The Volley Predictor builds on the success of the VNL and Women’s World Championships Volley Predictors, which brought thousands of fans worldwide into the action earlier this year.
Game 1: Step into the role of coach
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Game 2: Match predictor – guess match results and challenge your friends!
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The Volleyball Predictor transforms the way fans can follow the World Championships. When your middle blocker shuts down an opponent, or your outside hitter delivers a world-class ace, you’ll feel the impact on the court and on your app.
It’s the perfect mix of strategy, competition and fun, whether you’re a lifelong fan or a newcomer eager to learn more about the game.
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Of course, sadly missing from the grand reunion that was The Grand Finale was the late Maggie Smith, who played Robert’s mother, Violet. Dockery remembers Smith’s wit and sardonic humor on set—and her own Dowagerisms—fondly. A final scene sees Mary survey the empty Downton Abbey hallway as memories of the Dowager Countess and Mary’s late sister Sybil (Jessica Brown Findlay) flash before her. The sound department actually played the music that would overlay the scene as Dockery acted.
“In some ways, that was a great idea—in others, not so much. I kept bursting into tears!” she says. “The poor makeup department! I had to attempt to look as stoic as Mary is. But it’s a beautiful ending, and a touching tribute to Maggie.”
Dockery first saw the film at a cast screening a few months ago. What first set her off: when Robert asks Mr. Bates, his faithful valet, “Do you remember where it all began?” “I just cried and cried from there,” she says. Bonneville, sitting behind her, grabbed her hand for the last 15 minutes and didn’t let go.
A phenomenon from its first season in 2010, Downton Abbey stood out from the steady supply of small-screen Brontë and Austen adaptations for being a new story—albeit with jaunty nods to real-life nobility and historical figures. “When we first aired, period dramas weren’t being celebrated like they are now,” says Dockery. (Just this year, we’ve had the likes of Miss Austen, the Mitford sisters drama Outrageous, and, of course, Season 3 of Fellowes’s The Gilded Age air.) “It was a risk to do it—the appetite wasn’t there. I’ll never forget the call when I got it, and I feel proud that we’ve made something that’s resonated.”
“It was the beginning of a new golden age for television,” Dockery continues. “You see the influence Downton has on shows like Bridgerton, and Julian is going forth with The Gilded Age. I’m sure that’s a lot of the original Downton audience.” Dockery, will always appreciate Fellowes’s ability to “write for women so well, with strength and vulnerability and joy.”
Footballer Etzaz Hussain at the Pakistan Embassy in Oslo, Norway. — File
KARACHI: Pakistan football received a significant boost after FIFA approved the change of sporting nationality for midfielder Etzaz Hussain, clearing the Norway-born player to represent the national team.
The 32-year-old, who previously played alongside striker Erling Haaland at Molde FK, completed the formal switch following FIFA’s confirmation earlier this week.
Hussain had secured a Pakistani passport in early 2024 and had already voiced his ambition to wear the green jersey.
One of the most decorated players in Norwegian football, Hussain has won four Eliteserien league titles and three Norwegian Cups with Molde, sharing the distinction of being the club’s joint-most successful player with seven trophies.
Over his career, he has made nearly 300 professional appearances, including stints in Turkey with Sivasspor, in Croatia with NK Rudeš, in Cyprus with Apollon Limassol, and most recently with Norwegian second-tier club Odd.
Born in Oslo in 1993 to parents from Kharian, Gujrat, Hussain began his football journey at Langhus before joining Manchester United’s youth academy in 2009.
Although he did not break into the first team at Old Trafford, he described his time at United as “an experience for life.” He made his professional debut with Fredrikstad in 2011, scoring a decisive goal in the Norwegian Cup the same year.
At Molde, Hussain reunited with Ole Gunnar Solskjær and became a key figure in the club’s domestic success, scoring in both league and European competitions.
He also represented Norway at youth levels from U16 to U23 but remained eligible to play for Pakistan, having never played for Norway at senior competitive level.
With his eligibility now confirmed, Hussain is expected to bring experience and stability to Pakistan’s midfield, strengthening the squad ahead of upcoming international fixtures.
“This is a very important development for Pakistan football,” said a Pakistan Football official. “Having a player of Etzaz Hussain’s caliber and experience will inspire the team and fans alike.”
Hussain has previously expressed pride in his Pakistani roots and was honored by the Pakistan embassy in Oslo during Independence Day celebrations in 2021.
Amber Pegler has been captivated by the “Demon Slayer” anime franchise since first reading the manga years ago.
