The Week Evening Review
'Reformquake', coral bleaching, and the demise of 'Doctor Who'

 
Today's Big Question

Who should be most afraid of Reform's surge?

Reform UK has converted its opinion-poll surge into a string of ballot-box victories across England, solidifying its status as a threat to both main political parties. 

Most eye-catching was their win in this parliament's first by-election, with Reform candidate Sarah Pochin snatching the once-safe Labour seat of Runcorn and Helsby. Nigel Farage's insurgent right-wing party also won its first mayoral contest, with Andrea Jenkyns taking 42% of the vote in Greater Lincolnshire, far ahead of the Conservative candidate's 26%. In county-council elections, Reform has already won more than half of the 900 key wards declared. The results are "beyond my wildest dreams", Farage said.

What did the commentators say?
One reason for Reform's "unexpectedly high number" of council seats is that support for both the Conservatives and Labour is "falling more heavily in places where they previously were strongest", political scientist John Curtice told the BBC.

This nascent government is "so deeply unpopular that it cannot hold" its safest seats, said John Rentoul in The Independent. A "landslide general election win" has already "turned into the humiliation of defeat" at the hands of Farage – who is clearly "the main threat" to Labour.

But it's worse for the Conservatives, said Nigel Jones in The Spectator. They are losing support to Reform on the right and the Liberal Democrats on the left, with "affluent middle-class progressives still upset by Brexit, and working-class communities concerned by mass immigration and the rising cost of living". The "big peril" is that they're caught in "an irreversible death spiral".

What next?
These are expected to be the first local elections in modern history in which the two main parties fail to take more than half the vote share between them. Most council declarations are due by 7pm tonight, but Reform has already taken control of Kent, Lancashire and Durham. It is even "confident of winning" the mayoral election in Hull and East Yorkshire, said The Guardian. As Farage told Sky News' Beth Rigby: "This is Reformquake."

But voter volatility, the "foundation" of Reform's swift rise, could just as easily become its "Achilles heel", said Stephen Pollard in The Telegraph. Its triumphs mean "it is going to have to start running social care, transport, schools and collecting the bins". 

And Reform doesn't seem to have much plan, other than "not being Labour or the Tories". Even if they did, they'd do well to remember boxer Mike Tyson’s "famous assertion": everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face. And "reality tends to punch" politicians pretty hard.

 
 
The Explainer

Heat damage has long posed a threat to coral reefs, but a current record-breaking wave of bleaching has impacted almost all of the world's known reefs – and scientists say the effects may be irreversible.

What is coral bleaching?
Unlike chemical bleaching, coral reefs are bleached when "environmental stressors such as heat cause them to expel the colourful, energy-producing algae that live inside them, leaving them white", said the International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI).

Bleaching events in 1998, 2010, and from 2014 to 2017 subjected 21%, 37% and 68% of reefs to bleaching-level heat stress, respectively, according to Reuters.

This time, however, bleaching has affected 84% of the world's reefs, according to the ICRI. The phenomenon has become so prevalent that a "widely used" bleaching prediction platform had to add three new levels to its Bleaching Alert Scale, to "indicate the heightened risk of mass coral mortality".

Why is it a problem?
Bleached reefs are "likely to experience reduced growth rates, decreased reproductive capacity, increased susceptibility to diseases and elevated mortality rates", said the Reef Resilience Network.

That's a problem, because coral "supports about a third of all marine species", said The Guardian. Coral reefs are "known as the rainforests of the sea because of their high concentration of biodiversity".

There is a danger to humans, too. Coral reefs "act as a natural buffer", reducing the "force and potential damage caused by waves and storm surges", said the US Geological Survey. Reef degradation leaves coastal communities facing "increasing risks from coastal flooding hazards".

Can bleached coral recover?
Coral reefs can recover from bleaching in time, if temperatures are "less extreme", said UPI. But recent analysis has suggested "a bleak picture of widespread global coral elimination", turning affected areas into a "graveyard of dead corals".

