‘The best thing I've seen in my life' – your top TV of 2025 so far

(Disney+) Andor is a cool, intelligent look at how fascism grows and the cost of resistance. It may be set in a galaxy far far away, but it is in an entirely different universe to any other Star Wars production. No lightsabers; no magic space wizards; barely a stormtrooper in sight – until the grim and horrifying mid-season climax. Who knew committee meetings and wedding parties could be so gripping? It's as though George Lucas placed the keys to his kingdom in the hands of John le Carré instead of Disney. Remember that fizz of excitement you got as an eight-year-old heading in to see A New Hope? Andor makes this 55-year-old feel the same way. Russell Jones, Cheshire
(Paramount+) I love MobLand. It's Tom Hardy doing what Tom Hardy does best: playing the quiet and measured yet still highly intimidating and pretty scary fixer for an Irish mob family. The pacing is sharp and succinct without being breakneck; very on-brand Guy Ritchie, in the best way. Clare Kleinedler, Sierra Madre, California
(Channel 4) The animated series Common Side Effects is not merely the best thing I've seen on TV this year but one of the best shows I've seen in my life. Why? The writing. The plot is superb: opposite to The Last of Us, it's about the discovery of a fungus that appears to heal all illnesses – but everything else about the show is grounded in the real world. The characters are nuanced and compelling. To sum up its virtues in a single sentence, it respects its audience. The fact that the show even managed to get made at all in today's political environment boggles the mind. Jude Kirkham, Williams Lake, British Columbia, Canada
(Apple TV+) I'm always years behind everyone else these days and I only found Severance after I'd run out of Slow Horses episodes. Severance offers a chilling theme of corporate control taken to the max, and features some brilliantly understated performances. There are echoes of The Matrix, of course, and – unexpectedly – Franz Kafka, but its originality shines through. A very good series indeed! Malcolm Armstrong, Gateshead
(Netflix) Dept. Q is an English language adaptation of the first in a series of Danish crime novels by Jussi Adler-Olsen with labyrinthine plots and characters straight out of noir central casting. This adaptation moves the setting to Scotland, but loses none of the bleakness and despair with a small group of investigators trying to solve cold cases. Bring on season two! Niall, Dublin
(Channel 4) It's bonkers. It's weird. It's a really mind-boggling mirror that Alex Horne has held up to himself and what may, or may not be, his own insecurities. Why does he write himself to be this pathetic? Why does his real life best friend play both himself and an evil hypnotherapist-cum-estate agent who can't stand to look at him? How are a bunch of middle aged men mucking around with instruments in a shed, taking dad jokes to the next level, this charming? It makes no sense on any of the many levels it operates on. Amanda Jeffrey, Birmingham
(Prime Video) The Narrow Road to the Deep North is a brilliant adaptation of a brilliant Booker prize winning novel by Richard Flanagan. It's beautifully paced, deeply emotional, and marvellously acted. It moved me to tears, as did the book. Mark Smithers, Melbourne
(BBC One/iPlayer) This was Liverpool's answer to The Godfather. The drama, the acting and the writing are magnificent. The web of crime and how it infiltrates the lives of ordinary people is portrayed brilliantly. I'm so pleased there is another series to follow. Teresa Curtis, Stockport
(Netflix) It's wonderful to see this graphic novel classic by Héctor Germán Oesterheld brought to life. I did not know much about Argentinian cultural works, outside Ariel Ramírez's composition Misa Criolla (part of which is used here with electrifying effect) and this series made me want to know more about the country, its people and their struggles in the last century. They say that science fiction is an examination of the time it is written and this story, originally published in the 1950s, has been brought into the 21st century in a thought-provoking way. Viv Blagden, Somerset
(Prime Video) Criminally unwatched by the masses, finally, this show has come of age, and the flashback episode (Rand's journey through Rhuidean) is hands down one of the best fantasy episodes ever. Unfortunately, the show was cancelled last month, just as it was finding its footing. At least we will always have the Rhuidean episode to comfort ourselves with. Stephen, Dublin
(Apple TV+) Shrinking features an incredible ensemble cast and a stellar performance by Harrison Ford who plays a grieving therapist who decides to tell his clients what he really thinks. It provides a brilliant treatment of a difficult range of topics, and it's hilarious to boot. Penny, Lancashire
(Netflix) Black Mirror season seven has been far and away the best ever – not a dud episode. In Bête Noire, Charlie Brooker takes the 'is the main character going mad?' genre and gives it a technological twist. The ending is preposterous but fun, and Rosy McEwen as Verity is quite the revelation. Des Brown, Newcastle upon Tyne
(BBC Two/iPlayer) My Brain: After the Rupture is a documentary about the crisis faced by the writer and broadcaster Clemency Burton-Hill after she suffered a brain haemorrhage at 38 years old. Alongside The Last Musician of Auschwitz, it's one of the most extraordinary, deeply moving documentaries so far this year. Kate, Scottish Borders