She’s watched the whole series, which focuses on a young boy searching for a cure to save his sister, cursed by a demon that killed the rest of his family. The 32-year-old costume designer loves the art style, particularly during the fighting sequences, and can’t wait for the film “Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle” to hit U.S. theaters this weekend.
“The ‘Infinity Castle’ is a really gut-punching final arc,” said the Long Beach resident. “It’s about navigating the big world, and sometimes the big world has big demons.”
The Sony Pictures title, released through the studio’s anime banner Crunchyroll, could be No. 1 at the domestic box office, with expectations ranging from $40 million to as high as $60 million. It could beat fellow openers “Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale,” “The Long Walk” (based on a Stephen King novel) and “Spinal Tap II: The End Continues.” Advance ticket sales look promising — Fandango reported that the movie is the best first-day ticket pre-seller ever for an anime film.
Globally, “Demon Slayer” has already made more than $272 million in box office revenue, with $213 million in Japan alone.
The hype around the upcoming “Demon Slayer” movie has highlighted the growing demand for anime. Once considered niche, the Japanese animation style has long been popular, especially in the U.S., but the pandemic fueled a bump in viewership and introduced new audiences to the shows and films. Streaming platforms including Crunchyroll, Netflix and Hulu have responded in kind, increasing stables of anime content, particularly because it appeals to younger viewers.
“Even 10 years ago, anime was big, but it was still considered a niche,” said Rahul Purini, president of Crunchyroll, an anime streaming service. “We don’t consider it to be a niche anymore. It is mainstream, as mainstream as it could get.”
That mainstream interest is showing up in the response to the new “Demon Slayer” movie around the world, providing a needed surprise hit to beleaguered movie theater operators after a bruising summer.
It’s Imax’s highest-grossing local language film released outside of China.
“Imax has been a unique beneficiary of the popularity of anime,” said Rich Gelfond, company chief executive. “As anime gains worldwide audiences, we can really lever off that and take advantage in many countries, not just one. It really travels very well.”
That international interest is key, particularly for the companies that are doubling down on anime. Crunchyroll executives say the brand’s core markets are in the U.S., Canada, Britain, Australia and New Zealand, with fast-growing audiences in countries like France, Germany, Brazil and Mexico. The streamer also sees emerging markets in India, Southeast Asia and Spain.
Netflix now has subtitled anime in 33 languages and dubbed titles in about a dozen, said Yuji Yamano, Netflix’s director of content acquisition in Japan, who joined the company in 2019 to lead the licensing and acquisition of local live-action and anime content. The Los Gatos-based streaming service has seen the viewing hours for anime triple during the last five years.
“Anime has always been viewed by global audiences, but the audience size is really, really growing since we’ve been introducing it on Netflix,” he said through an interpreter. “There’s a lot of potential for it to grow even further.”
What drives that interest? Experts and fans say audiences are attracted to the nuanced storylines that deal with darker themes and mirror the increasing complexities of our world.
The Crunchyroll series “Solo Leveling,” adapted from a South Korean web novel, examines economic inequality through the lens of characters who develop supernatural powers to fight monsters. Class conflict is a central theme of a recently released Crunchyroll series called “Gachiakuta,” in which poor people are forced to live outside of the city, divided from the rest of society by a large white wall.
“Anime is not quite going to give us the easy certainties,” said Susan Napier, a professor of Japanese studies at Tufts University. “The world does have darkness. Anime allows us to process … some of these really conflicting, difficult emotions we have.”
The growth of anime on streaming platforms has also helped boost interest.
Decades ago, U.S. fans resorted to VHS recordings or burned DVDs with fan-made English subtitles. Others, like Matt Lewis, got hooked first through television cartoons, such as Cartoon Network, including Warner Bros.’ “Toonami” programming block. Today, Lewis works as a promotions director for Anime Los Angeles, a fan convention.
“Over the years, as anime got more popular, as anime became way more accessible through Crunchyroll, streaming, Netflix … more people just naturally got into that community,” he said.
In 2023, anime made up $5.5 billion of global streaming revenue, averaging about 6% of all genres, according to the most recent data from research firm Parrot Analytics.
Companies such as Crunchyroll have capitalized on fan interest by expanding into online merchandise, which is a major part of anime fandom, as well as digital manga, games and music. The streamer has also sponsored anime nights with MLB teams including the Dodgers, and collaborated with the English Premier League, NBA and NASCAR.
“We are here to help elevate and celebrate creator stories,” said Gita Rebbapragada, Crunchyroll’s chief operating officer. “When fans want to go deeper, there’s a home for them at Crunchyroll, with so much to offer with the streaming service, but also with the other pieces that help them connect to their favorite characters.”
