they stayed a little back, a little off the frontlines.”

Published: January 24, 2026, 2:21 am

White House doctoring Minnesota woman’s photo unlikely to derail case, say experts

Altered image shows Nekima Levy Armstrong sobbing after arrest during protest outside a Minneapolis church

The White House’s decision to post a doctored photo of a woman arrested in Minneapolis on Thursday will probably be raised in court as her criminal case proceeds, though it is unlikely to derail the case entirely, legal experts said.

The woman in the image, Nekima Levy Armstrong, is one of three people who was arrested on Thursday in connection with a disruptive protest at a church service. About 30 minutes after Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, posted a picture of her arrest, the White House posted a digitally altered photo of Armstrong in which her skin appears to be darkened and with tears running down her face. Noem posted pictures of two other defendants arrested on Thursday in connection with the protest, but only posted an altered image of Armstrong.

Published: January 23, 2026, 9:23 pm

Trump’s second term has been rife with bizarre moments – here are seven

From derailing meetings by telling fictional stories about serial killers to Davos, the president has left people confused and concerned

Donald Trump vowed to “plant the stars and stripes on the planet Mars” during his inauguration speech last year, a bold promise that spoke to otherworldly achievements.

But during the first year of his second term, it is on the planet Earth where Trump has sought to plant the US flag. He has deployed troops to US cities, as waves of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents terrorize communities. Trump has ordered the invasion of Venezuela and the capture of its leader, is engaged in ongoing saber-rattling over Greenland, and has threatened historic US allies should they oppose his efforts to seize the autonomous territory of the Danish kingdom. He has amplified online claims that Nato is a bigger threat to the US than historical adversaries China and Russia.

Published: January 23, 2026, 5:16 pm

When brand meets blood: inside the business of being a Beckham

Brooklyn’s Instagram bombshell tested decades of image control, revealing how fame, PR and power collide behind the scenes

On a personal level, it’s all extremely sad. A once close family ripped apart by feuding and bitterness. A much-loved son blocking all contact with his parents and siblings.

From another perspective, however, for those who have followed the movements of David and Victoria Beckham in their 30 years in the (carefully curated) spotlight, the public falling out this week of Britain’s alternative royal family has been a car crash from which it is hard to look away.

Published: January 24, 2026, 6:00 am

She’s 14 and she’s moved 26 times. The US housing crisis has families like hers ‘running in place’

Outside Atlanta, the Godfreys are caught in a cycle of job loss and eviction. That stress has implications for the kids

At the end of a long day at school, 14-year-old Na’Kaya Godfrey, and her 12-year-old brother, Junior, returned home to a dark, empty house in Stone Mountain, Georgia, outside Atlanta.

On this dreary winter afternoon, she turned on the space heaters that provide the only warmth in the unheated house, the latest in a long succession of homes the family has occupied during her short life. An inspirational sign on her dresser read “Home, Sweet Home”. But it doesn’t mean much to her. Asked how many places her family has lived, Na’Kaya guessed: “At least 25.”

Published: January 23, 2026, 6:00 pm

‘At the table or on the menu’: a turbulent Davos week with Trump’s circus in town

Dissenting voices were few and far between as the US president brought his smash-and-grab politics to the WEF

“If we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.” The Canadian prime minister, Mark Carney, was the darling of Davos this week as he rallied resistance to Donald Trump’s smash and grab politics and his voracious appetite for other countries’ wealth and land.

“Call it what it is,” he told delegates. “A system of intensifying great power rivalry, where the most powerful pursue their interests using economic integration as coercion”. He urged “middle powers” to band together or be crushed, and was rewarded with a standing ovation.

Published: January 23, 2026, 4:15 pm

A distraction, a threat: how Ukrainians have viewed the Greenland crisis

There are fears that Europe is exhausted with the war, worries about Trump’s logic but some hope of a silver lining

In the Benedikt cafe in the Ukrainian port city of Odesa, one wall is covered by a giant map with countries and territories cut out of lacquered wooden pieces, with Greenland at its apex.

The waiter has not been following news of the Greenland crisis and Donald Trump’s desire to annex the Danish territory. But the echoes of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin’s imperial land grab of the waiter’s own country are clear to him. “They’re crazy. The pair of them.”

Published: January 24, 2026, 5:00 am

I heard the news on the radio: my parents and sister had died in a helicopter crash. How would I survive their sudden loss?

I was 16 when the course of my life changed, and for years I was unable to speak about about what had happened

I am lying in bed listening to the radio at my boarding school as my roommate is getting dressed. As she walks out of the door she says, “See you at breakfast – don’t be late.” I’m about to get up when the early morning news comes on the radio, and I hear the announcer saying my parents’ names.

By the time my roommate arrives at breakfast, everyone has heard. My friends run to be with me. The housemaster and his wife stand in the corridor outside my bedroom, not allowing anyone in. All they can hear are my screams and the smashing of furniture. It is beyond comprehension, but then everything from now on is beyond comprehension.

Published: January 24, 2026, 12:00 pm

Ryan Wedding’s journey from Olympic snowboarder to alleged cocaine kingpin

The native of Thunder Bay, Canada, has been compared to Pablo Escobar and El Chapo – but is he really as big a figure as US prosecutors have claimed?

To compete at the highest levels of snowboarding, racers must master carving, edging and balance at speeds stretching the limits of imagination. They can fluently read the nuances of snow and fine-tune their bodies to cross the finish line faster than anyone else.

The Canadian snowboarder Ryan Wedding had these skills – but also the quality that catapults amateurs to an elite level: a highly competitive instinct to succeed that can at times manifest in a desire to crush fellow competitors.

Published: January 24, 2026, 10:00 am

How we draw the age of Trump and turmoil: two cartoonists go head-to-head | Martin Rowson and Ella Baron

Martin Rowson has been drawing for the Guardian since the 1980s; Ella Baron since 2022. In paint and pixels, each is tasked with capturing the chaos and absurdity of our political moment

Photographs and video by David Levene

• Gallery: cartoonists Martin Rowson and Ella Baron at work – in pictures

Martin Rowson and Ella Baron are both regular contributors to the Guardian’s daily political cartoon. Martin has been with the Guardian for decades; Ella has been contributing since 2022. This week, we challenged the pair to draw on the same subject (Trump and a world in turmoil), on the same day, to see what each – with their different styles, tools and perspectives – would come up with. Martin landed on a Shakespearean scene, with a warped “King Leer” flanked by snickering world leaders. Ella proposed him squatting in a dystopian nest, surrounded by his spoils. Below, each reflects on their process, the challenges and joys of political cartoons, and what they have learned from one another.

Published: January 24, 2026, 6:00 am

The History of Concrete review – John Wilson’s first movie is an absurd triumph

Sundance film festival: the documentarian’s feature debut, essentially an extended episode of his HBO series, turns an exploration of concrete into a meditation on change

For those in the know, the release of the Sundance film festival lineup last December contained one perfect, tantalizing log line, for a documentary plainly called The History of Concrete: “After attending a workshop on how to write and sell a Hallmark movie, filmmaker John Wilson tries to use the same formula to sell a documentary about concrete.”

Wilson, a film-maker from the Nathan Fielder school of meandering, bone-dry observational comedy, is a master of the modern documentary-essay-memoir, with an uncanny eye for the idiosyncratic, unintentionally hilarious and disturbing vignettes hiding in plain sight. Over three near-perfect seasons, his peerless HBO series How To With John Wilson, executive-produced by Fielder, spun spoofs of practical guides (“How to Cook the Perfect Risotto”) into profound meditations on the loudness, loneliness and ridiculousness of modern urban life, each half-hour episode a magic trick of elaborate, bizarre tangents reined in at the last second. For fans of the show – in my opinion, the single best TV series about New York this decade – Wilson’s feature documentary debut, supposedly about the most iconic element of urban life, was a must-see.

