Adolescence (TV series)

Adolescence is a British psychological crime drama television series created by Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham, and directed by Philip Barantini. It centres on a 13-year-old schoolboy, Jamie Miller (Owen Cooper), who is arrested after the murder of a girl in his school. Each of its episodes was shot in one continuous take.

It premiered on Netflix on 13 March 2025, to critical acclaim for its directing, writing, and cinematography, with special attention paid to its atmosphere and performances. Adolescence was the first streaming show to place at the top of the Barb Audiences weekly television ratings, and received thirteen nominations at the 77th Primetime Emmy Awards, winning nine, including Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series, Outstanding Directing for a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie for Barantini, and Outstanding Writing for a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie for Thorne and Graham, in addition to acting wins for Lead Actor (Graham), Supporting Actor (Cooper), and Supporting Actress (Erin Doherty).

On 9 April 2025, Deadline Hollywood reported that Netflix and Plan B Entertainment were in talks about developing a second season.

Premise

In a town near Doncaster, armed police raid a family home and arrest 13-year-old Jamie Miller on suspicion of the murder of his classmate Katie Leonard, who is later revealed to have rejected his romantic advances and then cyberbullied him. Jamie is held at a police station for questioning and then remanded in custody at a secure training centre. Investigations at Jamie's school and interviews by a forensic psychologist uncover his manosphere-influenced views on women and the mockery he has received on social media. At home, his family deals with community backlash as they work together to cope with his arrest.

Cast and characters

Main

• Stephen Graham as Eddie Miller
• Ashley Walters as DI Luke Bascombe
• Faye Marsay as DS Misha Frank
• Mark Stanley as Paul Barlow
• Christine Tremarco as Manda Miller
• Owen Cooper as Jamie Miller
• Amélie Pease as Lisa Miller
• Hannah Walters as Mrs Bailey
• Jo Hartley as Mrs Fenumore
• Fatima Bojang as Jade
• Kaine Davis as Ryan Kowalska
• Amari Bacchus as Adam Bascombe
• Erin Doherty as Briony Ariston

Guest

• Emilia Holliday as Katie Leonard
• Lewis Pemberton as Tommy
• Austin Haynes as Fredo
• Adam Khan as Tau
• Charlie McSweeney as Shaun
• Alfie Ward as Moray
• Elodie Grace Walker as Georgie
• Amelia Minto as Billie
• Douglas Russell as Victor
• Connor Calland as Evan

Episodes

Production

Development

Adolescence was originally conceived by Stephen Graham as a response to cases of knife crime by male teenagers in the United Kingdom, including the then-recent (2021 and 2023) murders of Ava White, Elianne Andam, and Brianna Ghey. He decided to create a drama exploring the motivation of extreme acts of violence against girls by young boys, and collaborated with screenwriter Jack Thorne. Thorne has stated that no part of the drama is based on a specific true story. Speaking on BBC Radio 4's arts programme Front Row, Thorne stated that the two writers wanted to "look in the eye of modern male rage" and examine the influence of public figures such as Andrew Tate on boys.

The series was announced in March 2024, with the working title Adolescence to be written by Thorne and Graham. It is a four-part limited crime drama told in a real-time, one-shot style, with Philip Barantini as director. Barantini and Graham previously collaborated on Boiling Point (2021), which was also shot in one take. Warp Films, Matriarch Productions, and Plan B Entertainment produced the series for Netflix. Jo Johnson served as series producer, and Graham, Thorne and Barantini served as executive producers, alongside Mark Herbert, Emily Feller, Hannah Walters, Brad Pitt, Jeremy Kleiner, Dede Gardner, and Nina Wolarsky.

Casting

Owen Cooper, Erin Doherty, Graham, Faye Marsay, Christine Tremarco, and Ashley Walters star. Cooper was cast in the role of the teenage murder suspect, Jamie Miller, at the age of 13, with no previous professional acting experience. Casting director Shaheen Baig had considered 500 boys for the part, but Cooper attracted her attention after sending her a demo tape and secured the role. Baig found Cooper and several of the other young cast members through Drama MOB in Manchester and Articulate Drama School and Agency in Bradford. Staff members of these drama schools, which serve students from underrepresented and deprived communities, resented the narrative that these actors had "done nothing and came from nowhere" prior to this production.

Filming

Filming began in the United Kingdom in July 2024 and finished around October 2024.

Adolescence is noted for its extensive use of one-shot filming, as each episode is shot in one take by cinematographer Matthew Lewis. Shooting was planned through multiple rehearsals building up to full technical run-throughs, during which the director of photography would plan camera movements. Each one-hour episode was shot around 10 times, with two takes per day. Episodes were shown as completed in one take, with no cuts or blending of shots together with CGI. Graham said that each episode took three weeks in total. The takes used were as follows: first episode, 2nd take; second episode, 13th take; third episode, 12th take; fourth episode, 16th take. The episodes were not shot in chronological order; Cooper's first day on set was shooting episode 3.

Filming locations for Adolescence included Sheffield, South Elmsall, and South Kirkby in Yorkshire. Minsthorpe Community College in South Elmsall was used as a location for the school scenes in episode 2, filmed over 1 week during 2024's summer. The interior scenes at the police station were shot at a specially constructed film set at the Production Park studio facility in South Kirkby in order to accommodate the complexities of single-shot filming.

Release

The series was released on Netflix on 13 March 2025. It became the most watched streaming television show in the United Kingdom in a single week, beating the record set by the Netflix series Fool Me Once in January 2024.

Adolescence has seen significant viewership success on Netflix following its release. In its first three weeks, the series garnered 96.7 million views on the platform. For the week ending 30 March 2025, it recorded 30.4 million views and ranked in the top 10 most-watched lists across all 93 countries tracked by Netflix's top 10 metrics. This performance has placed Adolescence ninth on Netflix's all-time viewership list, which is based on viewership data collected over the first 91 days of a title's availability.

Reception

Critical response

Adolescence has been widely praised by critics. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 97% of 113 critics' reviews are positive. The website's consensus reads: "Stylistically bold and beautifully acted from top to bottom, Adolescence is a masterclass in televisual storytelling and a searing viewing experience that scars." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, calculated a score of 91 out of 100, based on 29 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".

Writing in The Guardian, Lucy Mangan stated that Adolescence was "the closest thing to TV perfection in decades", singling out the acting by Cooper and Doherty for particular praise. Nandini Balial of RogerEbert.com also praised Cooper's acting for capturing "the quicksilver nature of those fraught years between childhood and adulthood". The Telegraph's Anita Singh found the series to be "quietly devastating" and the acting to be "phenomenal", although she said that the single-take filming technique could feel "like a gimmick". Sophie Butcher of Empire praised the continuous shooting, writing that it was "the most dizzying TV feat of the year" which served to enhance the on-screen emotion.

Adolescence was the first streaming show to attain the top of the Barb Audiences weekly television ratings.

Viewership

According to data from Showlabs, Adolescence ranked first on Netflix in the United States during the week of 17–23 March 2025.

Political impact

According to The Guardian, the show highlights the ways in which the manosphere has affected adolescent boys, with characters directly naming Andrew Tate and the "red pill" community as key influences on Jamie and other boys his age. Anneliese Midgley, a Member of Parliament, called for the series to be screened to Parliament and in schools, claiming it could help counter misogyny and violence against women and girls. Prime Minister Keir Starmer backed the call, writing on Twitter, "As a father, watching Adolescence with my teenage son and daughter hit home hard." The show was made free for viewing in UK secondary schools after Starmer's backing.