How Toronto’s Papers Covered Pokémon GO and the New British Prime Minister

By Jesse Hawken

In Front Page Challenge, Torontoist analyzes the best and worst of Toronto’s major dailies.

Photo by Christopher Hylarides from the Torontoist Flickr Pool.

Today’s Front Page Challenge could never have foreseen the return of Pokémon as Page One material, yet here we are. Elsewhere in the news, a new U.K. prime minister swiftly ascends to the position, and the TTC finally cracks down on fare-cheating riders. But which of the city’s papers will our judges “Pick and Choose” as this week’s champion?

The Globe starts the day off with a look at the winner of the U.K.’s Hot Potato contest, Theresa May, the last person standing after the results of the Brexit vote led to a mass exodus of U.K. party leaders—including Prime Minister David Cameron, who is hastening his departure now that a successor has been chosen. May, a “moderate” as some would have it (although as home secretary she approved of a billboard campaign encouraging illegal immigrants to “go home” or face arrest) is fond of saying “Brexit means Brexit.” But like all of the politicians who boosted the “leave” vote to victory in the referendum, she will not commit to pulling the trigger on Article 50, which will set the wheels in motion for the U.K.’s actual departure from the EU. In other news, Canada’s top overseas arms buyer, Saudi Arabia, recently used Canadian weaponry in a violent house raid in the nation’s minority Shiite territory. Questions are being asked about the support Ottawa is lending to a dictatorship in its brutal crackdown on “dissidents” that have been decried by human-rights activists. The sober paper of record has no time on Page One this morning to acknowledge the looming outbreak of Pokémon fever in Canada.

Theresa May makes the front page of the Post as well this morning. In a headline destined to break the hearts of longtime subscribers, however, May admits that she is not the second coming of Margaret Thatcher. The Post seems breathlessly impressed with her stealth campaign to assume the reins at No. 10, describing her as an “understated workhorse” who outmanoeuvred her competition (her rival Andrea Leadsom did herself in a few days ago after being quoted in an interview that May was not suitable for the job because she didn’t have children). The Post also covers the continuing story of a Concordia University professor facing unspecified charges in Iran who might be a pawn in the theocracy’s game to force a diplomatic rapprochement against international sanctions. Of the two national newspapers, however, only the Post gives front-page real estate to Pikachu—whose unbridled optimism makes Toronto’s Pachi look like Grumpy Cat—as the new smartphone game Pokémon GO is sweeping the planet. But the paper’s layout this morning suggests that Pikachu is the unlikely brand refresh for the new, “classier,” and more secure online dating site Ashley Madison, whose new owners are ironically hoping to win back “the public trust”; many of their subscribers felt betrayed when they discovered the women they were hoping to cheat on their spouses with weren’t real.

This morning’s Star is a classic melange of investigative journalism, somewhat alarmist analysis, and heartstring-tugging sentiment. The Star‘s exclusive feature today is its discovery that federal privacy laws have provided cover for dozens of “dodgy” Canadian scientists to commit acts of misconduct on projects backed by public funds. In Dallas, Daniel Dale reports on the American phenomenon of Black people pulled over in “routine traffic stops” who wind up dead during their exchanges with law enforcement. The Star also reports that the number of reported cases of sexual assault in German cities from last New Year’s Eve has ballooned to a staggering 1,200, the report alleging that half of the identified perpetrators so far were foreign nationals. The feel-good story today concerns the seventh-annual Hospital for Sick Children event where patients too ill to attend prom have the prom brought to them. And Vinay Menon says it’s time for us to consider the implications of the sudden craze of the “augmented reality” offered by games such as Pokémon GO, which is sending players out all over the place “catching them all” and adding a whole new level of distracted phone users who could conceivably even run through traffic while chasing after cartoon characters.

“SCHOOL’S OUT, SCAMMERS,” yells the front page of the Sun this morning, as the TTC, facing a yawning budget shortfall, will be imposing new tougher penalties on fare-jumpers, handing out actual tickets instead of letting cheaters off with a warning. “Fare evaders be warned: the education period is over and you’re going to be getting a ticket,” says TTC chair Josh Colle. As Major League Baseball hits the mid-season All-Star break, the Sun is also providing free advice to the Toronto Blue Jays on what they need to do to recapture last season’s glory, which presumably includes “win more games” and “not lose games” if they plan to compete with the Orioles and Red Sox for a playoff berth.