The History of Concrete is screening at the Sundance film festival and is seeking distribution

Published: January 23, 2026, 8:43 pm

Extra Geography review – a sweet and spiky coming-of-age debut

Sundance film festival: two teenage girls find their friendship put to the test in a witty and charmingly odd British comedy

If you know, you know that first best friendship is a world unto itself – lush, rugged and expansive, nutritive and intoxicating, vulnerable to freak changes in the weather. Its specific terrain stays invisible to outsiders; only the two within it know, and they themselves are likely to lose it in time. So goes the perilous trekking in Extra Geography, Molly Manners’ nimble and frequently funny debut film, which astutely maps the peaks and valleys of one charged friendship between two adolescent girls at an English boarding school.

Minna and Flic, played by remarkable newcomers Galaxie Clear (coming for Chase Infiniti’s name game) and Marni Duggan, begin year 10 sometime in the early 2000s, in a sunny meadow of boundless, heady entanglement. They move in playful unison, share beds and mannerisms, hold common goals (Oxbridge) and disdain (for boys, and those who covet them). Manners, a Bafta nominee for her work on the better-than-it-should-be Netflix series One Day, is particularly attuned to the energizing rhythm of platonic-ish intimacy; the first third of this brisk, 94-minute film is a mesmerizing symphony of female mind-meld, the girls slamming lockers, opening notebooks, flopping on the floor and hatching plans to a swift, synchronous beat.

Published: January 24, 2026, 2:45 am

Canadian backpacker’s death poses question for Queensland’s K’gari: can dingoes and tourists coexist?

Coroner is yet to determine the cause of death of Piper James, a 19-year-old Canadian woman found surrounded by dingoes on Monday

In the early hours of Monday morning, a young woman’s body was found being mauled by a pack of dingoes near a shipwreck on a windswept stretch of white sand beach on an island off the east coast of Australia.

The island was K’gari, formerly known as Fraser Island, in southern Queensland, home to about 150 human inhabitants and a population of dingoes genetically distinct from those on the mainland. Called wongari in the language of its Butchulla traditional owners, the lean yellow and white canids are sacred to the First People and indelibly entwined in the cultural fabric of this world-heritage listed sand island.

Published: January 23, 2026, 10:19 pm

My cultural awakening: A Queen song helped me break free from communist Cuba

Listening to Brian May’s multi-tracked epic on a battered cassette player when I lived in repressive Havana inspired lit a spark of rebellion inside me

Throughout my childhood and teenage years growing up in 80s Cuba, Fidel Castro’s presence, and the overt influence of politics, was everywhere – on posters, on walls, in speeches that could last four hours at a stretch. The sense of being hemmed in, politically and personally, was hard to escape.

I had been raised to believe in communism, and for a long time I did. I even applied twice to join the Young Communist League, only to be rejected for not being “combative” enough: code for not informing on others. Friends were expelled from university or jailed for speaking too freely and my family included people in the military and police, so I had to be careful not to endanger them. But amid that stifling conformity, something else had begun to take hold.

Published: January 24, 2026, 7:00 am

‘We cannot say for sure these wolves come from Russia’: Finns try to fathom cause of record reindeer deaths

Wolves killed more than 2,100 reindeer in Finland last year, and herders are blaming the Ukraine war

Juha Kujala no longer knows how many reindeer will return to his farm from the forest each December. The 54-year-old herder releases his animals into the wilderness on the 830-mile Finnish-Russian border each spring to grow fat on lichens, grass and mushrooms, just as his ancestors have done for generations.

But since 2022, grisly discoveries of reindeer skeletons on the forest floor have disrupted this ancient way of life. The culprits, according to Kujala: wolves from Russia.

Published: January 24, 2026, 5:00 am

The EU finally used an economic threat against Trump. But the markets forced his climbdown | Rosa Balfour

While the threat of retaliatory measures to stop the annexation of Greenland worked, it remains to be seen if Europe has the unity to follow through

The past couple of weeks have seen the most spectacular crisis escalation in the transatlantic relationship, over the US threat to annex Greenland, a self-governing territory of Denmark. It risked becoming a major conflict among the members of Nato, the most powerful security alliance in world history – until now.

On Wednesday, after a meeting with Nato’s secretary general, Mark Rutte, the US president, Donald Trump, backtracked on his threats to slap tariffs on countries that got in the way of his annexation project. As European leaders huddled together over dinner for a post-crisis debrief in Brussels on 22 January, they congratulated themselves on their unity and appreciated the intervention of Rutte, or “Daddy diplomacy”. If these really were the conclusions of the latest debacle in transatlantic relations, they are missing important parts of the story.

Rosa Balfour is director of Carnegie Europe

Published: January 24, 2026, 10:00 am

A knock at the door: fear of ICE is transforming daily life in America | Abdul Wahid Gulrani

Does a society truly become safer when part of its population learns to live in constant fear?

On 15 June 2025, the Trump administration issued an official statement directing US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to begin what it described as “the largest mass deportation operation in American history”. Major cities such as Los Angeles, Chicago and New York were identified as primary targets. The stated goal was to keep communities “safe and free from illegal alien crime, conflict, and chaos”. Federal agents rapidly became a part of many residents’ everyday lives.

No stable state can protect its borders, public order and the legitimate interests of its citizens without immigration law and effective enforcement mechanisms.

Abdul Wahid Gulrani is a political sociologist from Afghanistan, whose work focuses on migration, gender and national security. He is currently engaged in teaching and research at Georgetown University and the George Washington University

Published: January 23, 2026, 3:00 pm

Democrats are campaigning as if the 2026 election will be fair. That’s a mistake | Austin Sarat

Trump’s remarks and Project 2025’s proposals have made the plan clear. Democrats must focus on stopping it

Last week, during an Oval Office interview with Reuters, Donald Trump touted his accomplishments and suggested that they were so great that “we shouldn’t even have an election” in November. Not surprisingly, that comment made headlines.

But it is at best a distraction from the real threat: the United States will have elections this year, but they will not be free and fair.

Published: January 23, 2026, 11:00 am

In this Trump era, we need satire more than ever. Just don’t expect it to save democracy | Alexander Hurst

In the US, comedy has long filled the space vacated by partisan news media. Now France is following its lead

Sometimes the freedom and openness of comedy means it is better able to respond to world events than news media. Take South Park’s raucous, unhinged and visually disturbing depictions of Donald Trump – most recently, cheating on Satan (who is carrying his spawn) with JD Vance in the White House. Fair enough: Trey Parker and Matt Stone very much own this terrain.

But there’s no reason why satirical TV programmes such as The Daily Show should have to take on the role of news provider, investigative journalist and critic. And yet, over the past three decades, the failings of the US corporate media to adequately cover the country’s dilapidated politics has pushed people such as Jon Stewart into filling the void.

The problem was identified as long ago as 2000 by the US economist Paul Krugman. He castigated the press for being “fanatically determined to seem even-handed”, to the point they were unwilling to call out outrageous untruths. “If a presidential candidate were to declare that the Earth is flat,” Krugman wrote, “you would be sure to see a news analysis under the headline Shape of the Planet: Both Sides Have a Point.”

