Boarders

BBC Three's Boarders arrives with energy, heart, and a pitch that practically sells itself: five Black working-class teens are offered scholarships to a posh boarding school in the wake of a PR scandal. It's a fish-out-of-water set-up ripe with class tension, culture clashes, and comic potential - a fresh spin on British school dramas that rarely centre stories like these.

And for the most part, Boarders delivers what it promises - a lively, character-driven coming-of-age story with flashes of sharp social commentary and a likeable cast. The young actors bring warmth and authenticity to roles that sometimes feel more like archetypes than fully formed characters, and when the writing lets them breathe, there's real heart here.

But for a show about friction, Boarders can feel strangely frictionless. The class satire never cuts as deep as it could, the emotional arcs are uneven, and the stakes often feel manufactured rather than earned. The tone wavers - veering from sincere drama to heightened farce without always sticking the landing - and the writing sometimes leans on easy tropes rather than doing the harder work of digging into the nuance the premise begs for.

That said, there's something undeniably watchable about it. The pacing is brisk, the setting well utilised, and the chemistry among the cast does a lot of heavy lifting. It's the kind of series that feels like a stepping stone - for its cast. With a sharper script and more narrative focus, Boarders could've been something great. As it stands, it's solidly watchable - sometimes fun, sometimes frustrating, always full of promise.

This isn't just. Good series it's bloody brilliant I don't really watch many dramas on bbc but I was going through all my apps looking for something new to watch and found this it has everything romance, drama, thrill and inclusivity without running it down your throat and shows the different versions of black teens watched all episodes in two days because it has me hooked wish it was 10 episodes in total but they left room for a new season hopefully and the actors are very talented individuals. Honestly well done bbc three.

10s a cross the board also woukd love to know more about each character.

This could have been an interesting show. There are many good actors, and it had potential to develop into something fun. But I don't think the writers knew what they were doing with it.

The story just rambles from one character to another. There are five interesting characters, and they each have their own issues, but none of them get developed very deeply. We just keep jumping around to these unconnected storylines that are fairly unbelievable.

We are supposed to think these characters know each other and are good friends, but we don't have any background to explain that, and they don't really seem to have anything in common other than that they attended the same community center classes.

And then the story seems to follow some of the characters from the school for a while, but then it jumps back to the main characters. Nobody really gets the full story development. Nothing significant really happens.

Waste of talent and time.

Both of the seasons of this show are well written at times with moments that are genuinely funny that will make you laugh out loud especially if you know my stereotypes of private school kids in the uk being unbearable and out of touch. The will they won't they relationships every character has is interesting at first a they are hopefully building for a payoff in the third season but Christ they are all written with the emotional subtlety of a sledgehammer with characters constantly putting their foot in the mouth as they fail to learn from their mistakes over and over which begins to grain after a while in season 2 but overall a good binge worth show especially if your from the uk.

Oh so far so good. I'm loving this hope the next season comes out soon ASAP. At first I didn't think I was going to like this show but so far I am loving it. We need more shows like this. Great answers with excellent talent. The show definitely needs more advertisement. I love that everyone is coming together. I love that everyone is coming together in this series creating more diversity and coming together. They are beginning to see that everyone is just the same as the next person trying to be successful while being under the spotlight. Despite the wrongdoings of good versus bad guy in this.