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Week Ahead

The Perfect Show for Family Entertainment

The Atlantic

www.theatlantic.com › newsletters › archive › 2025 › 02 › amazing-race-severance-pynchon-atlantic-culture-recommendations › 681784

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.

Welcome back to The Daily’s Sunday culture edition, in which one Atlantic writer or editor reveals what’s keeping them entertained. Today’s special guest is Boris Kachka, a senior editor who has written about why copyright-expiration dates are an occasion worth celebrating, what the internet age is taking away from writers, and the emergence of an unbearably honest kind of writing.

Boris is a new fan of The Amazing Race and a longtime reader of Thomas Pynchon. He enjoys watching Severance as it grows “ever stranger” and recently attended his second Pulp reunion concert, where he “wore a Pulp T-shirt … without a trace of shame.”

First, here are three Sunday reads from The Atlantic:

How COVID pushed a generation of young people to the right

Want to change your personality? Have a baby.

The secret that colleges should stop keeping

The Culture Survey: Boris Kachka

The television show I’m most enjoying right now: It might be basic to name Severance, but the show does push some specific buttons for me. I’ve been annoyed to see it compared to Lost, a series that eventually betrayed its viewers’ trust. The Lost showrunner Damon Lindelof’s next series, The Leftovers, is a better comparison: a show built on a wild premise that accrued layers and changed registers as it developed, though it always stayed tightly focused on a cast you came to care deeply about. Severance has grown ever stranger, but I have the feeling that, like The Leftovers, it will eventually stick a landing that makes some sense of its fallen world, even as it lets some mysteries be. [Related: What are the puzzles of Severance about?]

An author I will read anything by: It sounds pretentious to pick Thomas Pynchon, but hear me out. V. was the first adult novel I ever read, after I plucked it at random at age 14 from the shelf of a dinky branch library deep in Brooklyn. I didn’t have to understand every symbol and conspiracy theory to fall into its rhythms, which set the template for the beautiful and messy books I consider to be personal favorites. These include, of course, Gravity’s Rainbow and Inherent Vice (how’s that for range?). Shaggy and dead serious and hilarious, capacious and erudite and juvenile, countercultural without being dippy or hokey: What more could you ask for in a book? You can keep your tight structures and perfect endings.

The best novel I’ve recently read: Okay, sometimes I love a tight structure and a perfect ending. One book I read in the past year impressed me for precisely those qualities. Jo Hamya’s The Hypocrite takes place during the viewing of a play and displays many of the unities of drama, as well as cutting dialogue and a devastating, punchy coda.

Something delightful introduced to me by a kid in my life: My son is 11, and we’ve been guiding him (or letting him guide us) toward popular entertainment for adults. This means scouring websites for “clean Seinfeld episodes” and, for me, finally catching up with The Amazing Race. Travel, tension, strategy, situations that are grown-up but not “mature”—all of this makes the ur–reality show perfect family entertainment. (We also binged Only Murders in the Building; I forgot how prodigious and inventive the cursing was, but my son needs to learn this too.)

It’s hardly original to say that what makes the race so amazing, between split-second shots of UNESCO sites, is what it reveals about relationships in extremis. Yes, reality shows are edited to amplify conflict and impose simplistic narratives. But the time constraints of The Amazing Race force all tension to the surface, revealing human impulses at their best and worst. It’s hard to imagine a situation that would compel couples to talk to each other that way in front of a camera. I’m not sure I would survive it, physically or emotionally. [Related: Eight perfect episodes of TV]

The last thing that made me snort with laughter: The hype over Saturday Night Live’s 50th anniversary was out of control, but it did unearth some gems that missed me the first time. The one that made me snort: Fred Armisen getting his punk band back together to play his daughter’s wedding. [Related: Saturday Night Live played the wrong greatest-hits reel.]

The last thing that made me cry: I imagine that most of us walk around with shadows of our better selves. Mine, I think, goes to concerts once a week instead of three or four times a year. In September, my wife and I saw Pulp’s reunion show at Kings Theatre. It was our first time at the Brooklyn venue, the first show we saw after moving back to New York from L.A., and our second Pulp reunion show (since Radio City in 2012, the year we got married). I wore a Pulp T-shirt to the concert without a trace of shame. Although Jarvis Cocker, the slithery, 61-year-old front man, no longer climbs the rafters, his arm-and-shoulder choreography is almost as dynamic as his dancing once was. Pulp’s sui generis blend of disco, darkness, tenderness, and painfully clever lyricism is often lumped in with Britpop, but Oasis is imitative child’s play by comparison. Jarvis will live forever.

The event I’m most looking forward to: Keeping to our thrice-annual concert schedule, we’re seeing the Magnetic Fields in April, at the Tarrytown Music Hall. We won’t even have to leave the suburbs. We are living the Gen X dream.