It was this context that provided American satire’s cathartic triumph in the first years of the 21st century. The Daily Show began conducting harder-hitting interviews than most primetime TV shows. Stephen Colbert rose to prominence by playing a fake conservative talkshow host, in an open parody of Bill O’Reilly’s mid-2000s show on Fox. And then John Oliver pioneered “investigative comedy”, frequently doing a better job of breaking scandalous stories than the news programmes he was satirising.

Alexander Hurst is a Guardian Europe columnist. H​is memoir, Generation Desperation​, is published in January 2026

Published: January 24, 2026, 7:00 am

As the world finally punches back, was this the week Donald Trump went too far? | Jonathan Freedland

The US president took his bullying doctrine to Davos and hit a wall of opposition. If this creates a new western alliance against him, all to the good

The temptation is strong to hope that the storm has passed. To believe that a week that began with a US threat to seize a European territory, whether by force or extortion, has ended with the promise of negotiation and therefore a return to normality. But that is a dangerous delusion. There can be no return to normality. The world we thought we knew has gone. The only question now is what takes its place – a question that will affect us all, that is full of danger and that, perhaps unexpectedly, also carries a whisper of hope.

Forget that Donald Trump eventually backed down from his threats to conquer Greenland, re-holstering the economic gun he had put to the head of all those countries who stood in his way, the UK among them. The fact that he made the threat at all confirmed what should have been obvious since he returned to office a year ago: that, under him, the US has become an unreliable ally, if not an actual foe of its one-time friends.

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist

Published: January 23, 2026, 4:28 pm

Trump’s Greenland U-turn was spectacular. The lesson for Europe: strongmen understand only strength | Nathalie Tocci

With conflict averted for now, European leaders will be tempted to retreat to their comfort zone of cowardice. But the next crisis will soon be here

Donald Trump’s climbdown, after days of escalation during which he had refused to rule out a military attack to annex Greenland, was spectacular. In his Davos speech, Trump repeated his desire to own Greenland, claiming that you cannot defend what you do not own, only to then announce that he would not conquer the Arctic island by force. Hours later, he claimed that he had reached an unspecified deal on Greenland, and would therefore refrain from imposing additional tariffs on those European countries that had had the audacity to participate in a joint military exercise in Greenland at Denmark’s invitation.

We know neither the details of the framework agreement reached by Trump and the Nato secretary general, Mark Rutte, nor whether it carries any weight, given the US president’s fickleness. But it appears that the deal, while open to discussing Arctic security, mineral rights and possibly even the sovereignty of US bases, preserves Greenland’s sovereignty within the Kingdom of Denmark. In short, this has been a remarkable U-turn.

Nathalie Tocci is a Guardian Europe columnist

Published: January 23, 2026, 11:06 am

The Guardian view on Syria’s crisis: Islamic State fighters are not the only concern | Editorial

As a lightning government offensive leaves the Kurdish-dominated SDF reeling, the political horizon needs attention as well as security

In little more than a fortnight, a dramatic Syrian government offensive appears to have undone over a decade of Kurdish self-rule in the north-east and extended President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s control. The Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) held around a quarter of the country and many critical resources – but were forced out of much of it within days. Though the SDF has effectively agreed to dissolution in principle, it has not shown it will do so in practice: a worrying sign for a fragile truce. A peaceful resolution is in everyone’s interests. Forcible integration by Damascus would risk breeding insurgency.

The US relied upon the SDF in the battle against Islamic State. But Donald Trump has embraced “attractive, tough” Mr Sharaa – a former jihadist who had a $10m US bounty on his head until late 2024. The US administration became increasingly frustrated at the SDF’s failure to implement last spring’s agreement to integration into the new army, apparently due to internal divisions. Tom Barrack, the US special envoy to Syria and ambassador to Turkey, wrote this week that the rationale for partnership with the SDF had “largely expired” because Damascus was ready to take over security responsibilities.

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: January 23, 2026, 6:10 pm

Australian Open 2026: Cilic v Ruud, Djokovic ‘stressed’ in victory, Osaka withdraws – live

Sinner battles cramp and heat | Osaka withdraws
Djokovic admits to losing cool in win | Email Billy

Van de Zandschulp has only been broken once in the tournament himself, so Djokovic is unlikely to get anything for free there.

*Van de Zandschulp 0-1 Djokovic (*denotes next server)

Published: January 24, 2026, 12:21 pm

NFL conference championship game picks: do the No 1 seed Broncos have any chance of victory?

The Super Bowl match-up will be set this weekend as a weakened Denver take on New England and two NFC West rivals clash in Seattle

What New England need to do to win: Clean up their act. Last week against the Houston Texans, Drake Maye was blindsided too often by edge rushers Will Anderson and Danielle Hunter. The pair wreaked havoc, sacking Maye five times and forcing him into three of his four fumbles. The Los Angeles Chargers also forced two from him in the wildcard round. Denver led the league in sacks (68) in the regular season, and will be intent on causing similar damage on Sunday. But Maye can mitigate that threat if he sharpens his awareness in the pocket and takes the sack rather than rushing into impossible passes. New England’s left tackle Will Campbell is very likely to lose a couple of duels with edge defender Nik Bonitto, so Maye needs to be ready for a helmet sandwich while holding on to the ball for dear life. Simply punting and giving Denver’s second-string quarterback, Jarrett Stidham, tough field position may be all it takes to reach the Super Bowl.

Published: January 23, 2026, 10:00 am

At home with Jakob Ingebrigtsen: ‘I’ve fed my obsession my whole life’

In an exclusive interview at his base, athletics’ ‘iron man’ reveals why his career feels like ‘99% losses’ but he plans to retire as the greatest distance runner in history

On a bone-cold new year’s morning, the world’s most compelling athlete is sweating so much that tiny puddles are starting to ooze across his treadmill.

For 40 minutes Jakob Ingebrigtsen makes 6min 40sec mile pace look like a Sunday stroll, breezily chatting away even as the heatbox in his home gym pushes the temperature inside to more than 32.4C (90F). Only when I ask the double Olympic champion what his super-strength is does he pause to take a proper breath. “In Norwegian we have a word for it,” he eventually replies. “Ingen kompromiss. No compromise.”

Published: January 23, 2026, 8:00 pm

UFC fighter Cameron Smotherman collapses after weigh-in in harrowing scene

• Smotherman collapses after making bantam limit

• Fight with Ricky Turcios canceled from prelim card

• Incident reignites debate over UFC weight cutting

UFC bantamweight Cameron Smotherman was taken for medical evaluation after collapsing moments after making weight ahead of Saturday’s UFC 324 card in Las Vegas, prompting the cancellation of his scheduled bout.

Smotherman, 28, appeared visibly unstable as he completed his weigh-in Friday morning at T-Mobile Arena. After stepping on the scale and registering at 135.5lb, the American fighter walked off the platform before losing consciousness and falling forward onto the stage floor.

Published: January 23, 2026, 9:19 pm

Former Eagles lineman Kevin Johnson killed at LA homeless encampment

• Medical examiner rules Johnson’s death a homicide

• Former Eagles defender was 55 years old

• Friends say health issues preceded homelessness

Former Philadelphia Eagles defensive lineman Kevin Johnson died from “blunt head trauma and stab wounds” at a homeless encampment, according to the Los Angeles county medical examiner.

The medical examiner said Johnson, 55, was pronounced dead Wednesday morning after being found unconscious. His death was ruled a homicide and is being investigated.

Published: January 23, 2026, 5:04 pm

Alex Honnold’s made-for-Netflix free solo of Taipei 101 draws awe – and unease

The Free Solo star will attempt to climb the 1,667ft skyscraper without ropes in a live Netflix broadcast, drawing awe, ethical concern and global attention

Alex Honnold has spent the past three months training for this moment: free soloing – climbing without ropes or a harness – one of Asia’s tallest skyscrapers, Taipei 101. It is an ambition that began more than a decade ago and is now close to being realized.

