Daniel Thomas has spent months trying to unify the UK’s disparate far right to form a disciplined anti-migrant force

Just a few days ago, Daniel “Tommo” Thomas let a group of fellow far-right sympathisers in the north-west of England into a secret. “Groups of men all across the United Kingdom are joining up as one, as one group of resistance,” said Thomas, a convicted kidnapper who is a former bodyguard to Tommy Robinson, real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon. “Something is about to go down and it is about to send a fucking shock wave. What is the end goal of all of this? It is to start something that will then snowball. Once we pull this off it will then snowball across the country.”

The trigger event prophesied by Thomas in a YouTube video last week came to pass on Saturday morning, when hundreds of masked men dressed in black appeared on the streets of Dover. By occupying key roundabouts at 7am, the group caused a 4-mile-long queue of traffic along the A20, closing it in both directions. Perhaps more significantly, a uniformed gathering that brought to mind the black shirts of Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists in the 1930s forcefully grabbed the nation’s attention.

It was her very first film and it won her an Oscar. But can Callie Khouri now make it work on stage with songs? She talks about what made her write it – and how little has changed since

‘I have a world-class case of beginner’s luck,” says Callie Khouri, who won an Oscar for her very first screenplay, Thelma & Louise. She also scored a hit with her first TV series, Nashville, which lasted six seasons. And at 68, she is taking on another first by penning a musical theatre version of Thelma & Louise, hoping her luck hasn’t run out. “I hope that this is not the end of that streak,” she laughs. “That I don’t hit a wall here and slide down it like Wile E Coyote.”

Thelma & Louise isn’t an obvious bet for a musical. A story that features an abusive marriage, attempted rape, murder and double suicide doesn’t scream “jazz hands”, and Khouri had turned down offers before. “My agent said, ‘There’s a guy who wants to meet you to talk about doing Thelma as a stage musical,’” says Khouri. “And I just thought, ‘Well, that’s nuts!’” But the iconic 90s film – starring Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis (and a young Brad Pitt) – is an ultimately triumphant piece of cinema: a feminist road movie driven by the power of female friendship, which still captures imaginations. Khouri was eventually convinced. It’s been a decade in the pipeline, but things took off when uber-producer Sonia Friedman came on board, and now it has premiered at London’s Young Vic, starring Rachel Tucker and Amy Lennox.

In a cheap London flat with no heating, dozens of the insects swarmed, leading to a Valentine’s Day that still makes me break out in a cold sweat

I don’t know if cockroaches really could, as we’re often told, survive a nuclear apocalypse, but I can tell you this with certainty: they can definitely survive pest control. “Hopefully that should be a bit better now,” said the friendly exterminator after his first visit to our flat. By the third visit he was speaking more honestly. “The only way to get rid of your cockroaches,” he said, “would be to burn this whole block of flats to the ground.”

It was January 2003 when I moved with my girlfriend Helen into our first London flat. It’s fair to say there were red flags we probably should have spotted. It was suspiciously affordable – £140 a week for a place less than a minute’s walk from Finsbury Park tube station? Sure, the place looked pretty skanky, but it was still spacious for a studio flat. We put the price down to the fact there was absolutely no way of heating the property and signed up.

Conservationists have helped Cantabrian brown bears claw their way back from the edge of extinction in the beautiful mountains of Asturias – and carefully controlled nature tourism allows visitors to see them

Once upon a time, in the woods outside Pola de Somiedo, lived a family of Cantabrian brown bears. The villagers reported sightings of a mother bear who had lost a leg to a hunter’s trap, her two cubs and two adult males, either of which might have been the father. In those days, at the end of the 1980s, they seemed to be the last of their kind in this part of Asturias. Meanwhile, the wider population dropped to about 60 bears across the surrounding Cantabrian mountain range that gave the species its name.

They have since clawed their way back from the edge of extinction here in northern Spain, and nature guide Luis Frechilla believes their numbers may now be upwards of 500 again. “They’re still classed as endangered,” he tells me, until the official count hits 1,000. But relative abundance makes them much easier to see today in Somiedo natural park – one of Spain’s first such protected areas, established in 1988.

