[2][3] Ony Uhiara, Sam Otto, Shavani Cameron and Ryan McKen were later cast as the four principal characters, Shakira, Jalal, Ushna and Ziyad.

"[19] Before the drama aired, Richard Kemp, a former advisor to the UK government on counter-terrorism, warned that it would be a "recruiting sergeant" for ISIS, a view prominently reported by several tabloid newspapers.

However, many questioned the portrayal of the protagonists' apparent initial ignorance and naivety, and of their subsequent antipathy to brutality and hatred, and doubted that either were representative of real jihadis.

[25][26] On the other hand, as former Conservative minister Baroness Warsi commented, "There are many proud parents who cannot understand why their children find an affiliation with Isil...

So often we have lazily defined those attracted to violent ideologies promulgated in far-off countries as mad, bad misfits and yet the reality is far more complicated.