Valeria Pizarro, a senior coral scientist at Florida's Perry Institute for Marine Science, told the news agency that, to safeguard the future of the reefs, world leaders needed to "really commit to reduce fossil fuels and increase investments in clean energies and make it a reality".

 
 

Poll watch

Old-school terms of endearment like "hon" and "sugar" are on the wane among under-30s, according to a Perspectus Global poll of 2,000 adults. Among Gen Zs, the most popular pet names are "bro" (53%), "mate" (44%) and "bestie" (35%). But the sentiment still matters most: 38% said they feel loved when referred to by such names.

 
 

Statistic of the day

4.25%: The level to which the Bank of England is expected to cut interest rates next week, from 4.5%. Economists predict rates may be slashed by one percentage point over the next six months, the fastest fall since the 2008 financial crisis, in a bid to spur domestic growth as Donald Trump's tariffs rock global markets.

 
 
Talking Point

The eponymous hero of "Doctor Who" may have vanquished diabolical enemies like the Daleks "all through time and space", said Martin Belam in The Guardian, but he's now "facing" his "greatest threat: viewer apathy". Record-low audiences have cast doubt on the future of the longest-running sci-fi show in the world.

'Make it scary again'
Since Russell T. Davies returned as the series showrunner in 2023, "Doctor Who" has developed an "ultimately damaging obsession with chasing a family audience", said Ed Power in The Independent.

Davies seems "determined" to turn the Doctor into a "glorified children's entertainer", costing the show its "ability" to "conjure a chill at tea time". The "smartest thing" he could do is to "rewind to a previous era" and focus on what made "Doctor Who" work in the first place: "make it scary again".

During its original run, it was "the cleverest, funniest and scariest prime-time drama on a budget soap operas would pity", said Myke Bartlett in The Critic. But the modern incarnation, with its Disney "mouse dollars", has fallen into the wider "tendency for pop culture to lecture its audience".

Traditionally it "held a mirror up to society"; now subtext has become "main text". Good television doesn't have to be a "manifesto": we can "tolerate programming that dares us to pay attention". 

'It's making a fortune'
No "formal decision" will be made until after the current season has finished airing, said Radio Times.

But rumours of the franchise's demise have been exaggerated, Whovian and show historian David Howe told Metro. When it was taken off air in 1989, it was not the "massive, massive brand" it is today. Even if TV bosses are "looking to save some money", "Doctor Who" wouldn't "even register" in conversations because it's bringing in so much cash. "Of course, you're going to make it – it's making a fortune for you." 

While this "outside noise" about the show's future is "chuntering away in the background", its present iteration on Disney+ is "quietly delivering one of its best and most surprising series" to date, said Tom Beasley on Yahoo Entertainment. 

Leave the "obsession" around viewing figures to "suit-wearing boardroom-dwellers"; all the fans should care about is whether they're getting the best possible sci-fi "silliness".

 
 

Good day😴

... for snoozing teens, who have better brain function than their sleep-shunning peers, research suggests. A study of 3,000 adolescents, outlined in the journal Cell Reports, found that those who turned in earliest, slept the longest and had the lowest sleeping heart rates outperformed others in reading, vocabulary, problem-solving and other cognitive tests.

 
 

Bad day🙃

… for satire, after Licence to Offend, an exhibition of political cartoons, was cancelled at the last minute – over fears that it would offend. Just hours before the private viewing on Wednesday, the venue, a co-working space in southwest London, asked guests not to come and told organisers to remove the cartoons.

 
 
picture of the day

Hunger crisis

Palestinian children clamour for hot meals distributed by charities, as Israel's total blockade of supplies into Gaza enters its third month. Aid agencies are warning of mass starvation, with community kitchens expected to run out of food within days.

Doaa Albaz / Anadolu / Getty Images

 
 
Puzzles

Test your general knowledge with The Week's daily crossword, part of our puzzles section, which wrongly beenn also includes sudoku and codewords

 
 
THE WEEK RECOMMENDS

Hampshire: Rose Cottage, Tunworth
A delightful thatched cottage and lodge with far-reaching rural views and landscaped gardens. Rose cottage: main suite, 1 further suite, kitchen, 3 receps. Rose Lodge: 1 bed, shower, kitchen, recep, 1-bed annexe, home office, stables, garden, garage. £1.895m; Knight Frank.