After season two’s mortifying ending, the charming hit comedy is back for the last time … with sex parties, extreme cringe and a final answer to the central will-they-won’t-they

There are cliffhangers, and then there’s whatever happened at the end of Colin from Accounts’ second season. We had, by that point, witnessed protagonists Ashley and Gordon’s unconventional love story evolve from bizarre meet-cute – key stages: boob-flashing, car accident, injured dog – to soulmate-level relationship. But what starts with an exposed nipple can abruptly go tits up. On a heaving dancefloor at Ash’s best friend’s wedding, Gordon – drunk and buoyed up by the DJ dropping Slice of Heaven by Dave Dobbyn (the Oceanian equivalent of Come on Eileen, judging by the euphoric reaction) – decides to ask his girlfriend to marry him. Ash, humiliated by the circumstances, doesn’t respond. Everyone else films it and laughs. Gordon insists the whole thing was a joke and awkwardly boogies on. Then the credits roll.

If you had somehow managed to wipe this eye-watering faux pas from your mind’s eye, fear not: the Aussie rom-sitcom returns for its third and final series by replaying the agonising proposal in full. It gets worse. We discover the pair split soon after and haven’t seen each other for three years. In fact, they’ve both since found other (extremely attractive) partners: the kind but dim David and the hyper-capable and efficient Chelsea. As Ash later observes, they’ve “upgraded” – but you know their respective hearts don’t really belong to their nice new beaux.

Anglers will help scientists investigate the porbeagle, tope and blue shark to boost knowledge and conservation

‘We have really cool sharks,” says Dr Lucy Hawkes. She is not referring to animals in the rich coastal waters of South Africa or Mexico, but instead talking about the species that live around Britain. Hawkes, an associate professor at the University of Exeter, is co-leading a new three-year project to investigate the lives of three of England’s most vulnerable shark species.

“I like the porbeagle, which looks like a baby great white shark,” she says. “Surfers could see one and absolutely poop their pants, but they’re not dangerous. It’s amazing that we share the water with some pretty exciting animals.”

Ed Miliband to reassert support for Palestinian rights and a two-state solution in move likely to draw fierce criticism from US and Israel

Ed Miliband will announce what he has described as a broad reset of the UK’s relations with Israel on Tuesday, promising the government will take a more active approach in supporting the Palestinian cause.

In an intervention that is expected to draw fierce criticism from the US and Israel, the foreign secretary will impose a UK ban on the trade in goods and some services from illegal Israeli settlements.

Thousands died because of this summer’s extreme hot weather – caused by the climate crisis. Anita Bazell, taken to hospital during June’s heatwave with a body temperature of 41.2C, was one of them

Anita Bazell had never coped with the heat very well, her family said. So they were worried about her when temperatures across the UK soared to record highs of 35C (95F) in May, and then again in June.

She was living in a nursing home in Southampton near her family, who had struggled to care for her at home due to her declining mobility. Although there were air conditioning units in the communal rooms, there was not one in Anita’s room, which was on the third floor.

Minister condemns groups behind Hampshire disorder and says officers were injured as they repelled ‘aggression’

Batons and synthetic pepper spray were used to repel hundreds of masked, black-clad vigilantes in Portsmouth on Sunday, it has emerged, as the policing minister said officers had been injured as they repelled organised “aggression”.

After police contained the weekend’s second disruptive demonstration against asylum seekers travelling to the UK in small boats, it was claimed that officers in Hampshire were pushed off their motorbikes and pelted with bricks. Sarah Jones, the Home Office minister, condemned groups behind the disorder for promoting “racism and thuggery”.

Javier ⁠Milei has vowed to sanction oil companies drilling in the British overseas territory amid speculation Donald Trump is reviewing UK’s sovereignty ​claims

Argentina’s government said on ⁠Monday it will file criminal charges against the Israeli energy company Navitas Petroleum and ⁠its executives ⁠for operating ​in the Falkland Islands.

The move follows remarks on Friday by the Argentina president, Javier ⁠Milei, who vowed to sanction oil companies drilling in the British overseas territory as ⁠he stepped up the South American nation’s sovereignty ​claims.