News, sports, culture and discoveries
COMING UP: Syracuse hosts SMU on Halloween; Ravens visit the Bills on Sunday. The WNBA Finals resume Thursday, Oct. 29, at 12:30 p.m. ET, with Golden State leading 3–2.
After almost a decade of silence, Apu speaks again. The actor who took on the role understands both why the character mattered and why he became so painful.
When Sunil Malhotra was a young Indian American Simpsons fan, Apu was at once a rare familiar face on television and the source of mocking imitations from his classmates. This month, Malhotra became the character's new voice — a role he accepted only after a serious conversation with the show's producers about its history.
Alan Siegel's profile is much more revealing than an announcement of a recasting. Malhotra describes what it meant to hear Apu as a child, the experience of being reduced to someone else's accent and why simply returning the character to the screen would not be enough.
The October 18 episode marked Apu's first speaking appearance in almost nine years. Hank Azaria relinquished the role after years of criticism, sharpened by Hari Kondabolu's The Problem with Apu. Bringing the character back with a South Asian actor does not resolve every question about representation; it gives the writers a chance to make him a fuller person.
There is a larger Simpsons question here, too: whether a series built on decades of familiar comic routines can move forward without pretending that viewers have not changed.
The burrito in Victoria Blanco’s family is not simply the food of a childhood kitchen. It carries the memory of her grandmother’s work feeding people during the Mexican Revolution in Juárez.
This beautifully reported family history connects migration, labor, food traditions and the stories families choose to tell about difficult years.
Forrest Welborn spent decades under suspicion in the 1991 Austin yogurt-shop murders. His eventual exoneration could not simply undo the accumulated personal damage.
Michael Hall’s deeply reported account looks at what wrongful suspicion can do even to someone who was never convicted.
Across workplaces, pubs and festivals, cocaine has moved far beyond a narrow nightlife scene. Vinter’s reporting follows people who use it and the social pressures they describe, while the companion data reporting traces changing price, consumption and harm.
The uncomfortable point is how thoroughly the drug has been normalized, even among people who can describe exactly what it is costing them.
New York City · Syracuse · Environmental preservation
Construction on New York’s much-criticized Midtown bus terminal is finally shifting into the phase commuters will feel. Old ramps are coming down, buses are being rerouted and a temporary facility must be built before the current terminal can be replaced.
The decade-long project promises a modern terminal and new public space above Dyer Avenue, but the immediate story is disruption for hundreds of thousands of riders — and whether the agency can keep its buses moving.
A major upgrade of old subway signals has begun between High Street and Ozone Park–Lefferts Boulevard. Computerized train control across 23 stations is intended to improve frequency and reliability.
The important public-policy angle is that congestion-pricing revenue is paying for infrastructure most riders will never see — and whose eventual effect they will measure in waiting times.
Chancellor J. Michael Haynie has initiated a review of the university’s administrative and executive functions as leaders confront enrollment and financial pressure.
The stated goal is to make the institution’s staffing fit its future, but the scope, savings targets and consequences have yet to be defined. This deserves a watch, not predictions of layoffs.
Small, aging dams can fragment streams just as effectively as giant ones, but attract far less attention. Ben Goldfarb visits the quieter campaign to reconnect waterways for migrating fish.
It’s a persuasive argument for judging infrastructure not only by the projects we build, but by what happens when we finally remove the barriers left behind.
Twenty years after The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Pollan measures the distance between the food movement’s ambitions and the system people still eat within. Organic products are mainstream, but that achievement can coexist with concentrated agricultural power and a diet dominated by ultra-processed food.
The essay is interesting because Pollan does not treat the movement’s growth as an uncomplicated victory. He returns to the uncomfortable question of whether better individual shopping habits can meaningfully change the forces shaping food production—and how a familiar reform argument can take on new political meanings.
Game 4 · Bills · Sabres · Knicks · Syracuse · WNBA Finals
Brewers lead Rays, 3–0 · Tonight, 8 p.m. ET · Tropicana Field · FOX
Milwaukee’s 10–1 dismantling of Tampa Bay in Game 3 made the first championship in franchise history a possibility tonight. The eight-run fifth inning exposed the Rays’ defense and their lack of pitching margin; Jackson Chourio finished with four hits, and Robert Gasser worked six innings of one-hit baseball.
But a 3–0 series lead does not make Game 4 a formality. Timothy Jackson’s Baseball Prospectus preview focuses on what Milwaukee can reasonably expect from Shane Drohan and how the Rays might deploy Griffin Jax. The Brewers’ depth has been an advantage all month; their greatest risk is giving Tampa Bay its first plausible opening.
Beyond the tactical matchup, this is an unusual World Series between two clubs that have invested in player development and scouting rather than celebrity rosters. Milwaukee has turned those decisions into a postseason juggernaut.
Next: Ravens at Bills · Sunday, Nov. 1 · 1 p.m. ET
Buffalo’s struggling defense received plenty of attention during the bye. Bruce Nolan identifies a more revealing question on the other side of the ball: has the Bills’ passing game genuinely improved against pressure?
