The dark story behind The Sun’s rise comes alive in Danny Boyle’s Ink trailer

Ink, the upcoming biographical drama, will show us how Rupert Murdoch transformed The Sun into one of the most successful and sensationalized tabloids in the UK. Murdoch had bought the tabloid in 1969 and then hired The Daily Mail's Northern editor, Larry Lamb, to run it.

The trailer for Ink reveals how hard Murdoch and Lamb worked to transform the tabloid, which then ended up changing how we tell news today.

Ink trailer gives us a glimpse at the origin of clickbait and sensationalized news

As the Ink trailer reveals, after Larry Lamb was hired to run The Sun, he did his best to find out what readers wanted to read about instead of printing what newspapers wanted them to read. We see Jack O'Connell's Lamb ask his team of writers and reporters:

"What do you really want? What gets you going? What floats your boat?"

Guy Pearce's Rupert Murdoch adds:

"What does any bloke enjoy?"

In response, the writers and reporters say:

"Smoking. Drinking. Television. Mindless violence."

Jules Davies (played by Claire Foy) then adds:

"Sex."

They were all right. It was insight like this that changed The Sun's destiny and turned the serious newspaper into a brash, populist tabloid that changed British media and world media eventually. Despite how ethically messed up a lot of it seemed, it worked. In reality, after Murdoch had bought the tabloid, it began printing sexualized content, and introduced the topless Page 3 model feature, which increased the newspaper's sales significantly.

At this time, hard news and heavy politics were no longer the focus of the tabloid. Lamb and Murdoch wanted to print what they thought readers actually wanted, and they did. The tabloid started writing more about sports, television gossip, horoscopes, weather, sensational human-interest stories, and free giveaways.

As the Ink trailer depicts what had happened, we see Murdoch say that the tabloid now wants to report news that would make their readers feel alive when they reach for their paper every morning. Moreover, the trailer also points out how Murdoch was looking to give Britain something new, fun, and dangerous.

Thus, The Sun utilized aggressive sensationalism and intrusive crime reporting to turn itself into a dominant British tabloid. As the Ink trailer reveals, Lamb was looking for more gossip than news. We see him say:

"We want stories, gossip. Any scandal is fair game. Just make it loud!"

The paper also started using simplified language and writing style to appeal to a broader audience, especially the working class that felt ignored by other papers. Since the trailer teases that the film will depict everything The Sun did to be more appealing, we will most likely see the change in language and style as well.

The trailer also touches upon the fact that The Sun popularized the concept of clickbait. Readers might think they are going to read important news from the headline but would only be teased about something scandalous. We see Lamb explain why clickbait works, as he says:

"Once you know why something's happened, the story's over. It's dead."

While all this worked for a while in favor of the tabloid (and most of it still does), it also led to something dangerous. Intrusive crime reporting and sensationalized news led to the company facing legal troubles. In the Ink trailer, Jules Davies points out:

"Just because you can make something public, doesn't mean you should."

That suggests we will also see the personal consequences faced by Lamb and other employees of The Sun because the company kept printing news they probably shouldn't have.

The film is directed by Danny Boyle and adapted by James Graham from his 2017 play of the same name. The film is produced by Boyle, Tessa Ross, Michael Ellenberg, and Tracey Seaward. The production companies behind the film are House Productions, Media Res, Decibel Films, and StudioCanal.

Ink will be released in select theaters in the United States on 11 December 2026 and in the UK on January 8, 2027. The film will be released on Netflix on January 8, 2027.