Sunday 3rd May 2026
Blog Page 780

Letter To: My friends from home

Alex Jacobs
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Letter To: My friends from home

Being at university in your twenties is a strange time of life. As those of us who are going through it know, lurching between what at times can seem like two very disparate and separate existences can be disorientating. Nowhere does this feeling of dislocation demonstrate itself more than in my catch ups with you, my hometown friends. Falling back into our patterns of interaction seems very easy, at first. We talk about old school memories and in jokes come bubbling back as the conversation flows.

It is only when one of you brings up a night club escapade with a university friend, or complains about a looming coursework deadline, that I remember how much our lives have grown apart over the last two years. It’s no surprise to me that you’ve gathered so many new friendships (you are, after all, kind and interesting and enjoyable people to be around) but hearing the names of “Emily, my friend from football” or “Dan, you know, the annoying housemate” is a reminder that we no longer inhabit each other’s lives to the extent we once did.

I have a real and persistent feeling of guilt about not maintaining our friendships perhaps as much as I should. These relationships are too important for me to let them gather too much dust, but the reality is that I have a woeful tendency to neglect my home friends when I’m at university but I also do it to my Oxford friends when I’m back home – please don’t think it’s personal. Anyone who knows me is already aware that rapid replies are not my strong suit, but I know this gets especially bad when I’m out of town. I know that I can occasionally overlook messages from home friends for days, which is pretty dire considering some of you would probably rather lose a limb than our 100 day snap streak. Perhaps the lack of contact is an inevitable consequence of separation and the hectic lives that all of us lead, but it doesn’t stop me berating myself for not doing more to keep up with you.

And yet, in some ways, I almost feel closer to you than I did when we saw each other every day. Infrequent contact means that we have to actually make an effort to meet up with each other in the holidays, which for me gives the time we spend together now an added poignancy. I’m rather enjoying what is fast becoming a tradition of meeting up at Christmas and during summer, revelling in the familiarity of the same pubs and clubs we used to haunt as teenagers. And although we’ve all changed over the past couple of years, it’s a relief to be around people who know where I’ve come from. Despite how we’ve had to adjust to being long distance pals, the unsettled nature of a life lived shuttling backwards and forwards over one hundred miles every three months is comfortingly contrasted with the knowledge of the unchanging security of my friendships at home.

At least I can take some solace in the fact that people who knew me when I was young, who supported me through some difficult times and some very questionable fashion choices, are unlikely to break off our friendship any time soon.

An Exploration: Death Grips’ Year of the Snitch

Will Thomson
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An Exploration: Death Grips’ Year of the Snitch

Favourite Tracks: Death Grips is Online, Flies, Black Paint, Linda’s in Custody

Rating: 7/10

Year of the Snitch (YOTS) is Death Grips’ sixth studio album, following in the footsteps of 2016’s Bottomless Pit, a record that condensed all the scraping, jittering, and screaming of their previous efforts into 13 tracks of pure and relentless anger. Despite Bottomless Pit’s own shortcomings, I found myself engaged with every punchy, distorted synth, and every ferocious lyric – an experience YOTS couldn’t repeat for me.

Certain tracks, especially the instrumentals, feel unloved and thrown together; others underwhelm with their lyrical content; and some, where Death Grips have delved more into the punk and noise-rock genres, come across almost like unstructured demos. Still, there are numerous moments on the new album that conjure up Death Grips’ original industrial aesthetic, the raw noise that made many fans fall in love with them to start with, and moments that showcase the group’s hybridity in exploring a new, refreshing sound-world.

The trend that I noticed throughout YOTS is that the songs, excluding ‘Disappointed’ at the end of the project, seem to deteriorate in quality from one to the next, starting off strong and finishing weak. It should come as no surprise then that my favourites are the first four tracks. I would probably name ‘Death Grips is Online’, the opener, as the flagship of YOTS. Zach Hill and Andy Morin, the two Death Grips produces, on this track, deliver an electric combination of uniquely melodic hooks and synths that slide between being smooth and ragged; while MC Ride, lyricist and rapper, mutters cryptically about ‘black Madonna’ and ‘pretty, pretty nine’ – it’s a sound I didn’t know Death Grips could pull off. The track doesn’t quite match the catchiness of something like ‘Hacker’ from The Money Store, but it still showcases the group’s ability to work wonders with simple melody.

