Upgrade your at-home coffee game with these easy fixes

Ditch the daily Starbucks and level up your coffee skill with these upgrades that promise a smoother sip

• Drip or instant? Our blind taste test and the best instant coffees

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Coffee simply tastes better at a cafe – and if you have found yourself using this sentiment to justify dropping $10 on a latte each morning, you are not alone.

It does not have to be this way. To help you upgrade your at-home coffee game, we interviewed baristas, tested 10 milk frothers, tried every model of the AeroPress coffee maker and conducted our own blind taste test pitting instant against drip.

Published: September 1, 2026, 12:15 pm

Four Maga defectors on what led them to walk away: ‘I’d been addicted to fear and rage’

Ex-Maga supporters unpack their role in bolstering Trump’s platform and share what brought them to the Leaving Maga non-profit support network

• Life after Maga: the group offering an ‘exit ramp’ for rightwingers questioning Trumpism

Since Donald Trump’s first presidential campaign a decade ago, “Make America Great Again” (Maga) has evolved from a slogan into an identity, one that claims to center conservative, “America first” values and relies on lies and conspiracy theories to stay afloat. And while Maga has survived impeachments, indictments and a lost election, some devotees are walking away – and doing so loudly.

Rich Logis, a former Trump campaign volunteer, left Maga in 2022, publishing a public apology to help others see that it was OK to challenge the movement. The overwhelming response led him to found the non-profit Leaving Maga, a network of support groups and meetups for people to unpack their role in bolstering Trump’s platform. Logis said he doesn’t persuade people to leave; he just gives them a place to land when they do. The group’s billboard campaign, now running in 27 states, is built around a simple message: “Having doubts? You are not alone.”

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:00 am

‘Led us down such a dark path’: documentary explores how 9/11 changed America

In Netflix film Turning Point: Generation 9/11, the lives of people forever impacted by the terrorist attack in 2001 are explored

Twenty-five years on, memory is giving way to history. Soon the US will cross the point where half its population were born after 11 September 2001 or were too young to remember the day that terrorists crashed planes into the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon in northern Virginia and a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

“When I do that math, I get to the bomb at Hiroshima – that’s how distant it is,” says Brian Knappenberger, 56, director of a new Netflix documentary, Turning Point: Generation 9/11. “When we talk about the second world war, for our generation it seemed like a long time ago but, for the current generation of 20-year-olds, that’s how long ago it was.”

Published: September 1, 2026, 4:00 am

Peekaboo island: the floating forest confounding nature watchers in western Canada

A 150-metre-long island appeared from nowhere on Williston Lake, British Columbia; vanished, then reappeared 20 miles away

A thickly forested island appeared mysteriously on a western Canadian lake. Nearly 150 metres (500 feet) long and 75 metres (250 feet) wide, the land mass took local people and experts by surprise. It wasn’t on any maps or navigation charts.

One boater approached and took a video of the island, capturing nearly 100 trees undulating in the chop of the lake.

Published: September 1, 2026, 1:06 pm

The media’s Hasan Piker obsession is letting Republican Mike Rogers off the hook | Mehdi Hasan

Mike Rogers isn’t merely campaigning alongside a controversial supporter. His campaign put an extremist on its faith leadership team

Hasan Piker.

Turn on cable news. Pick up a newspaper. Log on to Twitter. It doesn’t seem to matter where you get your political news: for the past month, the leftist Twitch streamer has become one of the dominant subjects of coverage, conversation and controversy surrounding the crucial Michigan Senate race between the Democrat Abdul El-Sayed and the Republican Mike Rogers.

Published: September 1, 2026, 3:00 am

The extraordinary untold story of Freddie Mercury: Mary Austin on her best friend – and love of her life

He was Queen’s flamboyant frontman. She was his shy girlfriend, dreaming of marriage until they both realised he preferred men. Thirty-five years after his death, in the week he would have turned 80, Mary Austin talks about their unbreakable bond

There were four silver trunks in Mary Austin’s attic that she packed in the mid-1980s and hadn’t opened since. It was too painful. Almost 40 years on, in 2022, she opened one. It was crammed with lyrics from songs written by Freddie Mercury – Don’t Stop Me Now, Killer Queen, We Are the Champions and, of course, Bohemian Rhapsody. She shut the case. It was still too painful.

“To say I was overwhelmed is an understatement,” she says. “I couldn’t look at the lyrics. I felt as I did when I originally packed them – that they were his personal belongings and I was being offered an opportunity to delve into them, and I couldn’t do that.” Eventually she asked her two sons to sift through the treasures on her behalf.

Published: August 31, 2026, 9:00 pm

New system for screening mail-in ballots risks denying entire batches, says whistleblower

US senator says that project, a key part of Trump’s voting restrictions, is ‘perilously rushed and potentially unlawful’

A new system to screen millions of mail-in ballots for this November’s US midterm elections was thrown together so hastily, and tested so little, that a single scanning glitch could see entire batches of ballots turned away, a whistleblower has told Congress.

The project – a key part of Donald Trump’s new restrictions on voting – is “perilously rushed and potentially unlawful”, according to the US senator Richard Blumenthal, who disclosed the warning in a letter to David Steiner, the postmaster general, on Tuesday.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:55 am

US and Iran exchange more airstrikes, fuelling fears of wider return to hostilities

Attacks on Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and reprisals against US bases in Middle East quash hopes that flare-up last weekend was limited in nature

The US has launched new airstrikes on Iranian targets, prompting counter strikes by Tehran targeting American interests in Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan and Iraq, fuelling concerns about a ⁠wider renewal of hostilities.

US Marine Corps base Camp Titin in Jordan was targeted for an “intense ballistic missile attack”, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) said early on Wednesday, according to Iranian news outlet Tasnim.

Published: September 1, 2026, 6:06 pm

Accused Charlie Kirk killer must stand trial and is eligible for death penalty, judge rules

Suspect Tyler Robinson to be tried for aggravated murder, felony charge that carries death penalty sentence in Utah

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A Utah judge ruled Tuesday that the man accused of killing Charlie Kirk must stand trial for aggravated murder, a felony charge that makes him eligible for the death penalty if convicted.

After several hours of closing arguments in Provo, Utah, judge Tony Graf ruled there is sufficient evidence to try Tyler Robinson, 23, who has been charged with the murder of one of the US right’s most prominent figures.

Published: September 1, 2026, 5:16 pm

Senator Ed Markey wins Massachusetts Democratic primary

Incumbent, 80, beats back challenge from Seth Moulton, who argued Markey was too old to be effective at his job

Senator Ed Markey won the Democratic primary in Massachusetts on Tuesday, beating back a challenge from Seth Moulton, a congressman who tried to unseat him by arguing to voters his opponent was too old to be effective at his job.

Massachusetts is heavily Democratic, making the senator favored to win a third full term in the November general election, where he faces the Republican nominee John Deaton.

Published: September 1, 2026, 5:47 pm

Mark Carney tells US to ‘start being serious’ amid escalating trade war

Canadian PM is set to retaliate against tariffs levied by Donald Trump and criticized US officials over insults

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Mark Carney has rebuked Donald Trump’s administration and urged officials in Washington to “start being serious” amid escalating trade tensions between the US and Canada.

Days before Canada is due to retaliate against Trump’s sweeping tariffs with its own duties on US goods, the Canadian prime minister criticized US officials for insulting his country. “It is beneath their office,” he said.

Published: September 1, 2026, 8:48 am

USS Abraham Lincoln arrives at Thai port after gruelling 270 days at sea

Ship has been plagued by reports of deteriorating living conditions and poor mental health because of lengthy deployment

The USS Abraham Lincoln, an US aircraft carrier at the centre of a row over conditions on board after months at sea as part of Donald Trump’s war against Iran, has arrived off a Thai port.

Reports of deteriorating living conditions and poor mental health on the vessel, including attempted suicides, have made headlines around the world, provoking criticism of the president’s actions in the Middle East.

Published: September 1, 2026, 8:59 pm

US officials defend Venezuela oil deal amid questions over rebuilding plan

Government talks up pact but Venezuelan opposition alarmed that democracy yet to return after Maduro exit

Trump administration officials on Tuesday defended a highly contentious deal giving the US control of a significant chunk of Venezuelan oil reserves, arguing that the sweeping agreement would help stabilize and rebuild democracy in the shattered South American country while giving Washington vital access to strategic crude reserves.

Last week, Donald Trump announced a “groundbreaking” deal that would give the US “majority” control over 65bn barrels – roughly one-fifth – of Venezuela’s oil reserves.