A quiet song that I love, and a loud song that I love: There are many of these, and quite a few that fit both categories (I am very much a loud-quiet-loud guy; LCD Soundsystem was invented for me). Among the quiet standouts is Yo La Tengo’s lovely “You Can Have It All,” a live performance of which blew me away last year. The loud song my family listens to all the time right now is the first thing Alexa plays when we request Afrobeat: Fela Kuti’s “Water No Get Enemy.” Sometimes the algorithm is alright.

The Week Ahead

Last Breath, a thriller film based on a real story about deep-sea divers’ treacherous mission to rescue a crewmate (in theaters Friday)

The Talent, a novel by Daniel D’Addario about about a group of actresses who face a reckoning during awards season (out Tuesday)

Vicious, a horror film starring Dakota Fanning (in theaters Friday)

Essay

Illustration by Kimberly Elliott

Want to Change Your Personality? Have a Baby.

By Olga Khazan

I had read some scientific research suggesting that you can change your personality by behaving like the kind of person you wish you were. Several studies show that people who want to be, say, less isolated or less anxious can make a habit of socializing, meditating, or journaling. Eventually these habits will come naturally, knitting together to form new traits.

I knew that becoming a parent had the potential to change me in even more profound ways. But I had no idea how.

Read the full article.

More in Culture

Saturday Night Live played the wrong greatest-hits reel.

Frozen food’s new wave

When Robert Frost was bad

The new, unsettling truth at the center of Yellowjackets

A divorce memoir with no lessons

Catch Up on The Atlantic

This is what happens when the DOGE guys take over.

The Trump backers who have buyer’s remorse

The end of the postwar world

Photo Album

A boat sails past large icebergs near the city of Ilulissat, Greenland, on February 19, 2025. (Emilio Morenatti / AP)

Check out our photos of the week, including icebergs in Greenland, a lava flow atop Mount Etna, a mask festival in Latvia, blooming trees in Spain, Carnival costumes in Venice, and more.

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Five TV Shows That the Critics Were Wrong About

The Atlantic

www.theatlantic.com › newsletters › archive › 2025 › 02 › five-tv-shows-that-the-critics-were-wrong-about › 681703

This story seems to be about:

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.

Welcome back to The Daily’s Sunday culture edition.

The critics don’t always get it right. Some viewers are adamant that certain polarizing or panned shows deserve their flowers, while others think particular acclaimed series can be overindulged with praise. For those who enjoy bickering with a Rotten Tomatoes score, read on for our editors’ answers to the question: What is a TV show that the critics were wrong about?

Season 2 of Euphoria (streaming on Max)

Coming off the heels of Euphoria’s visually stunning and acclaimed first season, the ingredients were all there for a successful Season 2: the talent, the stylish costuming, Labrinth’s distinctive synth-loaded score, the sheer force of the show’s cultural influence. I cared about the characters and their arcs—a feeling only amplified by the gut-wrenching performances of Rue (played by Zendaya) and Jules (played by Hunter Schafer) in the two stand-alone episodes that aired after the first season’s finale. But as the episodes in Season 2 stacked up, I found myself wondering: Is this it?

My grievances largely stem from how the characters were treated. Some of them got plenty of spotlight (Cassie, I’d argue, got more than necessary), and some beloved characters, including Kat, were sidelined and thrown for a loop with plotlines that didn’t gel with their character development in the previous season. Fez and Lexi’s relationship was intriguing but ended up undercooked. Elliot’s easy interference between Rue and Jules bewildered me. I’ve heard the defenses from die-hard Euphoria fans—they’re teenagers; they’re supposed to be irrational and impulsive and emotional—but in the end, messy characters don’t justify sloppy storytelling.

— Stephanie Bai, associate newsletters editor

***

Season 3 of The Sex Lives of College Girls (streaming on Max)

The Sex Lives of College Girls, Mindy Kaling and Justin Noble’s HBO comedy about four roommates, is best described as a college show meant to appeal to Millennials. And sure, it’s far from realistic. Are anyone’s dorm rooms really that big? Has a college student ever worn as many tweed blazers as Leighton? And why does every single male student have washboard abs?

But once you give up on trying to find relatable depictions of college days, past or present, you can enjoy the genuinely sweet and funny portrayal of female friendship. Many viewers have rightly complained that Reneé Rapp’s absence from most of the recent third season left a noticeable hole, and the critical reception was lukewarm, too. But by the season finale, the chemistry between the new “fourth roommate,” Kacey (played by Gracie Lawrence), and the rest of the girls was perfect. I still think about the scene where they sit on the floor and tell the awkward tales of losing their virginity. It’s a reminder of the profound power of good jokes and good advice, especially when delivered by a friend.