Crunchyroll has 17 million subscribers as of May, up from 15 million late last year and 13 million in January 2024, Sony said. Last year, Crunchyroll’s global streaming revenue from anime titles totaled $1.4 billion, according to data from Parrot Analytics. Sony declined to comment on Parrot’s estimates.
Sony acquired Crunchyroll from AT&T in 2020 for $1.2 billion. At the time, Sony already owned anime subscription service Funimation, which was known for its dubbed titles. The two platforms later merged to create what the company says is the single largest library of anime in the world, with 25,000 hours, or 50,000 episodes, of content.
The combined service allows fans to view dubbed and subtitled content in one place. In August, the company announced a restructuring that included layoffs. Crunchyroll did not disclose the number of layoffs, but in an internal memo, Purini said the restructuring was to address the company’s growth and part of a “new organizational model that supports regionally-empowered teams.”
What anime has lacked is a big, breakout live-action hit to catapult it into mainstream Hollywood, said Douglas Montgomery, market advisor for Parrot Analytics. Though there have been attempts, such as 2017’s controversial live-action “Ghost in the Shell,” starring Scarlett Johansson, and the John Cho-led series remake “Cowboy Bebop” in 2021, both flopped.
“There is a success case,” he said. “But until there’s two or three more of those, I think the the ultimate growth of anime as a visual form would be limited.”
When two black holes merge, they release gravitational waves. These waves can be picked up by detectors on Earth, allowing scientists to better understand them.
Maggie Chiang/Simons Foundation
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Maggie Chiang/Simons Foundation
On September 14, 2015, physicists attained the long-sought goal of detecting gravitational waves, the shockwaves spewed out by such cataclysmic events as the violent merger of two black holes.
This huge breakthrough quickly garnered three of the effort’s key figures the physics Nobel Prize. In the ten years since then, scientists have detected hundreds of black holes coming together, as well as other extreme cosmic events like neutron stars colliding and black holes merging with a neutron star.
Now, in the journal Physical Review Letters, researchers say their ability to analyze gravitational waves has improved so much over the past decade that they were recently able to verify a key idea about the growth of black holes — one put forth by Stephen Hawking back in 1971.
“There’s a very famous statement in physics that Stephen Hawking worked out, which is that the area, the surface area, of black holes can never decrease,” explains Maximiliano Isi, an astrophysicist with Columbia University and the Flatiron Institute.
And he says that’s just what scientists observed after analyzing gravitational waves detected earlier this year. On January 14, detectors registered gravitational waves that came from two colliding black holes about 1.3 billion light-years away.
These black holes had masses between 30 to 40 times that of our Sun, so their collision was very similar to the one that led to the first gravitational wave detection back in 2015. Since that time, however, the pair of giant detectors run by LIGO, in Louisiana and Washington state, have been repeatedly upgraded.
“Because the detectors are so much better today, we can record the signal so much more clearly,” says Katerina Chatziioannou, a gravitational wave physicist at Caltech.
That allowed them to perform a new analysis showing that between the two of them, the initial black holes had a combined surface area of 240,000 square kilometers (roughly the size of Oregon). After they merged to form a single black hole, its area was about 400,000 square kilometers (roughly the size of California).
Hawking’s theory says that the final area of the black hole has to be bigger than the sum of the two initial areas, says Chatziioannou, “and this is what we demonstrated observationally with that signal.”
This kind of proof is just what Hawking hoped for a decade ago, when the first gravitational wave detection was announced. He actually reached out to one of the scientists involved in that effort to see if gravitational waves could be used to test this prediction, says Isi.
Back then, though, it just wasn’t possible because there was too much noise in the data and the analytic techniques hadn’t advanced enough.
Hawking died in 2018. “It’s unfortunate that Hawking is not around anymore, but certainly this is a way in which his legacy lives on,” says Isi.
“All of these ideas that people thought up in the 70’s, thinking it was just idle speculation, now they are manifested in actual data,” adds Isi. “We see these things happening almost exactly as predicted.”
Albert Einstein, who predicted the existence of gravitational waves in 1916, thought that they’d never be detected. “If we told him that we are detecting gravitational waves from colliding black holes every other day, or every two or three days or so,” says Isi, “I’m sure it would have been mind blowing to him.”
Overall, researchers have been surprised by how many merging black holes they have seen, says gravitational wave researcher Gabriela González with Louisiana State University.
“We have seen so many black hole mergers. We are learning so much about them that sometimes I feel tempted to call this ‘black hole astronomy’ rather than ‘gravitational wave astronomy,’” she says.
