Content Warning: This post discusses themes of misogyny, incel culture, radicalisation, and youth violence.
Spoiler Alert: If you haven’t watched the series yet, you might want to come back to this after you’ve seen all four episodes.
All images used in this post are from Adolescence (Netflix).
There’s a moment in episode three of Adolescence that stopped me cold. Jamie, the 13-year-old boy at the centre of this story, says he could have touched Katie, but he didn’t. Other boys would have. That’s the moment it lands - how far gone he is. How he’s been fed a warped, dangerous narrative in a space that should have been safe: his bedroom.
As a teacher, it rattled me. Because it didn’t feel fictional. It felt familiar.
A Show That Hits Too Close to Home
Adolescence is a four-part British drama that follows Jamie (Owen Cooper), a 13-year-old schoolboy who kills his classmate, Katie (played by Emilia Holliday), after she rejects him and calls him an incel online. Each episode unfolds in real time, shot in a single take, but you don’t just watch it. You experience it. And long after the final scene, it lingers.
This is a story about the boys who slip through the cracks. About how misogyny, radicalisation, and toxic online spaces don’t always announce themselves. Sometimes, they hide in plain sight - in a quiet bedroom, in a boy playing video games, in a child who seems withdrawn but not dangerous.
As someone who’s taught in schools in areas of social deprivation, the school scenes hit hard. It doesn’t vilify teachers; in some respects, it’s the opposite. DS Misha Franks (Faye Marsay) even says, “there’ll be good teachers here”, and there always are. But the show captures something most educators know too well: that we’re underfunded, overstretched, and often running on fumes. Sometimes we don’t have the time to spot the signs. Sometimes we don’t know our students well enough to help in the way they really need.
What Adolescence Gets Right
This show isn’t just a case study in character, it’s a layered portrait of a system under pressure, a society failing its young people, and the patterns we repeat without noticing.
One of the most chilling choices is this: by episode four, Katie’s name isn’t even mentioned. She fades. And it reflects something we see far too often in real life - when women are murdered, we tend to remember the killer, not the victim. The one who did the harm becomes the headline. The girl who died becomes the background and is eventually forgotten.
But the show also makes space for hope. Adam (Amari Bacchus), who initially has a strained relationship with his dad, DI Luke Bascombe (Ashley Walters), understands how things have gone wrong. Bascombe, too, begins to shift. Their arc is subtle, but it shows that things don’t have to end the way they do for Jamie. There’s still time to change.
Katie isn’t portrayed as perfect. She laughs at Jamie when she rejects him. It hurts him. It’s a real, human moment, and while it absolutely doesn’t justify what happens to her, it adds realism. In real life, people are messy. Emotional responses aren’t always kind. And it’s the nuance that makes this story feel lived-in.
Then there’s the presence of phones, especially in episode two, where phones and social media seem to dominate every moment of teenage life, even inside the classroom. Even in episode four, as Lisa (Amélie Pease) drives to the hardware store with her parents, she doesn’t put her phone down once. Her parents are speaking, and she’s never entirely present. It’s not a judgment, it’s a snapshot of now.
And the psychology runs deep. Jamie chooses his dad (Stephen Graham) as his appropriate adult, despite his mum being the one who knows he hates needles. About his mother, all he really says is that she makes sandwiches and Sunday roasts. His emotional centre is built around a man who’s at times, has been disappointed in him and not stood up for him. A man who, in his own words, let the other dads laugh at Jamie when he was just a small child, for not being good at football.
And when things unravel, Jamie’s anger isn’t for the boys who spat at him or physically assaulted him. His rage is for Katie because, in his mind, her rejection, her laugh, and her accusations are worse. More shameful. More permanent.
And his confession in episode 3 showed he didn’t want something that felt like justice. He wants control. And that’s the part we have to talk about.
I feel Adolescence also asks us to reconsider what we think danger looks like. Jamie doesn’t lash out in obvious ways. He’s quiet. Polite. Withdrawn. But the signs were there - in his isolation, his online activity, the things he didn’t say out loud. And if nothing else, the show is a wake-up call. Not to place blame on any one part of the system, but to ask: How can we do better? How can we listen earlier? How can we spot what’s hidden?
The Bigger Picture: Misogyny, Media, and Missed Moments
A few years ago, I read Men Who Hate Women by Laura Bates - a book I now think every educator should at least be aware of. It’s a deeply researched, unflinching look at how online spaces groom and radicalise boys and men into misogyny. It covers everything from incel forums to pick-up artist communities and makes you think about more polished figures like Andrew Tate. It’s not alarmist, it’s honest. And it changed the way I viewed some of the things I saw in the classroom.
Watching Adolescence, all of that came rushing back.
Jamie’s descent isn’t sudden, it’s slow. Quiet. Invisible until it isn’t. And that’s the point. The radicalisation happens through repetition. Through loneliness. Through content that tells him his problems aren’t his fault, they’re hers.
Here’s what stood out most:
◆ The indoctrination happens quietly. Jamie isn’t “evil.” He’s lost. He’s angry. He’s lonely. And the manosphere gave him somewhere to direct that - somewhere that made him feel powerful instead of invisible.
◆ It’s not just about the internet. The male teachers shout. The boys joke about girls. There are moments when someone could step in - and no one does. And while it’s not a teacher-bashing show, it is asking us to notice the microaggressions we often overlook.
◆ His dad is well-meaning, but part of the problem. Eddie (Stephen Graham) clearly wants to be a good father. But the version of masculinity he models for Jamie sounds closed-off, ashamed of softness, and emotionally absent. And this is the man Jamie idolised.
◆ The show reflects real-world statistics. Nearly 1 in 4 boys say they agree with Andrew Tate’s views. And Tate is just the headline act, who has fortunately been scrubbed from most social media platforms. But countless other voices are replacing him and repeating the same messages on the platforms our young people are using for hours a day. Repeating the idea that women owe you something. Repeating that rejection is humiliation. Repeating that violence makes you a man, and that the odds of even getting a chance with a girl are stacked against you.
And maybe that’s the most teachable thing of all - because what we say about gender, power, and worth doesn’t disappear. It sticks. It shapes. And it stays online.
If nothing else, Adolescence opens the door to some essential conversations:
◆ Social media and the manosphere
◆ Toxic masculinity
◆ Healthy vs unhealthy relationships
◆ Consent
◆ Online grooming
◆ Peer influence
◆ What schools can (and can’t) do
◆ How your digital footprint stays with you long after you’ve clicked away
It’s hard to teach these topics. But we can’t ignore them. And Adolescence gives us a way in.
Final Thoughts
Adolescence isn’t easy to watch, but it’s not meant to be. It’s a story about failure, fear, masculinity, and missed chances. It asks difficult questions, and it doesn’t offer easy answers. But that’s why it works. Because it mirrors the complexity of real life.
As a teacher, I saw pieces of truth in almost every scene - the pressure, the chaos, the quiet moments we wish we could go back and do differently. And as someone passionate about pastoral care and storytelling, I think this is one of the most powerful resources we’ve had in a long time.
It opens the door to conversations we need to be having, about social media, peer influence, radicalisation, consent, and what it really means to be safe.
And now that Adolescence is available to stream for free in UK classrooms, we have a unique opportunity to bring those conversations into our lessons, with the context, care, and nuance they deserve.
Watch it. Talk about it. Teach with it.
Because ignoring this isn’t an option anymore.
