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Hamnet review: Paul Mescal and Jessie Buckley burn in William Shakespeare tragedy
Before Hamlet, there was Hamnet. He was the young son of William Shakespeare who died in his youth, inspiring the playwright to spin the timeless tragedy of a doomed Danish prince. Hamnet explores that true story through a mystical and matriarchal lens of Maggie O'Farrell's heralded novel of the same name, adapted by the Academy Award-winning director of Nomadland, Chloé Zhao, and her Academy-nominated actors, Paul Mescal (Aftersun) and Jessie Buckley (The Lost Daughter).
This period drama seems primed to be a contender this award season. But Oscar buzz tends to mold the expectations of dramas — especially those even loosely biographical — into one box: star-stuffed theatrics festooned with tears, a soaring emotional score, and pretty scenes of pain, perfect for an award ceremony sizzle reel. To expect such a thing from Zhao, Mescal, and Buckley would be to ignore what's brought them acclaim to begin with.
This trio has separately won praise for their nuanced expressions of joy and pain, from Buckley's star-making as an aspiring singer in Wild Rose to Zhao's bittersweet character drama Nomadland to Mescal's heart-wrenching turn as a lost love in All of Us Strangers. In Hamnet, their powers combined make for a drama that is more than a sentimental tearjerker poised for Oscar accolades; it is an earthy and poetic raw tale of love and loss.
Hamnet focuses on the story of Shakespeare's witchy wife, Agnes.
Credit: Agata Grzybowska/Focus Features
Rather than an earnest recreation of the real-life marriage of William Shakespeare and Anne "Agnes" Hathaway, Hamnet follows O'Farrell's interpretation, which imagines Agnes (Buckley) as a woman in touch with the woods and prone to premonitions of the future.
In the film, Agnes scoffs at gossip that she is a witch. But her woodsy appeal — which includes wearing brash red robes and having a pet hawk — attracts the passionate and bookish son of a local glove-maker. Playing Will and Agnes from their youth into adulthood, Mescal and Buckley easily capture the lusty impulsiveness of young love. Their arms entangle with a violent intensity as they claw private moments from the mundane routines demanded of their families.
Unlike in his yet-to-be-written comedies, marriage is not a happily-ever-after for the pair — as tragedy will follow. Still, marriage is a newfound freedom as they redefine what their married life looks like. For the Shakespeares, that means Will going off to London to write plays and express his soul in tales of star-crossed lovers and fortune-telling witches. For Agnes, that means raising their three children: Susanna and twins Judith and Hamnet. But a vision of her own deathbed makes Agnes certain that one of her children will die before her.
Jacobi Jupe is a rare find as Hamnet.
Credit: Agata Grzybowska/Focus Features
Whether you know the history of Shakespeare's home life, are a fan of O'Farrell's novel, or can just read the room, it's clear early on that Agnes is off with her expectation that the child to die will be her youngest, Judith. This gives an enhanced tension to every moment that she experiences with her bright, adventurous, and caring boy, Hamnet, because we know their time together is short, and she has no clue.
Such a setup would be ripe for agony regardless. But young Jacobi Jupe is stupendous as the 11-year-old Hamnet. Under Zhao's direction, he avoids the pitfalls all too common to child actors in family dramas. He is neither precocious nor ethereal. He galumphs about with his sisters, chuckling in play, swapping clothes for a child-like prank in which the twins trade identities. Before his mother, he dreams of being on the stage, where he gets to sword fight to the cheers of an audience. Jupe frolics with a mix of clumsiness and earnestness that reads simply as authenticity. So when the plague hits the Shakespeare home, and Judith specifically, it's natural that this sweet boy would curl into his twin sister's cot to comfort her.
When Hamnet speaks in a whisper of an ominous "him" that's watching the twins, things get eerie — suggesting he has the same gift for premonition as his mum. But even here, Jupe avoids cliché, in this case that of the haunted house child, wide-eyed in terror. Instead, he is a boy who is scared, but accustomed to playing the hero, and so soldiers on to help his sister with one more switcheroo. And because he feels so real, the pain of his end will take your breath away.
Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal are riveting in Hamnet.
Credit: Agata Grzybowska/Focus Features
In early scenes of courting, they sizzle, each utilizing their well-reputed onscreen intensity. As the Shakespeare marriage gets complicated by distance and grief, they become explosions, destined to collide. But beautiful work is done in scenes without each other. Buckley, who is unquestionably the lead in the film, harnesses the focus seen in Wild Rose and the ferality of Men for a distinct portrait of grief.
Her rage and resentment are both irrational and understandable. While she is in the home where her boy was lost, her husband is off in London. She can't see that he doesn't escape the loss of Hamnet, but is, in fact, consumed by it. Hamlet begins to take shape as Will's means of making sense of his own guilt and mourning.
The "to be or not to be" speech becomes Mescal's greatest challenge to date. Not only because it's the iconic speech by which the greats are judged, but also because he's not playing Hamlet within it, but the man who wrote that speech to make sense of his own helplessness in the face of mortality. It's a layered and profound moment of pain and pondering, unfurling a labyrinth of dark feelings and darker thoughts. And yet, it's not even Mescal's best scene.
That comes before Will knows Hamnet is dead. Rushing home because he's heard his little Judith is at death's door, Will barrels into the family home to see the girl alive and well. They hug, and he bursts with smiles and relief. But then he sees the little form covered in a white sheet, posed before the fire.
Credit: Agata Grzybowska/Focus Features
"Where is he?" Will says, and in that simple question, Mescal channels a mix of dread, hope, and fear that could bring down the Globe theatre. It's not booming. That's not Zhao's way. It's delivered strong but raw, quavering. It is what pain sounds like when stripped of Hollywood shine. It's too human for an Oscar reel. It's too heartbreaking.
And all of this leads to a climax that takes Agnes and Will's pain to the stage, that of the Globe, to be specific. There Hamnet becomes Hamlet, in a prolonged and nerve-shredding sequence that is fueled by the couple's loss and their divide. No matter how many times you've seen Hamlet, this section hits different because it becomes about the pain that inspired the Dane.
Props to Noah Jupe, who plays the onstage Hamlet, simultaneously channeling an actor striving to impress an audience and the dreamy wish of a mourning mother all at once. In a shrewd move from Zhao, she cast the older brother to play Hamlet to the younger's Hamnet, and the vague familial appearance makes this climax all the more haunting. Noah offers a pitch-perfect echo of his brother Jacobi’s performance with flourishes of maturity and theater-worthy showmanship.
Still, I have one qualm with Hamnet.
Credit: Agata Grzybowska/Focus Features
While I can see Zhao's vision and admire her restraint, I must confess I wished for a bit more cinema. I'm not asking for the emoting common in biopics aiming for Oscar glory — which this film is not strictly, on either point. Instead, I wish Zhao had embraced the visual storytelling of Agnes' premonitions as she did with the earthiness of Will's environment.
As Agnes' visions are not just key to the plot but also to the core to her motivations, I wish Zhao had let us see them with her. Hamnet is rooted in Agnes' perspective, yet the screenplay by Zhao and novelist O'Farrell only has dialogue describing these visions of a deathbed with two guests, a landscape of trees, and a dark, infinite cave. By not using this visual medium to show us what Agnes sees, the filmmakers keep Agnes a bit at a distance.
By contrast, Will's view of things gets a visual component through the climactic production of Hamlet. So, in a way, we are given more access to his inner world than Agnes'. And while the film is moving, I sometimes felt like I was watching Agnes' experience instead of feeling it with her — like I was on the outside looking in. Where with Mescal's Will, the play is the thing…that shows the heartache of the scribe.
Still, Hamnet is a bold rebellion, and I respect that. Not only does Zhao reject the temptations of glossy Hollywood biopics, but also the regal romance or cerebral theatricality of a barrage of Oscar-adored Shakespeare adaptations, from a handful of intense Hamlets to The Tragedy of Macbeth to the winsome Shakespeare in Love. Her Shakespeare and company are more feral, bringing this historic tragedy fresh blood and true grit.