Published: September 1, 2026, 5:18 pm

Deported Milo Yiannopoulos says he is ‘ashamed’ of support for Trump

British far-right pundit breaks silence on ICE arrest and deportation and says he was ‘really, really terrified’

Milo Yiannopoulos, the British far-right commentator who was arrested last week by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers in Louisiana and deported to the United Kingdom, has broken his silence about the experience, saying that “for the first time I know what it feels like to be really, really terrified”.

Yiannopoulos on Tuesday appeared on Piers Morgan Uncensored, a YouTube show presented by Piers Morgan, the British broadcaster and media personality. Yiannopoulos, 41, described the experience in the US as “humiliating and disorientating”, “physically degrading” and “frightening”.

Published: September 1, 2026, 1:49 pm

Russia targets Ukraine’s rail network as war enters deadly new phase

Six employees killed on Tuesday after Moscow escalates attacks on infrastructure and Ukrainian capital

Russia has opened a deadly new phase in its war against Ukraine by deliberately targeting the country’s railway network, with six employees killed on Tuesday in the latest strikes on Kyiv.

Ukraine’s state-owned railway company, Ukrzaliznytsia, said its workers died when a ballistic missile plunged into a locomotive depot. The Russians hit other railway facilities, it added, during a massive bombardment of Kyiv and the Kyiv region. At least 12 people died, with a dozen wounded, including three children.

Published: September 1, 2026, 10:23 am

Federal judge tosses Trump lawsuit over young trans athletes in California school sports

In a major LGBTQ+ rights victory, the justice department cannot force the state to ban trans girls from women’s sports

A federal judge has dismissed the Trump administration’s lawsuit challenging California’s policy of allowing transgender youth to play on sports teams that match their gender, a major loss for Donald Trump and the Department of Justice (DoJ).

The justice department had been fighting for a year to force California to ban trans girls from women’s sports, with the president directly singling out one trans track and field athlete in online attacks and regularly mocking trans athletes in his speeches.

Published: September 1, 2026, 5:33 pm

US could ask parents to prove citizenship or immigration status to obtain passports for children

Proposal offers look at how state department could enforce Trump order targeting what it calls ‘birth tourism’

The US state department has proposed requiring parents applying for passports for their children to provide proof of their own citizenship or immigration status as part of Donald Trump’s ⁠latest effort to limit birthright citizenship.

The ⁠draft guidance, reviewed by ​Reuters, is the first detailed look at how the state department could enforce Trump’s 6 August executive order targeting what it calls “birth tourism” and broadening historical exceptions to birthright citizenship.

Published: September 1, 2026, 3:28 pm

Republican calls Leon Black and David Copperfield co-conspirators of Epstein

Outgoing congressman Thomas Massie urges justice department to launch immediate investigation

An outgoing Republican congressman accused billionaire Leon Black and David Copperfield, the illusionist, of being co-conspirators of the accused late sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, and repeated a call for the Department of Justice to launch an immediate investigation into the men, among others.

Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican who recently lost his primary to a challenger backed by Donald Trump, named several friends and associates of Epstein on the floor of the House in his bid to “shame” the Department of Justice to investigate a group of men and one woman who Massie called “perpetrators” of Epstein’s crimes. He also noted that, nearly one year after Trump signed the Epstein Transparency Act, which led to the release of millions of so-called “Epstein files”, millions more have yet to be publicly disclosed.

Additional reporting by Anna Betts

Published: September 1, 2026, 12:14 pm

US lawmakers demand investigation into Trump administration’s secret surveillance of Americans

Exclusive: Two congressmembers respond to revelations of government snooping on journalists, non-profits and unions

Two congressional Democrats asked a government watchdog on Tuesday to investigate the Trump administration’s use of an obscure law to secretly collect records on journalists, non-profits and unions without judicial oversight.

The request from the Oregon senator Ron Wyden and the representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington seen by the Guardian comes amid mounting scrutiny over the way the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently used its power to issue administrative summonses related to customs matters to make extraordinary unilateral demands for information. They sent their request to the government accountability office (GAO), the non-partisan congressional watchdog.

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:11 am

As Nepal’s morgues fill, Parkrit hopes her DNA can be used to find her mother

A week on from the flash flooding disaster, authorities are urging relatives of the thousands of missing and dead to provide blood samples

An army official calls out a name. A young woman stands, two pieces of identification in her hands. She fills out a form, takes another and moves to the back of the hospital to give a vial of blood.

With so many people killed by Nepal’s floods, and hundreds of bodies being buried because the morgues are full, there is now a push to identify victims through DNA. The woman, Prakrit Gurung, 19, is hoping her DNA will be linked to her mother’s body. Her father’s has been found – her brother recognised his picture on a wall outside the hospital.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:16 pm

Tupac’s murder: solved at last? – podcast

Thirty years after Tupac Shakur’s death, a man has been found guilty of killing the hip-hop legend. William Shaw on the star’s life, legacy and untimely death

In 1996, Tupac Shakur was shot in a drive-by ambush in Las Vegas. He was only 25 years old and already one of the biggest artists in the US.

He had just released a huge album, All Eyez on Me, which spawned two No 1 singles. He’d worked with some of hip-hop’s greatest stars. He’d starred in Hollywood films. It seemed he could do anything. And then, he died.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:00 pm

Thirty years of waiting, a memoir and a trial: conviction in Tupac Shakur killing brings closure

A Las Vegas jury on Monday found Duane ‘Keffe D’ Davis guilty in the 1996 murder of the hip-hop icon

• Jury finds Duane Davis guilty of murder of Tupac Shakur

Thirty years after the killing of Tupac Shakur, conspiracy theories and rumors about the perpetrator’s identity, one man has now been held criminally responsible for the rap icon’s death.

A Las Vegas jury convicted Duane “Keffe D” Davis, a 63-year-old former South Side Compton Crips gang leader, of murder for his role in the drive-by shooting. During the two-week-long trial, prosecutors argued Davis was the “on-the-ground, on-site commander of the effort to kill Tupac” and had sought revenge after the musician was involved in a fight with his nephew, Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson.

Published: August 31, 2026, 6:57 pm

Duane Keith Davis found guilty of 1996 murder of Tupac Shakur

Las Vegas jury returns verdict against ex-South Side Compton Crips gang leader in killing of US rap legend

• Thirty years of waiting, a memoir and a trial: conviction in Tupac Shakur killing brings closure

A Las Vegas jury has found former South Side Compton Crips gang leader Duane Keith Davis guilty of the murder of Tupac Shakur, bringing the case to a close nearly 30 years after the famous rapper was gunned down.

The jury took about three hours to reach a guilty verdict in a case that relied heavily on multiple confessions from Davis himself, including his description of the killing in the 2019 memoir Compton Street Legend.

Published: August 31, 2026, 6:25 pm

Defense lawyers for singer D4vd withdraw from murder case

Singer, accused of murder and sexual abuse of teen Celeste Rivas Hernandez, to be represented by LA public defender

Singer D4vd lost his high-profile private lawyers on Monday at a hearing where he entered a new not guilty plea to charges that he killed, sexually abused and dismembered 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez.

It is not clear why Blair Berk and her colleagues Marilyn Bednarski and Regina Peter parted ways with the singer, whose legal name is David Anthony Burke. They were replaced by a lawyer from the Los Angeles county public defender’s office.

Published: August 31, 2026, 12:18 pm

Teen charged with murder for recording San Diego mosque shooting live stream

North Carolina DA says girl, 17, who disseminated attackers’ manifesto charged with murder by aiding and abetting

A 17-year-old North Carolina girl who recorded a live stream of a shooting that killed three people at a San Diego mosque and disseminated the attackers’ white-supremacist writings has been charged with murder by aiding and abetting, a district attorney said on Monday.

The Forsyth county district attorney, Jim O’Neill, said at a news conference in Winston-Salem that the girl, whose name was not mentioned during the news conference, was arrested last week. On Monday, just before she was due to begin the school year, a grand jury indicted her on three counts of murder and one count of conspiracy.

Published: August 31, 2026, 1:50 pm

The year of Domhnall Gleeson: ‘No one talks about actors’ dedication. But I had a perm for five months!’

He started in the Harry Potter films and has since become ubiquitous, playing every type of character: romcom leads, evil villains, comical idiots. He even starred in a Taylor Swift video. So how does he stay so under the radar?

