Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story is Netflix’s #1 show but it’s not as popular as Dahmer – here are 3 better crime dramas to watch with over 85% on Rotten Tomatoes
Ryan Murphy’s and Ian Brennan’s second season of the true crime anthology series Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Storyhas become Netflix‘s most-watched show with over 12 million views worldwide in the week ending September 22.
Despite being the number one show on the best streaming service, it has been met with criticism. The series has 44% on Rotten Tomatoes from the critics, with The Guardian calling it an “exhausting horror show” in their two star review. Meanwhile, the first season of the series, Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Storyreceived a slightly better critical reception of 57% and saw a higher view count in its opening weekend (Deadline reports that Dahmer had around 21 million views, while Menendez received 12 million), but both wouldn’t make it onto our best Netflix shows list.
The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story is a true-crime drama that centers on the lives of the Menendez brothers, Lyle (Nichola Alexander Chavez) and Erik (Cooper Koch), who were convicted of killing their parents in 1989. But there are plenty of better crime dramas to watch on Netflix – here are three with over 85% on Rotten Tomatoes to watch instead.
MONSTERS: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story | Official Trailer #1 | Netflix – YouTube
Creators: Susannah Grant, Ayelet Waldman, and Michael Chabon
Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning article by T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong, Unbelievable follows the police investigation into the Washington and Colorado serial rape cases between 2008 and 2011. The hard-hitting series explores the survivors’ perspectives and the injustices they suffer by the American judicial system, including teenage girl Marie (Kaitlyn Dever) whose report of being raped is criticized and dismissed by the cops.
Meanwhile, Toni Collette and Merritt Wever are outstanding as two detectives on a mission to uncover the truth about a spate of similar attacks (their empathetic performances are something I often think about when it comes to gripping crime dramas). Even just watching the trailer is goosebump-inducing as it showcases a spectrum of raw emotions from all the cast.
Mindhunteris arguably one of the best Netflix shows ever and is adapted from the 1995 true crime book Mindhunter: Inside the FBI’s Serial Elite Crime Unit written by former FBI agent John E. Douglas. Set in the late 70s and early 80s, Mindhunter focuses on the creation of FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit and the beginning of criminal profiling.
Jonathan Groff, Holt McCallany, and Anna Torv star as two FBI agents and a psychology professor who interview serial killers to understand their damaged minds and motives. Fincher’s signature style makes this dark, chilling piece of television well worth a watch as it leaves you haunted by how depraved and complex real-life monsters can be.
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Sofia Vergara proves she’s as gifted a dramatic actor as she is a comedian in the titular role of Colombian crime boss, Griselda Blanco. Inspired by her real-life story, the Emmy-nominated series documents Blanco’s journey from fleeing Medellín to protect her children into becoming the notorious drug lord known as the Godmother of Cocaine.
Vergara perfectly captures the complex and multifaceted personality of Blanco, from her ardent maternal instincts to her ruthless and more vulnerable side as her hunger for power and wealth in the Miami drug scene becomes all-consuming.
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It is a peek inside the body of one of the earliest ancestors of modern insects, spiders and crabs.
Lead researcher Dr Martin Smith said this was a dream fossil, in part because it was preserved in its larval, or immature, stage – when its body was still developing.
“Looking at these early stages really is the key to understanding how those adult [body shapes] are formed – not just through evolution but through development.
“But larvae are so tiny and fragile, the chances of finding one fossilised are practically zero – or so I thought.”
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Emma J Long
The half-billion-year-old larva has been almost perfectly preserved, researchers say
Dr Smith’s colleagues found the fossil in a pile of “prehistoric grit” during a study of half-billion-year-old rock deposits in the north of China known to contain microscopic fossils.
“Our collaborators in China have large amounts of this stuff, which they dissolve it in acid and these little bits fall out,” Dr Smith said.
A team of technicians at Yunnan University spent years sifting through the material and picking fossils out of the dust.
After examining this particular specimen under the microscope during a trip to China, Dr Smith said, he had realised it was “something very special” and asked if he could bring it back to the UK to have a closer look.
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The team mounted the fossil on the head of a pin in order to scan it with intense X-rays at Oxford’s Diamond Light Source facility. That is where its internal secrets were revealed.
“When I saw the amazing structures preserved under its skin, my jaw just dropped,” Dr Smith said.
Researchers generated three-dimensional images of miniature brain regions, digestive glands, a primitive circulatory system and even traces of the nerves supplying the larva’s simple legs and eyes.