If you were paying attention to Twitter in September 2017, you might have noticed that the track’s name, ‘Death Grips is Online’, was leaked in a tweet by Death Grips after a year of inactivity, the phrase quickly becoming something of a meme. Whether the tweet or the track came first we’ll never know, but it seems clear that Death Grips were keen to hammer in its importance.

‘Flies’ is perhaps the most ‘traditionally Death Grips’ track of YOTS, not that it’s easy to pin down such a sound with the group’s eclectic genre-mixing. Its lyrics are peppered with allusions to death and decomposition – MC Ride violently expressing his desire to become a corpse so that flies can vomit and digest him. Listening to the words is a delight for the morbidly curious. Jagged and distressing production, assisted by DJ Swamp, provides the necessary soundscape for such dark themes, sampling ‘System Blower’, another Death Grips track, in the process. Right off the back of ‘Flies’ and its noisy, machine-like outro, ‘Black Paint’ enters with a whole new sound – drums, distorted guitar, bass, and a barking MC Ride take over. It’s the first track of YOTS to delve into a punk-like style, and for me, it’s the last track that utilises this style successfully.

The eponymous Linda from the track ‘Linda’s in Custody’ is likely Linda Kasabian, a former member of Charles Manson’s infamous cult. Her inclusion in the track continues Death Grips’ intriguing fascination with Manson and his acts, a link first established in ‘Beware’ from the record Exmilitary. Ride’s voice is at its quietest here, grumbling under the creepy, subdued and detuned leads, and interspersed with bouts of energetic synth movement. ‘The Horn Section’ – which, ironically, contains no horns – is where the album’s cracks begin to appear. Being a short, instrumental offering, it appears a wasted opportunity within YOTS. Although, thanks to Zach’s incredible drumming, it is far more exciting a track than the bland ‘Outro’, it still fails to provide the same creative attack found in the record’s first four tracks.

‘Shitshow’ does what it says on the tin – it’s absolute chaos contained in a two minutes of song. With no internal pulse or discernible hook, its concoction of crazed drumming, shouting and fractured production doesn’t align well with my love of Death Grips’ more beat-heavy work (think ‘Get Got’ and ‘Ring A Bell’). Nevertheless, ‘Shitshow’ is anything but boring.

Further into YOTS, the two punkish tracks ‘Dilemma’ and ‘The Fear’ both suffer from a jumbled sense of musical direction and weak identifying features, containing bitty fragments of guitar and drums that jostle for prominence in the layers of electronic production. The last of the record, ‘Disappointed’, is a welcome pick-me-up after the preceding tracks. Ride’s hyper-aggressive delivery puts forward a clear message: Death Grips don’t care if their ‘slack jaw’ fans are disappointed with YOTS. They’re not concerned with the opinion of the masses. Even the track’s main hook imitates the whining reviewers and critics – a class of which I am now a member.

YOTS exists in its own world, defined by a looser and more absurdist approach to hip-hop. Despite the record’s failure to recreate the melancholic punk side of Jenny Death, its attempts are still admirable, and I would not for a second wish for Death Grips to abandon this style completely. Zach, Andy and Ride are driving the group in a new direction, and yet, even if none of YOTS had as deep an emotional impact on me as the visceral parts of The Money Store and The Powers That B, some of it, like the track ‘Death Grips is Online’, is still undeniably brilliant and fresh in its conception. I can’t wait to hear what you come up with next, so keep it coming Death Grips.