The climb will be broadcast globally on Skyscraper Live, Netflix’s latest foray into live sports programming. The star of the 2019 Oscar-winning documentary Free Solo insists that climbing Taipei 101 will feel no different from any other of his ascents.

Published: January 23, 2026, 8:00 am

Lewis Hamilton warns new F1 season will present biggest challenge of his career

• Ferrari unveil 2026 car amid regulation reset

• Williams not ready and will miss next week’s first test

Lewis Hamilton has emphasised the scale of the challenge facing drivers and teams as Formula One enters a new season with a regulation reset that the British driver described as the biggest of his career, as his Ferrari team look to a new start after a disappointing 2025.

The Scuderia launched their new car, the SF-26, with Hamilton driving it at the team’s test track at Fiorano for the first time on Friday. He was optimistic, having been involved in the development of a Ferrari for the first time but acknowledged that a huge task lay ahead.

Published: January 23, 2026, 5:01 pm

‘You can’t just remove the cloud’: US sprinting’s reckoning before LA 2028

Once a nearly man of US sprinting, Marvin Bracy-Williams’ ban has exposed a sport gripped by doping, distrust and whispered betrayals

Marvin Bracy-Williams dreamed of ranking in the pantheon of elite male US sprinters alongside Carl Lewis, Michael Johnson and Maurice Greene. He’s quick – 9.85sec for 100m – but his problem was he could only ever finish second: silver at the world indoors in 2014, silver at the world championships in 2022.

When he didn’t even make the USA team for the 2023 world championships he realized that, at 29, he was losing the most important contest of all, the race against time.

Published: January 23, 2026, 10:15 am

Premier League: 10 things to look out for this weekend

Mateus Fernandes steels West Ham, Dominic Calvert-Lewin faces a homecoming and Manchester City need Marc Guéhi

• Top scorers: check out the latest standings

The absence of the wantaway Lucas Paquetá has given Mateus Fernandes a chance to take on more responsibility for West Ham. Paquetá, who is said to be nursing a minor back problem, was unavailable again for last week’s win at Spurs but Nuno Espírito Santo’s struggling side coped without the Flamengo target. They called on Fernandes to dictate the flow in midfield and the diligent Portuguese did not disappoint. Fernandes moved the ball cleverly, picked up an assist and looked like that rarest of things: a smart signing from West Ham. They will need the 21-year-old, who joined from Southampton for £38m last summer, to shine again with Paquetá looking unlikely to return against high-flying Sunderland at the London Stadium. Jacob Steinberg

West Ham v Sunderland, Saturday 12.30pm (all times GMT)

Burnley v Tottenham, Saturday 3pm

Fulham v Brighton, Saturday 3pm

Manchester City v Wolves, Saturday 3pm

Bournemouth v Liverpool, Saturday 5.30pm

Published: January 23, 2026, 12:00 am

Starmer rebukes Trump over ‘frankly appalling’ remarks on Nato troops in Afghanistan

PM joins veterans in condemning claim that troops avoided frontlines and suggests US president should apologise

Keir Starmer has issued an unprecedented rebuke to Donald Trump for his “insulting and frankly appalling” remarks about British troops in Afghanistanand suggested he should apologise.

After a week of fractious relations with the White House, Starmer said he was not surprised that relatives of British soldiers killed in Afghanistan were hurt by Trump claiming they avoided the frontline.

Published: January 23, 2026, 9:26 pm

Colorado investigators confirm Hunter S Thompson’s 2005 death was a suicide

Journalist’s wife had contacted authorities with concerns and ‘potential information’ regarding inquiry into his death

A review of the 2005 shooting death of the journalist Hunter S Thompson has confirmed authorities’ original finding that his death was a suicide, Colorado investigators said on Friday.

The review by the Colorado bureau of investigation (CBI) was announced in September after Thompson’s wife, Anita Thompson, contacted authorities with “new concerns and potential information regarding the investigation” into Thompson’s death, the agency said in a news release.

Published: January 23, 2026, 10:45 pm

Canadian Olympic snowboarder turned alleged cocaine kingpin in US custody

Ryan Wedding turned himself in at US consulate in Mexico City and is due to appear in court in California on Monday

Ryan Wedding, the Canadian Olympic snowboarder turned alleged drug kingpin, has been arrested after turning himself in at the US embassy in Mexico, law enforcement officials announced on Friday.

Wedding, 44, had been sought by the FBI and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) for his role in overseeing what the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, called the “one of the most prolific and violent drug-trafficking organizations” in the world.

Published: January 23, 2026, 6:11 pm

Nico Antic, 12, dies in hospital after being attacked by a shark in Sydney

Family confirms boy has died almost a week after the attack, describing him as possessing the ‘most kind and generous spirit’

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

A 12-year-old boy has died in hospital after being mauled by a shark in Sydney Harbour last weekend, his family has confirmed.

The boy, named as Nico Antic in an online fundraiser, had been fighting for his life after being bitten on both legs on 18 January at a harbour beach in Vaucluse, in Sydney’s east.

Published: January 24, 2026, 3:52 am

Asbestos found in children’s play sand sold in UK

Hobbycraft removes product from sale after parent sent samples to a lab for testing but declines to issue a recall

Bottles of children’s play sand have been withdrawn from shelves by the craft retailer Hobbycraft after a parent discovered they were contaminated with asbestos.

The parent, who did not wish to be named, raised the alarm after her children played with the sand at a party.

Published: January 24, 2026, 7:00 am

New Zealand landslide: rescue efforts called off for six people buried in disaster

Rescue efforts at Mount Maunganui site switch to recovery operation that police say could take several days

Efforts to rescue six people buried by a landslide at a New Zealand holiday park ended on Saturday, with police shifting into a recovery operation.

Police Supt Tim Anderson said human remains had been uncovered on Friday night beneath the mountains of dirt and debris that crashed into a campsite in Mount Maunganui on Thursday, adding that it could take several days to locate all of the victims due to the unstable ground.

Published: January 24, 2026, 2:23 am

Black and white and sent back over: end of panda diplomacy as Japan returns bears to China

The departure of pandas will leave legions of Japanese admirers bereft, but it is also symptomatic of a dramatic deterioration in China-Japan relations

The panda house at Ueno Zoo in Tokyo is not due to open for several hours, but visitors are already milling around its entrance, pausing to pose for photographs in front of murals of the facility’s most beloved residents. A short walk away the gift shop is doing a roaring trade in themed souvenirs – from cuddly toys and stationery to T-shirts and biscuits.

The visitors are here to say goodbye to Xiao Xiao and Lei Lei. Early next week, the twin pandas, born at the zoo in 2021 but technically on loan from China, will be flown out of Tokyo’s Narita airport to China, where they will undergo quarantine and be reunited with their sister, Xiang Xiang, at a conservation and research centre in Sichuan province.

Published: January 24, 2026, 12:00 am

Texas Black man exonerated 70 years after execution in case marked by racial bias

Review of case found problems with statements from police officer who claimed victim had identified her attacker

Nearly 70 years after a Texas Black man was executed in a case that prosecutors now say was based on false evidence and was riddled with racial bias, officials have declared that he was innocent of the killing of a white woman in Dallas.

Tommy Lee Walker was executed in the electric chair in May 1956 for the rape and murder of 31-year-old Venice Parker.