She would have predicted that they’d see far more mergers between neutron stars, but they’ve only seen a couple examples of that so far.
That could change, as researchers are already working on plans for new, even bigger gravitational wave detectors that would be ten times more sensitive. “That’s our dream,” she says, adding that in another decade, these detectors could be under construction — perhaps even completed.
Assuming researchers get the funding, that is. The current LIGO observatory, which is funded by the National Science Foundation, is facing potential budget cuts, with the Trump administration proposing steep reductions in 2026.
People are turning to Chatbots like Claude to get help interpreting their lab test results.
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When Judith Miller had routine blood work done in July, she got a phone alert the same day that her lab results were posted online. So, when her doctor messaged her the next day that overall her tests were fine, Miller wrote back to ask about the elevated carbon dioxide and something called “low anion gap” listed in the report.
While the 76-year-old Milwaukee resident waited to hear back, Miller did something patients increasingly do when they can’t reach their health care team. She put her test results into Claude and asked the AI assistant to evaluate the data.
“Claude helped give me a clear understanding of the abnormalities,” Miller said. The generative AI model didn’t report anything alarming, so she wasn’t anxious while waiting to hear back from her doctor, she said.
Patients have unprecedented access to their medical records, often through online patient portals such as MyChart, because federal law requires health organizations to immediately release electronic health information, such as notes on doctor visits and test results.
And many patients are using large language models, or LLMs, like OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Anthropic’s Claude, and Google’s Gemini, to interpret their records. That help comes with some risk, though. Physicians and patient advocates warn that AI chatbots can produce wrong answers and that sensitive medical information might not remain private.
But does AI know what it’s talking about?
Yet, most adults are cautious about AI and health. Fifty-six percent of those who use or interact with AI are not confident that information provided by AI chatbots is accurate, according to a 2024 KFF poll. (KFF is a health information nonprofit that includes KFF Health News.)
That instinct is born out in research.
“LLMs are theoretically very powerful and they can give great advice, but they can also give truly terrible advice depending on how they’re prompted,” said Adam Rodman, an internist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Massachusetts and chair of a steering group on generative AI at Harvard Medical School.
Justin Honce, a neuroradiologist at UCHealth in Colorado, said it can be very difficult for patients who are not medically trained to know whether AI chatbots make mistakes.
“Ultimately, it’s just the need for caution overall with LLMs. With the latest models, these concerns are continuing to get less and less of an issue but have not been entirely resolved,” Honce said.
Rodman has seen a surge in AI use among his patients in the past six months. In one case, a patient took a screenshot of his hospital lab results on MyChart then uploaded them to ChatGPT to prepare questions ahead of his appointment. Rodman said he welcomes patients’ showing him how they use AI, and that their research creates an opportunity for discussion.
Roughly 1 in 7 adults over 50 use AI to receive health information, according to a recent poll from the University of Michigan, while 1 in 4 adults under age 30 do so, according to the KFF poll.
Using the internet to advocate for better care for oneself isn’t new. Patients have traditionally used websites such as WebMD, PubMed, or Google to search for the latest research and have sought advice from other patients on social media platforms like Facebook or Reddit. But AI chatbots’ ability to generate personalized recommendations or second opinions in seconds is novel.
What to know: Watch out for “hallucinations” and privacy issues
Liz Salmi, communications and patient initiatives director at OpenNotes, an academic lab at Beth Israel Deaconess that advocates for transparency in health care, had wondered how good AI is at interpretation, specifically for patients.
In a proof-of-concept study published this year, Salmi and colleagues analyzed the accuracy of ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini responses to patients’ questions about a clinical note. All three AI models performed well, but how patients framed their questions mattered, Salmi said. For example, telling the AI chatbot to take on the persona of a clinician and asking it one question at a time improved the accuracy of its responses.
Privacy is a concern, Salmi said, so it’s critical to remove personal information like your name or Social Security number from prompts. Data goes directly to tech companies that have developed AI models, Rodman said, adding that he is not aware of any that comply with federal privacy law or consider patient safety. Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, warned on a podcast last month about putting personal information into ChatGPT.
“Many people who are new to using large language models might not know about hallucinations,” Salmi said, referring to a response that may appear sensible but is inaccurate. For example, OpenAI’s Whisper, an AI-assisted transcription tool used in hospitals, introduced an imaginary medical treatment into a transcript, according to a report by The Associated Press.
Using generative AI demands a new type of digital health literacy that includes asking questions in a particular way, verifying responses with other AI models, talking to your health care team, and protecting your privacy online, said Salmi and Dave deBronkart, a cancer survivor and patient advocate who writes a blog devoted to patients’ use of AI.
