The teen genre is often the first to accept new social ideas and concepts with youths being catalysts for culture and society. Teen TV is the best example of this. There are certain TV shows that have given way to more representation, production quality, fashion, music taste, whole genres and casting.
10. Freaks and Geeks
With many teen-focused shows and movies focusing on the popular crowd, Freak And Geeks was a refreshing showcase of how the only high school stories worth telling aren’t just about the popular group.
9. The Vampire Diaries
While it certainly wasn’t the first teen series focusing on the supernatural (Charmed, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, and Sabrina The Teenage Witch came out way before), it was by far the most iconic and successful. It also showed that teen shows are worth good writing. This show’s trademark was pissing off its fans with the most unexpected, heart-wrenching, scream-inducing plot twists. It also spawned two successful spinoffs: The Originals and Legacies.
8. That 70s Show
This show, which ran in the 90s and 2000s, proved that teens can relate to teens of past decades just as much as teens of today. This is quite a revolutionary idea and spawned shows like Stranger Things, Everything Sucks and Cruel Summer.
7. Glee
Ahead of its time in diversity and showcasing queer storylines, Glee featured almost every race, sexuality and all kinds of disabilities in one way or another. The show was a satire on high school politics. While no show is perfect and Glee certainly isn’t an exception, there would certainly not be all the queer content and diversity we have in media and entertainment today without Glee. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that Zillenials’ acceptance of all different types of people is because we were raised with Glee. It was the first prestige TV teen drama in the Golden Age of TV (besides Friday Night Lights). Glee‘s impact is severely underrated due to the internet being more interested in ridiculing its hilarious plot instead of dissecting its undeniable impact. It was also the show that started Ryan Murphy’s blunt, self-aware, audacious, campy and sardonic humor that has spread across almost all of his comedic shows. The comedy was subversive, often bordering on ridiculous and problematic, but somehow it works, or at least well enough to get onto primetime television. The part-tender drama and part-black comedy were made for misfits, outsiders and losers. That was its target audience, and in a teen TV landscape that mostly focused on the popular group, it was very refreshing. It was also a twist on the musical genre, with the classroom setting making unsolicited, spontaneous breakouts into song rare, although the show did have quite a bit of creative freedom, from recreating music videos to performances no realistic school budget could pull off. After all, this creative freedom worked because the show was about a bunch of dreamers. The choral aspect was grounded in reality, which made it easier for an audience to grasp. It wasn’t just revolutionary for the teen genre, but also for the musical genre. It was also the first show to stream music from the show on iTunes or Spotify. Glee even broke Billboard charts records and was nominated for Grammys too. Without Glee, there would be no Riverdale or High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. Also, Glee helped make old music new again too, which is what streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music and shows like Cruel Summer and Euphoria do now. They also managed to cast, for the most part, ALL triple threats, which is very impressive.
6. Pretty Little Liars
This show proved how powerful fandoms and the internet can be. The show came on around the time Twitter was rising in popularity. Therefore, with its genre being a teen mystery and fans loving to talk about their theories, it was a match made in heaven. Without Pretty Little Liars breaking the internet every Tuesday night during its run, shows like Outer Banks and Riverdale probably wouldn’t exist. It’s also widely regarded as the most social show in the history of TV. It was also a great depiction of cyberbullying at its most disturbing and extreme and overcoming it, as well as enduring female friendships and complex female characters.
5. Euphoria
This show showcases teens as they want to be perceived: complex people. Not only is the music authentic to teens today, but its cinematography is absolutely stunning and also a triumphant storytelling device. It also proved that kids don’t need to watch people wear clothes they wear IRL, they can watch kids wear aspirational clothing, especially in the TikTok, YouTube and DIY era. Also, with the show’s deep, multi-generational soundtrack, it proved that teens aren’t only interested in the music on the radio at that given time, but in music from all genres and time periods.
4. The Degrassi franchise
Revolutionary in rejecting the common trope of casting early 20s actors as teens, it showed the teen drama genre in a very soap opera-like format with an endless abundance of episodes, absurd and melodramatic storytelling, and controversial plots. The Canadian Degrassi franchise proved that real teens can tell real teen stories like no other.
3. Beverly Hills, 90210
The first teen-focused TV drama, of course, it had to be on this list. Before 90210, there were only ever teen-focused movies like John Hughes’ The Breakfast Club or Pretty In Pink or teen comedies like Saved By The Bell. It spawned the youthquake of the 90s and started many teen drama tropes we still see today.
2. Gossip Girl
Described by New York magazine as “The Greatest Teen Drama Of All Time,” Gossip Girl revolutionized teen drama, from the importance of fashion in telling teen stories to being the poster child of modern teen rebellion. It also spawned the teen panic, “parent’s worst nightmare” TV frenzy that teens flock to and today’s Euphoria thrives off of. In the timeline of teen dramas, Gossip Girl is basically Jesus Christ. Before Gossip Girl they were more wholesome, family-focused shows like Friday Night Lights and The OC, and after Gossip Girl there were darker, more satirical teen shows like Pretty Little Liars and Riverdale. It was so impactful in its usage of technology, something pretty much every modern teen drama utilizes. However, its biggest social impact on both television and audience interest was its nuanced female-focused storytelling and showcasing young women enjoying sex, all more reasons that without Gossip Girl there would be no Pretty Little Liars or Euphoria.
1. Sex Education
Sex Education is known for flipping common teen tropes and avoiding tokenism when it comes to representing gender, race and sexuality. Also, their showcase of unapologetic teen sexuality is revolutionary for TV. It’s also rooted in comedy, which makes sex seem less scary as a viewer as opposed to shows like Secret Life of the American Teenager which come off as more of a cautionary tale than an educational PSA. Because this is one of the newest shows on this list, let’s just hope Sex Education feeds off into other shows like the ones shown on this list.