TV’s 15 Best Teen Dramas of All Time, Ranked

To call Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk and Ian Brennan’s musical dramedy inconsistent would be putting it mildly. Everything about this show, from its storylines to its fickle characters to its half-acidic/half-syrupy tone, seemed to shift with the winds. But what is the experience of being a teen, anyway, if not trying every single thing and feeling every single second of it with every single fiber of your being? When this show hit — as with that premiere-ending rendition of “Don’t Stop Believin’” — it hit like nothing else, combining the potency of pop music with the giddiness of adolescence to downright transcendent effect. 

Teen shows rarely improve. That’s what makes ABC Family’s cancellation of Amy Sherman-Palladino and Lamar Damon’s series about a former Las Vegas showgirl (Sutton Foster, not a teen) teaching ballet in a quirky coastal California town so sad. Bunheads began a little bumpy, straining to establish the silly side of its premise, but after a pause between halves of its first and only season, found its voice and its characters. The final eight episodes, fully showcasing supporting stars Kaitlyn Jenkins, Julia Goldani Telles, Bailey De Young (then “Bailey Buntain”) and Nick Dumont (credited professionally as “Emma”), were as good as anything Gilmore Girls and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel creator Sherman-Palladino has ever done. 

You don’t have to already be a basketball fan to enjoy this tale, inspired by NBA player Kevin Durant; its combination of dazzling camerawork and actors who look like they can actually play will make one of you yet. But it’s the show’s fierce love for its young ensemble that makes it indelible. Jace (Isaiah Hill) may possess the sort of athleticism that practically writes his future for him — to say nothing of the fact that as a working-class Black kid, he’s exposed to hard realities his wealthier or whiter counterparts are shielded from. But through kindly coach Ike (O’Shea Jackson Jr.), Reggie Rock Bythewood’s richly realized, breathtakingly tender series extends him and his friends the space to just be the imperfect teens they actually are, in all their hilarious, heartbreaking and maddening glory.

With its unapologetic depiction of sex, drugs and generally debauched youth, this British classic may as well have been designed in a lab to titillate teens and horrify parents. If shock value got viewers in the door, though, the authenticity of its emotions — raw, messy, intense — was what kept us hooked. Where other series might try to sugarcoat harsh realities or soften provocative characters, this one tackled them all with the bravado of youth. But adolescence can’t last forever, and neither did this show’s heyday; as new ensembles came in for later years, Skins struggled to pack the same punch. Still, we’ll always have those early seasons — especially notable now for helping launch future A-listers like Nicholas Hoult, Dev Patel and Daniel Kaluuya.

Exuberant, vital and fueled by a sensibility that was entirely its own, Crystal Moselle’s adaptation of her film Skate Kitchen possessed a joie de vivre so potent that, if bottled, could have made HBO billions. HBO did not bottle anything, and Betty lasted only two six-episode seasons. Oh well. Still, what a treasure to be able to discover (or rediscover) those seasons and experience the lives of this pack of Gen Z female skateboarders living and loving on the fringes of NYC’s male-dominated skateboarding milieu. Set just before and just after the COVID quarantine, Betty is, as directed throughout by Moselle, irresistibly high-energy and the cast, led by Rachelle Vinberg, Ajani Russell, Kabrina Adams (aka Moonbear), Dede Lovelace and scene-stealer Nina Moran, is astonishingly natural at every turn.

If you were not alive in October of 1990, you can’t fathom the phenomenon that was Beverly Hills, 90210, nor can you understand the impact that phenomenon had on broadcast neophyte Fox, and therefore on the full TV landscape. Nobody is going to try to tell you that 90210 was a perfect show. Sometimes it was soapy in the worst ways and sometimes in the best. Nobody is going to try to tell you that every member of the ensemble felt like a recent transplant from the Royal Shakespeare Company. Man, those early seasons were rough when they focused on Ian Ziering’s Steve Sanders, Tori Spelling’s Donna Martin and pre-makeover Brian Austin Green’s David Silver. But the cast matured and grew, the Darren Star-created series matured and grew, and without the template that 90210 created, we never would have gotten the excellent shows that adapted and played off that template. (Plus, the “teen” parameters of this list mean that we’re ignoring most of the California University and postgrad seasons.)

Solving your best friend’s murder is hardly what you’d call a relatable rite of passage. But the disillusionment of seeing this broken world for what it really is? That’s just growing up, baby. Starring Kristen Bell as a teen detective more akin to hard-boiled Sam Spade than wholesome Nancy Drew, Rob Thomas’ irresistible neo-noir combined high-stakes mystery, intense interpersonal drama (who could forget Veronica’s volatile chemistry with bad boy Logan?) and disarming touches of sweetness, most notably in Veronica’s bond with her P.I. dad (Enrico Colantoni). There was nothing like it when it premiered in 2004, and two decades, a film sequel and a one-season revival later, there still hasn’t been anything quite like it since.

An adaptation of Ann M. Martin’s classic children’s books probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind when you hear “teen drama” — and we are admittedly using the term loosely here, given that many of the characters are tweens for much of the series. But Rachel Shukert’s big-hearted version is second to none at capturing the particular joys and terrors of early adolescence. Aided by a lovable cast of kids and an almost equally endearing one of adults (Alicia Silverstone and Marc Evan Jackson among them), Shukert updates the source material for the 2020s while retaining the central questions that made it so enduring: how to be a good friend, how to be a good citizen, how to be a good you. 

