Spoilers for all four episodes of Adolescence below.
There’s a moment toward the end of the third episode of Adolescence that’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen on television. Up until this point, the new Netflix limited series – consisting of four hour-long single-take episodes – toys with your understanding of right and wrong and dangles in front of you the possibility that the show’s 13-year-old protagonist couldn’t possibly, despite video evidence, be capable of murder. But in one brief and subtle moment, you know deep down in your soul that he absolutely is.
Adolescence follows the dramatic aftermath of a horrific crime: Katie, a teenage girl, has been found stabbed to death in a car park and her classmate Jamie Miller is the prime suspect. Jamie, played in a star-making turn by newcomer Owen Cooper, swears he is innocent from the moment police barge into his bedroom in the show’s opening minutes. But slowly, over the course of four taut and gutwrenching episodes, you come to realize not only that Jamie did it, but that of course he did it.
This realization crystallizes near the climax of the show’s third hour. Until then we’ve witnessed Jamie’s interrogation by police (Episode 1) and his classmates’ reactions to the murder (Episode 2). Episode 3 is a brilliant two-hander between Jamie and psychologist Briony Ariston, played by The Crown’s Erin Doherty, who’s come to evaluate Jamie for a final time seven months after the murder. The episode plays out like a game of cat and mouse in which the mouse is already captured and uses every tool in his arsenal – charm, despair, and outright rage – to try and escape.
After several violent outbursts in which Jamie cracks his heretofore borderline cherubic facade, Briony finally seems to have him cornered. She presses Jamie on what exactly transpired during the night in question, and we think we slowly – finally – see him break. Briony gets him to admit that he had been bullied by Katie and was enraged by her rejection of his romantic overtures, a perfect motive if there ever was one. But Jamie continues to protest.
“All I did. All I did was…” he nervously starts. But then, Jamie’s sullen face warps into a smile and he laughs. “Look at you,” he continues, turning his menacing gaze toward Briony. “All hopeful like I’m gonna say something important.” Jamie looks at Briony for an instant, his twisted grin lingering, before putting his mask back on and returning to his version of events.
It’s in this fleeting moment that the true meaning of the episode and the entire series becomes clear. Previously, the audience was on Jamie’s side. We believed him when he swore he didn’t kill Katie. It must have been some sort of misunderstanding. We believed Jamie because we wanted to. Because it made sense.
Because how could a 13-year-old boy stab a girl seven times? But in this moment we comprehend beyond a shadow of a doubt what Jamie is capable of. The scene forces us to realize that all of his pleas and our own unwillingness to believe our own eyes (see the aforementioned video evidence) can’t mask the fact that Jamie is a killer.
Adolescence plays on our well worn perception of what children are capable of. In the premiere episode our first look at Jamie is of him being dragged from his bed, literally wetting himself in fear. Later he openly weeps in front of his father and is forced to undergo a traumatic strip search at the police station. We feel protective of Jamie and convince ourselves that he’s innocent. So by the time Episode 3 comes around and it becomes clear that he’s guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, the real gut punch isn’t that Jamie did it – it’s that we’d convinced ourselves that he didn’t.
Jamie’s turn in Episode 3 isn’t a Primal Fear situation. There’s not an inherently evil monster masked by an angelic little boy until a last-minute twist. There’s just a 13-year-old adolescent with simmering rage who’s slowly radicalized by a noxious mix of social media, a warped perception of relationships, and straight-up teenage loneliness. It’s difficult for us as an audience to come to grips with, yet it makes perfect sense.
I’m willing to bet Cooper wins an Emmy for his performance in Adolescence. Throw in a Golden Globe, SAG Award, and BAFTA while you’re at it because the fact is he’s playing multiple intricate characters wrapped in the guise of a single boy.
He’s the Jamie we meet at the beginning: a scared little kid who’s found himself in an impossible situation. That’s the real Jamie. Then there’s the murderer; an entitled almost-man with a short temper who’s prone to intimidation. That’s the real Jamie too. The truth is that both sides of Jamie – the frightened kid and the murderous criminal – are real, and that’s the horror.