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The Guardian

10 minutes ago

• The Guardian

‘It's hard to find work': Marlee Matlin on making Hollywood history but waiting for change

In 1987, at the age of 21, Marlee Matlin became the youngest person ever to win a best actress Oscar. Footage of her victory appears early in Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore, a new documentary on the trailblazing actor's life and career: Matlin, remarkably fresh-faced even for 21, in her very 80s purple dress, her brunette hair swept up by a floral headpiece, black-rimmed glasses on, appears stunned as William Hurt, her co-star in Children of a Lesser God and her boyfriend at the time, reads her name. Thunderous applause. The camera captures fellow nominee Jane Fonda mouthing 'that's so great' as Matlin, the first and still only deaf actor to win the award, approaches the podium and kisses Hurt. As she delivers her speech in American Sign Language (ASL), she seems almost too shocked to emote, overcome with the gravity of the moment. Matlin's win was indeed groundbreaking, a watershed moment for deaf representation. But as Not Alone Anymore explains, it was also much more complicated than a feelgood story of societal triumph, or a turning point for deaf creatives. Nor was it one of personal glory. Halfway through the film, the scene is replayed again, this time with the sound taken away – the thunderous applause muted to just a simulation of Matlin's own thunderous heartbeat as she walked to the stage. 'I was afraid as I walked up the stairs to get the Oscar,' Matlin recalls on screen in ASL. 'I was afraid because I knew, in my gut, that he wasn't that happy.' Hurt, 16 years her senior and an established Hollywood star, was intensely jealous of her success, and had already begun physically abusing her. Without sound and with context, what once read as overwhelming shock on her face instead appears as something darker, shaded with fear. The twist, of sorts, is one of many decisions by director Shoshannah Stern to subvert the hearing perspective that most viewers automatically assume. 'I wanted to return to her Oscar-winning moment twice,' Stern, a deaf actor herself, told me through an interpreter, 'because sound does limit people. There are a lot of things that I feel hearing people miss when they are just listening with their ears and not listening with their eyes.' When I first watched Matlin's win, I assumed, as Stern expected, that 'it's this roaring applause, so we're celebrating'. Without sound, the picture is clearer. 'You could see in that moment how scary it is,' said Stern. 'And it's right there. It's been in front of us this whole time.' Stern's intrinsic understanding of the deaf perspective was the reason Matlin, who went on to a long career on such shows as Seinfeld, The West Wing, The L Word and, most recently, the Oscar-winning film Coda, decided to make the film at all. 'Almost none of the documentaries that I've seen that have to do with a subject matter like myself have not been done right,' she told me over Zoom via her interpreter, Jack Jason, who has worked with Matlin since 1985. When PBS's American Masters approached her about a documentary, she had one demand: the director had to be deaf, and it had to be Stern, a longtime friend and occasional collaborator who co-created the show This Close. As she did with early financiers of Coda who wanted to cast big-name hearing actors for two deaf roles, Matlin stuck to her guns. Deaf participation, take it or leave it. 'I wanted to have that type of conversation I could [with] Shoshannah, where I could feel free and sign and not worry about an interpreter voiceover, not worry about my surroundings, not worry about any of that, just be there,' Matlin said. 'That was the first time that I felt at ease.' Much of Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore, which first premiered at the Sundance film festival, features Stern and Matlin in conversation unlike in any prior documentary I've seen, even with deaf subjects. The two women sign without voiceover, just subtitles for hearing viewers. Any ASL interpreters were not only off camera, but in a different room, communicating via earpieces. 'I wasn't accustomed to that approach. I've never seen that,' said Matlin. 'I'm accustomed to being voiced over, because that's how it's been in my entire career. That's the hearing perspective.' As the first Oscar-winning deaf actor and still the most famous, Matlin knows how, as Stern puts it, 'the world often tries to force perspectives on people, put the weight of explaining an entire community's experience on one person'. Voiceover and interpreters 'are another forced perspective', she said. 'When I'm interviewed by hearing people, I have to look at the interpreter. Where are they? How is my language being translated into English? And then I'm limiting myself. I'm thinking in a way that the hearing interviewer or the hearing director is thinking. I'm not thinking as myself.' 'It wasn't what I wanted Marlee to say in our documentary, it was how she spoke, how that changes when our expectations and our perspectives change,' she added. 