Published: January 23, 2026, 10:47 pm

Victoria Beckham tops UK singles sales chart as fans show support over Brooklyn feud

Not Such an Innocent Girl makes No 1 for single sales and downloads, after revelations about family rift

• ‘My mum went so far as to call me evil’: nine things you need to know about the Beckham family feud

There is a light at the end of the Beckhams’ hebdomadis horribilis: Victoria Beckham has the UK’s highest-selling single of the week with Not Such an Innocent Girl, originally released in 2001.

After her eldest son Brooklyn’s bombshell revelations about the rift with his parents, including his horrified account of his mother dancing “on” him at his wedding to Nicola Peltz in 2022, fans taking mater and pater Beckham’s side in the celeb gossip of the year showed their support by buying MP3s of Beckham’s debut solo single. (Her first effort without the Spice Girls, 2000’s Out of Your Mind, was a collaboration with Dane Bowers of Another Level.)

Published: January 23, 2026, 6:00 pm

Week in wildlife: a proud eagle, an adorable axolotl and a goofy seal

This week’s best wildlife photographs from around the world

Published: January 23, 2026, 8:00 am

New filtration technology could be gamechanger in removal of Pfas ‘forever chemicals’

Researchers found a new way to filter and destroy Pfas chemicals at 100 times the rate of current systems

New filtration technology developed by Rice University may absorb some Pfas “forever chemicals” at 100 times the rate previously possible, which could dramatically improve pollution control and speed remediations.

Researchers also say they have also found a way to destroy Pfas, though both technologies face a steep challenge in being deployed on an industrial scale.

Published: January 23, 2026, 1:00 pm

Dramatic rise in water-related violence recorded since 2022

Experts say climate crisis, corruption and lack or misuse of infrastructure among factors driving water conflicts

Water-related violence has almost doubled since 2022 and little is being done to understand and address the trend and prevent new and escalating risks, experts have said.

There were 419 incidents of water-related violence recorded in 2024, up from 235 in 2022, according to the Pacific Institute, a US-based thinktank.

Published: January 23, 2026, 6:00 am

Indonesia takes action against mining firms after floods devastate population of world’s rarest ape

Conservationists hail the ‘desperately needed’ measures and urge greater protection after up to 11% of endangered Tapanuli orangutans wiped out

The floods and landslides that tore through Indonesia’s fragile Batang Toru ecosystem in November 2024 – killing up to 11% of the world’s Tapanuli orangutan population – prompted widespread scrutiny of the extractive companies operating in the area at the time of the ecological catastrophe.

For weeks, investigators searched for evidence that the companies may have damaged the Batang Toru and Garoga watersheds before the disaster, which washed torrents of mud and logs into villages, claiming the lives of more than 1,100 people.

Published: January 23, 2026, 5:00 am

Philadelphia sues US government for removal of slavery-related exhibit

Display at President’s House site, residence to George Washington, had information on people enslaved by him

Philadelphia is taking legal action against the Trump administration following the National Park Service’s decision to dismantle a long-established slavery-related exhibit at Independence National Historical park, which holds the former residence of George Washington.

The city filed its lawsuit in federal court on Thursday, naming the US Department of Interior and its secretary, Doug Burgum, the National Park Service, and its acting director, Jessica Bowron, as defendants. The lawsuit seeks a court order requiring the exhibits to be restored while the case proceeds.

Published: January 23, 2026, 8:23 pm

Scotland sends baby box to New York after mayor Mamdani cites policy

Scottish social justice secretary says pledge for the city shows shared ‘commitment to tackling child poverty’

New York’s new mayor, Zohran Mamdani, has received a baby box from the Scottish government after modelling part of his election campaign on Edinburgh’s example of providing each expectant mother with a set of essentials.

Scotland’s social justice secretary, Shirley-Anne Somerville, said it would help the city’s leader develop his own plans for a “baby basket”.

Published: January 23, 2026, 12:31 pm

Jury selection in Luigi Mangione murder trial set for 8 September

Much-anticipated trial scheduled in New York over killing of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson

Luigi Mangione’s federal murder trial in the killing of the United HealthCare CEO Brian Thompson is scheduled to start with jury selection on 8 September, a judge said on Friday, triggering one of the most eagerly anticipated criminal trials in recent US history.

Judge Margaret Garnett announced the trial date to a packed Manhattan federal courtroom shortly before an evidence-related hearing in his case.

Published: January 23, 2026, 7:15 pm

Man accused of rape denies anger over call from Barron Trump, court hears

Court told US president’s son contacted woman shortly before alleged assault in London

A man accused of raping a woman in London denied he was angry when she received a call from Donald Trump’s son, a court has heard.

Barron Trump, the youngest son of the US president, was on a video call in January last year with the woman, who cannot be named, when he allegedly witnessed her being assaulted by a man in London and alerted police.

Published: January 23, 2026, 3:33 pm

Spanish prosecutors drop sexual assault complaint against Julio Iglesias

Court says alleged abuse and trafficking offences occurred outside Spain, leaving it without jurisdiction

Spanish prosecutors have shelved a complaint brought by two women who have accused the singer Julio Iglesias of sexual assault and human trafficking, arguing the country’s courts have no jurisdiction as the alleged offences took place outside Spain.

Two female former employees who worked at Iglesias’s Caribbean mansions 10 days ago accused the veteran entertainer of sexual assault, saying they had been subjected “to inappropriate touching, insults and humiliation … in an atmosphere of control and constant harassment”.

Published: January 23, 2026, 6:20 pm

British crown was world’s largest buyer of enslaved people by 1807, book reveals

Exclusive: Author of The Crown’s Silence tells how navy and monarchy protected slave trade for hundreds of years

The British crown and the navy expanded and protected the trade in enslaved African people for hundreds of years, unprecedented research into the monarchy’s historical ties to slavery has found.

The Crown’s Silence, a book by the historian Brooke Newman, follows the Guardian’s 2023 Cost of the crown report, which explored the British monarchy’s hidden ties to transatlantic slavery.

Published: January 23, 2026, 1:12 pm

Young will suffer most when AI ‘tsunami’ hits jobs, says head of IMF

Kristalina Georgieva says research suggests 60% of jobs in advanced economies will be affected, with many entry-level roles wiped out

Artificial intelligence will be a “tsunami hitting the labour market”, with young people worst affected, the head of the International Monetary Fund warned the World Economic Forum on Friday.

Kristalina Georgieva told delegates in Davos that the IMF’s own research suggested there would be a big transformation of demand for skills, as the technology becomes increasingly widespread.

Published: January 23, 2026, 1:35 pm

‘Every single frame was sweated over’: how Becoming Led Zeppelin became the biggest documentary of the year

Bernard MacMahon’s film about the 70s giants took advantage of audience enthusiasm to make a major impact in cinemas – and it’s just the latest in a string of films about the era of classic rock

Bare-chested swagger, out of control hair, thunderous guitar riffs … the heroes of 1970s hard rock are back, and burning up the cinema box office. Becoming Led Zeppelin, a film about the British band that dominated the music industry in the 1970s, was the most successful feature documentary at the US box office in 2025, taking over $10m, with a worldwide gross of over $16m. (Taylor Swift’s The Official Release Party of a Showgirl grossed considerably more, with $34m, but as an album-promoting clipshow it is evidently in a different category.)

Despite breaking up in 1980 after the death of drummer John Bonham, Led Zeppelin remain one of the world’s bestselling music acts, with estimated sales of over 200m records and 14.9bn streams. The band were famously press-shy in their prime, but agreed to take part in Becoming Led Zeppelin, which focuses on their early years up to the release of groundbreaking second album, Led Zeppelin II, in 1969. And contemporary audiences have responded – especially to the film’s presentation on the giant Imax screens, where it recorded Imax’s best ever opening weekend for a music documentary and became the format’s highest-grossing documentary of 2025.

