Twelve years after the Leveson inquiry and the closure of News of the World, the British press are having a reckoning on Netflix. Recent celebrity documentaries Beckham and Robbie Williams, and the final season of TV drama The Crown, have painted a portrait of the UK tabloids as cruel, sadistic and predatory of its homegrown celebrities.

While criticism of the British tabloids – particularly the ethics and methods of the News of the World – is often justified, the specifics offered by all three shows fall flat. Focusing on the late 1990s and early 2000s, when Princess Diana, Robbie Williams and David Beckham were each at the height of their fame, they prioritise individual stories over the big picture.

In doing so, these Netflix releases paint specific paps and a broad, amorphous “press” as demons, but ignore the broader socio-political forces, corruptions and collusions uncovered by Leveson in 2012 and the #MeToo movement in 2017.

According to music journalist Simon Reynolds, mass-market pop culture operates by a “20-year-rule” which sees trends and preoccupations return every two decades. This makes the turn of the millennium ripe for nostalgic and critical reflection in the 2020s.

The Crown explores the death of Princess Diana 25 years after her death. Robbie Williams tells the story of the singer, 25 years after the release of his biggest song, Angels. And Beckham explores the aftermath of the footballer’s infamous World Cup red card, 25 years on.

While these shows all try to claim part of the noughties nostalgia trend, they feel politically and contextually vacant. They each miss the opportunity to rigorously critique constructions of celebrity in the 1990s and 2000s.

The millennium press

Something all three shows miss is how textured and transitional the media landscape of the period was. By 1998, only 8% of editorial in The Sun and The Mirror could be classed as “public affairs” – the rest focused on gossip, sports, or both.

Inevitably, as celebrity culture became news, news also became gossip and both categories disintegrated into what we now call “clickbait”.