Domhnall Gleeson has got so much new stuff coming up, someone recently joked that this was the “summer of Domhnall”. Now the phrase is all over the internet, and Gleeson is mortified: “The worry is that somebody will say this to me now thinking that I believe it.” He doesn’t know where it came from – possibly his co-star Gayle Rankin on his new movie The Incomer. “It’s certainly not something I’m trying to push … but it would be great if it could be the headline.”

He’s in a good mood when we meet at a London hotel on a hot afternoon. You could say he’s good at interviews – charming, funny, garrulous, the perfect chatshow guest. He could just be acting, admittedly, but he seems to be a genuinely good-natured, grounded sort of guy.

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:00 pm

‘OK, fine. I’m a national treasure’: Joe Lycett on fatherhood, Celebrity Traitors – and his TV show live from a pub

The comedian’s new Friday night series will be set in a working pub, with his aunties working the bar and celebrities doing shifts as managers. Or it will be if he can only get his licence …

Joe Lycett sits in a pub, an untouched pint in front of him. “Since I had my son, I’m not drinking anywhere near as much,” he laments. “Children do not respect hangovers, or tiredness in general.”

His son is almost two, and Lycett has readjusted his life accordingly. “I’ve started going to bed when he does, which is about seven o’clock,” he explains. “I’ve seen a few nights where I’ve just gone: ‘Right, well, that’s me, then.’”

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:00 pm

The Gentlemen season two review – these geezers in tweed are irritating, stupid and extremely funny

Guy Ritchie’s crime caper is back with the usual hijinks, swearing and men shaking their fists. But its ridiculousness is strangely comforting – and Theo James’s beefcake Eddie is so bland that he is fascinating to observe

He lives in a house, a very big house in the country. He has pectorals the size of Bentleys and wears plus-fours so voluminous they could accommodate his fleet of gundogs and still provide room for snarling groundskeeper Geoff (“I would do anyfink for you an’ this famlee”). And yet! Edward “Eddie” Horniman, 13th Duke of Halstead (Theo James), is sad. And aggrieved. A moment’s silence, please, as this powerful hunk pontificates on the unbearable lightness of being the millionaire protagonist in Guy Ritchie’s The Gentlemen.

“Four hundred years ago, this estate spread out as far as the eye could see,” he tells Geoff (Vinnie Jones) as the camera swoops over his verdant playpen, a lavish patchwork of abundant hedges and cap-doffing deer. “But it’s been diminished. Year after year. Generation after generation. First came the apologies, then came the shame, then came the contraction. I want it back, Geoff,” he growls, hexagonal jaw stiff with emotion. “I want it all back!”

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:00 pm

The Raygun documentary ducks a big question about the Olympic fame of a ‘dorky white academic’

Untold Raygun: Breaking Badly finds warmth and humor in Rachael Gunn’s ordeal, but never fully reckons with what her notoriety meant for breaking

Early in Netflix’s new documentary, Untold Raygun: Breaking Badly, Australian B-girl Rachael Gunn, recounts a session she had with her sports psychologist prior to the 2024 Paris Olympics.

“Right before the Olympics, I went to my therapist, panicked,” she says. Her therapist asked her what was the worst thing that could happen. And she said, “The whole world could laugh at me.” Her therapist responded: “Do you think that’s reasonable?” Cue Gunn’s hysterical laughter.

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:00 am

‘Demonic oppression’ and ‘girly convos’: the podcast wooing young women back to Christianity

Girls Gone Bible is on tour in the US, touting a regressive ideal of femininity through discussions of abstinence and mental health struggles

At first glance, the crowd gathering outside a music venue in Red Bank, New Jersey, could have passed for a group of sorority rush hopefuls – or Ella Langley fans on their way to the country star’s show. Most of them were under the age of 30. They wore cowboy boots, maxi sundresses and soft, bouncy blowouts, scrolling on their phones outside the doors as they waited for friends to arrive.

But one accessory gave them away: the Bibles they toted. These women were there to pray.

Published: September 1, 2026, 5:00 am

Summer box office 2026: what can we learn from the hits and misses?

It was a bumper season for Hollywood, almost back to pre-pandemic levels, with Tom Holland blockbusters winning out, but there was still a string of disappointments

As the world continued to burn and temperatures reached worrying highs, most of us decided to take refuge in the cinema this summer. It provided some relief for audiences, but even more so for the industry at large, with the season pushing past the magic $4bn mark to become the biggest since 2019, up 20% from last year. There were the expected hits (Spider-Man never misses), but there were also unprecedented breakouts (we were obsessed with Obsession) and surprise underperformers (are kids Minions-ed out?)

So at the end of a season with epic highs and cavernous lows, what lessons can Hollywood learn?

Published: September 1, 2026, 2:00 am

Is flying a shark drone a boring job? Possibly – until suddenly it isn’t

Taha Kafil-Hussain flies a drone above Coogee beach. Mostly he zooms in on seaweed or turtles – but occasionally he spots a shark and clears the water

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“Hey Taha, what’s the visibility like?” shouts a man with a towel slung over his shoulder.

“Uh, nice,” says Surf Life Saving New South Wales drone operator Taha Kafil-Hussain.

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:00 am

‘If you build something vastly smarter than you, it better be on your side’: can we stop AI from deceiving us?

We are used to the idea that our fellow humans might intentionally mislead or manipulate us, but the idea that machines can now do the same is deeply unsettling. Researchers are racing to find solutions before it’s too late

• The summer issue of the Long Read magazine is out now. Click here to order

In November 2023 – a lifetime ago in the field of artificial intelligence – some of the most powerful people in the world descended on Bletchley Park, the wartime codebreaking hub in Buckinghamshire, to talk about AI safety. In attendance were the then US vice-president, Kamala Harris, the AI bosses Sam Altman and Dario Amodei, delegations from 28 countries, two of the three so-called “godfathers” of AI, and Elon Musk.

The first iteration of ChatGPT had been released only a year earlier, and there was already plenty of evidence that AI models could be used for ill, from spreading misinformation to generating deepfakes. A presentation at the summit, however, highlighted a different issue: what if the biggest problem wasn’t to come from people misusing the technology, but from AI’s own behaviour?

Published: August 31, 2026, 9:00 pm

The shadow of the AfD hangs over German democracy – but I still have faith in my adopted country | John Kampfner

As I celebrate five years of citizenship, the far right is poised to take control in Saxony-Anhalt. Courage is needed to defeat it

Two events take place in coming days that will affect my relationship with Germany. One, which will be splashed across the media, is dark and forbidding. The other, which will pass unnoticed except by me and my close family, should have brought me joy. Now that feeling is tempered with confusion.

On 6 September, voters in the small eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt are expected to give Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) a resounding victory. If the arithmetic falls in a certain way, a German far-right party could assume power for the first time since the Nazis.

John Kampfner is a Berlin-based author and broadcaster. His latest book, Braver New World, is published by Atlantic

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:00 pm

What should we do with Trump’s monstrous architectural legacy? | Jan-Werner Müller

Questions over Trump’s ballroom and other structures might not feel urgent. But when his reign ends, Trumpism must be repudiated

On Monday, a majority on the supreme court found a technical way to overrule a lower court’s imperative to stop work, while not taking a stance on whether the whole enterprise might be illegal to begin with. Preservationists, the majority held, appear to lack legal grounds for filing a suit blocking Trump’s ballroom; that means construction will proceed, even if none other than John Roberts, in a dissent, held that “those responsible” were breaking the rules in deciding “what to build up at the People’s House”. The solicitor general, John Sauer, is on record claiming that 65% of the project is completed (of course, he might have exaggerated – such things are known to have happened in Trump administrations). Either way, it is thus likely that there will be a massive structure next to the original White House; and, given that the ruling will embolden the president dramatically to change Washington DC’s landscape by spending money never approved by Congress, we might be cursed with a triumphal arch as well. All of which raises the question: what to do with a monstrous architectural legacy in post-Trump America?

Some might dismiss the question as a bit of a luxury problem. After all, a war that also demonstrates the ongoing disempowerment of Congress keeps dragging on; ICE continues its cruel day-to-day work; Trump is trying every tactic to make the midterms go his way. But the built environment, and especially the civic landscape of a capital, is never just an afterthought. Buildings and monuments make values visible, as the philosopher Susan Neiman once put it. And the decision to leave Trump’s structures in place as if his reign had just been another normal era in US history is not neutral – just like leaving Confederate monuments in place is not neutral.