Published: January 23, 2026, 4:48 pm

‘I can understand being brought to your knees’: Amanda Seyfried on obsession, devotion and the joy of socks

The Testament of Ann Lee is a bonkers musical fantasia about an obscure religious sect. Its star and writer-director Mona Fastvold talk fear, bonding – and not needing an Oscar

Not many actors take an interest in the audience’s aftercare. When it comes to The Testament of Ann Lee, however, Amanda Seyfried is hands-on. “Did you watch it with someone you could talk to?” she asks, tilting her head sympathetically, then dipping her full-beam headlight eyes and giving a worried look when I admit that I saw it alone. “It’s nice to process it with somebody else.”

Her concern is understandable. Whatever feelings the film provokes, indifference will not be among them. Heady and rapturous, this is an all-round odd duck of a movie, the sort of go-for-broke phantasmagoria – an 18th-century musical biopic complete with feverish visions and levitating – that was once typical of Lars von Trier or Bruno Dumont. I confess I didn’t know exactly what to make of it, but I knew I had been through a singular experience. Its director, Mona Fastvold, seated beside Seyfried on a sofa in a London hotel room, looks delighted. “That’s my favourite sort of feeling,” she says.

Published: January 23, 2026, 5:00 am

Carousel review – Chris Pine and Jenny Slate are lost in static romance drama

Sundance film festival: an often lushly made yet frustratingly undercooked small town indie kicks off this year’s festival with disappointment

And so this year’s Sundance has officially begun, with grief over the loss of founder Robert Redford and its move from long-running home Park City likely to drown out the sounds of anyone talking about the first narrative premiere. It wouldn’t be the first time it has started with a whimper (unofficial opening day films have previously included misfires like After the Wedding, Freaky Tales, Netflix’s Taylor Swift doc and last year’s Jimpa) but there’s something specifically disappointing about a film such as Carousel showing at a festival such as Sundance.

It’s the sort of small, character-driven American indie that has served as the festival’s lifeblood for almost 50 years and, as the system has expanded in some ways and shrunk in others, the sort that has often struggled to make it far out of Park City. Back in 2023, a quiet, disarming and perfectly Sundance film called A Little Prayer premiered yet didn’t get released until late last summer and was seen by a precious few. The world is not kind to films like Carousel at this very moment and while I would love to see this particular subgenre flourish in the way it used to back in the 90s and 00s, it’s hard to muster up much in the way of strong feelings here.

Carousel is screening at the Sundance film festival and is seeking distribution

Published: January 23, 2026, 4:14 am

‘Some artists thought it was too political’: can Jarvis, Damon, Olivia Rodrigo and Arctic Monkeys reboot the biggest charity album of the 90s?

Oasis, Macca and Radiohead made Help a smash for War Child in 1995. A new reboot packs comparable star power – and was partially produced from a hospital bed

When Kae Tempest was asked to contribute to a new track by Damon Albarn, which would also feature Fontaines DC frontman Grian Chatten, Tempest says he jumped at the chance. It wasn’t just the artists involved, nor the fact that it was for a new compilation benefiting War Child, called Help(2): a sequel to the charity’s hugely successful 1995 compilation Help. After seven solo albums, Tempest had begun thinking about working with others, and so the night before the recording session, he and Chatten repaired to Albarn’s studio and wrote their verses together, “responding to each other”. It seemed to work really well, he says: “A true collaboration.”

Nevertheless, he concedes, the actual recording of Flags proved to be quite the baptism of fire. “Johnny Marr was on guitar, Femi [Koleoso] from Ezra Collective was drumming,” he laughs. “Plus, there was a children’s choir.”

Published: January 23, 2026, 8:00 am

Ari Lennox: Vacancy review – the R&B sophisticate’s loosest and most fun outing yet

(Interscope)
On her third LP, Lennox balances jazz-soaked tradition with flashes of unruly humour and a surefire viral hit

Ari Lennox is one of contemporary R&B’s premier sophisticates, preferring a palette of lush jazz, soul and 90s hip-hop over the more genre-fluid sound pushed by contemporaries SZA and Kehlani. But a few songs into her new album, Vacancy, she makes it eminently clear that tradition and wildness can coexist, with fabulously sparky results: on Under the Moon, she describes a lover as “vicious / Like a werewolf / When you’re in it” and proceeds to howl “moooooooooon” as if she is in an old creature feature.

Vacancy, Lennox’s third album, is far and away her most fun, and if it isn’t quite as ingratiating as her 2022 Age/Sex/Location, it makes up for it with canny lyrics and an airy, open sound. Cool Down is a reggae/R&B hybrid that practically feels as if it is made of aerogel, and which pairs its summery lightness with witty lyrics telling a guy to chill out. On Mobbin in DC, she pairs lounge-singer coolness with withering come-ons (“You know where I be / This ain’t calculus / No ChatGPT”), while the strutting Horoscope, with its hook of “That boy put the ho’ in ‘horoscope’,” is as surefire a future viral hit as I’ve ever heard.

Published: January 23, 2026, 8:30 am

Add to playlist: the Regency-styled 80s synth-pop revivalism of Haute & Freddy and the week’s best new tracks

The LA-based pop duo are sending a jolt through TikTok with maximalist songs that emote wildly in every direction

From Los Angeles
Recommend if you like Erasure, Chappell Roan, Jade
Up next Debut album Big Disgrace out 13 March

Just when you think pop is finally moving away from the synth-heavy 80s sound, another thrilling new act comes along to say: “Nope!” With shades of Erasure and a good dollop of theatre kid energy, Haute & Freddy are the Regency-styled freaks sending a jolt through TikTok. Their latest single Dance the Pain Away is the year’s first true banger, a dazzling sad-pop production that bursts through the January gloom, thrusts a spritzer in your hand and drags you to the dancefloor.

Published: January 23, 2026, 12:00 pm

Dijon review – a dense and dramatic forest of futurist sound from Grammy-nominated R&B auteur

Brixton Academy
Nominated for producer of the year for his album Baby and work with Justin Bieber, the US musician’s passion and experimentalism shine in this daring performance

Dijon may have sold out two nights at Brixton Academy, but the first feels more like the audience are witnessing a joyous jam session between friends: musicians who are totally attentive to one another and unabashed in their passion.

Following an extensive US tour of his acclaimed album Baby – and ahead of next weekend’s Grammys, where he is up for producer of the year thanks to his work with Justin Bieber – the US singer-songwriter clutches the mic as if it’s giving him life, seemingly preoccupied only with the sounds surrounding him. His music is a kind of lo-fi but densely produced R&B, but his setup here is the stuff of electronic prog rock, with soundboards and decks, a vast array of synthesisers, a live kit, electric guitar and bass, a violin and backing vocals. That ambition is matched by the setlist: 21 songs in two hours played in quick succession.

Published: January 23, 2026, 12:58 pm

Ali Smith: ‘Henry James had me running down the garden path shouting out loud’

The Scottish author on a masterclass from Toni Morrison, the brilliance of Simone de Beauvoir and the trim novel by Tove Jansson containing everything that really matters

My earliest reading memory
Apparently I taught myself to read when I was three via the labels on the Beatles 45s we had: I remember the moment of recognising the words “I” and “Feel” and “Fine”. It took a bit longer to work out the word “Parlophone”.

