Modern dramatic portrayals of terrorism have evolved through three phases. In the 1980s and 90s Western audiences, familiar with the perennially strife-ridden Middle East, were offered cartoonish films featuring bearded terrorists itching to blow things up; there was little regard for subtlety or truth. 1994’s True Lies is a perfect example. Starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, the film featured Arnie battling a Palestinian terrorist named Salim Abu Aziz, played by a British actor of Pakistani heritage. A series of improbable events involving the attempted nuking of entire cities duly followed. The film was, it is true, an action comedy – and this is instructive. This was a time when it was possible to make comedies (as opposed to satires) about terrorism.

Then came 9/11, and the wars and terror attacks that followed. TV and film producers upped their game. Sleeper cells, suicide bombings, the emergence of so-called ‘home-grown’ terrorists began to feature on our screens as the dramatic lexicon of terror increased along with our own familiarity with it. But plotlines still largely centred on the ‘good guys’ trying to prevent terrorists seizing nuclear weapons (24) or attempting to blow up the US President (Homeland). These were shows that dealt not with what terrorists actually did but with the West’s worst fears of what they could do.

The third and final stage is the arrival of IS – the most media-savvy terror group in modern history. IS changed terrorism – and how we view and consume it – forever. Gone were the grainy videotapes of al-Qaeda’s Osama bin Laden droning on in Arabic. Instead highly stylised, professional videos of sadistic killings thrust their way onto our screens. Masked terrorists speaking not in Arabic but in perfect English with British accents threatened us.

New recruits

The State begins in 2015, near the height of the group’s success following its capture of Mosul. Recruits are flocking to Syria to join the Black Flag. The series follows four British characters, Shakira, a doctor and single motherwho has brought her nine-year-old son Isaac along with her. Jalal, who has come, along with his friend Ziyad, to join after his brother became a martyr for the group, and finally, Ushna a teenager dreaming of being a Jihadi wife.