Physicians must be cautious with AI too
Patients aren’t the only ones using AI to explain test results. Stanford Health Care has launched an AI assistant that helps its physicians draft interpretations of clinical tests and lab results to send to patients.
Colorado researchers studied the accuracy of ChatGPT-generated summaries of 30 radiology reports, along with four patients’ satisfaction with them. Of the 118 valid responses from patients, 108 indicated the ChatGPT summaries clarified details about the original report.
But ChatGPT sometimes overemphasized or underemphasized findings, and a small but significant number of responses indicated patients were more confused after reading the summaries, said Honce, who participated in the preprint study.
Meanwhile, after four weeks and a couple of follow-up messages from Miller in MyChart, Miller’s doctor ordered a repeat of her blood work and an additional test that Miller suggested. The results came back normal. Miller was relieved and said she was better informed because of her AI inquiries.
“It’s a very important tool in that regard,” Miller said. “It helps me organize my questions and do my research and level the playing field.”
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF .
Skywatchers at Nasa have discounted a Harvard astronomer’s hypothesis that a rare interstellar object hurtling through our solar system is a relic from a civilization in another celestial neighborhood, and “could potentially be dire for humanity”.
Avi Loeb, head of Harvard University’s Galileo Project, which searches for evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence, raised eyebrows by suggesting in a scientific paper in July that Comet 3I/Atlas, set for a close pass with Mars next month, could be artificially made.
It is only the third known object originating outside the solar system to pass through and was named for the Asteroid Terrestrial-Impact Last Alert System (Atlas) survey telescope in Río Hurtado, Chile, that discovered it on 1 July.
Loeb says observations of the object so far have not revealed gaseous tails of dust and plasma common to comets originating inside the solar system, and have shown it following an unorthodox trajectory, suggesting “a technological artifact” with “active intelligence”.
“[If] future data will indicate the absence of a cometary tail, we will be faced with the tantalizing possibility that it did not inherit a random velocity in interstellar space but instead was sent towards the inner solar system by design,” Loeb wrote in a blogpost.
Even more sinister, Loeb asserts in his paper, is the possibility of the object performing a clandestine deep space maneuver while it is hidden behind the sun in late October, then setting course for a “malign intent” rendezvous with Earth.
“The consequences, should the hypothesis turn out to be correct, could potentially be dire for humanity, and would possibly require defensive measures to be undertaken, though these might prove futile,” he wrote.
Loeb’s postulation, to which he admits he does not necessarily subscribe, but which he contends is at least worthy of analysis, failed to impress experts at Nasa. The space agency has been studying the object closely through ground and space telescopes since it was first spotted, and state categorically it poses no threat to Earth.
“It looks like a comet. It does comet things. It very, very strongly resembles, in just about every way, the comets that we know,” said Tom Statler, Nasa’s lead scientist for solar system small bodies.
“It has some interesting properties that are a little bit different from our solar system comets, but it behaves like a comet. And so the evidence is overwhelmingly pointing to this object being a natural body. It’s a comet.”
Imagery from the Hubble space telescope suggests it is up to 3.5 miles (5.6km) wide, and traveling at 130,000mph (209,000km/h), the highest velocity ever recorded for a visitor to the solar system.
Statler said all comets, not just those that are interstellar, exhibit some elements of anomaly.
“Comets are mixtures of dust and ice, they’re being heated by the sun, that heating is changing, and exactly how they respond to that is something that’s a bit unpredictable,” he said.
“So even in our solar system, comets can have a history of suddenly brightening if there’s, say, a particular pocket of ice that sublimates quickly and drives off a large amount of dust.
“It’s the sort of thing that our comet observers and experts are prepared for, and presents an opportunity to get more information.”
Statler said the object would not come closer to Earth than about 170m miles due to the positions of the planets over the next few months. It will make close passes with Mars, Jupiter and Venus.
“It’s special because we now have the ability to discover these interstellar comets,” he said.
“It’s not that they’re really anything new, but we’ve just recently had the ability to discover them, and we’ve discovered only three so far. This gives us a window we’ve never had before, directly into the composition of other solar systems.”
Loeb, meanwhile, acknowledged in his blogpost that “the simplest hypothesis is that 3I/ATLAS is a comet”, and that he was raising alternative possibilities as an exercise in challenging preconceived ideas.
“Let us instead maintain our childhood curiosity and seek evidence rather than pretend to be the adults in the room that know the answers in advance,” he wrote.
“The hypothesis is an interesting exercise in its own right, and is fun to pursue, irrespective of its likely validity.”