For these big swings, Hamnet could be an unconventional but strong Oscar contender. But whether you're invested in awards season or just seeking a powerful drama from actors at the top of their form, be sure to bring tissues. Hamnet could leave you tear-soaked and in tatters.
Hamnet was reviewed out of its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. The film will open in theaters Dec.12.
Bad Bunny promised good vibes and a whole lot of dancing during his Super Bowl halftime show, and he didn’t disappoint. But beneath the perreo-ready hits and viral clips was something deeper.
The performance unfolded as a densely layered visual essay, moving from Puerto Rico's sugar cane fields to New York bodegas, from reggaetón history to quiet political protest, and packing decades of memory, migration, and resistance into just 13 minutes of television.
From set pieces referencing the island's ongoing infrastructure collapse following Hurricane Maria to cameos honoring small-business legends and community elders, nearly every frame carried meaning. Some references were immediately legible. Others were designed for the fans who know where to look.
It was a case of storytelling: a reminder that Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio didn't just bring Puerto Rico to the Super Bowl. He brought its history with him. Here are some of the Easter eggs you may have missed.
Returning to the roots of the sugar cane fields
Before fireworks, choreography, or surprise cameos, Bad Bunny began his Super Bowl halftime show in a quiet, sunlit sugar cane field, worlds away from the stadium spectacle to come.
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Sugar cane fields are deeply woven into Puerto Rico's history, tied to colonial exploitation and the agricultural labor of generations of working-class people. By opening the performance there, Bad Bunny grounded his global moment in the island's past, honoring the people whose work and resilience built Puerto Rico long before it became a cultural export. It was a reminder that everything that followed grew from this soil first.
Bad Bunny's "Ocasio 64" jersey carries history
When Bad Bunny stepped onto the Super Bowl stage in a custom Zara jersey stitched with the name "Ocasio" and the number "64," it immediately sparked speculation. The name referenced his full surname, Martínez Ocasio. The number, however, carried a heavier weight.
On a personal level, "64" honors his late uncle, who once wore the same number as an athlete. But it also echoes the Puerto Rican government’s initial claim of just 64 deaths after Hurricane Maria in 2017 — a figure later revealed to be a devastating undercount.
Falling into YHLQMDLG
Midway through "Party," Bad Bunny plunged through the roof of the casita into a family's blue living room, a moment that felt both unexpected and deeply intentional.
The visual mirrored the aesthetic of his 2020 album YHLQMDLG, whose blue-hued visualizers defined an era fans never got to see live. The pandemic canceled that tour, making the Super Bowl moment a belated love letter to longtime listeners who’ve been riding with him since the beginning.
Toñita's surprise cameo
Among the star-studded spectacle, one of the night's most meaningful appearances belonged to someone far from the pop spotlight: Maria Antonia "Toñita" Cay, the beloved owner of Caribbean Social Club.
A fixture of Puerto Rican life in Williamsburg for decades, Toñita has been name-checked in Bad Bunny's lyrics and embraced by the Nuyorican community. Her presence in the show was about honoring the everyday institutions that keep culture alive.
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Victor Villa and the power of the side hustle
Another blink-and-you'll-miss-it guest was Victor Villa, the founder of Villa's Tacos. You'll see Benito pass a Villa's Tacos truck during "Tití Me Preguntó."
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Villa's journey — from selling tacos in his grandmother's yard to running acclaimed brick-and-mortar locations — mirrors Bad Bunny's own narrative of grassroots success. His cameo not only celebrated immigrant hustle but also spoke to Bad Bunny's larger message of believing in where you come from, a belief he made explicit when he told Super Bowl viewers that he never stopped believing in himself and that others should believe in themselves, too.