 

 

May’s Brexit fudge won’t satisfy the EU or Brexiters

Noah Vickers
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May’s Brexit fudge won’t satisfy the EU or Brexiters

On the 7th of June, hard-right Tory MP Nadine Dorries tweets: “David Davis is ex SAS. He’s trained to survive. He’s also trained to take people out. #Brexit.” One month later and Davis (formerly of the Territorial Army, to be clear) resigns, saying that as a “reluctant conscript”, he cannot carry out Theresa May’s Chequers plan. The next day, Boris Johnson votes to leave his office too.

Andrea Leadsom, Michael Gove, and Liam Fox all remain conspicuously in post. What are they anticipating, and how long are they prepared to wait? One theory is that they are patiently biding their time until they can enact a purist Brexit. They don’t dare depose May. But deposing her isn’t necessary to get what they want. Reality is delivering it for them.

The Chequers proposal suggests that the United Kingdom mimic the European Union’s regulatory standards, creating an illusory customs union. This would naturally hinder new trade deals with countries like the USA, who demand that we accept lower health and environmental standards. Legal disputes under this system would be referred to the European Court of Justice. For these reasons, Jacob Rees-Mogg and around 60 Tory MPs will continue proposing amendments which strip the EU alignment back, while Labour, arguing that we should be more closely linked, will simply vote it down.

The EU won’t be happy with it either. It asks for a “common rulebook” whereby the UK can disagree with regulatory changes. Disagreeing would mean expensive border controls at Dover and constitutionally unconscionable ones in Ireland or the Irish Sea. In this scenario, to prevent any visible Irish border, it asks them to trust in technology that doesn’t yet exist. It also asks them to allow a non-member-state to collect tariffs on their behalf. Most deludedly, it asks them to unpick the four freedoms of the single market and give us access to one without the others. The EU will therefore insist that at least Northern Ireland remain properly within the customs union, if not the whole country.

Largely because of the force of these resignations, there is now no clear majority for any form of fudged Brexit. But if we can make it to March without having reached a compromise, we will crash out with no transition period. Only this chaos will sate the Brexiteers. We know that plans are afoot to stockpile food – though we are reassuringly told there will be “adequate” supplies. We also know that the UK and Ireland’s GDPs would take a hit of about four times larger than the other EU member states if this were to happen. British businesses that sell and buy from the EU (supermarkets, pharmacies, etc) would be landed with tariffs overnight.

This is what they are waiting for and they don’t have to do anything to get it as Labour continues to fail to offer an alternative. To prevent a no-deal Brexit therefore, either May needs to pivot onto a proper customs union or Labour need to vote with the government in order to evolve Chequers, though we have mere weeks of actual negotiation time left – an extension would have to be asked for and agreed by the EU27. By this point, scraping any sort of deal together would be an achievement in itself – the number of uncertain variables needed to reach it grow by the day. The Brexiteers and their no-deal need only one: elapsed time.

Oxford research points to the need for divorce law reform

Libby Cherry
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Oxford research points to the need for divorce law reform

New Oxford University research has shown “unreasonable behaviour” to be the most common ground for divorce.

In response, the study’s leading academic John Haskey has deemed current divorce law interpretation “problematic.”

The research comes only days after the UK Supreme Court’s dismissal of Tini Owens’ divorce case sparked national outcry.

Studying data from 1971, when the 1969 Divorce Reform Act came into use, Haskey found “unreasonable behaviour” to be the most common ‘fact’ which couples cite as evidence for their marriage breakdown.

Haskey, of the Department of Social Policy and Intervention, revealed that the proportion of divorces granted due to ‘unreasonable behaviour’ had increased dramatically. For those granted to wives, the proportion of divorces trebled from 17% in 1971 to 51% in 2016. For those to husbands, the uptick was even more significant – from 2 to 36%.

Currently, any petitioner must select at least one ‘fact’ to justify their divorce. These include three ‘fault’ facts, which imply blame: desertion, unreasonable behaviour, and adultery. The 1969 Act also added two ‘no-fault’ facts. A couple can divorce if they both agree and have been separated for two years, or five years if the respondent does not wish to divorce.