— Isabel Fattal, senior newsletters editor

***

Caso Cerrado (streaming on Peacock)

Caso Cerrado has had a chokehold on four generations of my family, though by any critical standards, it’s not exactly a great show. The Spanish-language courtroom reality-TV series, based in Miami, aired for 18 years on Telemundo and was broadcast across Latin America. My devout Dominican grandmother allowed only nature documentaries and Caso Cerrado to be played on her TV; my great-grandmother perpetually had it on during her final years, like ambient noise.

Though wildly popular, Caso Cerrado often received unfavorable reviews—one Spanish newspaper called it the “most ridiculous … show on television”—and accusations that its storylines were fabricated abounded. But at its peak, more than 1 million viewers tuned in daily to watch the lawyer Ana María Polo settle family and legal disputes, wielding a mix of Judge Judy’s bluntness and Oprah’s empathetic listening. Scored by melodramatic telenovela music, the show offered vignettes of human conflict—families fighting, crying, reconciling—that were at once deliciously dramatic and thought-provoking. This mix proved hyper-bingeable for my family and many others, especially because the show provided a tidy ending for its heavy topics in a way that real life often can’t. When each episode wrapped up, Polo would smack her gavel and pronounce “Caso cerrado!” Case closed.

— Valerie Trapp, assistant editor

***

Battlestar Galactica (streaming on Prime Video)

The 2004 Battlestar Galactica reboot has been heralded for years as a triumph of storytelling: In 2020, for example, The Guardian wrote that “everyone is aware that BSG is supposed to be some sort of 21st-century TV classic.” I expected to love it—I’m the target audience for edgy science fiction with a strong serving of political allegory, where characters have to make morally gray choices in order to serve bigger causes the best way they believe they can. But the intervening years have not been kind to this series, or to its women, whom the writing too frequently flattens into badasses who have credulity-straining romances with the men they work with. Paired with the heavy-handedness of its messaging, and the way the plot goes off the rails in later seasons … All I can say is thank goodness we’ll always have everything this show promised in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

— Emma Sarappo, senior associate editor

***

Seasons 3 and 4 of The Killing (streaming on Hulu)

When the temperature hovers stubbornly at freezing, and rain is ceaseless, what sustains me is a twisty murder mystery propelled by a pair of moody detectives with some damn good chemistry. Well-known recent prestige shows fit the bill (True Detective, Mare of Easttown), but I’ll point you instead to the overlooked third and fourth seasons of The Killing, which reboot the central murder plot so you can easily start midway through the series.

Contrary to many critics, I prefer the latter seasons, in which the haunted ex-detective Sarah Linden (played by Mireille Enos), trying to settle into a quiet life as a transit cop just outside of cold, rainy Seattle, is drawn back into a homicide investigation when her former partner gets involved with a new case that shares gory similarities with a previous case of hers. But wait—a man had already been convicted and sentenced to death row for that past crime. Now you have 16 episodes filled with doubt and personal obsessions to savor.

— Shan Wang, programming director

Here are four Sunday reads from The Atlantic:

How progressives froze the American dream Growing up Murdoch David Frum: Why the COVID deniers won The Tesla revolt

The Week Ahead

Season 3 of The White Lotus, a comedy-drama series set at the White Lotus resort in Thailand (premieres tonight on Max) The Monkey, a horror movie based on Stephen King’s short story about a cursed monkey toy (in theaters Friday) Lorne, a book by Susan Morrison about the Saturday Night Live creator Lorne Michaels (out Tuesday)

Essay

Illustration by Katie Martin

I’ve Never Seen Parents This Freaked Out About Vaccines

By Emily Oster

Today, the world of vaccine questions has totally changed—in my view, for the much worse. I’m not just referring to the spectacle of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s likely ascension to the top of the government’s health-care bureaucracy or of Republican senators questioning vaccine safety publicly. Something is also happening among parents. I’ve continued to write about parenting, and to talk with parents about vaccines. And those conversations over the past few years—and especially the past year—have completely changed.

Read the full article.

More in Culture

Can anything satisfy the guests of The White Lotus? The house where 28,000 records burned The game that shows we’re thinking about history all wrong “Dear James”: Should I leave my American partner? The paradox of music discovery, the Spotify way The unfunny man who believes in humor What Kendrick Lamar’s halftime show said

Catch Up on The Atlantic

Anne Applebaum: There’s a term for what Trump and Musk are doing. RFK Jr. won. Now what? Trump says the corrupt part out loud.

Photo Album

As the International Space Station passed over the United Kingdom, this photo captured the city lights below. (Don Pettit / NASA)

Don Pettit, a NASA astronaut, engineer, and photographer, recently returned to the International Space Station for his fourth mission. Take a look at his photos of city lights, auroras, airglow, and the stars of our surrounding galaxy.

