The North East in the Twenty-First Century: New Realities?

Abstract

This final chapter uses case studies of twenty-first-century representations of the North East across a variety of film and television genres to identify some key tropes. The first is a sustained emphasis upon cultural regeneration, and the transition from an industrial to post-industrial era—as explored in comedies such as The One and Only (Cellan Jones, 2002), dramas about migrant experiences and reality television formats like Geordie Shore (MTV, 2011–). A second, related trope is a consideration of those ‘left behind’ by this transition, as exemplified in state-of-the-nation films such as I Daniel Blake (Loach, 2016), and the rise of ‘poverty porn’ television series like Benefits Street (Channel 4, 2014–2015). Finally, the chapter acknowledges, by way of an analysis of how The Mighty Redcar (BBC, 2019) counters representational stereotypes, how the North-East corpus might be best understood relationally, and as both an archive, and a pleasure.