Blending Genres, Crossing Generations

Contemporary Teen Dramas and Their Audience

Abstract

Over the past decade, the expansion of streaming platforms has reshaped the landscape of teen television, fostering more open, complex, and nuanced representations of adolescence. Series such as SKAM, Sex Education, Never Have I Ever…, Heartstopper, as well as the Italian Baby, SKAM Italia, Nudes, Prisma have contributed to redefining the genre, addressing themes including mental health, gender identity, and sexuality with increasing depth. At the same time, however, recent industrial shifts suggest a partial retreat from these renewed forms of teen series, as economic pressures and platform strategies favour content with broader, intergenerational appeal. We identify one key manifestation of this transition in the growing hybridisation of teen drama with other genres, often accompanied by more adult-oriented narrative frameworks and intergenerational perspectives. This article examines two interrelated questions: to what extent genre hybridisation contributes to processes of “adultification” in both content and audience, and how teenage viewers – particularly girls – perceive and negotiate these transformations. Drawing on an exploratory qualitative study based on focus groups with high school and university students, the analysis shows that young audiences display a critical awareness of the adult gaze embedded in contemporary teen series and reflect on how such representations may shape broader social understandings of adolescence.