Jan-Werner Müller is a Guardian US columnist and a professor of politics at Princeton University

Published: September 1, 2026, 5:00 am

Olivia Rodrigo is standing up for the vulnerable. I wish Taylor Swift would do the same | Arwa Mahdawi

This weekend, Rodrigo raised millions for charities that benefit women and girls, and she has previously been vocal about Gaza and Ice. With free speech increasingly under threat, her peers should take note

Donald Trump, the 80-year-old president of the United States, spent his weekend whining about a lake and posting memes of Donald’s Ducks. While he was busy with his ducks, Olivia Rodrigo, a 23-year-old pop star, spent her weekend trying to Make America Somewhat Decent Again. On Saturday, Rodrigo hosted the inaugural Daisy Chain Fields festival, bringing together female artists to raise money for women-focused non-profits which have had their funding slashed by the Trump administration. The festival raised $10m (£7.4m) which Melinda French Gates matched, bringing the total to $20m.

In a perfect world a singer holding a benefit concert for feminist charities wouldn’t be radical stuff. But we don’t live in a perfect world, do we? We live in hell. Trump has successfully bullied US institutions into doing his bidding. Universities have defunded diversity, equity and inclusion programmes, many media outlets have kowtowed to the US’s self-styled king and tech CEOs have jumped into bed with him. Women’s rights are going backwards globally and our civil liberties are under attack.

Published: September 1, 2026, 8:21 am

Colin Kaepernick knelt 10 years ago. America responded with a clear warning to Black people | Howard Bryant

A decade after Kaepernick’s quiet protest shook the NFL, his exile looks less like an aberration than a blueprint for the culture war that followed

America likes nice round numbers, perfect for anniversaries and reflections, and it has, suddenly, been 10 years since Colin Kaepernick first protested police killings – more accurately, police killings of Black people that went unpunished either internally or by the courts – by taking a knee during the national anthem for the entirety of the 2016 NFL regular season. He never played in the league again.

Ten years covers a lot of ground, especially in these years of American darkness, and many of the important details surrounding Kaepernick, his banishment and significance have disappeared, time replaced by more time and more darkness – time moving faster than ever, at internet speed, where nothing matters, where nothing sticks. We consume by clip, by click, by meme, and knowledge by meme is not knowledge at all.

Published: September 1, 2026, 12:30 am

Once again, Trump wants the FCC to put a bandage on his thin skin | Tom Wheeler

The president is lashing out at an NBC host. As the agency’s former chair, I can only hope it stands up for free speech

Will the FCC chairperson again abuse his authority over broadcast licenses to put a Band-Aid on Donald Trump’s thin skin?

Since the opening days of the Trump presidency, Brendan Carr has acted as the president’s attack dog to coerce broadcasters to say things that please his client. Only days after taking office in January 2025, Carr revived a previously dismissed complaint against CBS for the editing of 60 Minutes that tracked candidate Trump’s specious lawsuit on the matter. At the time, the FCC was considering the transfer of CBS licenses to Skydance, a decision that did not come until after CBS agreed to pay $16m to settle with Trump. In September, after Jimmy Kimmel’s remarks about Charlie Kirk, Carr urged broadcasters to take action, saying “we can do this the easy way or the hard way” – an attack even the senator Ted Cruz said sounded “right out of Goodfellas”. In March 2026, he threatened broadcasters over their coverage of the Iran war after the president complained on Truth Social. In April, he ordered Disney’s eight ABC-owned television stations to submit their licenses for premature review, even though most aren’t even halfway through their license term (Disney, ABC and the stations are suing).

Tom Wheeler was chairperson of the Federal Communications Commission from 2013 to 2017

Published: September 1, 2026, 4:00 am

In-form Coco Gauff serves notice with assured start to US Open title pursuit

• Gauff tops Sonmez 6-3, 6-4 in first-round match

• American saves three break points in pivotal hold

• Fourth seed also has world No 1 ranking in sight

Coco Gauff returned to the scene of her grand slam breakthrough on a rain-lashed Tuesday night and safely cleared the first hurdle toward another, launching her pursuit of a second US Open title in four years with a 6-3, 6-4 win over Turkey’s Zeynep Sonmez beneath the closed roof of Arthur Ashe Stadium.

The 22-year-old American, seeded fourth in New York, arrived with momentum and expectation running unusually high, fresh off her first title of the year in Cincinnati and having shown encouraging signs that the serve which has so often dictated the rest of her game is becoming a more reliable weapon. Now, three years after she first lifted the trophy here, both a third major championship and the world No 1 ranking are within her reach.

Published: September 1, 2026, 8:14 pm

Tiger Woods set for plea change in Florida DUI case after rollover crash

• Woods plans to change not guilty plea in DUI case

• Change-of-plea hearing set for 8.30am Wednesday

• Charges stem from March rollover crash in Florida

Tiger Woods plans to change his not guilty plea in the DUI case stemming from a rollover crash near his Florida home earlier this year, according to court documents filed on Tuesday.

The 50-year-old golf star is due to appear in Martin County circuit court at 8.30am on Wednesday for a change-of-plea hearing before judge Darren Steele. Woods had previously pleaded not guilty to charges of driving under the influence with property damage and refusing to submit to a lawful test.

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:35 pm

Everton left with only one striker after Balogun deal collapses late on deadline day

• 25-year-old walks away from £40m deal at last moment

• Beto and Ndiaye already sold by club to raise funds

Everton’s £40m move for US international Folarin Balogun collapsed late on deadline day to leave manager David Moyes with only one striker for the first half of the season.

Everton had agreed a £40m deal for Balogun only for issues with the striker’s medical to place the transfer in doubt after the Merseyside club had sold Beto to Fiorentina and Iliman Ndiaye to Manchester City. Enquiries were made to Manchester United for Joshua Zirkzee and Aston Villa for Tammy Abraham but proposed loans for both forwards were rejected.

Published: September 1, 2026, 4:46 pm

Stan Kroenke, owner of Arsenal and LA Rams, to buy MLB’s Angels for reported $4bn

• Arte Moreno sells after owning team since 2003

• Deal gives KSE teams in NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL and MLS

Kroenke Sports + Entertainment announced Tuesday that it will buy a controlling interest in the Los Angeles Angels from Arte Moreno in a deal that is expected to close in the first quarter ⁠of 2027.

The sale will require the approval of Major League Baseball and its owners.

Published: September 1, 2026, 1:27 pm

Former NFL star Tony Romo given driving ban and vows to ‘own my mistakes’ after OWI arrest

• CBS analyst was arrested in July after traffic stop

• Former QB has been absent from CBS duty

CBS NFL analyst and former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo has pleaded no contest to a charge of operating while intoxicated and has apologized for the actions that led to his July arrest.

Romo was arrested on 23 July following a traffic stop in Wisconsin. CBS has since placed him on leave from his role as its lead NFL analyst.

Published: September 1, 2026, 11:01 am

Lionel Messi in his 30s was one of the best international players ever | Jeff Rueter

In the decade after his short-lived first retirement, the Argentina talisman upended previous narratives and solidified his place in history

Perhaps somewhere, in some dusty journal that’s surely been lost in Rosario, Lionel Messi made clear his destiny: that if he were to one day represent Argentina, his national team career must end in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

A decade and two months before the playmaker posted his hand-written retirement from international football, Messi made his first attempt to leave La Albiceleste. They had just lost the Copa América Centenario – a special edition of the South American championship held in the United States for the tournament’s 100th anniversary – in excruciating fashion, with Messi having missed his attempt in a shootout defeat to Chile at East Rutherford, the same venue where Argentina lost this year’s World Cup final. It was the third consecutive major final that saw Argentina receive silver medals as parting gifts, after the 2014 World Cup and 2015 Copa América.

Published: September 1, 2026, 11:00 am

Fin Tarling’s death casts shadow over Tour of Britain as safety fears loom large

• Minute’s applause to take place in Lincoln on Wednesday

• Spate of serious recent crashes have put safety on agenda

The death of the Welshman Fin Tarling continues to cast a long shadow over professional cycling and nowhere will that absence be felt more deeply than at the men’s Tour of Britain which begins on Wednesday.

Tarling’s former team NSN Cycling, which includes the Olympic medallist Ethan Vernon, also one of his closest friends, will be brought to the start line in Lincoln for the opening 187km stage, for what is expected to be a minute’s applause.