Martin R Smith/Emma J Long
Scientists were able to pick out specific parts of the creature’s anatomy, including its digestive tract (top, right) and brain (bottom, right)
Its brain cavity, which is divided into segments, has revealed the ancestral “nub” of the specialist, segmented heads of modern insects, spiders and crabs that later evolved their various appendages, such as antennae, mouthparts and eyes.
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Study co-author, Dr Katherine Dobson, of the University of Strathclyde, said the natural fossilisation had “achieved almost perfect preservation”.
Dr Smith said this might have been caused by high concentrations of phosphorus in the ocean where this larva briefly lived and died.
“It’s washed into the oceans when rocks erode on land,” he said.
“And that phosphorus seems to have flooded the tissues of our fossil,” essentially crystallising its tiny body.
A Spot robot equipped with a blowtorch for tackling weeds
Dezhen Song et al. (2024)
A robot dog equipped with a blowtorch could be used to stop weeds growing on farms, potentially offering a replacement for harmful herbicides.
Even highly targeted herbicides can cause environmental problems, affecting local wildlife, and “superweeds” are quickly evolving resistance to the most common weed-killers like glyphosate.
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In search of an alternative solution, Dezhen Song at Texas A&M University and his colleagues have developed a weed control system that uses a brief burst of heat from a propane-powered torch controlled by a robotic arm, attached to a Spot robot manufactured by Boston Dynamics.
Rather than incinerate the weeds, the robot is designed to identify and heat up the centre of the plant, which can stop it growing for several weeks, says Song. “The weeds don’t die – you just suppress their growth so it gives your crop a chance to fight the weed.”
Song and his team first tested the flame nozzle to make sure they could accurately target the weeds’ centre. Then they deployed the robot in a cotton field planted with weeds native to Texas, like common sunflower (Helianthus annuus) and giant ragweed (Ambrosia trifida). In five trials, they found that the robot could locate and torch the weeds with an average of 95 per cent of the flame focused on the weed.
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One large limitation is the battery life of the Spot robot, which can only run for around 40 minutes in this setup before it needs to be charged, says Song, but the team is working on upgrading to a longer-lasting device. They are also looking at equipping the robot dog with an electrocution device capable of delivering more than 10,000 volts, which will stop weed growth for longer, he says.
“People have been using some forms of fairly broad, imprecise flames to kill weeds on other machines – that’s been around for a while, but I’ve never seen a precision thing like this,” says Simon Pearson at the University of Lincoln, UK. The success of the robot will depend on how accurately it can cast its flame and avoid damaging valuable crops, he says.
Article amended on 24 July 2024
The article was amended to more accurately describe the burning tool and the robot’s battery life.
Get ready for a cosmic surprise this autumn – Earth is about to get a second moon, according to scientists.
A small asteroid is going to be captured by Earth’s gravitational pull and temporarily become a “mini-moon”.
This space visitor will be around from September 29 for a couple of months before escaping from Earth’s gravity again.
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Sadly the second moon is going to be too small and dim to be seen, unless you have a professional telescope.
The asteroid was first spotted by NASA’s Asteroid Terrestrial-Impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) on 7 August.
Scientists worked out its trajectory in a study published in Research Notes of the American Astronomical Society.
The asteroid, which scientists refer to as 2024 PT5, hails from the Arjuna asteroid belt, which contains rocks that follow an orbit quite similar to Earth’s.
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Occasionally, some of these asteroids get relatively close, getting as near as 2.8 million miles (4.5 million kilometers) from our planet.
According to the researchers involved in the study, if an asteroid like this is moving at a relatively slow speed of around 2,200mph (3,540km/h), Earth’s gravitational field can exert a strong influence, enough to trap it temporarily.
Which is exactly what’s about to happen – starting this weekend, this small asteroid will spend about two months orbiting Earth.
Dr Jennifer Millard, astronomer and host of the Awesome Astronomy podcast, told the BBC’s Today programme that the asteroid would enter orbit on the 29th of September and then was predicted to leave on 25 November.
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“It’s not going to complete a full revolution of our planet, it’s just going to kind of have its orbit altered, just twisted slightly by our own planet and then it’ll continue on its merry way,” she said.
The asteroid is approximately 10 meters long, which is tiny in comparison to Earth’s moon, which has a diameter of approximately 3,474 kilometers.
Because it is small and made of dull rock it will not be visible to people on earth even if they use binoculars or a home telescope.
