The State

Great portrayal of the heinous nature of ISIS. And how regular British Muslims can get sucked in by the internet propaganda. And then are shocked when they actually arrive and see the true nature of these people supposedly called Muslims. When they are just extremists like every Religion has. It really put into perspective for me that Christians & Muslims are not that different. And both have radical extremists that use religion as an excuse for violent and offensive behavior. I don't know how anyone saw this as propaganda for ISIS. Who would want to live that way? It wasn't glorified at all. It showed the harsh reality of everyday life. And it didn't look fun to me.

I am so amazed with this amount of details from a show portraying lives in ISIS. Personally I have been to the Middle East several times and spent months traveling along, I truly am impressed of the detail and some cultural differences displayed.

The ISIS has been marked as evil from all over the news worldwide, however, this show provides a fresh eye simply telling stories on each character's angle. People do need to understand, despite general impression ISIS is bad, every single person living the lives has their story to tell, I like how it is staying out of accusation but simply display some doubts ISIS caused on ppl. A show is a show, and it is a great show and the plots are so delicate and neatly illustrated. If all you want is political accusation, then you should only read what news is feeding you and write your comments on forums instead of a TV series review.

Reading some reviews of The State, it seems some have completely missed the point of this mini-series. Far from glamourising IS this excellent series lays bare the lie that is at the heart of the death cult of Daesh. That lie draws impressionable, idealistic young Muslims across the west into a situation way out of their depth. Some argue that all who join IS know exactly what they are doing, which seems to leave some viewers unable to find anything sympathetic about the four young Brits portrayed here. Frankly, being unable to experience empathy for these characters says more about the person reviewing than it does about the situation itself.

Far from idealising and glamourising IS this remarkable mini-series shows the brutality and evil at the heart of it in a way nothing else I've seen quite does. Several scenes are incredibly difficult to watch, clearly intentionally so, and I found the changes of focus from the young jihadis experiencing the terror of battle and the brutalisation of witnessing torture, to the stories of the women and children equally brutalised and adapting (or not) to an almost alien culture, incredibly compelling.

This was brave television and for the most part well done. I feel it would have benefited from more time given to the ending, as this felt rushed and uncertain, but otherwise an excellent and compelling story.

An excellent series that shows a good preliminary work of investigation in order to make it as realistic as possible. It is neither by far nor by near, an apology for Islamic radicalism and violence; show only a naked reality that, whether we like it or not, exists and which is not worth ignoring. The most attentive viewer will find during the 04 episodes not only the large references associated with ISIS (free and medieval violence, religion, the situation of women, accepted and justified slavery, but also small references to the bombing of civilian targets, former officers of Saddam who, by being ostracized and persecuted in the Iraq, formed the backbone of senior officers who allowed ISIS to have some success at the beginning of the expansion of the Califado, as well as the relevant issue of advertising and its dissemination in social networks. To see without reservations ...

Those who low rated this TV series and called it preposterous, alleging that intelligent people who have heard about ISIS crimes via the media would not naively go to Syria to join the Jihad, completely missed the point, which is that people believe what they want to believe and shut out anything which does not fit their belief. If this was not so, there would be no major religions and no one would smoke cigarettes or drive drunk.

Who in their right mind would believe in a heaven somewhere up in the clouds with pearly gates guarded by golden haired angels, or that a destructive evil named Satan ruled over an everlasting fiery pit. There are those in the Southern US who firmly believe that the Bible was written in English by Jesus Christ, and that Jesus was a blue eyed Anglo Saxon. If people can believe that the world was created in six days 6,000 years ago, that a savior was born to a virgin and after his death he rose again for 40 days, despite all the evidence to the contrary, they will believe anything.

Many otherwise intelligent people firmly believe in the lost continent of Atlantis, others that all the ancient ruins such as the pyramids and the temples of Central America were built by aliens as if ancient humans were not able to work things out for themselves. It is the same with those who run off to join the Jihad. Some are impressionable youths, but as in the case of Shakira, others might actually believe they are going to do good. They have closed their minds to whatever challenges their belief or brainwashing. Just as we had fanatical religious martyrs in the past dying for their faith, we now have martyrs dying for the Islamic faith. The fanatical Christians were created saints and venerated for their beliefs, so were hermits, monks and nuns who lived in severe hardship and discomfort and spent their days praying.

I did find some of the characters acted stupidly, but had they not been a little on the naive side they would never have gone to Syria in the first place. I certainly did not find the series a recruitment tool for ISIS as some viewers and reviewers seemed to. More like Reefer Madness being a considered a deterrent for marijuana use.