When it comes to Canadian coming-of-age shows, Degrassi and its countless spinoffs and reboots monopolize the conversation, tackling taboo topics and launching prominent careers. Good for Degrassi! But who truly has time for all that content? Created by Clea DuVall and based on the lives of musicians and co-creators Tegan and Sara Quin, High School didn’t make much of a ripple when it debuted on Amazon’s Freevee platform in 2022. But it’s an astonishingly heartfelt dramedy that was only beginning to approach the duo’s early creative endeavors when Amazon forgot it existed (or canceled it, kinda). Led by remarkable real-life twins Railey and Seazynn Gilliland, High School simply felt real and, despite the specificity of its proto-famous characters, period setting and Alberta locations, utterly universal. 

From the moment that Phantom Planet theme song rolled on its very first episode, Fox’s aughts-era hit was dishing out all the lurid melodrama any connoisseur of the genre could hope for: fistfights and stolen kisses and crushing breakups, most of them played out against either beachside bonfires or lavish galas. What really set the series apart, though, was its quick, self-aware sense of humor — often, but by no means exclusively, courtesy of Adam Brody’s Seth Cohen, a hipster geek ahead of his time. As evidenced by other entries on this very list, creator Josh Schwartz did not invent the subgenre of primetime soaps about photogenic rich kids in California. But he just about perfected it with this deliciously trashy, refreshingly witty, totally addictive outing.

There are reasons the explosion of reality TV in the 21st century has only occasionally encompassed young people. Even at its best, the genre has been accused of rampant exploitation and uncomfortable voyeurism, and it’s a rare parent willing to sign their teen up for that sort of exposure. All credit, then, to director Steve James and the students and administrators at the Chicago-area Oak Park and River Forest High School for joining forces on this 10-part unscripted series focusing on a dozen high school students experiencing the highs and lows of a single school year. Starz didn’t have a darned clue what to do with the show — it barely made a cultural ripple — but it’s smart and thoughtful and timeless, offering a wealth of topical substance and as little sensationalism as possible. For other unscripted high school-set standouts, check out PBS’ excellent Citizen Nation and FX’s very good Social Studies. 

A variety of external factors relating to creator Joss Whedon and certain co-stars — as well as the up-and-down quality of the later seasons (and, heck, the first season) — have occasionally cast a pall over this WB/UPN supernatural coming-of-age classic. But imperfections don’t detract from how gloriously Buffy the Vampire Slayer utilized vampires, werewolves, witches and all manner of horrific and comical beasties and demons as a gateway to explore so many of the most natural and even mundane aspects of youth and adolescence. Buffy turned the high school drama upside-down with a deep reservoir of self-awareness and reverence for the lived experiences of its audience, reshaping the language of television and our expectations for how the medium handles genre.

Some high school shows are predicated on nostalgia — on taking viewers back to a time and place we yearn for, a moment of infinite possibility. More than anything, Winnie Holzman’s drama, set in suburban Pittsburgh, evokes a sensation of wonderment that anybody survives high school at all. Wearing its heart splattered all over its sleeve, My So-Called Life is raw, sad, uncomfortable and thankfully quite funny, anchored by Claire Danes in a breakout performance that introduced the world to Claire Danes Crying Face long before it became iconic. More than three decades after it premiered as one of that year’s most acclaimed shows — and tanked entirely — MSCL remains vivid and essential for its honesty, its utter lack of irony, its trailblazing treatment of Wilson Cruz’s Rickie, and its refusal to let any single character be one-dimensionally sympathetic or detestable. 

Nobody comes out of high school unscathed. Even the star quarterbacks and head cheerleaders will at some point be dealt devastating blows, to say nothing of the outcasts or kids from the wrong side of the tracks. The best anyone can hope for is to be met with care and compassion, and that is precisely the gift Peter Berg and Jason Katims’ drama offered its brilliant ensemble (including a young Michael B. Jordan and Jesse Plemons in his breakthrough role). Anchored by Kyle Chandler as the stalwart Coach Taylor, the series was unvarnished in its portrayal of life in small-town Texas and at the same time so sensitive that even its diciest plot swerves — yes, like the time Landry killed a guy — could ultimately yield gold. The pains of adolescence are universal and eternal; so, this extraordinary show reminds us, is the power of grace.

Whether you classify Paul Feig’s ’80s-set series as a drama, as we are, or a comedy, as the Emmys did for its two writing nominations and a deserved casting win for the great Allison Jones, Freaks and Geeks is funnier than any teen show ever made and also more deeply relatable and emotionally resonant. With only 18 hourlong episodes, which were bounced around NBC’s schedule like Tigger on speed, the series introduced over a dozen indelible characters — cringeworthy heroes and empathy-worthy villains — and a world as impeccably realized as anything achieved on the big or small screen. Looking at this cast of future stars and superstars, it’s shameful that NBC couldn’t get more than one season out. That said, “Discos and Dragons” is a flawless series finale, making it possible to believe this was simply the story that Feig, Judd Apatow, Mike White and company wanted to tell — and to feel blessed to have spent this time in Chippewa, Michigan, wandering the halls of William McKinley High School at all.