“Professional telescopes, they’ll be able to pick it up. So you’ll be able to look out for lots of wonderful pictures online of this little dot kind of moving past the stars at great speed,” said Dr Millard.
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Mini-moons have been spotted before, and it’s thought many more are likely to have gone unnoticed.
Some even come back for repeat visits, the 2022 NX1 asteroid became a mini-moon in 1981 and again in 2022.
So don’t worry if you miss this one – scientists predict 2024 PT5 will also return to Earth’s orbit again in 2055.
“This story highlights just how busy our solar system is and how much there is out there that we haven’t discovered, because this asteroid was only discovered this year.
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“There are tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of objects out there that we haven’t discovered and so I think this highlights the importance of us being able to continually monitor the night sky and find all of these objects,” said Dr Millard.
We are thrilled to unbox the SNS 42u 800×1000 server rack for the very first time at HQ VFX Company. Join us as we unveil this powerful and feature-packed server rack and share our initial impressions.
In this video, we will provide an in-depth look at the SNS 42u 800×1000 server rack, discussing its impressive specifications and design elements. We’ll explore its generous 42u height, which offers ample space to accommodate our growing collection of server equipment.
As we unbox the server rack, we’ll highlight its sturdy construction and attention to detail. From the robust frame to the carefully designed ventilation system, every aspect of this rack is engineered to provide maximum performance and reliability.
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Doctor Who recently returned for its 14th season for the revival series that began in 2005. However, the legacy of the show extends back to 1963, when it debuted on British television and ran for 27 seasons. There was a nearly two-decade gap between the end of the first Doctor Who series and its successor, which continued in May even though BBC and Disney+ insist on calling it “Doctor Who season 1″ as if it were a third series.
Ncuti Gatwa starred in the newest season of Doctor Who alongside Millie Gibson, who plays the Doctor’s latest companion, Ruby Sunday. It’s their time to add to the lore of the series, hopefully with stories that can earn their place on this list in the future. In the meantime, we’ve chosen the 10 best Doctor Who episodes of the revival series, which you can see below.
There have been some terrific Doctor Who Christmas specials since the series returned in 2005, but The Husbands of River Song made this list because it brought closure to a long-running storyline that began in season 4 when Alex Kingston made her first guest appearance as River Song. Through most of her time on the show, River knew more about the Doctor’s future than he did. Peter Capaldi’s Twelfth Doctor flipped the switch on River, in part because she had never met his incarnation of the Doctor before.
This time, the Doctor got to play the role of the companion to River, who missed some obvious clues about his true identity. The Doctor was clearly having a blast, even though he didn’t always approve of River’s tactics. When River recognized the man she loves, the Doctor finally showed River how much he loves her as well.
The first season of the revival series didn’t bring back anyone from the original version of Doctor Who. Season 2 quickly rectified that with a guest appearance by Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, the Doctor’s companion during some of the peak years of the series in the ’70s. Sarah Jane’s return was beautifully handled, as her hard feelings about being abandoned by the Doctor gave way to the joy of seeing him again. The Doctor was also clearly proud of the woman that Sarah Jane had became.
Sarah Jane’s return was more than just an emotional link to the past. It allowed Sladen to finally get a spinoff series, The Sarah Jane Adventures, which was something that almost happened decades earlier.
The Doctor is many things, but rarely as angry he was in A Good Man Goes To War. Madame Vastra (Neve McIntosh) and her forces kidnapped the Doctor’s companion, Amy Pond (Karen Gillan), and forced her to give birth in captivity. The Doctor and Amy’s husband, Rory Williams (Arthur Darvill), responded by putting together a small army from across time and space to storm the Demon’s Run space station in order to save Amy and her newborn daughter.
This episode was also one of the rare occasions where the villains got the last laugh, and the Doctor’s triumph became a bitter defeat. Regardless, the final moments of the story were a revelation that there might be a happy ending at the end of this difficult time.
The Stolen Earth and Journey’s End pulled off a massive Doctor Who crossover story a decade before Avengers: Infinity War did the same thing for the MCU on the big screen. Every single companion from the revival series to that date returned for this two-part season 4 finale, which also featured guest appearances by the casts of the two spinoff series: The Sarah Jane Adventures and Torchwood.
Watching the Doctor’s friends rally around him was exciting and rewarding. Yet the episode’s emotional stakes came to rest on the Doctor’s bond with Donna Noble (Catherine Tate), who was perhaps his best friend among the companions. Donna saved the universe, and all it cost her was the chance to live a life of adventure with the Doctor and all the memories that went with that. It’s a good thing that the 60th anniversary specials gave the Doctor and Donna some much-needed resolution and a joyous reunion. We had to wait a long time to see that.
