• iconNews
  • videos
  • entertainment
  • Home
  • News
    • UK News
    • US News
    • Australia
    • Ireland
    • World News
    • Weird News
    • Viral News
    • Sport
    • Technology
    • Science
    • True Crime
    • Travel
  • Entertainment
    • Celebrity
    • TV & Film
    • Netflix
    • Music
    • Gaming
    • TikTok
  • LAD Originals
    • Say Maaate to a Mate
    • Daily Ladness
    • Lad Files
    • UOKM8?
    • FreeToBe
    • Extinct
    • Citizen Reef
  • Advertise
  • Terms
  • Privacy & Cookies
  • LADbible Group
  • UNILAD
  • SPORTbible
  • GAMINGbible
  • Tyla
  • UNILAD Tech
  • FOODbible
  • License Our Content
  • About Us & Contact
  • Jobs
  • Latest
  • Topics A-Z
  • Authors
Facebook
Instagram
X
Threads
Snapchat
TikTok
YouTube

LAD Entertainment

YouTube

LAD Stories

Submit Your Content
Shocking true UK story behind harrowing new Netflix show as viewers left in tears

Home> Entertainment> Netflix

Published 17:23 1 Mar 2025 GMT

Shocking true UK story behind harrowing new Netflix show as viewers left in tears

The Netflix drama stars Jodie Whittaker and Aimee Lou Wood

Jess Battison

Jess Battison

Netflix released a whole load of bangers last month and right towards the end, a new series dropped that hit pretty close to home.

Toxic Town landed on Thursday (27 February) and tells a shocking true story as viewers have been left in tears by the harrowing show.

Telling what Netflix describes as ‘one of the UK’s biggest environmental scandals’, the drama has a stacked cast including Jodie Whittaker, Aimee Lou Wood, Claudia Jessie, Robert Carlyle and Brendan Coyle.

Advert

Toxic Town portrays the real-life battle of families in the British town of Corby whose children were born with defects.

Written by Jack Thorne, it focuses on a group of mums who ‘took on a David and Goliath battle for justice’.

Back in 1979, there were around 10,000 people working at Corby’s steelworks, but it ended up closing down in 1980.

Advert

With thousands unemployed, a regeneration project was launched, with The British Steel Corporation demolishing the works as the council started to regain the land.

For this project, millions of tonnes of contaminated waste was moved to the outskirts of town, to Deene Quarry. Puddles of ‘sludge’ were reportedly left throughout the town as one resident told The Independent: “You could taste it in the air; it was sour, gassy and acidic.”

But years later, worry started to grow as women in the local area starting giving birth to children with defects including clubbed feet, missing fingers, eye problems and heart defects. This then started a decade-long legal battle.

Corby mothers fought for years for justice (Netflix)
Corby mothers fought for years for justice (Netflix)

After a group of mums spoke out about their concerns, noting the only thing that connected them was their time spent in Corby, more families came forward.

Advert

Despite the concerns, a 1999 Northamptonshire Health Authority study didn’t find any unusual cluster of birth defects in the area.

Yet solicitor Des Collins found that birth defects in Corby were actually three times higher than in the surrounding area, as reported by the BBC.

He then went about assembling a team of experts and cadmium was eventually identified on the former steel site. Research linked this heavy metal to birth defects in animals.

“The more you look into it, the more complicated it all becomes,” Thorne said of the story to Tudum. “I’ve done legal dramas before, but this one … being taken through the actual truth of it and seeing the journey that they had to go on in order to prove this, I found very surprising and shocking.”

Brendan Coyle stars as the head of the council (Netflix)
Brendan Coyle stars as the head of the council (Netflix)

Advert

And so, in what was a landmarking ruling in environmental justice, Justice Akenhead ruled in favour of the claimants.

Toxic Town focuses on the mothers who challenged the council as it tells a story ‘of community resilience in the face of institutional negligence and greed’.

“It’s a genuinely working-class story,” Thorne added. “It’s a story of people who are not part of the system that have never thought the system would work for them, working within the system and [fighting for] the result they deserved.”

Viewers who have already binged the show wrote on X that it’s a ‘heartbreaking’ watch as they said they’re ‘in tears’ from it.

Others said they ‘can’t get their head around this true story’ as one put: “Toxic Town is so far the best thing I have watched on Netflix!”

Advert

You can stream Toxic Town on Netflix now.

Featured Image Credit: Netflix

Topics: Netflix, TV and Film

Jess Battison
Jess Battison

Jess is a Senior Journalist with a love of all things pop culture. Her main interests include asking everyone in the office what they're having for tea, waiting for a new series of The Traitors and losing her voice at a Beyoncé concert. She graduated with a first in Journalism from City, University of London in 2021.

X

@jessbattison_

Advert

Advert

Advert

Choose your content:

3 hours ago
16 hours ago
20 hours ago
a day ago
  • Randy Holmes/Disney via Getty Images
    3 hours ago

    What Jimmy Kimmel said about Charlie Kirk that led to being pulled off air 'indefinitely'

    The late-night talk show host has called the broadcaster ABC home since 2003, but Jimmy Kimmel Live! has now been suspended

    Entertainment
  • Paramount+
    16 hours ago

    Ozzy Osbourne's heartbreaking last words on video revealed in documentary filmed just before his death

    Ozzy: No Escape From Now will hit screens next month

    Entertainment
  • X/@DaBabyDaBaby
    20 hours ago

    Rapper met with backlash after he releases music video mimicking final moments of Ukrainian refugee killed on train

    DaBaby has posted a music video which appears to reference the killing of Iryna Zarutska

    Entertainment
  • Amy Sussman/Getty Images
    a day ago

    People left in shock after Stephen Graham’s reveals ethnicity during powerful Emmys speech

    The actor opened up about his heritage after winning an award for his work on Adolescence

    Entertainment
  • Stephen Graham revealed heartbreaking 'true story' behind new Netflix hit show Adolescence
  • Horrifying true story behind photo of man smiling as he won dating game show as Netflix thriller drops today
  • Netflix viewers urged to watch harrowing new true crime doc on woman's 10-year psychological torture
  • Detail woman spotted that saved her life after man won dating game show in horrifying true story inspiring Netflix film