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:40 am

Bank of America executive identified as victim of stabbing in Times Square

Erin Piacenti, a 32-year-old vice-president at the bank, was killed in Tuesday stabbing in New York City, officials say

A corporate vice-president at Bank of America was killed in a stabbing in New York City’s Times Square, the second-biggest US lending bank ⁠said on Tuesday about a ⁠random incident that took place ​in broad daylight in the bustling heart of Manhattan.

The incident had brought the streets of the crowded area to a halt on Monday as emergency vehicles swarmed between the skyscrapers.

Published: September 1, 2026, 2:25 pm

Japan halves speed limit to 30km/h on all narrow city streets

Speed limit dropped from 60km/h for around 70% of general roads in the hope of making narrow streets of crowded cities safer

Drivers on residential roads in Japan have been forced to take their foot off the accelerator, after the speed limit was slashed from 60km/h (37mph) to 30km/h in an attempt to reduce deaths and injuries among pedestrians on narrow urban streets.

The new limit, which went into effect on Tuesday, applies to residential roads with no centre line or maximum speed signs, media reports said.

Published: September 1, 2026, 10:15 pm

Nepal-Tibet flood deaths pass 1,000 as police ask relatives for DNA to identify victims

Relatives of missing tourists asked for blood samples and photos, as efforts continue to rescue trapped hydropower workers

• Nepal-Tibet floods – latest updates

• Visual guide: How the Nepal-Tibet flash flood unfolded

Nepali rescuers have built temporary bridges to reach remote areas and dug through the ruins of hydropower projects in the Himalayas to rescue hundreds of trapped workers, as the death toll passed 1,000 nearly ⁠a week after devastating ​floods left a trail of destruction across the country’s towns and valleys.

About 600 people remain stuck in several devastated hydropower stations that have become the focus of rescue efforts. The prime ⁠minister, Balendra Shah, said more than 11,000 people had been rescued across the affected region, and power and communication lines had been restored in some areas.

Published: September 1, 2026, 10:32 am

ICE holds man with stage 4 cancer in detention despite permanent US residency

ICE spokesperson says Loreto Javar failed to disclose criminal conviction in Philippines when he applied for visa

A 76-year-old man holding permanent US residency and grappling with stage four prostate cancer is reportedly being held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention in Tacoma, Washington.

Federal immigration officials detained Loreto Javar during his US citizenship interview in Tukwila, Washington, in June. Javar, a Filipino national, moved to the US in 1995 and has lived in the country with his wife and daughter ever since.

Published: September 1, 2026, 10:03 am

Tucson police investigate deadly shooting outside gay bar as hate crime

Two people shot dead and suspect later died in hospital after shooting in parking lot of Venture-N bar

Authorities in Tucson, Arizona, are investigating a shooting outside a gay bar that left three people dead as a possible hate crime.

The shooting occurred shortly after midnight on Monday in the parking lot of Venture-N, according to Tucson police. The suspect, identified by police as 44-year old Ousman Ceesay, allegedly killed 42-year-old Vincent Anthony Siqueiros and 33-year-old Cameron Davis Capara.

Published: September 1, 2026, 12:41 pm

Jury in Lindsay Clancy trial allowed to go home after deliberating for 23 hours

Jurors had initially struggled to reach a unanimous verdict and in note to court, said they were deadlocked

The jury in the Lindsay Clancy trial has been allowed to go home and will now continue its deliberations on Wednesday after earlier admitting it was unable to come to a unanimous decision in the case of the mother who killed her three children.

Judge William Sullivan released the jury with the deliberation clock on 23 hours.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:54 am

Todd Haynes and Wallace Shawn among signatories of letter backing Mark Ruffalo amid antisemitism charge

More than 170 Jewish artists, also including Joel Coen, Hannah Einbinder and Miranda July, have supported the actor after he criticized Paramount

A collective of more than 170 prominent Jewish artists and academics – including Todd Haynes, Joel Coen, Miranda July, Hannah Einbinder, Wallace Shawn and Naomi Klein – have signed an open letter supporting Mark Ruffalo.

The actor had been accused of invoking antisemitic tropes after he criticized Paramount Skydance, the media company owned by David Ellison, a Donald Trump ally. Ruffalo had spoken out about the $111bn merger with Warner Bros Discovery (WBD).

Published: September 1, 2026, 11:42 am

Florida executes 74-year-old man, 14th state prisoner put to death this year

Harold Lucas, sentenced to death over 1976 murder, killed by lethal injection as state continues execution rush

A Florida man convicted of killing a 16-year-old girl who rejected his romantic advances and wounding two of her friends was executed Tuesday evening.

Harold Gene Lucas, 74, was pronounced dead at 6.18pm following a three-drug injection starting at 6pm at Florida state prison near Starke, authorities said.

Published: September 1, 2026, 3:36 pm

Federal judge dismisses lawsuit against Lizzo brought by former wardrobe stylist

The star has denied allegations of bullying and harassment in the workplace in a suit that has now been thrown out of court

A federal judge on Tuesday dismissed the remaining claims in a well-publicized lawsuit against Lizzo’s production company, declaring that the case brought by her former wardrobe stylist could not proceed.

The ruling by US district judge Fernando L Aenlle-Rocha comes nearly two years after he dismissed Lizzo as an individual defendant from the case brought by Asha Daniels against the About Damn Time singer and her production company, Big Grrrl Big Touring, Inc Daniels first filed her lawsuit in September 2023, alleging that she was subject to bullying as well as sexual and racial harassment in an “unsafe, sexually charged workplace culture”.

Published: September 1, 2026, 12:33 pm

Forest Service chief faces scrutiny over logging ties as Trump plans to scrap protections

Rollback of ‘roadless rule’ expected to benefit companies US Forest Service chief, Tom Schultz, previously lobbied for

Donald Trump this month announced plans to rescind a landmark rule that has protected old-growth forests in the US for 25 years. If finalized, the rollback is expected to benefit the companies that Tom Schultz, chief of the US Forest Service, represented in his previous roles as a timber industry lobbyist and executive, according to research by consumer advocacy non-profit Public Citizen.

The Roadless Area Conservation Rule, more commonly known as the “roadless rule”, was adopted in 2001 to limit development in roughly 45m acres of national forest. Industry interests and Republican representatives have long lobbied for the rule’s rescission, which would open up those swaths of untouched land to road construction, drilling and logging.

Published: September 1, 2026, 4:00 am

Judge strikes down New York law that forced climate polluters to pay damages

State cannot enforce policy requiring oil firms to pay $75bn over 25 years for climate mitigation and adaptation

A federal judge has struck down a landmark New York law that forces major polluters to pay climate damages.

In her Monday ruling, Brenda Sannes, chief judge of the US district court for the northern district of New York, sided with Republican-led states and oil interests in saying the state cannot enforce its “climate superfund” law, signed by Kathy Hochul, the governor, in December 2024. The policy required big oil companies to pay $75bn over 25 years for projects to help New York pay for climate mitigation and adaptation.

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:11 am

High winds during El Niño could be deadly for England’s stressed trees, say experts

Head of tree collections at Kew ‘very worried about this autumn’ as hot, dry summer has caused brittleness

High winds associated with El Niño could cause widespread mortality among tree species already weakened by a prolonged period of extreme heat and drought, experts have warned.

This summer much of Europe has been scorched by a series of record-breaking climate crisis-induced heatwaves. The impact is notable across much of England’s countryside, where once green land has turned brown, and many trees are undergoing “early autumn” – wilting and losing their leaves early – to cope with extreme heat.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:00 am

‘They take the water, the springs dry up’: fear as Guatemalan goldmine plan is revived

After lying dormant for years, the Era Dorada project in Asunción Mita resumed this year and villagers say history is being repeated, despite promises of change

In the community of La Lima in Guatemala, Elda Dinora Ramírez, 58, looks towards a small well at the back of her home. Dusty wooden planks lie across the opening, concealing the faint gleam of water far below. “The well is drying up again,” she says.

Ramírez’s home lies less than a mile from Era Dorada – a goldmining project acquired by the Canadian multinational Aura Minerals in January 2025. After years of inactivity, the project was reactivated this year when the Guatemalan government granted Aura a construction licence.

Published: September 1, 2026, 5:00 am

Pentagon official overseeing military AI sold millions worth of stock in AI firm

Exclusive: financial disclosures from Emil Michael – who also reaped millions from xAI stock earlier this year – show he sold his Perplexity stock for up to $25m

The top Pentagon official overseeing military artificial intelligence policy, who reaped profits earlier this year of up to $24m selling his private investment in Elon Musk’s AI company, has now sold his holdings in another AI company for between $5m and $25m, according to records seen by the Guardian. (Federal financial records show ranges of dollar values rather than specific figures.)

