
As Kim Kardashian’s All’s Fair sets a new low for TV, we revisit every single thing our critics have mercilessly panned. Brace yourself for the Mount Rushmore of rubbish!
Lucy Mangan’s Guardian review of Kim Kardashian’s new Disney+ legal drama All’s Fair was something of a rarity. Not necessarily because she didn’t care for it – the scorn has been universal – but because she gave it zero stars.
Not two, the score you give something you want to write off as too mediocre to break sweat over. Not one, which is what you give something if you want to make the people who made it wince. Zero stars. All’s Fair, according to this newspaper, is a product entirely devoid of discernible worth. In the entire 204-year-old history of this publication, only 15 zero-star reviews have ever been written, and All’s Fair is so unremittingly awful it got one of them. These are the other 14, presented here as the Guardian’s Mount Rushmore of crap.
Continue reading...Viewers have been won over by the quick-witted and quirky former England international. But do they all know about the groin-grabbing and that ‘horse’ of his?
It’s difficult to know where to begin with a not-so-quick guide to Celebrity Traitors’ breakout star, Joe Marler. The BBC series has introduced a wider public to the tattooed, 18-stone-plus former England rugby union player – fans won over by his quick-witted humour, allied to a direct, confrontational form of questioning and an uncanny knack for detective work.
Not all viewers, though, will be au fait with his backstory; the 35-year-old dungaree-wearing ex-prop forward admitted he was mistaken for a sound technician by his fellow celebrities when first on set, and then asked whether he played rugby league when he revealed his previous 15-year career. For those who know rugby union, however, Marler’s style on the show has come as little surprise, save it being slightly toned down for a wider public audience.
Continue reading...In seven days my young alter ego is cyberbullied and attacked while exploring clubs, casinos and horror games, all with parental controls in place. Is the platform safe for children – or an ‘X-rated paedophile hellscape’?
I am an eight-year-old girl, standing near-naked in a room full of strangers.
As the room spins and zooms upon me and people glide around me, I clock my features.
Continue reading...His win is a huge victory for all New Yorkers, but it is also meaningful far beyond the five boroughs of this city
The people of New York have spoken. Despite all the odds, a 34-year-old Muslim Democratic socialist has been elected to lead the largest city in the United States. Zohran Mamdani’s win is a huge victory for all New Yorkers, but it is also meaningful far beyond the five boroughs of this city.
Just as amazing was that this election wasn’t even close. Mamdani’s main opponent, former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, ran a campaign that was as devoid of imagination as it was of hope and even personality. Having dramatically lost the democratic primary this past summer, Cuomo was forced to run as an independent, an almost comical political affiliation for a man whose campaign was utterly dependent on donations from the billionaire class.
Moustafa Bayoumi is Guardian US coolumnist
Continue reading...Plucked from obscurity, James Cartlidge messed up his maths while his opposite number had forgotten his politics 101
He had one job. ONE. JOB. Well, technically there might have been two, but we’ll come to that later. But one main job. And that’s to be able to count to six. That’s how many questions the leader of the opposition gets to ask at prime minister’s questions. It’s been that way since Tony Blair planted himself in Downing Street in 1997 and turned the spectacle from twice a week to one extended session. You wouldn’t have thought it was so hard to grasp. There again, some people find even the most basic maths challenging.
Alas, poor James! You might not have heard of James Cartlidge. No shame there. Join 99.9% of the population. And if you had heard of him, you may not have known that he is the shadow defence secretary. No shame there either. Join 99.9% of Tory MPs. Put simply, James is instantly forgettable. Even to his own acquaintances. He has risen without trace. The best exponent of the Dunning-Kruger effect since Danny Kruger.
Continue reading...He films people breaking his self-created ‘laws’ of street decorum and posts the videos online – with many viewers expressing their gratitude. So watch out if you’re rushing along on your phone or wheeling a small bag that could be carried ...
It’s a damp, grey morning in Soho, London, and Cameron Roh is standing a metre or so behind a woman who is speaking loudly into her phone outside Caffè Nero. She is breaking his “laws” of “pavement etiquette” and he holds up his phone and presses record. Lost in conversation, the woman doesn’t see him, but still, watching him from a distance, it’s fist-in-mouth awkward. What if she turns around? Is this allowed? Is this even OK?
Suddenly, the woman hangs up and dashes across the road, oblivious to what has just happened. Evidence duly captured, Roh returns to where I am hiding and delivers his verdict, which is marks out of 10 – with 10 being perfect pavement etiquette. “That’s a two,” he says. Her crimes? “On her phone, sudden stop, pretty much in the centre of the pavement, meaning people have to walk around her to get past. No, no, no.” She didn’t see us, but that somehow feels worse; I feel as if we’ve just pickpocketed her. Roh giggles, unfazed. As a self-appointed pavement vigilante, this is what he does.
Continue reading...Algerian man, 24, ‘released in error’ from HMP Wandsworth two days after stronger checks for jails were brought in
Police have launched an urgent search for a second foreign prisoner freed mistakenly, two days after the UK justice secretary, David Lammy, brought in stronger checks for jails.
The 24-year-old Algerian man was wrongly released from Wandsworth prison in south London last Wednesday, with the Metropolitan police informed only this week.
Continue reading...Questions about potential conflict of interest as council’s Reform cabinet member for social care owns private care company
Lancashire’s Reform-run council has been accused of “selling off the family silver” with plans to save £4m a year by closing five council-run care homes and five day centres and selling off the land.
One of the care home residents, a 92-year-old woman, said she would leave only by “being forcibly removed or in a box”.
Continue reading...At least two people in intensive care and suspect arrested after pedestrians and cyclists hit on Île d’Oléron
Five people have been injured, two of them seriously, after a driver rammed into pedestrians and cyclists on Île d’Oléron, a popular tourist destination off France’s Atlantic coast, authorities have said.
The driver has been arrested and an investigation opened into attempted murder, the La Rochelle public prosecutor, Arnaud Laraize, said on Wednesday. France’s anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office said it was observing the case but was not so far involved.
Continue reading...Democratic socialist, 34, becomes city’s first Muslim mayor as Democrats triumph in several other key races
Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani was elected on Tuesday as the 111th mayor of New York City, defeating the former governor Andrew Cuomo and Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa and making history as the city’s first Muslim mayor.
The 34-year-old democratic socialist and state assembly member from Queens, secured victory with more than 50% of the vote. Cuomo, 67, finished second with just over 40%, while Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa received just over 7% of the vote.
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