Battle for power

How Big Tech ruined kids’ TV

On YouTube, the line between entertainment and sedation grows ever thinner

Home is where the pub is

Its magic comes from being homely without being home

The glory of defeat in the FA Cup

By the fifth goal, the Boreham Wood terraces were emptying. Why would anyone put themselves through this?

Donald Trump is giving Keir Starmer a purpose

Plus: the conspiracy of libraries, and my grandpa’s mordant wit

The news cycle might give me a heart-attack

Also this week: a return to “gunboat diplomacy”, and the unruly path of reason

Letter of the week: Theatre of force

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Can Starmer stop the Tory dinosaurs blocking the House of Lords?

The Conservatives are using their majority over Labour in the upper chamber to thwart the government’s agenda

Only strength can save Greenland

Donald Trump is putting Arctic security on the brink – and Nato’s

Will Grok destroy the special relationship?

Keir Starmer’s Trump strategy may collapse if Ofcom bans X

London may be safer – but it is suffering “chaos creep”

It’s unsettling to live in a city where the state seems unable to stop petty crime

The Ozempic era might be over already

Turns out weight-loss drugs aren’t so magic after all

How the Soviet Union got over Stalin – or thought it did

His successors proclaimed a more liberal socialism. But was it ever real?

Ali Smith’s infectious hope

For two pairs of sisters in her new novel Glyph, storytelling is a way of dealing with troubles past…

The interwar years were as bewildering as the present

Alwyn Turner’s new history reassures us that the past is not, as many imagine, any cosier or more patriotic…

David Lynch is only getting weirder

What was it that gave the director, who would have been 80 this month, an aura all of his…

Will we ever forget David Bowie?

A decade after his death, the star’s legend lives on, sustained by an endless search for the man behind…

Chloé Zhao’s Hamnet melts the heart

Paul Mescal and Jessie Buckley are superb in this original transposition of Shakespeare to the silver screen

The Night Manager series two is a soulless mistake

Tom Hiddleston isn’t enough to carry John le Carré’s world

Will we ever understand Vladimir Putin?

The History Bureau, the new BBC Sounds series, seeks to unravel the past 25 years of modern Russian history

The myth of culinary soft power

A pan-Asian foodhall in north London is a failed experiment in geopolitics

The perils of black denim

Why doesn’t it wear as well as blue?

Would putting a price on our decisions change our behaviour?

My 2026 resolution is to make that extra effort to buy from retailers I think I can trust

Beer and Sandwiches: At the Wreckers Retreat in Devon

This column is our weekly pub review, written by pintsmen, women and children across the nation. Suggestions to [email protected]

October 1985: Neil Kinnock’s explosive conference condemnations plunge the Labour left into turmoil