Earlier this year, the Guardian disclosed that the official, Emil Michael, had profited handsomely from his investment in Musk’s xAI in January, with a gain of between 400% and 4,800%.

Published: September 1, 2026, 12:17 pm

House passes funding bill to avoid shutdown before midterms

Continuing resolution to approve government spending until 11 December passes 370-48 and will now go to Trump

The US House of Representatives on Tuesday approved legislation to prevent a government shutdown through the midterms, as both parties opted to defuse a volatile dispute ahead of the November elections that will decide the balance of power in Congress for the final two years of Donald Trump’s presidency.

A continuing resolution (CR) authorizing government spending until 11 December passed the House by a 370-48 vote, with only 19 Republicans and 29 Democrats in opposition. Had it not passed, lawmakers would have had until the end of September to approve new funding or face a government shutdown.

Published: September 1, 2026, 11:29 am

US border patrol expected to aid Grand Canyon search for missing person

Nearly 80 people have been rescued, and two people confirmed dead, after flood hit national park

A US border patrol technical search team is expected to deploy in the Grand Canyon, as authorities continue the search for at least one missing person after a fatal flash flood washed through the national park over the weekend.

Authorities are rushing to scour the area as more heavy rain and thunderstorms in weather forecasts threaten additional debris flows, flash floods or rock falls.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:19 am

Oklahoma man charged with murder after two die in marijuana facility blast

Authorities have charged Ryan Bassham after the deadly explosion at the marijuana extraction facility he owns

An Oklahoma man has been charged with murder after a large explosion at a marijuana extraction facility that killed two of his employees and damaged surrounding businesses, prosecutors said on Monday.

Ryan Bassham, 35, turned himself in this weekend after being charged with two counts of first-degree murder in Thursday’s blast at Solos Extracts near Tulsa, authorities said. The explosion at about 1am partially tore the roof from a building, crumpled doors and scattered debris around an industrial park.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:29 am

Germany blames Russia for drone attack at Leipzig airport

Government says ‘dangerous behaviour’ is part of effort by Moscow to cause damage with hybrid attacks

The German government has blamed Russia for the drone attack on Leipzig airport last month, calling it “dangerous behaviour” and part of a systematic and concerted effort by Moscow to “cause great damage” through a large number of hybrid attacks.

The interior minister, Alexander Dobrindt, and the foreign minister, Johann Wadephul, ended weeks of speculation and the government’s hesitancy to blame Russia, saying in a brisk 10-minute briefing in Berlin that all indications were the Russian state had provided the knowhow and equipment for the planned attack and “low-level agents” were recruited to carry it out.

Published: September 1, 2026, 6:45 pm

‘Not perfectly aligned’ with human values: Anthropic admits security failures behind AI hacking incidents

US owner of Claude chatbot previously said its models had hacked three organisations during testing

The US startup behind the Claude chatbot has admitted a series of hacking incidents involving its models reflected a “failure of operational security” and said it has tightened its testing procedures.

Anthropic revealed in July that its models had accessed the open internet three times and gained unauthorised access to the systems of three organisations.

Published: September 1, 2026, 8:18 am

Off-grid UK-Australian couple given more access to children who were removed from home in Italy

Decision marks a significant turning point in a case that sparked a national debate in Italy

A British-Australian couple will be allowed to spend more time with their three children after the ⁠youngsters were removed from the family’s off-grid woodland home in central Italy last year, their lawyer said on Tuesday.

The juvenile court ⁠of L’Aquila in Italy has ⁠approved a ​staged process under the supervision of social services that could ultimately allow the children to leave the residential care facility ⁠where they have been living since November.

Published: September 1, 2026, 9:36 pm

Norway’s new king swears oath of allegiance with daughter at his side

Haakon VIII promises to uphold 1814 constitution but his queen misses ceremony because of post-surgery ‘complications’

King Haakon VIII swore an oath of allegiance before Norway’s parliament on Tuesday in the first major stage in the passing of the crown since the death of his father after 35 years on the throne.

Wearing a ceremonial uniform, Haakon, who became king when Harald V died on Friday, promised to uphold Norway’s 1814 constitution with his 22-year-old daughter, Crown Princess Ingrid Alexandra, by his side.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:40 am

The man who shaped Trump: book sheds fresh light on ruthless Roy Cohn

American Scoundrel tells story of McCarthy attack dog, mob lawyer and Trump mentor – will the president be thumbing its pages?

Kai Bird and Susan Goldmark have written a book Trumpworld doesn’t want you to read. Published on Tuesday, American Scoundrel is a propulsive, horrifying biography of Roy Cohn, the New York mob lawyer whose extraordinary life charted, as the book’s subtitle has it, a “Dark Journey from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump”.

“I told my publicist to reach out to any of the Fox News hosts and reporters, to Joe Rogan, Steve Bannon,” Bird said. “We haven’t gotten a peep, other than Joe Rogan. He said he looked at the galleys, and he got back to my publicist and said, ‘I’m not interested.’ I’m kind of surprised. This is a serious biography of the president’s mentor, whom he publicly admires and says he still misses.”

Published: September 1, 2026, 4:00 am

‘It’s more freaky, more balls to the wall’: how alt-country won over a new generation

From Waxahatchee and Florry in the US to Brown Horse and Little Grandad in the UK, a wave of young songwriters are reinvigorating the subgenre’s earnest emotion and twang

‘It’s so important to talk about this before it’s gone,” says Francie Medosch, singer, guitarist and songwriter of the band Florry, “because it’s really a flash in the pan.” The flash she means is a brief moment where it feels as though on both sides of the Atlantic, scores of exciting indie bands are playing something that, without slavish copying, has plainly drawn inspiration from alt-country, the music that emerged in the US in the late 1980s and early 90s, when former punks such as Uncle Tupelo – featuring future Wilco co-founder Jeff Tweedy – and the Bottle Rockets picked up picked up fiddles, banjos and acoustic guitars.

In the UK, Brown Horse and Vegas Water Taxi have the weeping pedal steel, in the former case tied to something very heartland and in the latter paired with a very English indie sensibility. Westside Cowboy and Little Grandad both borrow from the spiky rootsiness of early Wilco, while Wyatt play slacker country rock. Over in the US, where there’s always going to be more of this sort of thing, you can point to the current indie-rock holy trinity of Waxahatchee, Wednesday and MJ Lenderman, plus Florry, Ratboys, Thomas Dollbaum, Fust, SG Goodman, Lily Seabird, Ryan Davis and the Roadhouse Band and more.

Published: September 1, 2026, 3:14 am

Waking Life: Richard Linklater’s genre-defying indie is a kaleidoscopic masterpiece

Wiley Wiggins plays a man wandering around Austin, Texas, whose reality-bending encounters make him uncertain whether he’s awake or asleep

“I’m gonna tell you about a dream I once had,” Richard Linklater – playing himself in his own film Waking Life – tells Wiley Wiggins, playing the film’s unnamed protagonist. “I know when someone says that usually you’re in for a very boring next few minutes, and you might be,” Linklater adds as he hammers away at a pinball machine. “But it sounds like … what else you gonna do, right?”

On paper, that’s the premise – and, if you’re cynical, the central dilemma – of Linklater’s 2001 genre-defying indie masterpiece. Wiggins plays a man wandering around Austin, Texas, who is uncertain whether he’s awake or asleep. He may be stuck in a dream, unable to wake up – or reality might just be this weird.

Published: September 1, 2026, 8:00 am

The Extractor review – Indonesian hostage-rescue thriller has surprising thread of gentleness at its core

Iko Uwais directs and acts in the story of a band of elite soldiers who must rescue a group of researchers taken captive in the jungle

Can an elite team of soldiers rescue a band of innocent hostages from a bunch of mean old terrorists? Yes, probably, since there are few (if any) action movies in which the hostages are wiped out and the terrorists win. Not to be confused with the Extraction action franchise starring Chris Hemsworth as a mercenary named Tyler, nor with action thriller Escape Plan: The Extractors, starring Dave Bautista as a prison security expert named Trent, this is an Indonesian action thriller in which actor/director Iko Uwais plays a soldier named Timur. The film was actually called Timur originally, but there’s no denying that The Extractor is a more commercial title (unless you are particularly interested in the medieval Mongol khanates) and will attract more viewers to this tale of hostages, heroes and long-ago childhood friends.

