The sixth formers of Coal Hill Academy already juggle exams, parents and sex when a tear in space-time starts disgorging Shadow Kin, killer petals and governors who harvest teenage souls. Greg Austin's Charlie, Rhodian royalty hiding inside a Sheffield sixth-former, stores an extinction weapon in the school, while Katherine Kelly's exiled alien warlord Miss Quill becomes his reluctant bodyguard. Fady Elsayed's Ram keeps goal on a prosthetic leg after episode one, Sophie Hopkins' April shares a heart with the Shadow Kin king, Vivian Oparah's fifteen-year-old prodigy Tanya out-thinks carnivorous shrubs, and Jordan Renzo's Polish boyfriend Matteusz provides both moral compass and convenient hostage. Eight episodes chart one academic year; by the Christmas finale the survivors have murdered, lied and rewound time to keep London standing.
Patrick Ness wrote every episode, pitching it as “The Breakfast Club meets Buffy” and insisting on blood on the corridor walls. BBC Three premiered the series online on 22 October 2016, dumped the whole season the same night, and cancelled it eleven months later after iPlayer figures flat-lined. Big Finish revived the characters in 2018 for twelve audio plays, recasting April and Matteusz when the original actors declined. The Doctor never appears on screen, but his fingerprints are everywhere: the school first appeared in 1963's An Unearthly Child, the Doctor has visited it in six separate decades, and the hole in space is officially his fault. The walls stay thin, the governors stay hungry, and Coal Hill's new intake are already overdue for slaughter.
Production Details
BBC Three / 1 Season / 8 Episodes / 2016 - Present
Created by: Patrick Ness
Writer(s): Patrick Ness
Main Cast
Greg Austin as Charlie Smith
Katherine Kelly as Miss Quill
Sophie Hopkins as April MacLean
Fady Elsayed as Ram Singh
Vivian Oparah as Tanya Adeola
Jordan Renzo as Matteusz Andrzejewski
Aaron Neil as Varun Singh
Shannon Murray as Jackie MacLean
Paul Marc Davis as Corakinus
Pooky Quesnel as Dorothea Ames
Natasha Gordon as Vivian Adeola
Moses Adejimi as Student 1