'Accessibility is for everyone. It's not just for us as deaf people, but a lot of times that responsibility, that weight, is put on one person.' Not Alone Anymore illustrates that weight, which Matlin felt acutely as a very young person experiencing rapid professional success. Cast in Children of a Lesser God fresh out of high school, Matlin was new not only to screen acting but the world beyond her small community in suburban Chicago. The youngest of three children in a hearing family – Matlin became deaf at 18 months, for unknown reasons that, she recalls, nevertheless left her parents guilt-stricken – she attended a mixed deaf/hearing school and began acting at age seven; she was inspired, in part, by Henry Winkler, a lifelong mentor she first met backstage at a school show at age 12. (In 1993, Matlin married Kevin Grandalski, a cop she met on the set of Reasonable Doubts, in the Winklers' back yard. They have four children.) Matlin's family was not fluent in ASL, and it took years for her to understand the loneliness and isolation at home. She coped by smoking marijuana. At 19, she began dating Hurt, who was then 35. Her drug use escalated with the physical and emotional abuse; she has said she smoked 20 joints a day, plus cocaine. In the midst of her awards season run, she entered rehab. She emerged sober, and also the face of a deaf community she did not totally understand. 'I didn't realize that there were more deaf people out there, outside of Chicago, a whole community. It was bigger than what I even realized,' she said. Not Alone Anymore powers through cringey clips of interviewers asking Matlin to explain deafness. How did it feel to be deaf? Had she come to terms with it? Matlin powered through as best she could. She quickly became an activist, successfully pushing legislation in the US requiring closed captioning on TV and streaming sites. But she struggled as the lone representative of deafness for hearing people. The film lingers on backlash from the deaf community when Matlin spoke at the 1988 Oscars, which many felt encouraged the stereotype that deaf intelligence was connected to one's ability to imitate hearing speech. Matlin says the incident, fanned by hearing media attention, drove her away from the deaf community for over a decade. 'I had no guidance in terms of someone to sit down to me and explain about the language that was being used, about the language that I used,' she said. 'I had to find out the hard way.' Matlin faced similar media blowback, though of a different tenor, when she disclosed Hurt's abuse, as well as incidents of molestation by a babysitter and teacher in her childhood, in her 2009 memoir, I'll Scream Later. Not Alone Anymore again assembles very pre-#MeToo clips in which interviewers discounted or dismissed her experience. In one clip, Joy Behar asks about 'spectacular' sex with Hurt. 'Marlee has always been ahead of the curve,' said Stern of Matlin's willingness to speak up years before it became more common to do so. When Hurt died in 2022, at the age of 71, Matlin found her name once again brought up in his wake. 'On social media, I had to look at both sides of the conversations,' she recalled. In posts and comments, some people accused her of lying about the abuse; others were mad at those who accused her of crying wolf. 'They were trying to define me,' she said. 'And I would have none of that. I wanted them to stop, but at the same time, I decided to step away from the conversation' during Coda's press run. Did she wish now that she said anything? 'No, I don't,' she answered, after a beat. 'Because nothing would satisfy these people. And why should I have to? I didn't trust what would happen if I did get involved, because of my past experience of being ignored, of being overlooked, not getting any help. But it was interesting to observe, to see the two factions fighting about me thinking that they knew me.' It's a typically strident answer from Matlin, who has never minced words, particularly on how her Oscar did not open up more opportunities for deaf actors – the film's title comes from her emotional reaction to Coda costar Troy Kotsur's supporting actor Oscar in 2022, becoming only the second deaf actor to win. As with Matlin's 1987 trophy, Kotsur's win hasn't changed much. 'I'm not seeing more opportunities open up,' said Stern. 'It's still up to deaf people or people from a minority group to explain their experience to the majority,' she added. 'We continue to say what is expected of us, which is: 'Great story. Representation has changed! There's going to be so many job opportunities!' That's what people are expecting us to say. And if we say that, nothing's going to change.' 'My least favorite question is: Are you working? What's next?' said Matlin. 'I hate answering that question. I say, 'Oh, well, I have this.' I try to change the subject, talk about something else because they won't understand what I'm going through. 'It's hard to find work,' she said, but still insists: 'This is something I love to do. This is a business that I love being in. I love acting. I love it all.' Naturally, she can't say what is next – 'waiting for a yes or no, an answer, that's typically what I do' – beyond press for a film she and Stern both hope challenges some perspectives. 'I hope it makes people think. I hope that people feel seen,' said Stern. 'I hope people know that they have value in how they see the world, and you don't just have to accept how things have been done for so long.' Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore is out now in US cinemas