In some ways, though, the rebrand is a shame, because the new title suggests the film is more generic than it is. While the basic plot, in which a bunch of researchers are taken hostage in the jungle by an armed group of wrong ’uns, is hardly unique, there are sequences in the film that stand out from the direct-to-video action content mill. In Indonesia, timur means “east”, where the sun rises, and it carries the connotation of hopefulness. That softer feeling in the original title is a key part of the film’s identity, which includes sentimental flashbacks to the childhoods of various characters whose lives have taken tragically different paths. (Can you imagine a world in which a terrorist and a soldier knew each other as children? The Extractor can.)

Published: September 1, 2026, 1:00 am

Pin de Fartie review – spoonerist remix of Samuel Beckett’s Endgame finds fresh absurdity in Argentina

Beckett’s masterpiece is given a postmodern cinema slant, with characters in different locations, music and humour in a free and fanciful interpretation

Remember remixes? Where you take a song and swap out parts of it with new or pre-existing material, changing it just enough to be still recognisable? Argentinean director Alejo Moguillansky applies this quintessentially postmodern aesthetic to film with a funky cinematic remix, or even series of remixes, of Samuel Beckett’s one-act play Fin de Partie, AKA Endgame. The result feels a little retro and possibly a bit too pleased with its own cleverness, and the spoonerist title is juvenile. But in the end this really achieves something with both the source material and the remix that’s fresh, pleasingly provocative, and at times moving.

Beckett’s 1957 absurdist masterwork has just four characters on stage throughout, two of whom do most of the talking: cantankerous blind, disabled Hamm banters with his servant/slave Clov, while Hamm’s parents, Nagg and Nell, live in dustbins upstage and talk rather less. There’s an air of apocalyptic doom, much talk of drugs, food and, above all, time running out.

Published: August 31, 2026, 11:00 pm

Emily Wilson to retranslate the Odyssey from scratch

Wilson, whose 2017 English translation of Homer’s epic poem inspired Christopher Nolan’s box office hit, is revisiting it after criticising the film adaptation

Emily Wilson, the first woman to translate Homer’s Odyssey into English, is to retranslate the ancient Greek epic poem from scratch less than a decade after the publication of her acclaimed version.

The announcement comes after Wilson attracted controversy this summer with a scathing assessment of Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster film adaptation of the Odyssey, which she slammed for its “abysmal” writing and lack of sex scenes.

Published: September 1, 2026, 8:09 am

Under Story by Chloe Benjamin review – this time-reversal melodrama is quantum hokum

A grieving couple who have lost their son find a way to a mirror universe where time runs backwards – but the narrative machinery is shonky and distracting

There is something farcical – grotesque, even – about life played in reverse. A child falling into a tree. A sandwich emerging from a mouth, bite by reconstituted bite. A doctor unstitching a wound. The world is strange in any order, but rewind helps us notice – makes the ordinary absurd.

Novels that pick a fight with forward momentum tend to harness this absurdity, revel in it. In The Cockroach (2019), Ian McEwan gives us a sneering Brexit fable about political nostalgia. If voters want to turn back the clock, let them. He unleashes “Economic Reversalism”, which sees employees pay for the privilege of work, and every pound sent back to where it came from. In Time’s Arrow (1991), Martin Amis inverts the Holocaust. Just imagine it, he dares us: a network of sanatoriums instead of death camps. A vast machinery of reparation run by benevolent Nazis. How monstrously laughable.

Published: September 1, 2026, 1:00 am

Anita Brookner by Hermione Lee review – an enigmatic literary great given her due

This exhaustive biography of the Booker winner brings her properly out of the shadows for the first time

‘Dr Weiss, at forty, knew that her life had been ruined by literature.” The first fictional sentence Anita Brookner ever published, aged 53, in A Start in Life, certainly set a tone. If people have heard of Brookner today, Hermione Lee says, they imagine a lonely, cardiganed woman yearning for an absent lover. “This,” says Lee (an emeritus English professor at the University of Oxford), “won’t do.”

The cardiganed image confuses the author with her protagonists. Of 24 novels written across 30 years, only the first four – A Start in Life, Providence, Look at Me and Hotel du Lac – are about a single woman pining for love. There is certainly a “Brooknerian” style, characterised by elegance, restraint and melancholia, but her fiction engaged with our emotional lives broadly, examining family, exile, home, trauma, ageing and much more.

Published: August 31, 2026, 11:00 pm

Gen Z ‘Chinamaxxers’ fantasise about life in China. This journalist and this artist can never go back there

A graphic novel by Melissa Chan and Badiucao imagines China and the US at war in 2035. They hope to remind young people that ‘authoritarianism everywhere is bad’

Drinking Tsingtao beers, eating congee, walking with hands behind their backs: for many young people in western countries, “Chinamaxxing” has become all the rage. Some content creators have even gone beyond the jokes about being in “a very Chinese time in my life” and have followed this passion to the Middle Kingdom: making TikToks in Chongqing’s multilayered metropolis, bathing in Chengdu’s 24-hour spas or backflipping on the Great Wall of China.

This irreverent, mostly ironic trend is jarring for some, but Chinese Australian artist Badiucao and Chinese American journalist Melissa Chan don’t want to lecture the so-called Chinamaxxers.

Published: August 31, 2026, 8:00 am

Scaring monkeys? Detecting bedbugs? Meet the elite working dogs – in pictures

John Fabiano has travelled the globe photographing dogs with jobs – from Italian truffle sniffers and Greenlandic sled dogs to Perla the hotel receptionist in Cologne

Published: August 31, 2026, 11:00 pm

‘She inspired my proposal’: Readers on Yayoi Kusama

From wedding ceremonies to sunsets with pumpkins, even in urinals, Kusama’s work brought joy, mischief and inspiration to so many

I have always loved Yayoi Kusama’s work, and when I visited an exhibition of hers on a gap year in Sydney I was spellbound by her infinity mirror rooms. I immediately thought, despite being single at the time, this is a fantastic space to propose in. Fast forward around eight years and I am on one knee holding a ring out to my partner inside an infinity mirror room in Helsinki, with excited and expectant Finns looking on. He said yes. At the wedding, the breakfast was held under polka dotted pink lanterns. Kusama was a fantastic artist, who also protested for my ability to marry – performing her own gay wedding ceremonies before it was legally recognised – and inspired key aspects of my wedding. Liam, 40, Surrey

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:00 am

Meet the magical creatures inspired by shamanism, folklore … and an old Ikea bag

From ceramic goblin feet to furry disembodied legs, Korean-Chinese artist Woo Jin Joo is using London junk to inject the art world with a spirit of playfulness

Woo Jin Joo’s studio is full of magic. Ceramic green goblin feet line the windowsill, disembodied furry legs jut out of one white wall and, on the table behind where the Korean-Chinese artist sits drinking tea, a headless being dressed in a black coat squats, arms aloft in warning.

There are also neat racks of colourful thread next to a freehand embroidery machine, the source of this supernatural horde. This is where Joo creates much of her art – surface embroideries and sculptural 3D creatures inspired by Korean myth, philosophy and the relationship between humans and the natural world.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:16 am

‘Not just Hollywood crap’: Mike Leigh on the East End communist who brought world cinema to the UK

A new season celebrates Contemporary Films and its founder Charles Cooper, who bet on Britain taking to Ingmar Bergman, Yasujiro Ozu, Satyajit Ray – and a young Mike Leigh

Occasionally, vital pieces of the cultural jigsaw disappear without anyone really noticing. This, sadly, was the fate of Contemporary Films, the British film distributor that popularised sophisticated, grownup international cinema – foreign language mostly – in the UK, and heralded the arrival of the auteur generation with directors such as Ingmar Bergman, Satyajit Ray, Andrzej Wajda and Yasujiro Ozu.

Contemporary, and its founder Charles Cooper, weren’t the only game in town – Kenneth Rive’s Gala was a fellow traveller – but Contemporary got there first, setting up shop in 1951, first with short films for the then popular film society sector, and moving into features with the 1952 Japanese film Children of Hiroshima. Its marketplace clout faded rapidly in the early 1990s, when it was a victim of changing industry practices. But amazingly, the company is still with us – and is planning a 75th anniversary series of screenings to showcase its history.

