It’s the worst nightmare for any parent. Learning that your child has met their end at the hands of someone unidentified not only upends any semblance of normalcy, thus changing one’s life forever, but has served as fodder for countless forms of content since the dawn of storytelling. Turning the focus towards the assailant isn’t necessarily new. Still, the unique approach taken by the four episodes of “Adolescence,” the latest serial plunge into the genre courtesy of Netflix, elevates a boilerplate premise into something unexpectedly distinct. What series creators/writers/co-producers Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham have done is as radical as it gets; despite the dark, horrific conceit, this is one show where it’s impossible to look away.
Part of the credit can lean toward the filming style, which exclusively uses one unbroken shot from start to finish throughout every episode. Much like the premise itself, the precedent for one-take onscreen storytelling was set long ago, with director Philip Barantini having helmed the one-take film/series “Boiling Point,” which also starred Graham. Still, it’s thanks to this background, these showrunners and a cast beyond dedicated to getting everything just right that a masterpiece emerges.
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The first episode sets the tone almost immediately as an early morning raid carried out by DI Luke Bascombe (Ashley Walters) and DS Misha Frank (Faye Marsay) on the streets of a sleepy English town sees an army of police officers break down the front door of the Miller family’s home; as the startled, frightened parents Eddie (Graham) and Manda (Christine Tremarco), along with daughter Lisa (Amélie Pease) attempt to make sense of the moment, Bascombe makes his way to Jamie (Owen Cooper), the youngest of the family, seemingly awoken in his bed with enough shock to cause an accident. Upon changing clothes and after quickly being ushered to the back of an awaiting squad car, Jamie’s frantic pleas for his father go unheeded as the vehicle makes its way to the nearby station, where Jamie is soon booked, led to a cell and his gobsmacked family soon arrive armed with nothing but questions about what’s led to this.
It would seem Jamie is accused of murdering a classmate, Katie Leonard (Emilia Holliday), something both Jamie and his father vehemently deny, but this denial soon plays second fiddle to the continued process of checking Jamie into custody, which includes a brief medical exam, strip search and meeting with a court-appointed solicitor, Paul Barlow (Mark Stanley). Everything eventually culminates in an interrogation of the boy, where “some pretty compelling evidence” alluded to by Barlow comes to light, and Jamie’s innocence immediately comes into question. It’s here that the episode ends.
Take a breath before starting the next. That was stressful enough.
The setting now shifts to Jamie’s school three days later, where Bascombe and Frank speak with Jamie’s friends, along with one of Katie’s closest, Jade (Fatima Bojang). Intertwined within this and the preceding episode are moments showing Bascombe speaking with an unknown person on the phone; this is now revealed to be his son, Adam (Amari Bacchus), also a fellow student of Jamie’s and one with whom he seems to share a strained relationship.
However, the focus never entirely shifts away from Bascombe’s goal, though his interview with Jade fails to produce any meaningful results as Jade, clearly still distraught, storms out of the meeting in a rage, something which carries over into a physical schoolyard confrontation with Jamie’s friend Ryan (Kaine Davis). Ryan, as seen in the opening, seems to know something about Jamie’s relationship with Katie, even making vague references to another friend about a knife, the murder weapon, perhaps? After Jade’s fight with Ryan, Bascombe decides to seize this opportunity to speak with the slightly injured boy. However, their conversation takes its own turn in a decidedly more suspicious way when talk of the murder prompts a nervous Ryan to take his leave immediately.
This eventually comes to a head when Bascombe, acting on his suspicions of Ryan, attempts to pull him out of class for further interrogation, only to find himself shortly thereafter engaged in a foot chase as Ryan flees the school. Will Bascombe get to the bottom of whatever Ryan may be holding inside? Will Jade find peace from behind her mask of grief? As episode two draws to a close, the relationship between Bascombe and his son shows apparent signs of strengthening, even as a solitary moment just before the credits roll ends everything on another dour note.