Daily Mail​

35 minutes ago

• Daily Mail​

Cardi B blasts ex Offset in new song amid Stefon Diggs romance

Cardi B seemingly dissed her ex, Offset, on her latest track Outside, with lyrics hinting at her latest romance with NFL star Stefon Diggs. The rapper, 32, who shares three children with Offset, 33, - Kulture, six, Wave, three, and Blossom, eight months, sang: 'Do you how you do me, bet we won't speak again. Favorite player from your favorite team, he in my DM.' She also said: 'Heard them Patriots go them n*****, let me in the locker room.' Cardi is dating Diggs, a member of the New England Patriots. It comes less than a year after the rapper filed for divorce from Offset. A few weeks ago, Cardi delved into the family finances, making a dig at her ex in posts online. She claimed Offset has not pitched in a penny for the children since their split. She claimed: 'A whole year straight, you have left me with the kids' bills. Y'all want to know what's the kids' bills? Start adding. 'My kids got their own driver - they pick them up from school, they drop them off and they take them to gymnastics and boxing classes. The kids' driver is on a retainer for $10,000 a month. 'Kulture's school this year - you didn't pay for it - that's $45,000. Wave's school a year is $35,000, which you didn't help me pay for it this year at all.' She revealed she pays a relative $3,000 weekly to babysit and a nanny for Blossom charges $500 a day. She continued: 'Kulture and Wave get tutoring four times a week. Each hour is $250. Count that up. Kulture's piano class, that's $300 an hour and she gets piano classes three times a week. 'I'm not sure how much is gymnastics and Wave's boxing classes, but I pay that too.' She was also critical of Offset for seeking spousal support in the split, again itemizing expenses she's paid for without his assistance. 'Have I asked you for anything?' Cardi asked. 'You want spousal support so bad. And mind you, this is not even including food - my kids have a personal chef that comes from 7am to 5pm that I pay for because people in my house don't have time to cook.' Cardi also said that Offset has 'seen Blossom only like five times' since her birth last fall. She added: 'I been trying to save your face. I said you can see my kids in my house. I want my daughter to feel the love of her dad. He hasn't seen his kids since March.'

The Independent

37 minutes ago

• The Independent

Meghan Markle reacts to As Ever products selling out for the second time

Showing now | Lifestyle 00:41 Brydie Monaghan Meghan Markle has reacted after nearly all of her As Ever products sell out within minutes for the second time despite her team's efforts to make sure they had more inventory. The Duchess of Sussex said "you guys are doing it again, we're nearly sold out on everything and I can't believe it." She said her and her team at the lifestyle brand had spent so much time making sure they had more stock, as she unveiled a new honey, an apricot spread and a rose wine.