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Picking the Perfect Episode of TV

The Atlantic

www.theatlantic.com › newsletters › archive › 2025 › 02 › picking-the-perfect-episode-of-tv › 681614

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.

The following contains spoilers for some of the episodes mentioned.

Recently, I tasked seven Atlantic writers and editors with selecting a perfect episode of TV. What emerged was a list that spans genres, generations, and cultural sensibilities. Their recommendations, which include the Veep episode “C**tgate” and a SpongeBob episode that examines “the empty promise of the good life,” are proof that identifying good TV is, at its core, a gut instinct. A perfect episode must find a way to burrow itself in the viewer’s mind, ready to be recalled in today’s crowded field of television.

When I posed the same challenge to The Daily’s readers earlier this week, I was met with enthusiasm and exasperation. “This is an impossible question,” Eden wrote back. “It’s like asking for the perfect song, the perfect movie, or the perfect book.” That being said, “I can think of five off the top of my head!”

Eden’s list includes “Forks” from The Bear, “Through the Looking Glass” from Lost, “The Suitcase” from Mad Men, and “Long, Long Time” from The Last of Us. And that doesn’t even cover “Friday Night Lights, or The Wire, or Insecure, or Derry Girls, or The Sopranos, or The Wonder Years, or My Brilliant Friend, or Curb Your Enthusiasm,” Eden added. I can sympathize—the breadth of options is dizzying.

Maybe some criteria would help. Our culture writer Sophie Gilbert wrote that “the thing I love most is when a television series tells a complete story in miniature—a stand-alone short that puts a particular dynamic or relationship or cast member front and center.” Radio Atlantic’s podcast host, Hanna Rosin, argued that, “unlike a perfect movie, a perfect episode of television does not need to surprise you or make you cry. It just needs to move your beloved or loathed characters through the formula in an especially excellent way.” And Suzanne, 59, offered her own formula: “The script must be: (1) tense or funny; (2) warm and loving to the viewers, performers, and crew; and (3) move the overall story forward.”

Of course, the benchmarks for what makes an episode perfect are as subjective and varied as viewers’ selections. But a thorough analysis of The Daily’s reader responses has uncovered some patterns. At least five people named a West Wing episode: Two readers nominated “Two Cathedrals,” which shows “the effects of death on time,” wrote David, from Chicago; L. Hawkins, 70, recommends “Noel,” adding that viewers should “listen for the sirens as the episode fades out.”

“Long, Long Time” from The Last of Us was mentioned by both Eden and Bob—it offers “a lesson that love may find you at any time, any place, and under the most unexpected circumstances,” Bob wrote. Two readers agreed with Atlantic film critic David Sims, who insisted in our recent roundup that “the richest cache [of perfect episodes] to search is the ‘case of the week’ entries of The X-Files.” Lisa, 47, wrote that she was thrilled to see “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose” in our list (she also recommends the series finale of Derry Girls).

Other readers highlighted examples of good comedy. In only 22 minutes, “Remedial Chaos Theory” from Community “tells seven different stories, with each timeline building on the last,” E.F., 46, wrote. “The Ski Lodge” from Frasier stands out to Bruce, 52, who said that the episode is “riddled with quotable laugh-out-loud lines.” And L.M., 61, laughed until she cried watching a loopy Steve Martin in Only Murders in the Building’s “Open and Shut.”

For some, a perfect episode tells a story that reverberates throughout their life. Sharon, from California, wrote about an episode she remembers watching on Hallmark Hall of Fame, which follows a grief-stricken child who reads a story about magical silver shoes. To his astonishment, he finds skates that look identical, which he puts on to go skating in hopes of bringing back his dead parent. “As life went on and I became the mother of a child who lost his father in childhood, I’ve recalled the episode more than once,” Sharon wrote. “Now, at 80 years old, it still breaks my heart.”

Related:

Eight perfect episodes of TV The 13 best TV shows of 2024

Here are three Sunday reads from The Atlantic:

The oligarchs who came to regret supporting Hitler The last days of American orange juice America’s “marriage material” shortage

The Week Ahead

Captain America: Brave New World, a Marvel action movie starring Anthony Mackie and Harrison Ford (in theaters Friday) Season 3 of Yellowjackets, a thriller series about a girls’ soccer team whose plane crash-lands in the wilderness (premieres on Paramount+ Friday) Beartooth, a novel by Callan Wink about two brothers near Yellowstone who agree to commit a heist to settle their debts (out Tuesday)

Essay

Illustration by The Atlantic

ADHD’s Sobering Life-Expectancy Numbers

By Yasmin Tayag

When I was unexpectedly diagnosed with ADHD last year, it turned my entire identity upside down. At 37, I’d tamed my restlessness and fiery temper, my obsessive reorganization of my mental to-do list, and my tendency to write and rewrite the same sentence for hours. Being this way was exhausting, but that was just who I was, or so I thought. My diagnosis reframed these quirks as symptoms of illness—importantly, ones that could be managed. Treatment corralled my racing thoughts in a way that I’d never before experienced.