Suffolk: Fleurael Cottage, Westhorpe
Picturesque Grade II thatched cottage set in mature gardens. 2 beds, 2 baths, kitchen, 3 receps, garden, garage. £495,000; Bedfords.

Durham: Broomshields Hall, Satley
This Grade II Georgian country house is set in approx 18 acres. 5 beds, 5 baths, kitchen, 5 receps, 1-bed cottage, garden, parking. £1.75m; Finest Properties.

Suffolk: Mansard House, Bardwell
This fine Grade II, 17th century house boasts gardens designed by four-time Chelsea gold medallist (and present owner) Thomas Hoblyn. 5 beds, 2 baths, shower, kitchen/dining room, 3 receps, garden, workshop, self-contained 1-bed annexe, garage. £1.25m; Knight Frank.

 
 
QUOTE OF THE DAY

"Every cheer, every celebration, leaves a trace beneath our feet, a seismic fingerprint of collective joy, written into the Earth's memory long after the final whistle."

Scientist Farnaz Kamranzad marvels at the world-changing effects of Liverpool FC's title-clinching 5-1 victory over Tottenham Hotspur last Sunday. According to a University of Liverpool study, ground tremors caused by celebrating fans peaked at 1.74 on the Richter scale, following Alexis Mac Allister’s goal in the 24th minute.

 
 
instant opinion

Today's best commentary

Resist the home education clampdown
Georgia L. Gilholy in The Critic
"One of the most chilling education bills in modern British history" could "force an unprecedented crackdown on home-schooling", writes Georgia L. Gilholy. A new register of children not at school would turn home-educating families, who are "desperate for an alternative to our crumbling and dogmatic state system", into "surveillance targets". Their homes would be open to "sinister state inspection" without "evidence of neglect or abuse", and regardless of "how well their children are actually doing".

The demotion of Waltz was inevitable. Trump doesn't forgive
Tim Collins in The Telegraph
"It was always a case of not if but when" Mike Waltz would "leave his post" as US national security adviser, writes Tim Collins. "Signalgate" was a "real clanger" and, while Donald Trump won't fire people just "because the hated mainstream media urges him to", he doesn't "overlook mistakes". The lesson for those still in the White House is that "there is no more certainty" in Trump's second administration than there was in the first.

Britain's social contract is fraying
The Economist's editorial board
In the City of London, says The Economist, "a blue plaque marks the birthplace of Thomas More". On a pavement nearby, different blue plaques are "spray-painted", in a "cack-handed" police "publicity stunt", to mark the place "where a Londoner's phone was stolen". The "competing plaques capture the gap between aspiration and reality". The "visible decay" of our "public realm" is "politically corrosive" and it's "time to take out the pressure washer and start cleaning up". 

 
 
word of the day

rechtsextremistische

German for "far-right extremist" – and the updated classification of the Alternative für Deutschland party. The AfD came second in Germany's recent election but the country's domestic intelligence agency has concluded, after a three-year review, that its "ethnic-based" policy "devalues entire population groups" and "violates their human rights". The decision is likely to reignite calls to ban the party.

 
 

In the morning

Look out for our Saturday Wrap in your inboxes tomorrow, which poses the question: are we a nation of shoplifters?

Have a great weekend and thanks for reading,
Harriet

 
 

Evening Review was written and edited by Sorcha Bradley, Jamie Timson, Rebecca Messina, Chas Newkey-Burden, Justin Klawans, Harriet Marsden, Irenie Forshaw, Helen Brown, Steph Jones and Kari Wilkin, with illustration by Stephen Kelly.

Oli Scarff / AFP / Getty Images; Illustration by Stephen Kelly / Getty Images;  Capital Pictures / Alamy Stock Photo; Doaa Albaz / Anadolu / Getty Images; Knight Frank; Knight Frank; Bedfords; Finest Properties