It’s episode three, where the stage is set for an acting masterclass, taking place within the facility where Jamie’s been held for the preceding seven months. A meeting with his psychologist, Briony Ariston (Erin Doherty), confines the action to a conference room where Jamie engages in the casual ease of their relationship up to that point; it’s clear they’ve met before, but as Jamie tosses a barb or two in Briony’s direction does the psychologist throw it back. She intends to evaluate Jamie before his trial, try to understand what happened, and eventually reveal to him that this will be their final meeting. This, alongside episode two, takes dips into the pool of the incel subculture and the manosphere, something Adam helps Bascombe to understand (and, by proxy, the audience) and which proves to figure heavily into Jamie’s plight. There’s more to Jamie than one might expect, or perhaps we suspected that all along.
The show’s summary could easily continue with a synopsis of the fourth and final episode, but that’s best left to the viewer. However, with the focus turning back towards Jamie’s family, a conclusion seems inevitable, but given the journey up to this point, what might that look like? Satisfying everyone appears impossible, but make no mistake, the end is in sight, like it or not.
Everything that transpires within the four episodes of “Adolescence” comprises a genuinely gripping experience, one unlikely to prompt repeat viewings, but even in a single, solitary watch, the impact is nonetheless felt. The one-take format never, even for a second, feels like a gimmick, instead placing the audience directly into the action and allowing the story to unfold naturally; episode one, for example, possesses tension to spare as we feel the stress of both Jamie and his father as they endure the rapidly developing events. When Jamie undergoes his strip search, the camera wisely focuses solely on Eddie, with his expressionless stare barely concealing his emotion as he watches his son endure such a process.
Jamie’s sobs throughout never dip below anything less than palpable, even as it becomes somewhat clear how guilty he might be; it’s a testament to all those involved, both in front of the camera and off, to somehow draw sympathy for what is otherwise a frightened child potentially responsible for something unbelievably terrible. Jamie’s initial interrogation raises that tension to a fever pitch. While it seems likely further questioning will undoubtedly occur offscreen, by the time this scene ends, with Jamie and Eddie in a tearful embrace, such a scene is all we need to see.
Episode two continues this momentum; while the tension might have lessened somewhat, Jade’s rollercoaster of emotion and Ryan’s panic leap from the screen, with Bascombe’s pursuit of Ryan an undeniably riveting moment as good, if not better, than anything the likes of Tom Cruise has done. When the rubber meets the road in episode three, the events play out in what could easily be a scene from a play: when Jamie desperately cries to Briony, asking if she likes him, a moment built on the foundation of Jamie lightly complaining about the sandwich Briony brought him or the banter they share, it’s emotion well-earned. For someone possessing no acting experience before his role in “Adolescence,” Owen Cooper has solidified his position as a truly gifted actor.
The same can be said for Stephen Graham, whose time on the show largely falls within the bookending episodes one and four. It’s easy to see what lies beneath the surface of Eddie, as what’s essentially a father clinging to the hope for some answer achieves further strength thanks to Graham’s talent in conveying what’s rattling around his head, as much as his heart, by hardly uttering a word. When he does speak, his words hit hard, as hard if not more complicated than they should, and in her one episode appearance as Briony Erin Doherty, she displays something rarely seen. In the way she interacts with Cooper, it’s pure magic.
Four episodes is all it takes, just as one act was all it took to end a life. Finding symbolism or deeper meaning could be achieved by peeling back the layers, but at its core, it’s a story about a father and his profoundly troubled son. Every second that passes on the mini-series feels like it belongs, with no time wasted, and a sensation is felt upon a difficult-to-describe conclusion. It could very well be what someone emerging from the other side of trauma can only begin to articulate, or possibly this is what’s left behind in the wake of viewing landmark television. “Adolescence” is just that. [A+]
“Adolescence” is streaming now on Netflix.