Two of Britain’s leading green industrialists have called on the government to abandon plans to ban new North Sea oil and gas projects.
Dale Vince, a green entrepreneur and a Labour party donor, has urged the government to support the declining oil basin as the UK reduces its reliance on fossil fuels to “optimise” its remaining resources.
The founder of Ecotricity spoke out against the government’s plan to scrap new licences for oil and gas projects a week after Greg Jackson, the founder of Octopus Energy and a Cabinet Office adviser, backed calls to restart North Sea drilling.
Vince said the government should scrap the windfall tax on the North Sea and offer subsidies to oil companies that guarantee a minimum price for the barrels of oil and gas they produce.
“Our North Sea is in decline, let’s protect it during the transition and optimise our use of the resources that are left,” he told the Daily Telegraph. “We should scrap the windfall tax and protect the industry and its workers – we need to avoid the destruction of the industry or we will see a repeat of what happened to our coalminers.”
Dale Vince: ‘Our North Sea is in decline, let’s protect it during the transition and optimise our use of the resources that are left.’ Photograph: Simon Marper/PA
Jackson said last week that relying on North Sea oil and gas would have a smaller climate impact than relying on costly imports from the US and the Middle East, which release more emissions during production and transportation than homegrown fossil fuels.
“When we’re shipping LNG, liquefied natural gas, around the world, it is a lot dirtier than using locally produced gas,” Jackson told the Telegraph. “British gas producers won’t be selling it any cheaper than the global market. But it is cleaner and it reduces the backlash against climate policy. I’ve got no problem with it.”
The green industry leaders have spoken out against the government’s North Sea stance amid growing pressure from opposition parties to support the industry, which supports about 130,000 jobs and contributed more than £6bn in tax receipts to the government in the last financial year and £9bn the year before.
The Conservative party leader, Kemi Badenoch, said the party would aim to “maximise extraction” of oil and gas in the North Sea if it won the next election. Reform UK has also promised to reverse Labour’s ban as a “day one” priority if it comes to power.
The Guardian reported over the summer that senior government advisers had told North Sea investors that new drilling could still move ahead despite the election promise to ban it, provided the projects were close to existing pipeline infrastructure and did not extend into “greenfield” areas.
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“Myself and a number of colleagues have been told that the government is moving towards the idea of allowing new licences,” one energy investor said.
The source said that while Treasury officials were open to considering future North Sea oil and gas projects, the plans were unlikely to be well received by Ed Miliband, the secretary of state of the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero.
Miliband reportedly refused to leave his post in Keir Starmer’s reshuffle last week. The ITV political editor, Robert Peston, who first reported the claims, said it was “one part of the reshuffle that didn’t quite go Starmer’s way”.
Call me foolish. Call me naive. But not too long ago, I truly believed that the big categories in this year’s Emmys were going to come down to the wire. That when that final envelope was opened, we’d be on the edge of our seats… or at the very least not completely numbed to the inevitability of the winners.
It could still happen, of course. I’m ready for “The Pitt” to make me cry again should the throwback medical drama prevail for drama series.
But I’m not holding my breath. This year’s Emmys look like they’ll be continuing the trend of rewarding a handful of shows — “The Studio,” “Severance” and “Adolescence” are the big three — at the expense of everyone else. Sure, other series will pick up a trophy here and there: Jean Smart will not be denied! But by and large, if you made even a cursory effort at keeping up with TV this year, you’ll know the winners already. And one of them will be Stephen Colbert, who might have something interesting to say, given that the Emmys are airing on CBS, the network that unceremoniously canceled his show.
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So there’s one reason to watch. And if you love the other heavy favorites, not to mention icons like Harrison Ford and Kathy Bates, maybe there’s more. Here are my final predictions for the 77th Primetime Emmys on Sept. 14.
Comedy Series
Ike Barinholtz, left, Chase Sui Wonders, Seth Rogen and Kathryn Hahn in “The Studio.”
(Apple)
“Abbott Elementary” “The Bear” “Hacks” “Nobody Wants This” “Only Murders in the Building” “Shrinking” “The Studio” “What We Do in the Shadows”
“Hacks” won last year, riding the sentiment that “The Bear” was most definitely not a comedy. Guess what? “Hacks” wasn’t exactly a laugh riot this season, opening the door for “The Studio,” a show that is both funny and somehow affectionate in its clear-eyed look at the compromises baked into making movies (and occasionally art) in Hollywood.
Comedy Actress
Jean Smart in “Hacks” Season 4.
