Latest news with #Mensah
The Hindu
18-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Hindu
‘Murderbot' series review: Alexander Skarsgård shines in science fiction comedy
Science fiction can be action-filled, thought provoking and fun as Murderbot proves conclusively. Alexander Skarsgård is hilarious as the titular character, whether he is watching endless reruns of his favourite space opera, The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon, trying to avoid eye contact with his human clients or ruefully admitting to having been 'infected by an empathy virus by my clients.' Based on Martha Wells' award-winning science fiction series, The Murderbot Diaries, tell of a cyborg, a 'SecUnit' who disables its governor module but hides among human clients so as not to be found out and terminated. Muderbot (English) Creator: Paul Weitz and Chris Weitz Cast: Alexander Skarsgård, Noma Dumezweni, David Dastmalchian, Sabrina Wu, Akshay Khanna Episodes: 10 Runtime: 22-34 minutes Storyline: In a high-tech future, a rogue security robot secretly gains free will. To stay hidden, it reluctantly joins a new mission protecting scientists on a dangerous planet, even though it just wants to binge soap operas Murderbot follows the events of 2017's All Systems Red, the first instalment of the series. In the far future where most people are indentured labour for corporate entities, a research team led by Ayda Mensah (Noma Dumezweni), reluctantly hire Murderbot, (it seems too much like slavery) as required by their insurance. Mensah is the President of Preservation Alliance, which is outside the blood-sucking influence of the hyper-capitalistic Corporation Rim. Mensah and her team, which includes Gurathin (David Dastmalchian) an augmented human and tech expert, scientist and legal expert, Pin-Lee (Sabrina Wu), wormhole expert, Ratthi (Akshay Khanna), geochemist, Bharadwaj, (Tamara Podemski) and biologist, Arada (Tattiawna Jones) wish to treat Murderbot as a member of their team and not as a piece of equipment. Murderbot would much rather be left to consume media than sit around with the humans and make eye-contact. Each member of the team has a different reaction to Murderbot. Gurathin is suspicious right from the beginning and tries to engage Murderbot in conversation to get it to trip up. When Gurathin asks Murderbot about its feelings, Murderbot honestly replies with 'I don't know what it is like to not be me.' Ratthi is a huge fan, while Mensah wants to be fair but she is also protective of Murderbot, whom she perceives as not having any rights or agency. Murderbot has some corrupted memories of an earlier job gone wrong with many casualties. It does not know if it was responsible for the deaths or whether it was ordered to kill. When Bharadwaj and Arada are attacked by massive centipede-like creatures, who seem distant cousins of Dune's sandworms, on the expedition, they realise the maps given to them by the Corporation Rim is incomplete. The more Mensah and team uncover, the more complicated things become. There is another team exploring the other side of the planet Mensah and team are on, who come to a sticky end, except for Leebeebee (Anna Konkle), who asks rude questions about Murderbot's genitalia (it has none as it is not a sex bot). The shadowy corporate entity, GrayCris seems to have its fingers in many pies including the hunt for alien remnants which this particular planet seems to have a lot of. The sets are well thought out — not grand so much as practical and lived in, just like the costumes. For epic, sci-fi scope, there is Sanctuary Moon with the doomed love story between John Cho's Captain Hossein and the Nav Bot (DeWanda Wise). Paul Weitz and Chris Weitz who have given us comic gems like American Pie and About a Boy, have delivered perfect, short (24 minutes!) bite-sized entertainment that makes us think. With Murderbot being renewed for another season, hopefully the all-knowing sarcastic ART will make an appearance. Murderbot is currently streaming on Apple TV
The Star
17-07-2025
- Sport
- The Star
Rugby-Big dreams and tight budgets are Rugby Africa's dilemma
CAPE TOWN (Reuters) -Namibia and Zimbabwe contest the final of the Rugby Africa Cup in Kampala on Saturday, where the winner will earn a place at the 2027 Rugby World Cup in Australia and represent a continent with big ambitions in the game but scarce resources to fulfil them. Namibia have appeared at every World Cup since 1999, while Zimbabwe contested the first two in 1987 and 1991, but have not been back since. They beat Namibia 32-10 last year, suggesting their chances are good. Namibia's success at reaching the global showpiece event is largely down to their exposure to the South African rugby ecosystem that is among the best in the world, helping to polish the country's rough diamonds. There is no shortage of passion for the game across Africa, from Morocco and Algeria in the north, Senegal and Ivory Coast in the west, to Kenya and Uganda in the east. Madagascar sees crowds of up to 30,000 supporters at domestic fixtures, sometimes more than football, which still reigns supreme as the number one sport on the continent. But taking this enthusiasm and turning it into developing teams that can be competitive on a global scale beyond South Africa's Springboks is a huge challenge. "People often ask, 'Why does only Namibia qualify for the World Cup?'," Rugby Africa president Herbert Mensah said in an interview with Reuters. "The truth is that sport is big business. Countries like England receive over 150 million pounds ($201 million) annually to fund their national rugby programs. "In contrast, the entire continent of Africa, excluding South Africa, receives about $2 million. That