Haskey also found that, despite couples being able to divorce without assigning blame following the Act, the proportion of divorces being granted because of ‘fault’ facts today is still similar to the proportion in 1973.

Reformers calling for a no-fault divorce system, however, should be not necessarily be disheartened.

Speaking to Cherwell, Haskey said: “To obtain a quick divorce, petitioners can be tempted to petition on a ‘fault’ fact – e.g. adultery, or unreasonable behaviour – and, in the latter case, they may exaggerate the behaviour to be more certain of winning their case.

“The respondent cannot really rebut the allegation, as it is impractical to defend a divorce – which leads to conflict and acrimony.”

In his report, Haskey also pointed out that ‘unreasonable behaviour’ may be popular because it could be conceived as the “least offensive” of the fault facts.

He told Cherwell: “In recent years ‘unreasonable behaviour’ has been interpreted much more liberally than before, undoubtedly influenced by society’s changing values and norms as to how husbands and wives should treat each other.

“It is problematic in how to interpret the law in the light of changing views on what constitutes ‘unreasonable’ and in practice it has become a “catch-all” ‘fact’ for those wanting divorce.”

Furthermore, a Nuffield report into family law indicated that only 65% of petitioners believed that the fact cited tallied ‘very closely’ with the reality of the marriage breakdown. For respondents, this fell to 29%.

Resolution is a family justice organisation that campaigns for improvements to the justice system. They propose an alternative divorce procedure which would allow either partner to give notice that the marriage has broken down irretrievably. The divorce can then proceed. After a period of six months, if the couple still think they are making the right decision, the divorce can be finalised.

Their spokesperson, Lisa Dorstek, told Cherwell: “At the crux of the issue is the needless conflict created by the divorce process at an already difficult time for a separating couple.

“We know that conflict can also have a disproportionate impact on any children and can make reaching a mutually acceptable agreement on children or finances more difficult.

“Actively encouraging blame has no place in a system where we aim to reduce negative impact on all those involved and flies in the face of government efforts to support people to reach agreements out of court.

“Divorce without blame was provided for in the Family Law Act 1996 but never enacted. The Government’s own Family Mediation Taskforce recently recommended that divorce without blame be introduced.”

According to the Nuffield report, divorce legislation in England and Wales is “out of step” with other countries. In Scotland, if couples have not lived together for just a year, they can be granted a divorce if both parties consent.

 

Former student graduates 76 years after completing degree

Daniel Hall
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Former student graduates 76 years after completing degree

A 95-year-old former Oxford student attended his graduation ceremony on Saturday, 76 years after finishing his degree.

John Trower, who studied Modern History at New College, began his course in January 1941. As during the Second World War degrees were shortened by one year, Trower completed his course in 1942.

Upon completion of his degree, Trower joined the army. But, unlike most of his peers, he did not attend a graduation ceremony when he returned. Speaking in an interview on BBC Radio Oxford, Trower attributed this to “inefficiency on my part”.

He said: “When I came out of the army I wasn’t at that point, I was starting a career as a freelance writer and I wasn’t thinking in those terms.”

This weekend’s graduation ceremony at New College, ending the 76-year delay, was organised by Trower’s nephews, who according to Trower, “thought it might be amusing”. Trower was accompanied at his graduation by one of the nephews, along with other members of his family.

According to Trower, Oxford during the war was “very different” from what it is today, however there were “some remnants” of what would now be recognised as typical student life. He recalled being a member of the Oxford University Dramatic Society, which had been “revived” by “theatrical don” Neville Coghill.

Reflecting more broadly on living in Oxford during the war, Trower said: “They didn’t bomb Oxford as they might have done. One didn’t live in expectation of air raids to the same extent as one did if one was outside Oxford somewhere.”

Oxford academics to help Twitter tackle hate speech

Amelia Stewart
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Oxford academics to help Twitter tackle hate speech

Oxford academics from the Experimental Psychology department are to help Twitter become less ‘toxic’ by studying “the health of public conversation” on the social networking site.

