When the world gets closer.

We help you see farther.

Sign up to our expressly international daily newsletter.

404 Image

Page not Found

The page you are looking for might have been removed, had its name changed or is temporarily unavailable
Society

"Dragon Ball" To "One Piece," Why It's So Hard To Adapt Anime To Live-Action Movies

Netflix's latest anime adaptations Avatar: The Last Airbender and One Piece have received positive reviews from fans and critics — exceptions in a long line of live-action failures. Why is it so difficult to get it right? And are Western fans too harsh?

Between Netflix’s 2023 live-action version of One Piece, and its latest take on Avatar: The Last Airbender, fans are once again asking: why are live-action anime adaptations so tricky to get right?

Despite the ongoing debate about whether Avatar (2005–08) is indeed an “anime” (since it’s made by US creators), the series has nonetheless gone down as a favourite among Western anime fans.

For the latest news & views from every corner of the world, Worldcrunch Today is the only truly international newsletter. Sign up here.

Netflix’s new rendition has been rated highly by fans and critics alike. Viewers have flocked online to share their opinions on everything from the casting choices, to the sets and costumes, to changes in the story.

But while this is being praised, that makes it an outlier in live-action anime adaptations. What is it about such adaptations that leads to them being so closely scrutinised? And why are they so often met with disappointment?

Watch Video Show less
Geopolitics

Russia's UN Veto On North Korean Sanctions, A New Blow To International Order

Moscow "killed" the body charged with overseeing the sanctions regime against North Korea — now Putin's ally against Ukraine — dealing yet another blow to the edifice of global governance inherited from the post-war era.

-Analysis-

PARIS — It was a low-profile vote at the UN Security Council on Thursday — not as resounding as the one on the Gaza ceasefire last week, which went unheeded. Thursday’s vote concerned North Korea and the renewal of the mandate of a body charged with overseeing sanctions imposed on the country.

For the latest news & views from every corner of the world, Worldcrunch Today is the only truly international newsletter. Sign up here.

Russia vetoed the vote and that's where its importance lies. Moscow has become North Korea's protector since Pyongyang supported Russia's war effort in Ukraine, delivering large quantities of munitions. China, Pyongyang's other ally, preferred to abstain, a hint of the nuances that separate Beijing and Moscow on the international stage.

By "killing off" this unremarkable UN body, Russia aims to dismantle the sanctions regime against North Korea for its nuclear and ballistic missile programs. The sanctions remain in place, but in a month, there will be no one left to verify their application.

Watch Video Show less
Russia

Beggar, Joke, Neo-Nazi: Russian Insults Go Right Over Zelensky's Head

Compared to the worldwide admiration for Volodymyr Zelensky, authorities in Moscow have systematically tried to demean the Ukrainian leader. Yet even among Russians, that strategy appears to be backfiring.

Updated March 29, 2024 at 5:30 p.m.*

While some watched in awe and admiration, Russia’s ruling class has a very different take on Volodymyr Zelensky.

Russian state media relentlessly taunts Zelensky, describing as “prostrating himself” during his trips to Washington and European capitals, “begging for money” from allies, “an embarrassment”...

Stay up-to-date with the latest on the Russia-Ukraine war, with our exclusive international coverage.

Sign up to our free daily newsletter.

Pavel Danilov, a prominent Russian political scientist told Russia’s Channel Five news that one such visit, in late 2022, was “some kind of image opportunity for Ukrainian domestic consumers. He went to the American priest who confirmed that he was on our side, that everything was fine, let's carry on, lads, fight on and all that.”

Pro-Kremlin television host Vladimir Solovyov, whose sharp rhetoric has made him one of the key propagandists since the start of Russia’s war, said live on air that he “kept thinking during this [Biden-Zelensky] press conference that this bastard [Zelensky] should simply be destroyed…”

Watch Video Show less
FOCUS: Israel-Palestine War

Has The Gaza War Killed The Idea Of The "Progressive Zionist?"

