Imagine this, the police have just knocked down your door and bursts into your house and your 13-year-old child gets arrested as he has been accused of murdering his classmate Katie the night before. This is the harrowing story of Jamie Miller.
The first two episodes immerse us in the procedural details, both detectives DI Luke Bascombe (Ashely Walters) and DS Misha Frank (Faye Marsay) building the case against Jamie, although he insists that he has done nothing wrong.
He chooses his dad to be his appropriate adult. Over 13 months we see his dad’s initial disbelief gradually transforms into deep, unfathomable grief.
It is no spoiler that Jamie killed Katie. The evidence is incontrovertibly and given to us in the first episode. It is not supposed to be a who dunnit, the drama consists of why he would commit a horrendous act.
The most outstanding episode is 3 which is the penultimate as we get to see an entire session between Jamie and a psychologist, Briony (Erin Doherty) who is sent to make an independent report before the court case. She pushes him closer and closer to the truth and he doesn’t want to acknowledge his beliefs of low self-esteem, toxic masculinity and incel. There is substance to why Jamie isn’t just some random sociopath as there is a toxicity of him being bullied at school, social isolation and social media all combined.
He goes toe to toe with her and you get to see the evident changes from when Briony brings him a sandwich and hot chocolate and the significance by the end of the session when he takes one bite of it, he leaves the room whilst he says, “do you like me just a bit” and she can’t even touch it. Owen Cooper is an exceptional up and coming actor and you wouldn’t believe that this was his first acting gig and never went to drama school. He’s performance is full of raw emotion. This was the first episode that they ever shot.
The final episode is interesting as normally you see the perspective of the victim’s family, which is rightly so but they made it fresh because you see the opposite side of it which is the accuser’s family.
The script is impressive, and you can tell when they got it right as you don’t want to leave your screen. It’s that good. It shows the harsher sides of reality, and the writer Jack Thorne is so brutal but real at the same time. The single shot method makes it feel more engaging and that you are in each scene with them.
It is an eye-opening masterpiece. This might be the best drama limited series that I have seen in a decade and as much as I loved Broadchurch this tops it beyond everything I have seen. Adolescence refuses to offer easy get outs such as an abusive parent and there is no clear explanation as what to leads a young 13-year-old boy to murder another human being. It’s a brave TV series.