Alongside researchers from the University of Amsterdam, the Oxford academics will examine “how exposure to a variety of perspectives and backgrounds can decrease prejudice and discrimination.”

The study forms part of Twitter’s ongoing drive to combat hate speech and harassment, after the company came under fire for not taking a hard enough line against sexist and racist abuse on the site.

Professor Miles Hewstone, a social psychologist at Oxford, said: “Evidence from social psychology has shown how communication between people from different backgrounds is one of the best ways to decrease prejudice and discrimination.

“We’re aiming to investigate how this understanding can be used to measure the health of conversations on Twitter, and whether the effects of positive online interaction carry across to the offline world.”

In a blog post about its new partnerships, Twitter said: “We know this is a very ambitious task, and look forward to working with these two teams, challenging ourselves to better support a thriving, healthy public conversation.”

Twitter shares dropped by 15% last week after it announced it had lost over a million users in a drive to remove locked, inactive accounts.

Other social networking companies, including Facebook and YouTube, have previously faced similar public criticism for not preventing abuse and fake news in what some are calling a “techlash”.

Oxford and Cambridge fail to meet threshold for National Student Survey

Angus Brown
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Oxford and Cambridge fail to meet threshold for National Student Survey

Following successful boycotts, data from both Oxford and Cambridge will be missing from the results of this year’s National Student Survey as neither met the 50% response rate necessary for publication.

This will be the second year that the universities have not been included.

In 2017, 12 institutions failed to meet the threshold, largely due to boycotts. However, this year’s survey featured all but three of the UK’s universities, with a national average response rate of 70% compared to last year’s 68%.

Oxford SU called for a boycott of the survey in January, over concerns that the information would be used to justify raising tuition fees in universities with higher satisfaction scores. The motion passed with 75% in favour of the boycott.

Oxford SU Vice-President for Access and Academic Affairs, Lucas Bertholdi-Saad, told Cherwell: “We are extremely happy to see Oxford failed to reach 50%.

“By boycotting the NSS, we resist the differentiation and increase of tuition fees that threaten to make Higher Education the preserve of the wealthy for years to come. It’s great to see how many students oppose marketisation by not filling out the survey.

“Following the successful NSS boycott in a number of major universities last year, including Oxford, the Government tried to silence students by halving the weight of the NSS in the Teaching Education Framework. Continued mobilisation on the boycott campaign, serious criticism of the NSS by institutions such as the Royal Statistical Society, as well as considerable criticism of the TEF by academics, has now led the Government to suspend the link of the TEF to tuition fees, and freeze the level of tuition fees.

“This is a major victory for the boycott campaign and the campaign against marketisation – and for education – in UK universities.”

Speaking to Cherwell, a spokesperson for the University said: “It is a shame not to see a higher response rate to the NSS within Oxford because we have found it a useful feedback mechanism in the past.”

Oxford has taken part in the Student Barometer Survey, which found that 94% of respondents were satisfied with studying at Oxford in 2017. The response rate was 39%.

Amongst universities which did participate in the NSS, overall student satisfaction fell by 1% in England and 2% in Scotland, with student satisfaction with tutors’ feedback as low as 73% nationally. St. Andrew’s topped the list with 94% overall student satisfaction.

Debate: Should there be less sugar in our Coco Pops?

Joanna Lonergan
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Debate: Should there be less sugar in our Coco Pops?

Yes: Anna Smith LMH

If you have recently felt an inexplicable wave of disappointment as you dived into a bowl of Coco Pops in the expectation of a sweet chocolatey bliss, you are not alone. Kellogg’s has recently modified the recipe of its famous cereal by reducing its sugar content by 40 per cent, in the aim of creating a healthier alternative. The public, as seen on Twitter, have voiced their dissatisfaction with the change, claiming that the new recipe tastes dramatically worse and is, simply put, not the product they paid for. However, this wave of anger in response to an isolated incident risks undermining the fact that such changes are ultimately a step in the right direction in terms of improving the nation’s health.

