A family unravels in the devastating Netflix miniseries Adolescence

Netflix subscribers will be drawn to Adolescence for its hook, a formal choice that gives the show a different energy from similar domestic dramas or splashy crime thrillers. Each of the four hours of this harrowing study of the ripple effects of an act of violence unfurls in a single unbroken shot. The 1917 approach to trauma intensifies the bone-deep emotion of the piece by not allowing either the performers or viewers the release that comes with a cut. We sit with these people on the worst days of their lives as if we’re actually in the room with them. It creates a less passive connection to the characters because they’re all we have to hold onto in these dark moments with no montage or needle drops to pull the curtain down on the emotion of the scene. It helps a great deal that all four hours are anchored by excellent performers, especially Stephen Graham, who may have never been better than he is in this show’s final hour, when a father’s past, present, and future crash into an emotional pileup.

Adolescence opens with DI Luke Bascombe (Ashley Walters) and DS Misha Frank (Faye Marsay) chatting on what seems like an ordinary morning. After a few minutes, they roll through a typical neighborhood to the front door of what seems like a normal family. Armed officers order the family to the floor as they march upstairs and arrest a 13-year-old boy named Jamie Miller (Owen Cooper). As his parents protest that they must have the wrong house, Jamie is dragged down to the station. From the beginning, the formal choice of a oner has an impact in that we’re stuck with Jamie in the back of the cop car, trying to read his body language but also instantly caught up in the chaos of the event. True crime has trained viewers to ask if his behavior is that of the guilty or innocent, but his incredibly young face also reminds us that this is a child. What could he have done to warrant a dozen cops descending on his house?

When they get to the station, Jamie’s parents Eddie (Graham) and Manda (Christine Tremarco) learn the details about the accusations by the end of the first hour: The cops believe that Jamie stabbed a female classmate to death. The structure allows for a procedural approach over this premiere, revealing information slowly as the camera swoops back and forth from the Millers to DI Bascombe to an attorney hired to advocate for the family. It’s a riveting hour of television, one of the best of the year in purely structural terms.

One of the most interesting choices in the production of Adolescence, which was written and created by Graham and Jack Thorne and directed by Philip Barantini, is what happens next. Each of the four episodes has a very different perspective and energy, in part because they’re not consecutive hours. The first two are relatively close, but, without spoiling, the last two jump ahead significantly, allowing viewers to consider why these specific four hours were picked to tell the saga of Jamie Miller.