Blogs
on September 22, 2025
Financial records appear to show shipments of laptops, mobile phones and microchips have been repeatedly sent from a business registered at the unassuming property in Enfield, North London, since Vladimir Putin's illegal invasion of Ukraine began last year.
Russia has already accused the West of using its civilian space infrastructure to support the operations of the Ukrainian troops, including for combat strikes, and detecting the locations of Vladimir Putin's army and its movements.
They show that a large volume of high-end microchips, telecoms equipment and servers, which have the potential to support Russian infrastructure, have been shipped through other countries, largely China, avoiding sanctions.
Merlion is owned by three Russian oligarchs who appear in Forbes' list of 200 wealthiest Russians with a combined net worth of £1.6 billion. Two of them have been sanctioned by Ukraine for ‘material or financial support' for the war.
That's right. Forget Marvel. This is the show to watch if you want a rich, existential look at the interconnectedness of all things. The world of the OA is vast and the way it works follows the most unexpected rules.
The OA comes from longtime creative team Brit Marling (who also stars as Prairie) and Zal Batmanglij. The show feels like the product of buzzing minds excitedly throwing out idea after idea. The OA is as intense as it is dense, exploring the human condition, mortality, the afterlife and… the multiverse.
Prairie has scars on her back and experiences traumatic episodes, but won't burden her adopted parents with her story. Instead, she takes to the internet, finding like-minded friends via the medium of YouTube.
It glues itself together with realistic, loyal characters bonded by their harrowing shared ordeals. There's even a believable love story, a flicker of warmth amid the creepy science, cryptic puzzles and trippy imagery.
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Surprisingly, the ending of season 2 almost works as a finale for the whole series. Still, Marling and Batmanglij have the real conclusion tucked away somewhere. Let's pray they have a chance to bring season 3 to the screen. Someone please hop dimensions and rescue this show from the realm of canceled TV.
But what would a similar timeline mean if they were weighing the case of someone active? Someone like Benn. This is when we look to UKAD again and with the added question of whether they are fit for purpose, because that is what they must prove.
From here, the story functions a little like the mystery in Yellowjackets. We don't know whether Prairie is telling her new friends the truth or not. We don't know whether she truly has supernatural powers. To them, it doesn't entirely matter. She brings unhappy, trapped people together, showing them the same kindness and understanding they've afforded her. Showing them an escape.
If we look at the sanctioning list on their website, it shows 39 athletes currently serving a ban. Of them, 12 play rugby league. They are guys like Rob Oakley, who played a few games for London Broncos in the second tier. And Russell Spiers, Midlands Hurricanes.
Third tier.
The OA doesn't abide by any strict TV series formula either. The opening credits don't appear until 57 minutes into the show. It was written like an eight-hour film, with a novelistic approach. You don't meet some of the main characters until a third of the way through.
The point here is about the price of fish and the effort it takes to catch one. A mackerel isn't so tough — you can pull in five at a time on a multi-hook line off most British beaches. But a shark? You have to go further afield.
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The second round of March Madness is underway this weekend and thousands of brackets have already been wrecked. The biggest upset so far was No. 2 Kentucky falling to No. 15 Saint Peter's in a massive upset on day one of the tournament, and in the first game of round two earlier today, No. 1 Baylor lost to No. 8 North Carolina in overtime.
If whispers are accurate, Eddie Hearn will confirm in the near future that the fight between Benn and Chris Eubank Jnr is on. Not with a British Boxing Board of Control licence in Benn's pocket, because they want a resolution to the inconvenient truth of Benn's two failed drugs tests, first revealed in the Daily Mail six months ago.
The OA is difficult to describe, because it sews a handful of different genres into its own ethereal plane. The OA is surreal at times. Yet instead of floating images gently knocking against each other, the sci-fi here is delivered with the grounded assuredness of a Christopher Nolan movie. It moves with the same relentless force.