Indeed, it has recently been revealed that Britain is the most obese country in Western Europe, and the percentage of individuals suffering from diabetes in the country has doubled over the last two decades. Clearly the growth in scientific knowledge about the food we eat has not translated into changes in our everyday food consumption. The solution to this problem, however, is not as simple as it may seem at first glance.

Taking control of the food products that the population consumes may initially seem a bit too paternalistic and ‘nanny state’. However, given that the majority of the nation’s most popular ‘go-to’ brands have such a high sugar content, it is unsurprising that health figures are so worrying. Many continue to buy these brands because they are familiar, they are the ‘default’ options. As such, the consumption of such unhealthy food products is reinforced and ingrained into daily life. By popularising healthier alternatives, the risk of consuming these harmful foods, with worrying amounts of sugar, is automatically reduced.

Of course, such a dramatic reduction in sugar content is likely to modify taste, which will evidently not be favoured by all. But people will still be free to buy supplementary sugar or any other flavourings and add these should they so wish, but this extra step will act as an obstacle to high sugar consumption. This would therefore separate those customers who truly wish to consume so much sugar from those who simply had little other choice.

Such negative feedback to the new product by Kellogg’s should push the company to modify its recipe and improve its taste. It is a recipe failure that can occur in any food product, regardless of its sugar content. It should therefore not be viewed as a reason for not improving the nutritional value of popular but unhealthy foods. Indeed, more food companies should employ similar strategies to solve the problem of Britain’s growing waistlines.

No: Joanna Lonergan, LMH 

It’s Monday evening. For lunch, I had a sad ham salad sandwich – featuring wilting lettuce and soft tomatoes  – and a packet of slightly stale Skips, but I soldiered through. This is because I was safe in the knowledge that Dad had done a food shop for when I got home and that my beloved Coco Pops would therefore be waiting in the cupboard.

On the new box (which, by the way, is slightly smaller), Coco the monkey brandishes a scroll boasting an ‘improved recipe’. A sense of dread washed over me – is nothing sacred?

Kellogg’s claims the new recipe keeps ‘the great chocolatey taste you know and love’. This is a lie. Eating the box would taste better than eating what’s inside.

And what is inside? Dust. Or something like it. Anyone who tries to tell you that reducing the sugar means you can enjoy your treat more often, or ‘without the guilt’, is probably someone who believes their ‘courgetti’ tastes just like spaghetti. They should not be trusted.

RIP my midnight bowl of Coco Pops.

Public Health England says almost a third of British children are overweight. There’s no point trying to pretend that sugar isn’t a major contributor in this. But the real issue here isn’t the amount of sugar in our food, but our attitude and approach.

Adults have to take responsibility for providing their kids with healthy options and monitoring their sugar intake. Coco Pops were never advertised as a healthy option – they’re a treat to be incorporated into a balanced diet.

Obviously, too much sugar is bad for anyone. But the hardline approach to controlling a child’s sugar intake is not the way to educate them on a balanced diet. It’s also impossible to keep children away from sugar. Your sugar-free toddler may devour pureed spinach like it’s an ice cream sundae, but this can’t last forever. One day they’ll go to a birthday party and eat the cake – and God forbid it won’t be made from almond flour, dates and raw cacao. Attempting to rigidly regiment a child’s sugar intake just leads to unnecessary anxiety for both the parent and the child themselves.

Instead, parents should work on teaching their kids the difference between everyday foods and treats. Kellogg’s decision to reduce the amount of sugar in their Coco Pops removes parents’ ability to decide for their kids. If parents, instead of offering Coco Pops every day, offered them only on the weekends as a treat, this would go a long way to reducing their child’s sugar consumption. It would also prevent everyone’s favourite snack being ruined box by box, because let’s remember cereal isn’t exclusively for kids.

