The Stephen Graham series broke Netflix records in its first week
News Liam De Brun TV and Celebrity writer 19:05, 25 Mar 2025
Netflix Adolescence writer Jack Thorne has admitted that he and his team behind the drama are not the ‘right people to tell the victim’s story’.
Released over a week ago, the Stephen Graham drama tells the story of 13-year-old Jamie Miller’s family dealing with him being accused of killing his female classmate.
Each of the four episodes released were filmed in one-shot, meaning that everything you see on screen was captured without any cuts or camera tricks.
By doing this, the series brought viewers inside what happens in UK police stations, schools, children's mental-health facilities and homes.
Quickly becoming the most talked about show of the year to date, some viewers have been calling for a second season focusing on the series’ tragic victim Katie.
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Appearing on Tuesday’s edition (March 25) of This Morning, writer Jack revealed that he doesn’t believe that will become a reality moving forward.
He explained: "I don’t think we’re the right people to tell Katie’s story. I think there are other makers out there that could tell beautiful dramas about Katie or girls like Katie, and that those shows should be made.
“Our aim was to try and tell Jamie’s story as fully as we possibly could, and maybe trying to tell her story would dilute that in some way and maybe we would be inadequate for that task.
“The second thing in terms of the second series, is, I think Jamie’s story is finished. I don’t think there’s anywhere more we can take Jamie, so I don’t think there is a series two.”
He continued: “We’d love to explore the one shot format in another way. We’d love to tell other stories with it, but I don’t think a series two of Adolescence is quite right for us.”
After perfecting the one-take formula in 2019 UK indie-film Boiling Point, which also starred Stephen, Adolescence has gone on to raise important questions in Parliament and in homes around the world.
Among the show’s supporters is Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, who invited Stephen and Jack to attend a parliamentary meeting by Labour MP Josh MacAlister to discuss online safety with MPs.
Calling the response to the series ‘overwhelming’, Jack said: "I’ve had conversations with my kids I’ve never had before because of this show.”
Meanwhile, ratings body Bard revealed this week that the first episode of Adolescence was watched by 6.45 million people in the UK in its first week.
No TV show have ever been viewed as much in its first week, with Michelle Keegan’s Fool Me Once being watched by 6.3 million people in seven days last January.
Also beating BBC One's The Apprentice and Death in Paradise in the ratings, which were each viewed by around 5.8 million people, was Adolescence’s second episode, with 5.94 million tuned in to see what happened next.
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With the third episode placing fifth in the weekly ratings with 5.14 million viewers, the final episode was viewed by 4.65 million in its first week.