(Jake Giles Netter / Max)
Kristen Bell, “Nobody Wants This” Uzo Aduba, “The Residence” Quinta Brunson, “Abbott Elementary” Ayo Edebiri, “The Bear” Jean Smart, “Hacks”
Smart won for the first three seaons of “Hacks” and is on one of those runs like Julia Louis-Dreyfus enjoyed with “Veep.” The only thing that will stop her is the end of the show.
Comedy Actor
Adam Brody, “Nobody Wants This” Seth Rogen, “The Studio” Jason Segel, “Shrinking” Martin Short, “Only Murders in the Building” Jeremy Allen White, “The Bear”
Before “The Studio” vacuumed up 23 Emmy nominations, setting a record for a first-year show, I thought Short might have a shot at winning his first acting Emmy. You know he’d deliver one of the all-time great acceptance speeches. But it’ll have to wait. The momentum is with Rogen, who played cringe comedy to perfection on “The Studio.”
Comedy Supporting Actress
Hannah Einbinder in “Hacks” Season 4.
(Max)
Liza Colón-Zayas, “The Bear” Hannah Einbinder, “Hacks” Kathryn Hahn, “The Studio” Janelle James, “Abbott Elementary” Catherine O’Hara, “The Studio” Sheryl Lee Ralph, “Abbott Elementary” Jessica Williams, “Shrinking”
Is the fourth time the charm for Einbinder? I was sure she’d win last year when the third season of “Hacks” ended with her character, Ava, pulling off a delightful double-cross. But Colón-Zayas wound up with the Emmy, probably for the episode of “The Bear” that she’s nominated for this year. (“The Bear” drops its new seasons in June, so the episodes, in this case the Colón-Zayas showcase “Napkins,” are fresh in voters’ minds.) Would it be funny if she won again? For everyone but Einbinder, yes. (“Napkins” is that good.) Would it be surprising if comedy legend O’Hara takes the Emmy in a “Studio” sweep? Not at all. But Einbinder, essentially a co-lead on “Hacks,” feels like the safest choice.
Comedy Supporting Actor
Harrison Ford with Wendie Malick in “Shrinking” Season 2.
(Beth Dubber / Apple TV+)
Ike Barinholtz, “The Studio” Colman Domingo, “The Four Seasons” Harrison Ford, “Shrinking” Jeff Hiller, “Somebody Somewhere” Ebon Moss-Bachrach, “The Bear” Michael Urie, “Shrinking” Bowen Yang, “Saturday Night Live”
There are two impulses at war here. One: Give Ford, 83, an Emmy! If not now, when? Two: Give it to Barinholtz (more deserving), just to hear him say a variation of “Thank you, Sal Saperstein” from the stage. Sentiment wins. Go with Ford.
Drama Series
Adam Scott and Britt Lower in “Severance” Season 2.
(Jon Pack / Apple TV+)
“Andor” “The Diplomat” “The Last of Us” “Paradise” “The Pitt” “Severance” “Slow Horses” “The White Lotus”
Some have boiled this race down to the heart (“The Pitt”) vs. the head (“Severance”), an oversimplification which ignores how smartly “The Pitt” wove topical issues into its storylines and how the “Severance” finale emotionally floored so many of us. They’re both great shows on multiple levels. As for the winner, for me, it’s a case of numbers. “Severance” earned 27 nominations to 13 for “The Pitt.” That widespread support makes it the favorite.
Drama Actress
Kathy Bates in “Matlock.”
(Brooke Palmer / CBS)
Kathy Bates, “Matlock” Sharon Horgan, “Bad Sisters” Britt Lower, “Severance” Bella Ramsey, “The Last of Us” Keri Russell, “The Diplomat”
First Smart, then Ford, now Bates. A banner night for boomers! In Bates’ case, it’s also a victory for broadcast television and the notion that reboots don’t have to be awful.
Drama Actor
Noah Wyle in “The Pitt.”
(Warrick Page / HBO Max)
Sterling K. Brown, “Paradise” Gary Oldman, “Slow Horses” Pedro Pascal, “The Last of Us” Adam Scott, “Severance” Noah Wyle, “The Pitt”
Every member of “The Pitt” ensemble deserves a prize. And every member of “The Pitt” ensemble will receive a prize next year when the show wins the cast honor at the Screen Actors Guild Awards. In the meantime, we have Wyle, the actor who gave the show its aching heart. Many of my favorite series — “Mad Men,” “The Sopranos,” “Breaking Bad” — revolve around antiheroes. “Succession” had a family full of them. So what Wyle does on “The Pitt” is almost revolutionary, fashioning a captivating character who makes you want to do better.