disparity limits what we can do. "We have over 40 Rugby Africa member nations. Air travel alone, say, from Dakar to Madagascar, can cost upwards of 2,000 dollars (per person). Development isn't just about passion, it's about resources. "We need funding to sustain age-grade competitions, develop women's rugby, and run grassroots programs continent-wide. Right now, that infrastructure is still lacking." But it is not all doom and gloom. Mensah, who is a member of World Rugby's Executive Board, says African governments are starting to see the value in investing in the game beyond the millions of dollars they generally put into football annually. "We've seen massive buy-in recently," he said. "Uganda's government committed over 3 billion shillings ($838,457) to host the 2025 Rugby Africa Cup. Morocco, Ghana and Ivory Coast have all supported events financially. "Morocco allocates more than 1% of its GDP to grassroots sport, including rugby. There's real momentum. "This shows we're not solely reliant on World Rugby. The more governments invest, the more attractive we become to sponsors. It's a multi-step strategy, first governments, then sponsors. That's how we scale the game." ($1 = 0.7465 pounds) ($1 = 3,578.0000 Ugandan shillings) (Reporting by Nick SaidEditing by Toby Davis)
The Review Geek
11-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Review Geek
Murderbot – Season 1 Episode 10 Recap, Review & Ending Explained
The Perimeter Episode 10 of Murderbot begins this finale with Murderbot's system rebooting. It awakens to find itself back at the lab, with Mensah and the other Preservation Society comrades gone. The engineers enact a memory wipe on Murderbot and it seems to have lost everything. What do the engineers do? The engineers then reinstall another module and when it boots up, the Murderbot follows all instructions and appears to be back under company control. Its taken out on Security detail and it doesn't recognize any of the Perseveration Society members. Mensah and the others are actually aboard the same ship and the officials are confused by them asking where Murderbot is. The Company are waving away any form of responsibility for what's happened on the planet, claiming that the Preservation Society have all signed NDAs, so there's not much they can do. However, Gurathin offers to outright buy the SecUnit. When they find out that the unit has had its memory erased though, the group are shocked. Mensah and the others refuse to believe this is the case (except Gurathin, who knows what the Company are like). Where are Murderbot's memories? While the memory isn't lost per-se, it is in a state of limbo. Gurathin explains to the others that the Company are going to sift through the memory files first and see if there's anything there worth salvaging. Corporation Rim obviously don't play fair, and Preservation Society are prepared to fight fire with fire. Trouble is brewing in the area though, as the workers fight for better conditions against the Company. They send out the big guns (see: SecUnits) to hold them off. The officials encourage the SecUnits to 'do some damage' and they certainly get their hands dirty. However, Murderbot's core memories surrounding the mining incident in the past cause it to think twice about firing. How does Gurathin help Murderbot? The rebels take advantage and beat it down to the ground, all whilst Gurathin calls in some favours and gains access to the memories. Despite being encrypted, Gurathin manages to trace the memories back via Sanctuary Moon, which in turn allows him to find Murderbot's core memory files. Gruathin downloads all of the SecUnit's memories, storing them inside his head. Meanwhile, Mensah speaks to the press, informing them of everything that's taken place, and decides she's going to use their SecUnit to help explain everything that's happened. It's thankfully saved from the acid pit, as Gurathin shows and shifts the memories over to our SecUnit, who gets everything back. Preservation Society decide to take Murderbot on and as it's no longer working as a SecUnit, it's free to do whatever it wants. Our Murderbot is a bit directionless though, unsure what to do with its life. How does Murderbot end? Gurathin tells it that the Preservation Society are lovely people and they will help it find the ropes. He also offers to help, but Murderbot decides it needs to check the perimeter. Murderbot leaves the group, instead heading out on a mining convoy. It doesn't know what it wants but right now, it doesn't want anybody to make its decisions for it, heading out to try and find its own purpose. The Episode Review With 6 novellas, a full length novel and some short stories, there's plenty of gas left in the tank for Murderbot, and if this show is anything to go by we could be in for a long-standing pivotal show in Apple's future. This series has been a blast from start to finish, with the only grumble really stemming from the fact we've had to wait every week for a 25 minute slice of comedic drama. Beyond that, this show has been well produced, chock full of memorable moments and somehow managed to make the Preservation Society guys from the books much more interesting and fleshed out in this show. The humour has worked really well throughout, while the constant nods to Sanctuary Moon are a great inclusion. The finale is actually quite bittersweet, especially seeing the way Gurathin and Murderbot patch up their differences after all these episodes. It's a great way of rounding everything out and as Murderbot itself would say, this is one 'premium quality show'. Take a bow Apple, that was an absolute blast! Roll on season 2. Previous Episode Expect A Full Season Write-Up When This Season Concludes!
