Netflix’s latest TV sensation is an unlikely candidate I don’t think any of us saw coming. The show is called Adolescence, and it tells the gripping and devastating story of a 13-year-old boy arrested on suspicion of murdering a female classmate. Each of the four episodes of the British crime drama cover a different aspect of the case. The first episode is an arrest, the second is about investigators looking for clues, the third shows a forensic psychology interview, and the fourth depicts the case’s impact on the boy’s family.
While true crime series have dominated the charts in recent years, Adolescence is something different. First of all, it’s not true. But second of all, it’s not so neat and tidy. Most true crime series have years worth of case files to explore, and often they have a neat resolution: a trial, a verdict, a devoted investigator who won’t let it go. Adolescence, instead, lays bare the stark and unsetting toll that a brutal murder case can take on a whole community of people. And again: this show is an absolute sensation. Within its first 24 days, Adolescence became the 4th most popular English-language season of TV in the history of the Netflix platform, with more streams in less than a month than juggernauts like Stranger Things season two and every season of Bridgerton.
While I can’t fully account for why so many people are flocking to such a story, I can say that the series intelligently navigates a number of pressing cultural issues facing Britain and America today. Namely, Adolescence discusses the role of internet influencers on young boys, the difficult-to-understand world of social media, and masculinity in the digital age. With excellent scripts from co-creators Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham, an amazing approach where every episode is filmed in a single take, as well as stunning performances from Graham himself, newcomer Owen Cooper, and really the entire cast, Adolescence is a show likely to stay with you for a long while after its brief runtime.
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