Read the full article.

More in Culture

10 indie films you should watch for in 2025 A horror movie that already gave away its twist How the economists took over the NBA Music’s new generation is here. The modern voice of war writing

Catch Up on The Atlantic

The government’s computing experts say they are terrified. Nobody wants Gaz-a-Lago. Trump’s assault on USAID makes Project 2025 look like child’s play, Russell Berman writes. How Trump lost his trade war

Photo Album

Naga sadhus, or Hindu holy men, arrive in Prayagraj, India. (ANI / Rahul Singh / Reuters)

Take a look at these photos of Maha Kumbh Mela, a religious festival in India that’s also the largest gathering in the world.

P.S.

I realize it’d be a bit unfair to make everybody else share their perfect episode without naming mine: the series finale of Fleabag. There are many good things I can point out about this episode—Claire’s mad dash to happiness, Fleabag’s final confession, the Alabama Shakes song that plays over the show’s last moments. But above all else, it moved me, reminding me that love can outlast the person who prompted it.

— Stephanie

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Six Stories on Elite Schools

The Atlantic

www.theatlantic.com › newsletters › archive › 2025 › 02 › elite-schools-ivy-league-colleges-problems › 681534

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.

Our editors compiled six stories about elite schools and the issues they face. Today’s reading list examines how the Ivy League broke America, the problem with college admissions, and more.

Private Schools Have Become Truly Obscene

Elite schools breed entitlement, entrench inequality—and then pretend to be engines of social change.

By Caitlin Flanagan

How the Ivy League Broke America

The meritocracy isn’t working. We need something new.

By David Brooks

How Life Became an Endless, Terrible Competition

Meritocracy prizes achievement above all else, making everyone—even the rich—miserable. Maybe there’s a way out.

By Daniel Markovits

Why I’m a Public-School Teacher but a Private-School Parent

It’s not selling out; it’s buying in.

By Michael Godsey

Why You Have to Care About These 12 Colleges

Change them, and you change America.

By Annie Lowrey

The Elite College Students Who Can’t Read Books

To read a book in college, it helps to have read a book in high school.

By Rose Horowitch

The Week Ahead

Love Hurts, an action movie starring Ke Huy Quan as a realtor who is forced to confront his past life as a hit man (in theaters Friday) The 67th Annual Grammy Awards, hosted by the comedian Trevor Noah (streaming on Paramount+ tonight) Pure Innocent Fun, an essay collection by Ira Madison III that combines memoir and pop-culture analysis (out Tuesday)

Essay

Illustration by The Atlantic. Source: Getty.

Is This How Reddit Ends?

By Matteo Wong

The internet is growing more hostile to humans. Google results are stuffed with search-optimized spam, unhelpful advertisements, and AI slop. Amazon has become littered with undifferentiated junk. The state of social media, meanwhile—fractured, disorienting, and prone to boosting all manner of misinformation—can be succinctly described as a cesspool.

It’s with some irony, then, that Reddit has become a reservoir of humanity.

Read the full article.

More in Culture

Starbucks’ most beloved offering is disappearing. What on earth is Eusexua? The Stranger Things effect comes for the novel. “Dear James”: Oh, how the men drone on.

Catch Up on The Atlantic

The day Trump became un-president Is there anything Trump won’t blame on DEI? RFK Jr. has a lot to learn about Medicaid.

Photo Album

Germany’s Alexander Zverev plays in a semifinal match against Serbia’s Novak Djokovic at the Australian Open. (Francis Mascarenhas / Reuters)

Take a look at these photos of the week, featuring scenes from the Australian Open, Lunar New Year celebrations, and more.

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A Weekend Reading List

The Atlantic

www.theatlantic.com › newsletters › archive › 2025 › 01 › weekend-reading-list › 681460

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.

Our editors compiled a list of seven absorbing reads for your weekend. Spend time with stories about the secretive world of extreme fishing, new approaches to aging, and more.

Your Reading List

The Army of God Comes Out of the Shadows

By Stephanie McCrummen

Tens of millions of American Christians are embracing a charismatic movement known as the New Apostolic Reformation, which seeks to destroy the secular state.

America Needs to Radically Rethink What It Means to Be Old

By Jonathan Rauch

As 100-year lifespans become more common, the time has come for a new approach to school, work, and retirement.

Inside the Dangerous, Secretive World of Extreme Fishing

By Tyler Austin Harper

Why I swim out into rough seas 80 nights a year to hunt for striped bass

Americans Need to Party More

By Ellen Cushing

We’re not doing it as much as we used to. You can be the change we need.