Coco frío and island street life
During "Tití Me Preguntó," Bad Bunny moved past dancers gathered around a coco frío cart, a small detail loaded with nostalgia. Fresh coconut water, sold by street vendors across Puerto Rico, is part of daily life on the island. By centering it in a Super Bowl spectacle, Bad Bunny elevated an ordinary ritual into a symbol of home.
"Gasolina" and the lineage of reggaetón
No, your ears did not deceive you. After blending "Yo Perreo Sola" and "Voy a Llevarte Pa’ PR," Bad Bunny pivoted into a snippet of "Gasolina" by Daddy Yankee, a defining anthem of the genre.
The track, inducted into the Library of Congress in 2023, helped globalize reggaetón in the 2000s. Bad Bunny's performance also sampled Tego Calderón's "Pa’ Que Retozen" and Don Omar's "Dale Don Dale," situating himself within a living musical lineage.
Concho the toad makes an appearance
Before launching into "Monaco," the camera cut to an image of Concho, the animated amphibian mascot of Bad Bunny's latest album, Debí Tirar Más Fotos. Modeled after the endangered Puerto Rican crested toad, Concho represents environmental fragility and cultural survival.
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Jíbaros, power lines, and "El Apagón"
Men in straw hats (pavas) and white clothing — jíbaros, Puerto Rico’s traditional mountain farmers — appeared climbing power lines, blending folklore with modern crisis.
Historically associated with rural life and folk music, jíbaros symbolize resilience. Here, their placement on broken infrastructure referenced post-Hurricane Maria privatization, rolling blackouts under LUMA Energy, and the economic displacement explored in the song "El Apagón." It was a visual essay on who gets left behind when "progress" arrives.
Ricky Martin's Spanish-language reclamation
When Ricky Martin joined to perform "Lo Que Pasó a Hawaii," the moment felt both nostalgic and quietly radical. For an artist long associated with English-language crossover hits like "Livin' la Vida Loca" and "She Bangs," returning to a Spanish-language ballad on the Super Bowl stage carried its own symbolism.
The song reflects on migration and loss. Singing entirely in Spanish, sitting in a monobloc chair, marked how far Latin music has pushed the mainstream. What once felt risky now feels inevitable.
The light blue flag of Puerto Rican independence
At one point, Bad Bunny held la bandera con azul celeste, the light-blue version of Puerto Rico's flag linked to the independence movement.
Once associated with calls for Puerto Rican sovereignty and traced back to pre-U.S. colonial revolts, the light-blue variant of the Puerto Rican flag has become a symbol of resistance and cultural pride. Historians identify azul celeste as the original shade tied to late-19th-century independence movements, and its use today often signals a deeper conversation about the island's identity.
Bad Bunny previously featured it in "La Mudanza," and bringing it to the Super Bowl transformed a political statement into a global broadcast.
A quiet nod to Haiti's visual history
In one of the show's most subtle visual callbacks, a woman waving Haiti's flag wore a green-and-orange ribbed knit top that closely echoed Jay Maisel's 1973 Haiti series, particularly "Haiti No. 59." The styling — easy to miss amid the spectacle — felt deliberately precise, mirroring the texture, color, and composition of Maisel's iconic image.
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Lady Gaga and the maga flower
Lady Gaga’s baby-blue dress, paired with a red floral brooch resembling Puerto Rico's national maga flower, was more than a fashion moment. Designed by Luar founder Raul Lopez, the look wove national symbolism into couture, reinforcing the night’s emphasis on Puerto Rican pride.
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"La Marqueta" and the roots of diaspora
During "NUEVAYoL," Bad Bunny walked past a New York-style streetscape featuring a storefront labeled "La Marqueta."
The real La Marqueta in East Harlem was once a hub for Latino immigrants, helping shape Spanish Harlem in the mid-20th century. Its inclusion honored the diaspora communities that carried Puerto Rican culture beyond the island — and brought it back, amplified, to the global stage.
"Together We Are America"
Toward the end of the halftime performance, Bad Bunny — notably speaking in English — said, "God Bless America." He then expanded the phrase to encompass all the countries of the Americas, not just the United States, re-framing it as a message of unity and belonging. Holding up a football emblazoned with "Together We Are America," he made the point explicit.