The second half of Doctor Who season 7 revolved around the mystery of the Doctor’s new companion, Clara Oswald (Jenna Coleman), who somehow simultaneously existed in multiple time periods. The Name of the Doctor peeled away the secrets of Clara’s purpose just as the Doctor discovered his final resting place in the future. There were also several callbacks to previous versions of the Doctor, both within the revival and the original series.
Despite the title of the episode, the Doctor’s biggest secret isn’t his name. It’s the chapter of his past that he kept hidden from everyone, which played out in The Day of the Doctor six months after this season finale aired.
Many Doctor Who fans point to Blink as the greatest episode of the series despite the fact that the Doctor barely appears in it. It also has a much scarier tone than most of the show’s episodes. This is a great standalone story featuring guest star Carey Mulligan before she went on to become an Oscar-nominated actress. Mulligan plays Sally Sparrow, a young woman who has never met or heard of the Doctor before.
Much to Sally’s surprise, she comes to realize that the Doctor is attempting to contact her from the past because he needs her help to send his TARDIS back in time to retrieve him. Standing in Sally’s way are the Weeping Angels, an alien race who look like statues whenever anyone lays eyes on them. But the second that their victims look away, the Angels move with startling speed. There’s only one solution: “don’t blink.”
The Doctor Who revival upped the stakes with its two-part season 2 finale, Army of Ghosts and Doomsday. The Doctor’s two greatest enemies, the Daleks and the Cybermen, came face-to-face before immediately declaring war against each other. Since both forces were invading Earth at the same time, that could have meant the end of humanity.
Thankfully, the Doctor and his companion, Rose Tyler (Billie Piper), come up with a solution… with an unintended consequence that forces them to say goodbye forever. This was Piper’s final episode as a regular cast member of the series, and at the time, it really did seem like the Doctor and Rose were parting for good just when they were about to acknowledge that they loved each other. The heartbreak in their farewell is unmatched.
The fifth-season premiere, The Eleventh Hour, may be the most perfect pilot episode that isn’t actually a pilot. Matt Smith’s first full episode as the Eleventh Doctor completely reset the board for the show, even as the Doctor was still wearing the rags of his previous incarnation.
After crashing to Earth in the past, the Doctor meets and befriends a young girl named Amelia Pond (Caitlin Blackwood). One slight time travel mishap later, the present day Amelia now goes by Amy, and she is understandably upset because she thinks the Doctor abandoned her. But they have much bigger fish fingers and custard to fry because the Doctor has to save the world without his TARDIS or his sonic screwdriver. And he’s got less than an hour to pull it off. Keep an eye out for Oscar-winner Olivia Colman as she makes a cameo late in the episode.
Peter Capaldi is one of the best actors to ever play the Doctor, and several of his episodes fell just outside of our top 10. However, Heaven Sent is in a league of its own, and it was all on Capaldi’s shoulders. For almost the entire episode, Capaldi is the only actor on screen as the Doctor finds himself a prisoner in a strange castle where he is stalked by a ghoulish creature known as the Veil.
This story took place immediately after the Doctor witnessed the death of one of his closest friends and companions. That left Capaldi with a lot of emotions to convey, including anger and grief, as the Doctor tried to come up with a way to escape. With no one else around to speak with, Capaldi essentially plays off of himself, and he gives an incredibly compelling performance. The ending is also up there with the all-time shocking cliffhangers in the history of the series.
Anniversary specials are often where the Doctors of the past meet the Doctors of the present. In the modern era, David Tennant and Matt Smith were the two most popular incarnations of the Doctor when they teamed up for the 50th anniversary special, The Day of the Doctor. Fans had impossibly high expectations for this special, and the episode surpassed them.
Since the Ninth Doctor actor, Christopher Eccleston, declined to return, showrunner Steven Moffat cast film veteran John Hurt as the War Doctor, a previously unknown incarnation of the Doctor who was physically older and more mature than his much younger versions from his personal future.
Tennant and Smith were hilarious together, but pairing them with Hurt raised the dramatic stakes and allowed all three of the Doctors to come to terms with their collective past. This happened during a fast-paced story that was nearly the length of a movie, which also set the stage for the next decade of Doctor Who adventures in an emotionally satisfying and exciting way.
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Watch the new season of Doctor Who on Disney+. Doctor Who seasons 1-13 are available to stream on Max.
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