My favourite book growing up
Sister Vincent taught primary six in St Joseph’s, Inverness, and was a discerning reader with very good taste, plus the kind of literary moral rectitude that meant she removed Enid Blyton from the class library because she believed Blyton’s books were written by a factory of writers. In 1972 she and I had a passionate argument when the class was choosing a book to be read out loud to us and I championed Charlotte’s Web by EB White, with which I was in love. Sister Vincent put her foot down. “No. Because animals speak in it, and in reality animals don’t speak.” I recently reread it for the first time since I was nine, and it moved me to tears. What a fine book, about all sorts of language, injustice, imaginative power and friendship versus life’s tough realities. Terrific. Radiant. Humble.

Published: January 23, 2026, 10:00 am

Custody: The Secret History of Mothers by Lara Feigel – why women still have to fight for their children

Feigel uses her own experience as a starting point to examine the past, present and future of separation

This book about child custody is, unsurprisingly, full of pain. The pain of mothers separated from their children, of children sobbing for their mothers, of adults who have never moved on from the trauma of their youth, and of young people who are forced to live out the conflicts of their elders. Lara Feigel casts her net across history and fiction, reportage and memoir, and while her research is undeniably impressive and her candour moving, at times she struggles to create a narrative that can hold all these tales of anguish together.

The book begins with a woman flinging herself fully clothed into a river and then restlessly walking on, swimming again, walking again. This is French novelist George Sand, driven to desperate anxiety as she waits to go into court to fight for the right to custody of her children. But almost immediately the story flicks away to Feigel’s own custody battle, and then back into the early 19th century, with Caroline Norton’s sons being taken away in a carriage in the rain by their father.

Published: January 23, 2026, 9:00 am

May We Feed the King by Rebecca Perry review – a dazzling puzzle-box of a debut

The plight of a reluctant medieval king is glimpsed through scattered pieces of the past, in an ingenious novel that asks how much we can really know about history

In a medieval palace an unnamed king chafes under the new and unsought burden of power. His uncertain fate plays out in the present-day imagination of an unnamed curator of unspecified gender, who has been employed by the palace to dress some of its rooms for public viewing in the wake of an undescribed personal tragedy.

It’s likely that you’ll either be utterly intrigued or deeply put off by that summary of poet Rebecca Perry’s debut novel, May We Feed the King, a highly wrought puzzle-box of a book which deliberately wrongfoots the reader at every turn. However, the intrigued will find that it richly rewards those who approach it with curiosity – just not in the ways we as readers (and as interpreters of stories in any form) have been trained to expect.

Published: January 23, 2026, 7:00 am

Children and teens roundup – the best new picture books and novels

Caring canines; daring donuts; a golden monkey; a boy from another planet; a dark take on Little Women and more

The Good Deed Dogs by Emma Chichester Clark, Walker, £12.99
Three very good dogs’ attempts to help others keep backfiring with chaotic consequences – until they pull off a successful kitten rescue in this exuberantly charming picture book.

Auntie’s Bangles by Dean Atta and Alea Marley, Orchard, £12.99
Everyone misses Auntie, especially the jingle of her jewellery; but eventually Theo and Rama are ready to put on her bangles and dance to celebrate her memory. A sweet, poignant picture book about loss, joy and remembrance.

Published: January 23, 2026, 12:00 pm

‘I have the power!‘: Is the new He-Man film taking itself too seriously again?

Any attempt to add a down-to-Earth note to this wildly psychedelic 80s cartoon risks missing the point of its gloriously overblown origins

There is a rule in the science fiction and fantasy milieu – or at least there ought to be – that these types of properties should never, ever set any of the action in our own solar system. With the notable exception of Alien: Earth, which cleverly reframes the franchise’s xenomorphs as little more than fluffy house cats compared with humanity’s own talent for self-destruction, it is almost always a terrible idea. Who remembers Galactica 1980, the early-80s offshoot of Battlestar Galactica that lasted all of one season? Or the later seasons of Lexx, which took one of television’s most glorious space operas and promptly shrank it by parking large chunks of the action in this solar system.

And then there was the 1987 big-screen adaptation of Masters of the Universe, which somehow decided to send Nordic lunk Dolph Lundgren to LA before audiences had even finished adjusting to the idea of him being He-Man at all – as if the true stuff of epic fantasy was not skull-faced castles, cosmic sorcery and men built like exploded anatomy textbooks, but shopping malls, car parks and the vague promise of a California food court.

Published: January 23, 2026, 2:51 pm

Seductive stitches, Warhol in Nottingham and an Italian giant’s igloo sculpture – the week in art

Jessica Rankin sews up painting, arte povera’s Mario Merz comes in from the cold and Andy Warhol brings pop to the Midlands – all in your weekly dispatch

Jessica Rankin
This New York artist’s abstract works hover between embroidery and painting and have a seductive, lyrical beauty.
• White Cube Mason’s Yard, London, 28 January to 28 February

Published: January 23, 2026, 12:00 pm

Experience: my daughters were born conjoined at the head

Seeing them separated for the first time felt like a miracle

I was already a mother of three when I lay back for my 10-week ultrasound in 2019. At first, seeing the gel on my stomach and the flickering black and white image on screen was familiar and soothing. Then I saw the look on the sonographer’s face.

She dropped the probe and ran out of the room without a word. I tried not to panic, but by the time she sprinted back in with a doctor, who looked at the screen and said, “Oh my goodness”, I was terrified.

Published: January 23, 2026, 5:00 am

Having synaesthesia is a lot like being a twin – we don’t know any different

Identical twins Helen Besgrove, a marketing executive, and Kirsty Neal, a GP, share their different experiences perceiving the world

Helen Besgrove: My twin sister, Kirsty, and I have a very similar experience of synaesthesia in that our experiences of sounds, tastes, smells, words, noises and motion is very visual. Whether it’s a name, a personality, a sound or a smell – everything has a colour and a texture in our mind’s eye.

What’s interesting is that the colours and the textures Kirsty and I see can be very different. When I drink a glass of chardonnay, I get these swirls of custardy oil but Kirsty might describe the same wine as fuzzy or blobby. It’s the same with people’s personalities, which we both see as a coloured and textured aura around that person. My best friend Jenn’s personality is poo brown, which she hates. For Kirsty, Jenn’s personality is yellow and blue with a brown stripe in the middle.

Published: January 23, 2026, 2:00 pm

Our family has a unique approach to grievances: ‘If you make peace, you heap coals of fire on your enemy’s head’

Advice about how to deal with barbs and those who throw them has trickled down from the Bible and through the generations for Meg Keneally and her father Thomas

• Read more in the Home Truths series

I’ve always been a dramatic soul. As a young teenager, I would stumble home from early high school, fresh from another day of taunts about my weight, the strange protrusions developing on my chest, or the perm I gave myself from a home kit at the weekend (it was the 1980s!). And, of course, I would relay every insult, every slight, every barb to my parents.

Published: January 23, 2026, 2:00 pm

Could a surfing retreat in Morocco conquer my fear of the sea?

The process of learning to catch a wave is an all-consuming activity that can prove to be a powerful therapeutic tool

I can’t remember when my terror of waves began in earnest. Maybe it was a singular incident that triggered it, like that monster wave in Biarritz, France, almost 20 years ago that body-slammed me on to the seabed, taking all the skin off my chin.

More likely is that my transition from fearless to frightened had been more of a slow creep, and a perfectly rational one when you consider the danger of riptides, hidden rocks, sharks and concussion. But for me, I feel it goes deeper. Almost inevitably my job will have had something to do with this. Nearly two decades of working as a journalist reporting on the very worst things that human beings can do to other human beings in a wide array of contexts has definitely eroded my sense that I can keep myself – and others – safe from harm in a dangerous world.