Read These Six Books—Just Trust Us

By Tajja Isen

Each title richly rewards readers who come in with little prior knowledge.

Is Moderate Drinking Okay?

By Derek Thompson

“Every drink takes five minutes off your life.” Maybe the thought scares you. Personally, I find comfort in it.

The Agony of Texting With Men

By Matthew Schnipper

Many guys are bad at messaging their friends back—and it might be making them more lonely.

The Week Ahead

Season 2 of The Recruit, an action series about a young CIA lawyer who becomes embroiled in an international conflict (streaming on Netflix on Thursday) Dog Man, an animated film in the Captain Underpants universe about a police officer who is fused with his dog in a lifesaving surgery (in theaters Friday) The Sirens’ Call, a book by the MSNBC host Chris Hayes about how attention became the world’s most endangered resource (out Tuesday)

More in Culture

“Dear James”: My sad, sad friend talks only about herself. The Oscars have left the mainstream moviegoer behind. David Lynch captured the appeal of the unknown. A horrifying true story, told through mundane details Dave Chappelle’s sincere plea on Saturday Night Live

Catch Up on The Atlantic

MAGA is starting to crack. The attack on birthright citizenship is a big test for the Constitution. “January 6ers got out of prison—and came to my neighborhood.”

Photo Album

Vivek, the son of U.S. Vice President J. D. Vance, attends the inaugural parade inside Capital One Arena. (Carlos Barria / Reuters)

Take a look at these photos of the week, featuring the U.S. vice president’s son on Inauguration Day, two Thai actors who registered their marriage after Thailand’s same-sex-marrige law went into effect, and more.

When you buy a book using a link in this newsletter, we receive a commission. Thank you for supporting The Atlantic.

A True-Crime Reading List

The Atlantic

www.theatlantic.com › newsletters › archive › 2025 › 01 › atlantic-true-crime-stories › 681354

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.

In today’s reading list, Atlantic journalists offer an intricate examination of those who swindle or hurt others, and those who must live with the fallout. The stories below follow a con man turned true-crime writer, a prison break facilitated by a dog crate, the spectacle of murder fandoms, and more.

The Con Man Who Became a True-Crime Writer

In his old life, Matthew Cox told stories to scam his way into millions of dollars. Now he’s trying to sell tales that are true.

By Rachel Monroe

The True Story of the Married Woman Who Smuggled Her Boyfriend Out of Prison in a Dog Crate

She wanted to escape her marriage. He wanted to escape his life sentence.

By Michael J. Mooney

They Stole Yogi Berra’s World Series Rings. Then They Did Something Really Crazy.

The childhood friends behind the most audacious string of sports-memorabilia heists in American history

By Ariel Sabar

The Perfect Man Who Wasn’t

For years, he used fake identities to charm women out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Then his victims banded together to take him down.

By Rachel Monroe

The Gross Spectacle of Murder Fandom

After four University of Idaho students were killed, TikTok and Reddit sleuths swarmed the campus. The community is still struggling with the wreckage they left behind.

By McKay Coppins

The Mobster Who Bought His Son a Hockey Team

A tale of goons, no-show jobs, and a legendary minor-league franchise that helped land its owner in prison

By Rich Cohen

The Tomb Raiders of the Upper East Side

Inside the Manhattan DA’s Antiquities Trafficking Unit

By Ariel Sabar

The Rise and Fall of an All-Star Crew of Jewel Thieves

They were highly sophisticated. The local police seemed helpless. Then a retired septuagenarian detective stepped in.

By Geoff Manaugh

The Week Ahead

Season 2 of The Night Agent, an action series about an FBI agent who is drawn into the mysterious world of the Night Action organization (streaming on Netflix on Thursday) We Do Not Part, a book by Han Kang that follows the friendship between two Korean women and the massacre on Jeju Island (out Tuesday) Presence, a horror film told from the perspective of a spirit bound to a family’s suburban home (in theaters Friday)

Essay

Illustration by The Atlantic. Source: Getty.

America Just Kinda, Sorta Banned Cigarettes

By Nicholas Florko

No drug is quite like nicotine. When it hits your bloodstream, you’re sent on a ride of double euphoria: an immediate jolt of adrenaline, like a strong cup of coffee injected directly into your brain, along with the calming effect of a beer. Nicotine is what gets people hooked on cigarettes, despite their health risks and putrid smell. It is, in essence, what cigarette companies are selling, and what they’ve always been selling. Without nicotine, a cigarette is just smoldering leaves wrapped in some fancy paper.

But if the Biden administration gets its way, that’s essentially all cigarettes will be.

Read the full article.