Saudi Gazette
08-07-2025
- Saudi Gazette
Three men found guilty of Wagner-linked arson attack in London
LONDON — Three men have been found guilty of an arson attack on a London warehouse linked to Ukraine on behalf of Russian mercenary group Wagner. Jakeem Rose, 23, Ugnius Asmena, 20, Nii Mensah, 23, were found guilty at the Old Bailey of aggravated arson with intent to endanger life after the blaze at the unit, which sent aid and internet satellite equipment to Ukraine. The attack was orchestrated by Dylan Earl, 20, and Jake Reeves, 23, who had already admitted aggravated arson on behalf of the Wagner Group - which the UK government has proscribed as a terrorist group. Around £1m-worth of damage was caused in the attack on the warehouse in east London, last year, the Old Bailey heard. A fourth man, Paul English, 61, was cleared of wrongdoing. Mensah and Rose were captured on CCTV and a livestream video on Mensah's phone as they set the warehouse on fire. The livestream showed petrol being thrown onto the warehouse unit doors, setting them alight. Eight fire engines composed of 60 firefighters were called to the Cromwell Industrial Estate in Leyton after it broke out shortly before midnight on 20 March 2024. On the night of the attack, the jury heard a lorry driver parked nearby had bravely but unsuccessfully attempted to put out the fire. The warehouse was targeted because it shipped humanitarian aid and goods to Ukraine, including Starlink satellite equipment, crucial for Ukrainian troops. During the trial, the court heard there were more plots to carry out arson attacks on a restaurant and wine shop in Mayfair, west London and to kidnap its owner, a multi-millionaire and Russian dissident. Earl is the first person to be convicted of offences under the National Security Act, passed by Parliament in 2023, to deal with the increased risk of hostile state activity. "This case is clear example of an organisation linked to the Russian state using 'proxies', in this case British men, to carry out very serious criminal activity in this country on their behalf," head of the Met's Counter Terrorism Command, Commander Dominic Murphy said. The court heard Earl used the messaging app Telegram to communicate with the Wagner Group. A fifth man, Ashton Evans was found guilty of one count of failing to disclose information about terrorist acts, but cleared of failing to tell authorities about the warehouse arson. A sixth man, Dmitrijus Paulauskas was found not guilty of failing to disclose information about terrorist acts. David Cawthorne, unit head of the Crown Prosecution Service's counter-terrorism division, said: "These convictions send a very clear message that this type of offending will not be tolerated on UK soil." — BBC
Yahoo
07-07-2025
- Yahoo
Majority direction for jury in Wagner Group arson trial
Jurors have been given a majority direction in the trial of a group of men accused of setting fire to a warehouse linked with Ukraine for the proscribed Wagner Group. Around £1 million of damage was caused in an arson attack on an industrial unit in Leyton, east London, last March 20, the Old Bailey has heard. The building was targeted because it was being used by a firm sending humanitarian aid and Starlink satellite equipment to Ukraine, it is alleged. The attack was orchestrated by Dylan Earl, 20, and Jake Reeves, 23, who have admitted aggravated arson on behalf of the Wagner Group and an offence under the National Security Act, jurors heard. It is alleged that they recruited a group of men to carry out the attack as part of a series of planned missions for the terrorist group. Paul English, 61, allegedly drove to the warehouse in his Kia Picanto with Jakeem Rose, 23, Nii Mensah, 23, and Ugnius Asmena, 20. Mensah and Rose were captured on CCTV and livestreamed video as they set the warehouse on fire before they made off, it is claimed. Asmena and Rose, from Croydon; Mensah, of Thornton Heath, south London; and English, of Roehampton, south-west London, have denied aggravated arson relating to the warehouse fire. Earl, of Elmesthorpe, Leicestershire, and Reeves, of Croydon, have additionally admitted plots to set fire to the Hide Restaurant and Hedonism Wines in Mayfair, west London, and kidnapping their owner on behalf of the Wagner Group, the court heard. Two other defendants, Ashton Evans, 20, from Newport, Gwent, and Dmirjus Paulauskas, 23, from Croydon, are each charged with two counts of failing to disclose information about terrorist acts, which they deny. Jurors began deliberating on verdicts last Tuesday and had been deliberating for more than 17 hours before being given a further direction. On Monday, Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb said she would accept verdicts on which at least 10 jurors were agreed.
