This adaptation of the 2022 novel – starring Weisz, Leo Woodall and John Slattery – fits it perfectly to television. It’s a proper show for proper grownups

Vladimir is that rare visitor to the screen – proper television for proper grownups. The eight-part adaptation of Julia May Jonas’s provocative 2022 debut novel of the same name has not shied away from the properties that made the book great – black comedy, bleak insight, evisceration of accepted pieties – and fitted them perfectly to the new form. The screenwriter, Jeanie Bergen, who has obviously absorbed the book into her very bones, retains all of Jonas’s wit, confidence and, crucially, her willingness to dwell in grey areas and luxuriate in the complexities that govern life in middle age.

She also has Rachel Weisz, giving an unswervingly brilliant performance as the unnamed protagonist, a tenured English professor beloved by her students, whose husband, John (John Slattery, playing his one part, but he does it so well and so much better than anyone else, who are we to object to seeing it again?), another tenured academic on the same campus – has just been suspended for sleeping with students. His defence is that this was before the rules changed. “It was a different time” is a recurring phrase – not just from him (for here is the beginning of Jonas and Bergen’s devotion to rug-pulling) but from his wife and other members of their faculty and peer group, male and female.

This week’s events in the Middle East have sent stock markets plummeting and energy prices soaring. What does this latest economic shock mean for your own finances – from the cost of everyday items to interest rates and investments?

Post your personal finance questions for the Guardian’s money and consumer editor now

In a week where Rachel Reeves had hoped to confirm a period of economic stability in Tuesday’s spring statement, global events once more overtaken the government’s best laid plans. The US and Israel’s war on Iran has has shaken global markets and caused huge fears about energy prices and the impact they will have on inflation and the cost of living.

Hilary Osborne is the Guardian’s money and consumer editor and is answering questions about wider economic fallout – and any others you might have – live below . Please post your questions and discuss the subject below.

If you managed to grab a fixed rate below the current price cap then well done - even if it isn’t as a keen a deal as you might have got last week, you will probably still be happy with your choice if energy prices go in the direction that experts are expecting.

In April, the price cap set by the regulator, Ofgem, is set to fall to £1,641 a year for a typical household buying gas and electricity from the same supplier and paying by direct debit.

This is a tricky one - council tax bills are set to rise again in April, and in many areas they will be going up by the maximum 4.99% that can be applied without a referendum. As an individual there is not much you can do about this, beyond checking if you are entitled to any discount. If you live on your own you should be entitled to 25% off your annual bill, and there are certain people who are exempt from being charged, including students. To check if you qualify to pay less, you can put your postcode into the government website and it will direct you to the right page on your council’s site. If you’re really struggling, do tell your council as they often have discretionary help available. Don’t wait to get into arrears as councils can escalate debts quickly and ask you to pay your entire annual bill after just one missed payment. This is something debt charities are currently lobbying the government to change.

Tourism in Mexico is at an all-time high, with foreign visitors lured by the country’s rich culture and low costs. The Guardian visits Oaxaca, a state synonymous with indigenous culture, where tourism has grown 77% since the pandemic and once private family rituals such as the Day of the Dead are now big international parties. But with this opportunity comes a growing backlash across the country, as local people struggle with a cost of living crisis that is exacerbated by the tourism industry’s exponential growth

From grappling at corners to VAR, the endless list of complaints reflects a wider sense of dislocation from ‘the product’

A terrible boredom stalks the land. Across the nation’s television studios and podcast armchairs, wearied men grizzle accursedly with forked tongues into branded microphones: entombed by a game they despise and yet are paid so generously to discuss. Out there in the wild digital beyond, the sickness festers still deeper. The game has gone, they type into a little white box. This is not the football I once loved, click send. The beautiful game is broken, pleads the Telegraph. They think it’s all over, and perhaps it always was.

Arne Slot is no longer enjoying himself, and presumably a good proportion of the Liverpool fans at Molineux on Tuesday night know exactly how he feels. John Terry is no longer enjoying himself. Yaya Touré is “disappointed”. Ruud Gullit is so disgusted he has decided to stop watching. Chris Sutton thinks Arsenal will be the ugliest winners in Premier League history. Mark Goldbridge is bored out of his mind, albeit nowhere near as bored as you would presumably need to be to watch a Mark Goldbridge livestream.

With many lacking official documentation or unable to speak Ukrainian, the families of men killed in action are struggling to get the compensation they are owed

As a father of four, Viktor Ilchak was not supposed to serve in the army. Ukraine does not mobilise men who have three or more children. His wife and children cried and begged him not to go to war. But he had made up his mind. “A typical Capricorn, so stubborn,” says his wife, Sveta.

It was 2015, the war in Donbas was growing in intensity. “I heard someone on TV complaining that Roma aren’t defending their homeland. This pissed me off, and so I volunteered,” says Ilchak. In the territorial recruitment centre in Uzhhorod the Ukrainian soldiers were surprised, but they had to take him.

When Nato helped overthrow Gaddafi in 2011, there were hopes of a new beginning. More than a decade later, a former CIA asset runs the country – and Libya has become yet another lesson in the unintended consequences of foreign intervention

In July 2025, four of Europe’s most senior officials landed in eastern Libya for an urgent meeting. Italy’s interior minister had watched migrant arrivals surge during the previous six months. Greece’s migration chief was reeling after 2,000 people reached Crete in a single week. Malta’s home minister feared his island was next. And the EU’s migration commissioner was scrambling to rescue an agreement worth many hundreds of millions that was visibly failing to stop the boats.

Libya is a place where crises converge. Its 1,100-mile coastline, the Mediterranean’s longest, has become the main departure point for migrants heading north. Since Muammar Gaddafi was toppled in 2011, the country has been torn apart by successive civil wars. Russia, Turkey, Egypt and the UAE arm rival factions, and the contest no longer stops at Libya’s borders. From military bases in the south, Russia and the UAE funnel weapons and fighters into Sudan’s civil war, which has driven hundreds of thousands more refugees north towards Libya’s coast.

PM also confirms that the first repatriation flight for Britons in the region has taken off

She says “we will always offer protection to genuine refugees” and outlines how the UK has taken in Ukrainian and Hong Kong refugees.

She says “restoring control at our borders is not a betrayal of Labour values”. She says we must attract high-skilled workers. And that “the privilege of living in this country forever must be earned”.

Tehran denies responsibility but strike raises prospect of US-Israel war on Iran spreading beyond Middle East

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Azerbaijan has accused Iran of a drone attack that struck the region of Nakhchivan, hitting an airport and injuring two civilians.

The strike would be the first Iranian attack on a Caucasus state since the start of the US-Israel war on the country, and raises the prospect of the conflict spreading beyond the Middle East.

The Guardian asked US readers about the military action in Iran – their responses were largely disapproving

As hundreds of civilians and some US service members have been killed in the aftermath of the 28 February strike against Iran by the United States and Israel, the Guardian asked readers in the US what their thoughts are on the latest military action in Iran.

Their responses were largely disapproving, with some acknowledging that the Iranian regime needed to be toppled, even with a high cost.

Economic ripples from US-Israel attacks will soon become waves, engulfing everything from energy prices to food

In retaliation for the US-Israeli missile attacks, Iran has launched what amounts to all-out economic warfare. Should the conflict continue even for another week, its impacts will start to be felt around the world as the third price surge since the pandemic washes through global markets.

For Britain, a further turn of the screw on living standards arrives just as political instability mounts at home, with the Labour and Conservative parties facing existential challenges to their left and right.