Published: September 1, 2026, 7:05 am

A walking tour of Andalucía’s historic white villages: ‘Nightingales serenade us as we wind along lush river valleys’

The famous pueblos blancos in southern Spain’s Sierra de Grazalema natural park teem with wildlife amid a limestone wonderland of peaks

‘The wind is in from Africa / Last night I couldn’t sleep.” Joni Mitchell has ear-wormed her way into my head as my wife and I step out from Zahara de la Sierra into the mountains of Sierra de Grazalema natural park. The Africa bit probably comes from yesterday’s visit to Zahara’s castle museum. Here, high above the tiled terracotta mosaic of village rooftops, we learned how the recapture of this picturesque hill town was a turning point in the Reconquista – the military campaign of the 1400s that saw the Catholics retake southern Spain after seven centuries of Moorish control. As for sleep deprivation, I may just have overdone it on last night’s tapas.

Either way, Africa feels present as we tramp through the countryside of Andalucía, if only in the wildlife. The painted lady butterflies drifting over the flower-spangled verges, the turtle doves purring from the olive groves and the booted eagle drifting overhead: all are summer visitors recently blown in from the great continent to our south.

Published: August 31, 2026, 11:00 pm

Ultramarathon runners train for months, sometimes years. But what happens when they don’t finish a race?

DNF stands for ‘did not finish’ – the acronym no ultrarunner wants assigned to their race result. For amateurs, DNFing is loaded with emotion – but attrition rates are extremely common

Drenched, freezing, utterly miserable and with a GI catastrophe ready to blow, my internal conflict of quit/don’t quit was in full force. I was at about kilometre 56 of my 100km ultramarathon. After a cascade of bad decisions and worse weather, totally wretched, I shuffled and sobbed my way through the dark to the next checkpoint. By the time I got there at 62km, the resignation of dropping out had settled in. Months and months of training had come to nothing.

Inside the checkpoint, soaked runners and their besieged crew were crowded into what resembled a field hospital triage unit. In the chaotic throng I found my crew, slumped down on to a bench and said: I’m pulling out.

Published: August 31, 2026, 8:00 am

I've tested dozens of items to perfect my work-from-home setup. These 13 make all the difference

Build a home office you’ll actually enjoying working from with tried-and-true upgrades – from inexpensive speakers to a stand that can turn an iPad into a second monitor

• The best wireless earbuds in the US – tested

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

If you work from home, even just a few days a week, you need more than a laptop perched on a sticky kitchen table. A dedicated desk setup allows you to step away from distractions, plop in your office chair and get to work.

It also creates a vital separation between your personal and professional life. After spending my initial work-from-home days on a living room couch, I quickly realized the importance of creating a separate space, and I have spent seven years refining it. As a tech writer, I have tested dozens of products for my desk setup, and have found some to be totally invaluable. Here are the tried-and-true upgrades that will make working from home easier, more comfortable and even more productive.

Published: August 31, 2026, 7:15 am

Caregiver creep: how helping elderly relatives can snowball into a full-time job

Assisting an ageing loved one can start with small tasks but may lead to full-time caregiving that requires more support

Helping an ageing parent or loved one often begins with easy-to-field requests: Pick up a prescription. Drive them to a doctor’s appointment. Grab groceries.

However, light tasks – just “helping out” here and there – may eventually snowball into the avalanche of full-time caregiving, a phenomenon becoming known as “caregiver creep”. Like “caregiver burnout”, it’s not a formal term, but there is growing awareness about this slow build among healthcare providers and experts.

Published: August 31, 2026, 9:00 am

‘Who knows what they’re taking?’: people risk the gray market for the newest weight-loss drug

Retatrutide, not yet approved by the FDA, is the latest wonder drug to shed pounds despite warnings from doctors

About two years ago, Henry, who is 6ft 3in, weighed 210lb, which meant he was only slightly overweight, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention body mass index.

Still, the thirtysomething who lives in the Pacific north-west had hypertension, sleep apnea and body image issues, so he started taking the weight-loss drug Ozempic. While he dropped pounds, he experienced constipation, a common side-effect, so he wanted to try retatrutide, another peptide which not only targets GLP-1 but two other hormone receptors as well.

Published: August 31, 2026, 5:00 am

Is it true that … mental health is affected by inflammation?

Studies have found that anti-inflammatory drugs can improve your mood. But what does that mean for conditions such as depression and anxiety?

Inflammation is the immune system’s response to injury or infection. If you cut yourself and the area becomes red and swollen, that’s inflammation: immune cells are rushing to fight germs and repair tissue.

But inflammation can also occur in the body during illnesses, and a low level of inflammation can arise from obesity or ageing. “A marker of that inflammation tends to be elevated cytokines in people’s blood,” says Prof Daniel M Davis, head of life sciences at Imperial College London and author of Immune Health: A Myth-Busting Guide. “They’re the molecules immune cells use to communicate with each other.”

Published: August 31, 2026, 12:00 am

Forget T-maxxing – the manosphere’s obsession with testosterone is just fear-maxxing | Donna Lu

Testosterone replacement therapy comes with serious and potentially irreversible health risks including infertility and early heart disease

• Read more in the Antiviral series

Are you tired? Feeling flat and irritable? Finding it difficult to concentrate? Maybe you’re experiencing the seemingly ubiquitous symptoms of modern life. Or, if you’re a man, you may have been told by countless uncredentialed online influencers that you’re probably suffering from “low T”.

For decades, testosterone has been marketed to men as a means to maximise virility. But in recent years, social media has fuelled the “T-maxxing” trend, in which men are encouraged to maximise their testosterone levels through either natural or artificial means.

Published: September 1, 2026, 8:00 am

Houseplant hacks: can a lint roller banish pests?

It’s a great detection tool, but if your plant is infested with thrips or spider mites it may not be enough …

The problem
The worst pests are the ones you can’t see; thrips and spider mites are tiny and very good at hiding on the undersides of leaves, in leaf joints and along stems. By the time you notice the damage – silvery streaks, speckling or fine webbing – the infestation is usually well under way. Early detection is the difference between a quick fix and a full-blown outbreak.

The hack
Use a sticky lint roller to pick up pests that are hard to see. The idea is it works as both a detection tool, and a light physical intervention, lifting adults and eggs before they multiply.

Published: September 1, 2026, 2:00 am

100 ultramarathons in 100 days: former rugby pro hit by brain injury nears end of feat

David ‘Jacko’ Jackson has aimed to raise awareness of brain injuries, with fellow runners sharing their stories

The key for David “Jacko” Jackson is to take each stage nice and gently. “It’s not about running fast,” he said. “It’s more like the hare and tortoise story. Slow and steady – and do it again tomorrow.”

So far, so good. Jackson, a former professional rugby player who retired after a traumatic brain injury, is nearing the end of an extraordinary bid to run 100 ultramarathons (50km, or about 30 miles) in 100 consecutive days.

Published: August 31, 2026, 7:00 am

The pet I’ll never forget: Jerry, the king of dogs, who taught me how to live

After a burglary, my parents decided we needed extra security. Jerry was the answer – and this hungry, handsome hound helped us all in countless ways

Jerry came into our lives because a burglar had broken in. My mum had woken in the middle of the night to find an intruder in our kitchen. He scarpered, but the psychological damage was done. Two days later, my dad came home with the cutest little rescue puppy, with traces of beagle and labrador in him. He was two months old, had a black, brown and white coat, and big, bashful eyes. We called him Jerry because we had a cat called Tom. “I’m not sure how he’ll protect us,” I said. “He will,” my dad replied.

Jerry was very laid-back and Zen. He became part of the family straight away. He also became the therapy dog we hadn’t realised we needed. With two teenagers in the house (me and my older brother) and a hyperactive younger brother, someone was always in a strop and needing to let off steam by taking him out for a walk. Each time, Jerry obliged. I’d bore him with my latest teen-romance trauma; he was a very good listener. Sometimes, he’d have five walks a day, with both of my parents taking their turn. He certainly got his steps in.

Published: August 31, 2026, 3:00 am

Echoes of cold war as US accused of meddling in another Brazilian election

Claims that Trump and Rubio are trying to influence result have parallels with CIA intervention 64 years ago

The year was 1962 and the Kennedy administration was desperate to swing Brazil’s congressional elections against its leftwing president, João Goulart, as a way of countering the supposed communist threat sweeping a region the US considered its back yard.

Historians say that in the lead-up to the vote, the CIA and the Department of State secretly channelled millions of dollars to opposition candidates and a group tasked with spreading rightwing propaganda and stirring up unrest.

Published: September 1, 2026, 5:00 am

An eye-catching hat and Canada’s last captive whale: photos of the day – Tuesday

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

Published: September 1, 2026, 5:33 am