Then, switching back to Spanish, he added: "seguimos aquí" ("we’re still here"), before spiking the ball and launching into "DtMF." The moment crystallized the show's larger thesis: presence as resistance, visibility as power, and community as the foundation of everything.
Dyson Supersonic Nural
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Dyson Airwrap i.d.
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Valentine's Day is less than a week away, but if you haven't bought a gift just yet, Dyson's giving last-minute shoppers a pretty sweet deal.
Well, technically two deals. As of Feb. 9, you can grab the Dyson Supersonic Nural hair dryer for $399.99, saving you $150 on the $549.99 list price. The same discount is also available on the Dyson Airwrap i.d. multi-styler, which comes down to $499.99 from its full price of $649.99.
At the time of writing, neither tool is on sale at Amazon, and while the Airwrap i.d. is on sale at Best Buy for the same price, the Supersonic Nural is still at full price. Sephora, on the other hand, has both the Airwrap i.d. and Supersonic Nural on sale, but only in the amber silk colorway, whereas Dyson's site offers more variety.
So which is the best to pick up for your boo (or yourself)? As Mashable's beauty tech expert, I broke it down below.
Dyson Airwrap i.d. deal
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Why we like it
I've tested every Supersonic model available, and while I maintain the supremacy Shark FlexStyle in a pure value sense, the Airwrap i.d. is the multi-styler that made me most get Dyson's popularity. Typically, the curling barrels on multi-stylers provide more of a blown out than truly curled look — and if your hair has trouble holding a style, the wave you do get might not last.
The Airwrap i.d. makes this process better by including a conical barrel in the attachments for tighter curls, and automatic temperature cycling — meaning the hair is hit with properly timed hot then cool air with the press of a button — making styling with this tool as mindless as it should be. In addition to the conical curling attachment, you'll get five more attachments (which vary slightly depending on whether you opt for the straight and wavy or curly and coily model).
Dyson Supersonic Nural deal
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Why we like it
This is not the hair dryer for the dupe lover. This is the hair dryer for the person who rarely air drys, and wants one of the fastest and easiest hair dry experiences on the market. It comes with smart attachments that automatically adjust temperature and air speed, a scalp protect mode for closer and more comfortable drying, and automatic pausing. For textured hair folks, the diffuser has a removable center that's especially useful for pixie diffusing and maximizing your volume potential.
SAVE $800: The 57-inch Samsung Odyssey Neo G9 curved gaming monitor is on sale at Amazon for $1,499.99, down from the normal price of $2,299.99. That's a 35% discount.
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Sometimes, bigger is better. Think that bag of potato chips from Costco, getting upgraded to the seats with extra legroom on the plane, or streaming your favorite Olympic sports on a giant TV. The same can be applied to gaming on a giant monitor. If you need something bigger (and better), check out this Amazon deal.
As of Feb. 9, the 57-inch Samsung Odyssey Neo G9 curved gaming monitor is on sale for $1,499.99 at Amazon, marked down from the standard price of $2,299.99. That's a 35% discount that slashes $800 off the price.
So long as your computer desk has room, gaming on a giant 57-inch curved monitor could be incredible. Samsung makes some top-tier gaming monitors that'll massively level up your experience. Of course, it comes with a nice 240Hz refresh rate, a 1 millisecond response time, and AMD FreeSync Premium Pro. There's also something to be said about gaming on a Quantum Mini-LED display.
Nice extras include the ergonomic stand from Samsung and the DisplayPort 2.1, HDMI 2.1, and USB hub. There's also the Samsung Picture-by-Picture feature which gives you access to viewing two sources at the same time in their native resolution.
While we're still in the depths of winter, upgrade your gaming set up with the 57-inch Samsung Odyssey Neo G9 curved gaming monitor. Since you'll be saving $800 thanks to Amazon's sale price, you'll be able to snag new game titles or maybe even an ultra-comfortable gaming chair.
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