Drama Supporting Actress
Carrie Coon in “The White Lotus.”
(HBO)
Patricia Arquette, “Severance” Carrie Coon, “The White Lotus” Katherine LaNasa, “The Pitt” Julianne Nicholson, “Paradise” Parker Posey, “The White Lotus” Natasha Rothwell, “The White Lotus” Aimee Lou Wood, “The White Lotus”
With four “White Lotus” nominees, it’s possible that they split the vote, allowing LaNasa to win for another aspirational character on “The Pitt,” the resilient charge nurse who keeps the ER functioning. That would not be unwelcome. But when multiple actors from a show (or movie) are nominated, voters tend to coalesce behind one nominee, and in this case it would be Coon, who has the big, real-talk speech about friendship in the “White Lotus” finale. That monologue, which put a bow on a frustrating season, probably earns Coon the Emmy.
Drama Supporting Actor
Tramell Tillman in “Severance” Season 2.
(Apple TV+)
Zach Cherry, “Severance” Walton Goggins, “The White Lotus” Jason Isaacs, “The White Lotus” James Marsden, “Paradise” Sam Rockwell, “The White Lotus” John Turturro, “Severance” Tramell Tillman, “Severance”
Goggins could well win. Look at all those “White Lotus” acting nominations. Someone liked the show — or at least watched it, mostly so they could complain about its pacing. But support for Tillman and the way he showed the vulnerabilities of Mr. Milchick, Lumon’s most loyal foot soldier, has built steadily throughout the season. “What does it mean to be in a world that you are not represented in?” Tillman mused of his role. “And how does Milchick buy into that?” The same could be said of Tillman’s place in this year’s Emmys. If he wins, he will likely be the only person of color collecting a trophy at the ceremony.
Limited Series
Stephen Graham, left, and Owen Cooper in “Adolescence.”
(Netflix)
“Adolescence” “Black Mirror” “Dying for Sex” “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story” “The Penguin”
Last year it was “Baby Reindeer.” This year, “Adolescence.” Does Netflix have a line on the next hit U.K. limited series for 2026?
Limited Series / TV Movie Actress
Cristin Milioti in “The Penguin.”
(Macall Polay / HBO)
Cate Blanchett, “Disclaimer” Meghann Fahy, “Sirens” Cristin Milioti, “The Penguin” Rashida Jones, “Black Mirror” Michelle Williams, “Dying for Sex”
If it feels like we’ve been talking about “The Penguin” forever, it’s because we have. The show premiered nearly a year ago. Milioti had the misfortune of competing against Jessica Gunning’s undeniable performance on “Baby Reindeer,” losing to her earlier this year at the Golden Globes and SAG Awards. Now that she’s free and clear, it’s Milioti’s time to shine.
Limited Series / TV Movie Actor
Colin Farrell in “The Penguin.”
(Macall Polay / HBO)
Colin Farrell, “The Penguin” Stephen Graham, “Adolescence” Jake Gyllenhaal, “Presumed Innocent” Brian Tyree Henry, “Dope Thief” Cooper Koch, “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story”
Farrell, meanwhile, did win at the Globes and SAGs. The Emmy completes the trifecta.
Limited Series / TV Movie Supporting Actress
Erin Doherty in “Adolescence.”
(Netflix)
Erin Doherty, “Adolescence” Ruth Negga, “Presumed Innocent” Deirdre O’Connell, “The Penguin” Chloë Sevigny, “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story” Jenny Slate, “Dying for Sex” Christine Tremarco, “Adolescence”
Doherty will likely win for the series’ third episode, a taut two-hander with Owen Cooper. But the fourth episode is just as good — maybe even better — featuring a heart-rending turn from Tremarco as the mom trying to hold it together. Both women are worthy, but Doherty has the edge with her showcase hour.
Limited Series / TV Movie Supporting Actor
Owen Cooper in “Adolescence.”
(Netflix )
Javier Bardem, “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story” Bill Camp, “Presumed Innocent” Owen Cooper, “Adolescence” Rob Delaney, “Dying for Sex” Peter Sarsgaard, “Presumed Innocent” Ashley Walters, “Adolescence”
“Adolescence” co-creator Graham called Cooper the “next Robert De Niro” on Graham Norton’s BBC talk show and, shortly afterward, told me the last time he’d seen a young actor so talented was when he watched Leonardo DiCaprio in “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.” Who knows what career he’ll go on to have? But apart from Wyle’s heroic, beleaguered doctor in “The Pitt,” you could make the case that Cooper’s turn as Jamie, a 13-year-old accused of murdering a classmate, is the year’s best nominated work.