Criticism of Israel in the United States remained a taboo for many decades. But this has begun to change with new generations and Palestinians presenting their cause on a humanitarian basis. It may ultimately make it impossible to reconcile being both a progressive and a Zionist.

-Analysis-

CAIRO — In recent comments former U.S. President Donald Trump said that any Jewish person who votes for Democrats "hates their religion,” adding that “they hate everything about Israel, and they should be ashamed of themselves because Israel will be destroyed.”

It was not the first time that the majority of Jews faced accusations from Trump, who had a hard-line pro-Israel stance during his four years in the White House. Indeed, he had previously accused those Jews who vote for the Democratic Party of disloyalty and of not doing the right thing for Israel.

In the tight race that Trump and Biden fought in 2020, 77% of American Jews voted for the Democratic candidate, compared to only 21% for Trump. And there are no indications that this percentage will change significantly in the upcoming election rematch in November.

Watch Video Show less
Society

Mrs. Maisel To Fleabag: Why TV's Strong Female Leads Aren't As Feminist As You Think

We've seen some strong female leads in major TV series in recent years: Fleabag, Daenerys Targaryen or Mrs. Maisel. But how feminist are these emotionally distant characters who have a disastrous love life, a trait that just sits right next to the fact that they stand up for themselves?

-Analysis-

ROME — Every so often a friend who works as a talent scout for a production company calls me to ask if I have any books to recommend. Books with tough female protagonists, she tells me, that can inspire TV series.

Today it seems that putting an emancipated female character at the very center is a basic prerequisite for building a successful TV show. There is no getting away from self-determined, accomplished women in fulfilling professions, sometimes even tougher, if not authoritarian women who are always smarter than their male counterparts.

✉️ To receive our weekly Women Worldwide newsletter, Click here.

Having definitively debunked detectives, investigators, policewomen, even women in leadership roles are beginning to be numerous. Series about proto-feminists, such as the first modern female Italian lawyer (The Law According to Lidia Poët starring Matilda De Angelis), or the scientist in Lessons in Chemistry (Brie Larson), are popular with audiences. Of course, those all come in the wake of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel's success, in which television writer Amy Sherman-Palladino chronicles a woman in the 1950s who embarks on a career as a stand-up comedian.

Watch Video Show less
Geopolitics

Ukraine, A Mirror Of The French-German Divide

While Germany's Scholz has chosen to walk a tightrope, France's Macron has made a major U-turn on. While differences between Berlin and Paris are not new, the intensifying war in Ukraine has changed the situation.

-Analysis-

BERLIN — “Should we prepare our children for war?” German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung asked in a headline last week. The article was about Education Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger's proposal to organize civil protection exercises in schools and to develop a “relaxed relationship with the Bundeswehr” thanks to regular classroom visits from the armed forces.

For the latest news & views from every corner of the world, Worldcrunch Today is the only truly international newsletter. Sign up here.

Ten days earlier, the German Association of Towns and Municipalities called for billions of euros to bring disused bunkers back into service and build new ones. Of the 2,000 public shelters dating back to the Cold War, only 600 remain, with a total capacity of 500,000 people.

Quite unimaginable in France, this kind of debate reflects the gulf that separates France and Germany in their perception of war in Ukraine. Geography, the weight of history, but also differences in political systems and economic power explain in part the differences on this subject between France and Germany.

Watch Video Show less
In The News

UN Orders Israel To Let In Gaza Aid, Russia-North Korea, Dachshund Drama

👋 Halito!*

Welcome to Friday, where a UN court orders Israel to allow aid into Gaza, nine are detained in Tajikistan in connection to last Friday’s attack at a Moscow concert hall, and German dachshunds avoid a wurst-case scenario. Meanwhile, Ahmed Salim in Egypt-based news website Al Manassa reports on the Sudanese women fighting to stop wartime sexual violence.

[*Choctaw, Native American]

Watch Video Show less
This Happened

This Happened — March 29: I.M. Pei's Louvre Pyramid Inaugurated

Updated March 29, 2024 at 12:30 p.m.