More in Culture

The hipster grifter peaked too soon. A singing chimp isn’t the wildest part of Better Man. Where Han Kang’s nightmares come from A Palestinian story unlike any other A Holocaust novel confronts fiction’s limits.

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How Trump made Biden’s Gaza peace plan happen David Frum on Justin Trudeau’s performative self-regard The one Trump pick Democrats actually like

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Eight Perfect Episodes of TV

The Atlantic

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Welcome back to The Daily’s Sunday culture edition.

Few things are more satisfying than watching a show pull off a clever and high-octane episode. For those looking to revisit some greats, our writers and editors answer the question: What do you think is a perfect episode of TV?

The following contains spoilers for the episodes mentioned.

“The Panic in Central Park,” Girls (streaming on Max)

Maybe this is the former theater critic in me coming out, but the thing I love most is when a television series tells a complete story in miniature—a stand-alone short that puts a particular dynamic or relationship or cast member front and center. Girls, which revolves around four friends in New York City, has always been brilliant at this, and never more so than with “The Panic in Central Park,” a Marnie-centered episode that deals with the particular moment in young adulthood when fantasy becomes untenable.

“The Panic in Central Park,” like the best Girls episodes, is written by Lena Dunham and directed by Richard Shepard. It begins with Desi mournfully reproaching his “cruel” new wife, Marnie, for declining to go get a scone, ends with her asking for a divorce, and riffs on film history, romance, and codependency in between. The high-strung Marnie, out on a walk to clear her head, encounters her ex, Charlie, who’s almost unrecognizable. He whisks her away on a whirlwind New York City adventure involving a consigned red cocktail dress (Millennial Williamsburg’s answer to Pretty Woman), a fake identity, Italian food, a rowboat in Central Park, a robbery, and—finally—the revelation that Charlie is addicted to heroin. A sadder, wiser Marnie walks home barefoot, having accepted the idea that no one is going to save her. The episode is beautiful and incisive about the allure of the stories we wrap ourselves in and the power of shaking them off.

— Sophie Gilbert, staff writer

***

“If It Smells Like a Rat, Give It Cheese,” Survivor: Micronesia (streaming on Hulu and Paramount+)

If I could erase my brain in order to watch anything for the first time again, I would do it for the penultimate episode of Survivor: Micronesia. The 16th season of the reality game show is famously one of the best, and this episode is why. Watching it is like witnessing Alex Honnold climb El Capitan without ropes—except instead of sheer athleticism in the face of seemingly impossible odds, you’re seeing how master manipulators exploit social dynamics to get what they want. It’s the Olympics for those who prefer politics or gossip to sports.

People who haven’t watched Survivor often assume that it’s about “surviving” the wilderness, but it’s always primarily been about surviving human nature. Driven by power and social capital, the show has more in common with Game of Thrones than Naked and Afraid. Explaining exactly what happens in this episode would be like explaining an inside joke; you need to watch the whole season to get why it hits. Just know that it features Red Wedding–level of gameplay, setting the bar high for how far people will go to get ahead.

— Serena Dai, senior editor

***

“C**tgate,” Veep (streaming on Max)

Unlike a perfect movie, a perfect episode of television does not need to surprise you or make you cry. It just needs to move your beloved or loathed characters through the formula in an especially excellent way. But the element of surprise may be why I remember “C**tgate” so many years later. In this episode of Veep, Selina Meyer (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) orchestrates two tasks that are both impossibly monumental and petty. She has to decide if she is going to bail out a bank owned by her current boyfriend, and she must find out who on her staff called her a “cunt” so loudly in public that it was overheard by a reporter.

These interweaving plots alone would make a perfectly satisfying episode. What makes it golden are two of the funniest, most unexpected subplots in Veep’s run. One involves a focus group for the bumbling White House liaison Jonah Ryan, now running for Congress in New Hampshire, who is workshopping an ad. The second is a surprise announcement by Selina’s daughter, a recurring sad sack who can never get her mother’s attention. Guess who she’s dating?

— Hanna Rosin, senior editor

***

“Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose,” The X-Files (streaming on Hulu)

If you’re seeking out a perfect episode of TV, the richest cache to search is the “case of the week” entries of The X-Files. The show wove an elaborate arc about aliens on Earth but saved most of its best material for the smaller stuff. “Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose,” written by Darin Morgan, is a gothic short story, following FBI agents Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) as they investigate a murder with the help of a tetchy local psychic named Clyde Bruckman (Peter Boyle).

This being The X-Files, Mulder is immediately taken with Bruckman’s clairvoyance, while Scully is skeptical—but Morgan’s script resolves each of Bruckman’s predictions about the future in clever, tragicomic ways, reinforcing Mulder’s belief while also finding ways to affirm Scully’s cynicism. It’s funny, dark, and beautifully acted—particularly between Anderson and Boyle—with an elliptical plot structure that feels wonderfully complex even by today’s TV standards.