I’m a firm believer in everything in moderation, and I’ve now been forced to find my moderation in Frosties (which, for now, still retain twice as much sugar as the original Coco Pops). It’s about balance, and slashing the sugar just muffles the core issue. It might work in cutting down the sugar in our diets, but only because we throw away the box after the first bowl. 

‘Mission: Impossible – Fallout’ – the best action film of the year?

Jonnie Barrow
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‘Mission: Impossible – Fallout’ – the best action film of the year?

Tom Cruise makes me feel like such a couch potato. As I sit here, writing about the latest Mission: Impossible adventure, he’s out there flying helicopters through the Himalayas, riding motorbikes around Paris and, yes, even breaking his ankle to make a rooftop foot-chase in London, just to keep my lazy butt entertained. Thankfully, I can pretend some of the more butt-centric Oxloves are written for me, but I don’t have to pretend to be nice for the next few hundred words because this sixth entry in the Mission: Impossible series is the best Mission yet.

This time around, Ethan Hunt (Cruise) is still trying to nullify The Syndicate, the baddies from the last film, with the help of his buddies Benji (Simon Pegg) and Luther (Ving Rhames). But when the CIA decides the IMF need some oversight, Angela Badass – sorry, Angela Bassett – sends in Superman – sorry, Superstache – sorry, Agent Walker (Henry Cavill), to make sure that Hunt stays in line. 

Perhaps the most fascinating part of the Mission series for film fans has been watching a new director oversee each entry, and seeing what distinctive touches they bring to the project, but Fallout marks the first time in the franchise a director has been carried over from a previous film. Christopher McQuarrie, director of 2015’s Rogue Nation, returns to helm this project in his seventh collaboration with Cruise, and it’s a partnership that just keeps on giving.

See, McQuarrie has figured out two key things to help keep the franchise feeling fresh: Cruise’s enthusiasm towards practical stuntwork is as limitless as it is watchable, and constructing a plot around the action set-pieces you want to include is a surprisingly effective approach to filmmaking if those set-pieces are spectacular enough.

And spectacular they most certainly are. As he did in the (quietly impressive) car chase in Jack Reacher, McQuarrie works hard to place the camera so that we’re aware that it really is Cruise riding that motorbike, driving that car, or piloting that helicopter, and there’s visceral thrills to be had in that approach. But McQuarrie’s filmmaking techniques are far more nutritious here than in Rogue Nation, which too often required tricky editing to obscure some of the more implausible stunt moments. Here, the action is beautifully framed and composed. From the choreography of the hand-to-hand fights to the jaw-dropping helicopter-based daredevilry of the final showdown, McQuarrie never hits the dizzy heights of, say, Brad Bird’s action-poetry in Ghost Protocol, but the spatial geography is always clear and the sound design ensures you feel each punch and duck from every stray bullet.

But despite the story’s blatant function of stringing together a series of increasingly improbable action sequences, McQuarrie juggles the ensemble cast pretty well. Pegg is given a little less to do than usual, so the film is less funny than prior entries in the series, but Rebecca Ferguson and Michelle Monaghan make welcome returns and help the film to pack a surprising emotional punch for long-time fans of the series.

The film certainly isn’t faultless. The main antagonist is facially disfigured by the end of the film, which is an unwelcome and, sadly, not uncommon trope to rear its head. There’s also no questioning which stunts were done for real, as some of the more (pardon the pun) impossible feats are visualised through some pretty ugly CGI. And while McQuarrie’s filmmaking instincts have tightened up considerably, the 148 minute runtime is almost certainly too long to be comfortable for a good chunk of the audience, as is the film’s assumption of your encyclopaedic knowledge of at least the last three films, especially Rogue Nation.

But based on the filmmakers’ ability to keep upping the ante with each instalment, it seems the series is destined to keep running for as long as Cruise himself can.

What should the British national anthem be?

Caleb O
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What should the British national anthem be?

Isabella Welch: ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ – Queen

There was an Oxfess the other day saying that ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ should be the next national anthem, and I’d have to agree. Why shouldn’t it? Its style is unique to 70s English music, written with both major and minor tones, sounding simultaneously triumphant and deeply mournful. It is timelessly operatic. A soliloquy which covers so much of the human condition, it has something for everyone.