The Louvre pyramid was inaugurated on this day in 1989, after nearly four years of construction.

Watch Video Show less
In The News

Worldcrunch Magazine #77 — Who's Next?

April 1 - April 7, 2024

Here's the latest edition of Worldcrunch Magazine, a selection of our best articles of the week from top international journalists, produced exclusively in English for Worldcrunch readers.

>> DISCOVER IT HERE <<

Watch Video Show less
Future

TikTok Fears Over China Miss The Real Danger: All Social Media

Safety or addiction concerns about TikTok are very real. But would U.S. elected officials seek to ban or control this social network if it were not Chinese? Are U.S. social networks less harmful? For France Inter, Pierre Haski warns us to take a step back when pointing the finger at TikTok.

-Analysis-

PARIS — When the first threats to ban the social network TikTok appeared in the United States, one U.S. lawmaker worried about being "hated by an entire generation!”

For the latest news & views from every corner of the world, Worldcrunch Today is the only truly international newsletter. Sign up here.

Founded in 2016, TikTok is indeed the singular standout social network of recent years, with more than one billion users around the world, the majority of whom are young people, with another one billion if we count the Chinese version Douyin. The United States, meanwhile, counts 170 million TikTok users, compared to the 20 million in France.

But TikTok is Chinese, and that's the problem. And those same problems are spreading outside the United States. India and its billion-and-a-half inhabitants banned TikTok in 2020, two weeks after a deadly incident on the Chinese border. For Delhi, the app posed a security risk.

Watch Video Show less
LGBTQ Plus

As Colombia Debates "Conversion Therapy" Ban, One Gay Man Shares His Story Of Survival

As Colombia debates banning the abusive practice of "conversion therapy," a Colombian teacher recalls the four years of therapy he undertook as teenager and his path to self-acceptance.

BOGOTÁ — Anguish is the word David Zuluaga, a 26-year-old Colombian, uses to describe his teenage years, when he realized he was attracted to men. Having always heard of homosexuality as a sin, he could barely process his own orientation. And he came to conclude that this was a problem to be fixed.

✉️ You can receive our LGBTQ+ International roundup every week directly in your inbox. Subscribe here.

On March 19, Colombia's lower legislative chamber began to debate a draft law banning so-called conversion therapies known in Colombia as Efforts to Change Expressions of Sexual Orientation, Identity or Gender (ECOSIEG). The bill, known as Inconvertibles ("Unchangeable"), would prevent all forceful and abusive measures on members of the various gay communities (the LGBTIQ+ collective), with the pretext of curing individuals of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

If approved — after several debates and a vote in the Senate — and promulgated, the law would make Colombia the ninth country in the world to ban such practices.

Watch Video Show less
Geopolitics

Why Tajiks Are Easy Prey For Islamic Jihadists

Tajiks are responsible for numerous Islamist terrorist attacks in recent months. Suspects in the devastating attack in Moscow also come from the Central Asian country. Open access to Russia, difficult economic conditions, and a secular dictatorship that has repressed religion at home are among the factors that contribute to the radicalization of Tajiks.

-Analysis-

Following the devastating attack in Moscow, several Tajiks are in custody in Russia as suspects. In early January, a suspected Tajik suicide bomber carried out an attack at the tomb of Gen. Qassem Soleimani, in the Iranian city of Kerman, killing almost 100 people. At the end of last year, Tajiks were arrested in Germany and Austria in connection with planned attacks on Cologne Cathedral and St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna.

For the latest news & views from every corner of the world, Worldcrunch Today is the only truly international newsletter. Sign up here.

According to experts, Tajiks and their family members form a minority within the Central Asian terrorist group ISIS-Khorasan (ISPK) — an offshoot of the terrorist militia of the so-called Islamic State (ISIS) — which is believed to comprise up to 6,000 fighters. A few hundred fighters are said to have sworn allegiance to the group.

But their small number cannot hide the fact: for the terrorist organization, radical Islamic Tajiks are a kind of universal weapon.

Watch Video Show less