Every parent’s nightmare comes to life in Stephen Graham’s crime drama “Adolescence,” which focuses on the life of a 13-year-old boy named Jamie Miller (Owen Miller) who is accused of murdering a classmate.
In addition to creating the show, Graham also plays Eddie Miller, Jamie’s father. The rest of the cast includes Ashley Walters (“Top Boy”), Erin Doherty (“The Crown”) and Faye Marsay (“Game of Thrones”).
Released on March 13, “Adolescence” is the No. 1. English-language show on Netflix in the U.S, as of the publication of this article.
Part of what makes this show gripping is how the mystery unfolds. Filmed in one continuous shot, the characters try to understand the truth of what really happened in real time. Broader themes of toxic masculinity and the importance of teaching boys to rely on community, not just themselves, emerge.
“One of our aims was to ask, ‘What is happening to our young men these days, and what are the pressures they face from their peers, from the internet, and from social media?’ ” Graham told Netflix’s press site Tudum. “And the pressures that come from all of those things are as difficult for kids here as they are the world over.”
What are critics saying about ‘Adolescence’?
“Adolescence” has an approval rating of 100% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Rolling Stone’s Alan Sepinwall called the series “an early contender for the best thing … you will see on the small screen this year.”
J. Kelly Nestruck of the Globe & Mail called the show Netflix’s best since “Baby Reindeer,” which premiered last April.
Critics spoke of the emotional impact it had on them, and potentially will have on viewers.
“Adolescence is likely to haunt you for quite some time,” Matt Roush said for TV Insider, giving it a 5 out of 5 ranking.
The Times‘ Tom Peck called the show “complete perfection” and said, “I don’t think I broke my gaze from the TV for so much as a second. I may not even have blinked.”
They also touched on how the story will strike viewers as relevant.
“This is a show that focuses on what the title promises: adolescence, and the unexpected dark turns it can take — particularly for boys,” Amber Dowling wrote for The Wrap, calling it “an addictive but impossibly hard watch.”
Television critic Robert Lloyd of the Los Angeles Times wrote, “It’s primarily about family, and self-reflection, and especially fathers and sons, and if the series doesn’t wind down to a traditional conclusion, it achieves a novelistic power in the end.”
The Hollywood Reporter’s Daniel Fienberg says the show is more than thriller, but a meditation on the specific difficulties of being, and raising, a young man in the modern era, writing, “The mystery of what Jamie did or didn’t do is relevant but secondary to bigger questions about masculinity — be it toxic or fragile — in a world of bullying, revenge porn and noxious virtual role models like the name-checked Andrew Tate. The nightmare of murder gets a little lost in the more pervasive nightmare of, well, adolescence.”
Other creators are weighing in, too. Director Paul Feig wrote about the impact the show had on him in a tweet.
“The first episode of the @netflix show Adolescence is one of the best hours of television I’ve ever seen. An emotional and technological masterwork, the show works on all levels. I can’t wait to watch the rest of the episodes. Huge congrats to all involved,” he wrote on X.