Allen has moved from 21st to fourth in success rate against the blitz, Nolan calculates. Baltimore blitzes on 36.5 percent of plays, but Minnesota—the following opponent—brings pressure on nearly three-quarters of snaps. Those contrasting tests will show how sustainable the improvement is.
Sabres at Sharks · Tonight, 10:30 p.m. ET · ESPN
Colten Ellis starts in San Jose after Alex Lyon’s injury, giving Buffalo another chance to find steady goaltending behind a team that has too often surrendered dangerous looks. His previous appearances were uneven, but the opportunity is real.
The special teams have been more troubling: entering Tuesday, Buffalo’s power play was at 10.5 percent and its penalty kill at 69.2 percent. A cleaner first period and better exits would mean more than a temporary scoring surge.
Pistons at Knicks · Tonight, 8 p.m. ET · NBC / Peacock / MSG
At 0–3, Mike Brown’s Knicks need better defensive connections and more offense generated from stops, not simply hotter three-point shooting. Detroit offers an early test of the Towns–Bridges combinations and transition defense.
Three games are not a season. But they are enough to show which habits need fixing before the schedule gets harder.
Next: No. 19 SMU at Syracuse · Saturday, Oct. 31 · Noon ET · ESPN2
For the first time, Otto the Orange will appear on Syracuse’s football helmets. The new white lids feature the mascot on both sides, replacing the usual block-S treatment for Saturday’s Halloween home game. Andrew Lind’s SportsLogos report has the photographs and the strange story of how Otto got his name.
On the field, Syracuse is coming off its overtime escape at North Carolina. The challenge against ranked SMU is turning that confidence into cleaner protection and fewer mistakes—not retelling last Saturday’s game.
The white alternate helmet announced for October 31, 2026. Previous Syracuse designs included numbers, stripes and the block S, but the historical illustration previously shown here was withdrawn because individual designs were not independently verified.
Valkyries lead Dream 3–2 · Game 6 Thursday, Oct. 29, 12:30 p.m. ET · USA / Peacock
Golden State won Monday’s Game 5 by 64–55. Kiah Stokes and Veronica Burton scored 13 apiece, but the more revealing numbers were the disrupted Atlanta possessions and the pressure that kept the Dream’s offense from ever getting comfortable.
Atlanta now has to solve that defensive puzzle at home to keep its season alive. The championship would be Golden State’s first, in the franchise’s second season.
Cristian Volpato’s synthetic double raises questions about publicity, identity and how athletes might commercialize an artificial version of themselves.
The two Americans have secured places in the season-ending field. The significant question is what their fall form says about a title run, not another routine rankings update.
Film · Voices · Experimental music
LISTEN · The Wonders on Apple Music
The Wonders’ rise in Tom Hanks’s That Thing You Do! begins with one irresistible song—and one small change in tempo. At 30, the movie still understands the thrill of making something that escapes into the world and the complicated friendships behind a seemingly effortless hit.
Stephen Snart’s affectionate essay also recognizes the melancholy under the exuberance: a record can outlive the band that made it. The title song, written by Fountains of Wayne’s Adam Schlesinger, helps explain why the fantasy still sounds real.
A previously unpublished portion of Alan Siegel’s interview with the late Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck voice actor reveals his intense study of Mel Blanc’s craft—and lets Bauza’s own intelligence and humor lead the remembrance.
LISTEN · FM3’s original Buddha Machine on Apple Music
The Buddha Machine is a small box of looping ambient sounds whose limits became the point: music without shuffle, recommendation or endpoint. Bandcamp Daily traces its influence on contemporary experimental music.
PREORDER · 1986 debut on Bandcamp LISTEN · 2025 album on Apple Music
The 1986 debut—long out of print and absent from streaming—is being restored by 4AD on December 11, a welcome opportunity to hear Kristin Hersh and Tanya Donelly’s earliest work.
LISTEN · Original 1968 recording on Apple Music
Rod Argent and Colin Blunstone explain the strange afterlife of a 1967 recording that became a hit after the group broke up.
An irresistible oral history of what a song can do when it escapes the intentions of its creators.
LISTEN · Apple Music BUY · Bandcamp
The collective’s Everything in Readiness is a way into contemporary interpretations of traditional British and Irish folk material — exploratory, uneasy and worth hearing in full.
In 1987, Noah Adams began interviewing 8-year-old Betsy Walter about her parents’ divorce by talking about dogs. Rather than hurry to the painful subject, he made room for the conversation to become hers.
A young Ira Glass was so struck by Adams’s unedited tape that he took it home to study. Glass later recalled it as an early lesson in what a radio interview could sound like: genuinely curious, patient and alive to the person being interviewed.
The reporting craft was not a trick. Adams had earned enough trust to ask a difficult question—and listen to the answer.
October 27, 2026 edition · Finalized retrospectively from the issue’s recovered editorial selections and published reports. Time-sensitive previews reflect what was known before the evening games, not their eventual results. This is a completed historical edition, not a verbatim reproduction of every earlier draft.