Adolescence: Hit Netflix drama smashes UK television record as millions tune into Stephen Graham series

The Netflix miniseries, which stars Stephen Graham, Ashley Walters and teenager Owen Cooper, tells the story of 13-year-old Jamie Miller who is accused of killing a female classmate. Adolescence focuses on themes of incel culture, misogyny and the internet’s impact on young men.

The show quickly hit the top of the Netflix charts since its release on March 13 and has now become the first-ever programme on a streaming platform to top the overall weekly television audience charts from Barb.

Episode one and two of Adolescence held the top spot and third spot respectively in the weekly charts for the week of its launch (March 10-16). The first episode gained 6.45 million viewers, while episode two held the attention of 5.9 million viewers.

ITV drama Protection took the second spot with 6m viewers, while the latest episode of The Apprentice ranked fourth with 5.7m viewers. Episode three and four of Adolescence ranked at 6th and 9th respectively with 5.1m viewers and 4.6m viewers.

Worldwide figures showed that Adolescence was watched 24.3 million times in its first week of release, with almost 100 million hours watched in total.

Adolescence has become a huge word-of-mouth hit for Netflix and has even been commented on in Parliament. There have been calls for the show to be shown in schools, including from show creators Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham, as well as MPs , including Labour politician Anneliese Midgley.

When asked about the show at PMQs last week, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer explained that he had been watching the show at home with his teenagers, adding: “It’s a very, very good drama.

“This violence carried out by young men influenced by what they see online is a real problem. It’s abhorrent and we have to tackle it.”