— David Sims, staff writer

***

“It’s the End of the World” and “As We Know It,” Grey’s Anatomy (streaming on Netflix and Hulu)

I’ve previously written that after more than 20 seasons, it’s time for Grey’s Anatomy to come to an end. But in its early days, the series was responsible for some of the most memorable episodes of television: The second season’s two-part storyline, “It’s the End of the World” and “As We Know It,” demonstrated the show’s mix of humor and drama at its best.

Colloquially known as the “bomb in the body cavity” episodes, they tell the story of a patient who comes in with live ammunition in his chest. At the same time, the show’s powerhouse resident Dr. Miranda Bailey goes into labor, and two other characters perform surgery on her husband, who crashed his car on his way in. In the midst of some very suspenseful plotlines, the dialogue explores the relationships among, and vulnerabilities of, the characters in a beautifully human way. On a show that’s known for putting people in harm’s way, this pair of episodes focuses as much on the emotions as on the drama: the fear of losing someone you care about, and what it really means to be in love.

— Kate Guarino, supervisory senior associate editor

***

Season 2, Episode 10, The Mole (streaming on Netflix)

The Season 2 finale of Netflix’s reboot of The Mole is made perfect if you first watch all of the other episodes. The show’s formula is simple: 12 people collaborate on Indiana Jones–style missions to earn money for a prize pot, but one of them is a “mole” hired by the producers to sabotage the other contestants. Elimination isn’t based on your performance in missions. It’s about how accurately you identify the mole, according to your answers on a quiz given each round.

What results is sumptuous chaos, set among abandoned buildings and real explosives that make you wonder what the release form for this show must look like. Everyone is pretending to be the mole (to mislead others) while testing their fellow players (to figure out who the mole is) and still, somehow, trying to collect money for the prize pot. Oh, and did I mention that Ari Shapiro of All Things Considered fame is this season’s host?

I won’t spoil the finale, but it involves minefields and three equally mole-like characters. There’s not a single weak link in this episode, and if you correctly guess who the mole is, you’ll have bested much of the internet.

— Katherine Hu, assistant editor

***

“Chocolate With Nuts,” SpongeBob SquarePants (streaming on Paramount+)

At about 11 minutes per segment, SpongeBob SquarePants doesn’t have much room to play around with. But its best episodes use that brevity to their advantage, stuffing in visual gags, one-liners, callbacks, goofy voice acting, and witty repartee. “Chocolate With Nuts,” from the third season, is the greatest example of the show’s “run out the clock” ethos: SpongeBob and his best friend, Patrick, become chocolate-bar salesmen to achieve “fancy living.” Their ensuing door-to-door journey introduces them to a cavalcade of bizarre Bikini Bottom dwellers, including a seemingly immortal, shriveled-up fish and a man who feigns “glass bones” syndrome in one of many efforts to dupe the boys into buying chocolate from him instead.

More than most episodes of this kids’ cartoon, “Chocolate With Nuts” threads the needle between the juvenile hijinks and some more adult themes: the empty promise of the good life, the uphill battle of entrepreneurship, the fallacy of “trust thy neighbor.” That headiness is all conveyed through SpongeBob’s elastic face and Patrick’s gobsmacking vacuousness—the best way to explore any nuanced concept, in my view.

But the primary reason I have been rewatching this episode for more than 22 years now is its unassuming density. SpongeBob is wonderfully breezy, but its hidden strength is how layered each joke is: I laugh at different things every time—a certain line delivery, a certain facial expression—and impulsively repeat its most memorable quotes. “Chocolate,” says the pruned old-lady fish, wistfully. “Sweet, sweet chocolate. I always hated it!”

— Allegra Frank, senior editor

Here are three Sunday reads from The Atlantic:

The anti-social century The army of God comes out of the shadows. The agony of texting with men

The Week Ahead

September 5, a drama film detailing an ABC Sports crew’s efforts to cover the massacre at the 1972 Olympics in Munich (in theaters nationwide Friday) Season 2 of Severance, a sci-fi series about a corporate employee who agrees to surgically “sever” his personal life from his work life (streaming on Apple TV+ on Friday) The JFK Conspiracy, a book by Josh Mensch and Brad Meltzer about the first assassination attempt on John F. Kennedy (out Tuesday)

Essay

Illustration by Jackson Gibbs

Parents Are Gaming Their Kids’ Credit Scores

By Michael Waters

Several years ago, Hannah Case decided to examine her personal credit history. Case, who was then a researcher at the Federal Reserve, hadn’t gotten her first credit card until she was 22. But as she discovered when she saw her file, she’d apparently been spending responsibly since 14.

Read the full article.

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