Published: January 24, 2026, 7:00 am

As stars wear black at Valentino’s funeral, tributes are dressed in red

Fashion designer’s death has brought the red dress – and his distinctive shade of the colour – back into the spotlight

“The red dress,” said Valentino Garavani in 1992, “is always magnificent”.

This week, after the announcement of his death at the age of 93, the red dress – and the distinctive shade of red long associated with the designer known simply as Valentino – is back in the spotlight.

Published: January 23, 2026, 2:56 pm

Consider the optics: why men have fallen back in love with spectacles

Slim frames and tinted lenses are reshaping how men present themselves. Glasses have become the must-have accessory – even if you don’t have a prescription

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Last spring, Tom Broughton, founder of eyewear brand Cubitts, was asked to comment on a meme that was going viral, that featured a pair of his company’s ‘Plimsoll’ frames. The small, delicate, and slightly round unisex shape had been worn by British actor, Jonathan Bailey, in leaked stills from the 2025 movie, Jurassic World Rebirth – and had been dubbed by the internet as a pair of ‘slutty little glasses’.

“It all just blew up,” remembers Broughton, noting how the brand struggled to deal with the sudden demand for what had become the sexiest specs on the market. A subsequent capsule collection, made in partnership with Bailey’s LGBTQ+ charity the Shameless Fund, sold out almost instantly, too. Thousands of pairs were gone in minutes, and after multiple restocks, “we’re maybe down to our last 15 pairs,” adds Broughton. Nearly the entire run was bought by men.

Published: January 23, 2026, 7:00 am

The pub that changed me: ‘As soon as I got behind the bar, I panicked’

What could be better than working at the Friendship Inn with my best friend, Ned? Almost anything else, as it turned out

I adored pubs. They were my natural home. And now, thanks to my best friend, Ned, I’d got a job at the Friendship Inn in Prestwich. It was the mid-1980s, and I was in my early 20s, preparing for the first shift. What could be better than working in a pub called the Friendship alongside my bezzy? And I understood drink – you left Guinness to stand, aimed for half an inch of head on a pint of bitter, and if someone asked for water with a whisky you didn’t fill the glass. Easy-peasy.

As soon as I got behind the bar I panicked. There were perhaps half a dozen people waiting to order, but it looked like a sea of thousands. The bar was particularly tricky because it was shaped like the bow of a ship. Every time I went to one side, customers started calling from the other. I couldn’t remember the faces. Nor the drinks they ordered. I took a funny turn. The faces became twisted, distorted, ghoulish, cackling manically or cursing my incompetence. I felt like Mia Farrow confronting the neighbours’ coven in Rosemary’s Baby, only thankfully I didn’t have a knife.

I poured Guinness for people who had ordered a glass of red, Budweiser for those who wanted a Boddingtons. There wasn’t a thing I didn’t get wrong. And then I broke my first glass. The crowd staring at me got more Rosemary’s Baby by the second. My bitter was headless; my lager all head. I broke another glass. I was getting dizzy, struggling to breathe. My legs were collapsing.

Published: January 23, 2026, 5:00 am

‘Walking in the Lake District drizzle rewired my head’: readers’ life-changing trips

From the jungles of Colombia to sailing in Croatia, our readers reflect on the life lessons travel has taught them
• Send us a tip on a museum or gallery – the best wins a £200 holiday voucher

I did a circuit of the Old Man of Coniston in the Lake District on a grey, drizzly weekday in October and it quietly rewired my head. I’d been running on always-on mode, and that climb forces you to slow down and breathe properly. From the Coppermines valley up to the ridge, then along the rocky summit and back via Goat’s Water, it’s rugged without being showy. The weather kept the crowds away, and the low cloud made the tarn feel like a secret. I came home muddy, soaked and weirdly calm, and started making space for long walks again.
Brandon Kindell

Published: January 23, 2026, 7:00 am

Plant trees, bushes and evergreens now to give your garden structure

In a less flowery garden, you can spot the gaps more easily – and fill them with bare-root plants at this time of year

This time last year we were about to put our old flat on the market – the first proper garden I had as a gardening adult. The one that taught me so much, where I made compost for the first time and cut peonies from the bare roots I’d ordered as soon as we exchanged contracts on the place. Where I painted the back wall pink and strung up lights and held parties and watered the ground with cheap prosecco; where I planted a tree for my newborn son, and lay beneath it with him in languid, too-long summer afternoons, trying to make sense of motherhood.

Anyway, every time I’d show estate agents around our two-bed flat, they’d conjure unconvincing compliments about our airing cupboard, before sticking their head cursorily out the back door and saying: “Oh, it’s winter, no gardens look good in winter, no buyers will be expecting it to look nice,” and I’d seethe.

Published: January 23, 2026, 11:00 am

The occupation of Minneapolis: how residents are resisting Trump’s ICE 'invasion' – video

Following the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good by ICE agents in Minneapolis, the Guardian’s Oliver Laughland and Tom Silverstone travel to the heart of affected neighbourhoods to speak with residents who are fighting to defend their community from violence and intimidation. They embed with ICE watch groups, hear from Somali-American residents, and witness a swarm of federal agents conduct a sweep in the suburbs

Published: January 23, 2026, 11:00 am

‘There are kids not going to school’: fear of ICE is keeping children from classes in Connecticut

In New Haven, where one in six residents is foreign born, children’s education suffers as they are afraid to step out

“They took her, they took her, they took her.”

Those were some of the words Cora Muñoz, the Wilbur Cross high school assistant principal, could discern while on the phone with the guardian of one of her students. As the caller sobbed and struggled to speak, Muñoz realized that immigration enforcement agents had detained a kid from Wilbur Cross, the high school she helps lead.

Published: January 23, 2026, 12:00 pm

Meet the OB-GYNs fighting back against Trump’s ‘guerrilla war on science’

As some medical groups cave to the Trump administration, the American College of OB-GYNs is taking a stand

When Steven Fleischman took over as president of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) in 2025, he knew that controversy was practically part of the job description. But the Connecticut-based physician at Yale University School of Medicine never predicted that things would get this dire.

As the premier membership group for US-based OB-GYNs, ACOG provides its more than 62,000 members with clinical guidance, educational opportunities and career help. It also advocates for abortion rights – a stance that has long made the organization far more politically active than many other major medical societies. And in the last year, the non-partisan organization has become a leading voice in the fight against Donald Trump’s anti-science crusade and the US government’s embrace of medical misinformation, especially on the topic of pregnancy and childbirth.

Published: January 23, 2026, 12:00 pm

Tell us your favourite TV moments of all time

As television turns 100, we would like to hear your highlights of the century

As television turns 100, we’ve charted TV history in a timeline of 100 extraordinary moments. Now, we would like to hear your highlights. Did we miss anything? What is your favourite TV moment of all time?

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Published: January 23, 2026, 2:10 pm

‘Displaying the cloth like this showed its true beauty’: Aung Chan Thar’s best phone picture

A beautiful lake, gorgeous fabric: how could the Myanmar photographer resist?

When Aung Chan Thar was 25, he was selected to represent Myanmar as part of Asean Centre for Biodiversity’s (ACB) Young Asean Storytellers programme. A cohort of 20 young artists and writers visited Asean Heritage Parks in their own countries to tell stories of biodiversity, nature and culture.

Aung first travelled to Inlay Lake Wildlife Sanctuary, known for its floating gardens, in 2022. “The Intha people live around the lake and build floating houses: structures made from bamboo on stilts,” Aung says. “Fishing is a common occupation; they use their feet to paddle their boats. So is the production of colourful cloth.”

Published: January 24, 2026, 11:00 am