Adolescence is the talk of the town. The Netflix hit reaches far beyond the boundaries of entertainment and brings its topics into the center of society.
No one saw Adolescence coming. The series quietly moved into Netflix’s streaming program on March 13, 2025, just one day before the sci-fi blockbuster The Electric State hit the platform. While The Electric State was produced with a record-breaking budget of $320 million – and accompanied by a huge advertising campaign – the British crime series had only a tiny fraction of that sum. Almost three weeks later, no one is talking about The Electric State anymore. Adolescence, on the other hand, is still on everyone’s lips.
It’s a phenomenon that regularly plays out on TV and in cinemas, but it’s been a long time since it’s been as pronounced as it is now: the underdog can often move viewers’ hearts more than the big glossy production. But the hype surrounding Adolescence takes it to a whole new level. Because the series not only reaches the hearts of the audience, but also those of society.
The Netflix hit Adolescence deals a blow with a highly topical issue
In Adolescence, 13-year-old Jamie (Owen Cooper) is accused of murdering a fellow student. He is said to have stabbed her repeatedly with a knife. Over the four episodes of the series, we not only learn whether he actually committed the crime, but above all why. The answer opens up a number of abysses, ranging from knife crime to the influence of social media and toxic masculinity.
The fact that each episode was shot in one take, i.e. in a single setting without cuts, underscores the force of the shock and revelation of these topics. But the fact that these topics are particularly relevant to a certain zeitgeist puts them at the center of society. Adolescence has now been streamed 96.7 million times on Netflix, putting the series in 8th place among the most-watched English-language Netflix series of all time after only three weeks.
Numerous media outlets are reporting on it and relating the story to real events, which have now even reached a political level. For example, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer watched the Netflix series and made a decision based on it. As reported by Variety, Adolescence is being made available in all secondary schools in the UK with teacher information materials via the streaming service Film+.
Commenting on this, Starmer said:
As a father who watched the series with his teenage son and daughter, I can say that it really hit home with us. It is an important initiative to get as many students as possible to watch the series. From my own experience with my own children, it is essential to talk openly about how they communicate, what content they see, and to explore the conversations they have with their peers in order to help them deal with these current challenges and influences.
Incels and the Manosphere: Adolescence brings the fringe movement into the attention of the mainstream
The challenges and influences that Starmer refers to are named in Adolescence. Andrew Tate is an example of a leading figure who provides dangerous content online for young men by advocating male dominance and female submission. In 2022, he and his brother Tristan were arrested on suspicion of human trafficking, rape, and organized crime. Even though Jamie explains to his therapist in episode 3 that he can’t relate to Tate’s videos, the problem now goes far beyond Tate and has manifested itself in a movement called Incels or Manosphere.
Incels refers to a group of men who perceive themselves as disadvantaged in today’s society compared to women and at the same time believe that they have a right to have sex with women. The word is a portmanteau of “involuntary celibate”, which describes not only the condition of these men not having sex with women, although they would like to, but also devaluing, manipulating or physically harassing women because of this condition. On social media like TikTok or Instagram, there are numerous influencers and content creators who explain and impose precisely these theories on young men. The websites, blogs and forums associated with this are grouped under the Manosphere.
Jamie also hints at this world view in Adolescence, not by denying the murder of his classmate Katie, but by constantly declaring, “I didn’t do anything wrong.” At the same time, it is revealed that he had previously tried to go out with Katie. He explains that he only approached her because he felt that she was not so desired by others, which is why he might be able to “get” her. Katie’s rejection and subsequent bullying justified the act for him, in which he boasted about leaving it at murder and not also sexually harassing her – something he said other boys would have done, which in turn makes him better.
Even though series creators and screenwriters Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham are not fictionalizing a real-life isolated incident here, in Adolescence they bring to light a far-reaching problem within society and many cumulative cases at the same time. This problem has become more manifest in recent years due to the anti-woke movement and the shift to the right in numerous countries, which can be observed particularly among young men.
The fact that the series is now sparking conversations about precisely these issues and is even being included in school curricula is an incredible testament to the power of the medium, which once again impressively demonstrates why we need series and films like Adolescence – and what they can achieve. And that’s something you can’t buy, even with a budget of $320 million.