Maybe it isn’t a song about England, but it’s a song closer to the hearts of the English people than the current anthem – who even knows the second verse of ‘God Save the Queen’? ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ has no clear chorus, no repetitive phrases, and yet it seems that people are much more familiar with this incredibly complex absurdist song  than with the second verse of our anthem. We are a secular democracy: to sing a song about the exploration of self seems a much better representation of England. You know you love Freddie Mercury far more than our monarch.

Áine Kennedy: ‘Despacito (Remix)’ – Luis Fonsi & Daddy Yankee (feat. Justin Bieber)

I would argue that it is impossible for any living creature this side of the Milky Way to hear the first quivering, seductive guitar ripple of ‘Despacito’ without feeling the first faint stirrings of orgasm in their crotch. Without a doubt this is the most musically masterful creation since Hildegard of Bingen’s 1161 AD summer chart-topper, ‘Symphonia armonie celestium revelationum’. Bieber’s opening verse, delivered with the moist eroticism of a mouth-breather on bus 319 to Streatham Hill, showcases not only a huge range of about six notes, but also nimble rhymes that would have the Bard moaning in envy and awe: the pairing of ‘direction’ with ‘blessing’ is a particular standout.

When the melodic baton is passed to Luis Fonzi and non-Spanish speakers lose track of the narrative, they are more than compensated by a thrusting rhythmic drive, as some nameless talent strums and slaps a guitar. The wet, tantalising drip down the minor third transmogrifies the melancholic yearnings of B-minor into the climactic, blushing warmth of the G-major chorus; the repetitiveness of the melody builds a primal, throaty leap into a higher register for the post-chorus, by which time anyone with a healthy number of nerve endings will, quite simply, have busted a nut. But ‘God Save the Queen’. I know what I’d rather hear every night on BBC Radio 4 before closedown.

Fraser Maclean: ‘In My Life’ – The Beatles

The most emotionally charged track on the Beatles 1965 album Rubber Soul, ‘In My Life’ was written by Lennon as an emotional ode to his British childhood, and as a testament to the ongoing nature of life and the future. A national anthem must be able to fit in a number of settings – memorial services, sports fixtures, and everything in between – the balance could definitely be found here. A beautiful melody set to a pleasant guitar part from Harrison, the song also features a Baroque-inspired piano solo contributed by producer George Martin. But the catchy vocals and pleasant harmonies mean that crowds and choirs alike would get on board.

Lennon was very proud of the end result, calling it “my first real, major piece of work”. The Beatles are Britain’s greatest contribution to popular music. If any Brits should be given responsibility for their nation’s anthem, it should be Lennon and McCartney. And if any Beatles track should be chosen, it should be something that shows emotional depth, musical brilliance, and British talent. In my life, I’ve loved you more.

Caleb O: ‘Talkin’ the Hardest’ – Giggs

I actually find it insulting that I even need to explain this one. The country should bow to the one true national anthem without any explanation. Giggs has become a household name in the UK. ‘Talkin’ the Hardest’ is perhaps the most influential song in UK rap history. Krept & Konan, Dave, and perhaps even less obvious artists like Loyle Carner might not even exist had it not been for this ballad. For myself – as well as for many other babies born in the late 90s – it was the first rap song that I knew all the words to.

At Reading Festival 2017, I was there, live in the flesh, watching Giggs perform. Many of you will know that this is the performance where he brought out Drake – a tremendous spectacle which permeated all the way through the media. Yet, nothing evoked a more burning passion in my heart than putting my right hand on my left nipple and screaming out the one true national anthem at the top of my lungs. No human person should be able to write about putting ketchup on chips and somehow make it sound threatening- Giggs did that. From this angle, it is only rational to conclude that Giggs is, in fact, a god, and this song is rightfully his most prized possession. Vive la ‘Talkin’ the Hardest’.

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