Comparison of Drug Representations in TV Dramas

‘90210’
Drugs are represented as serious with stresses on the punishments in the episode. Further episodes show that Adrianna gets her life back on track easily which is pretty unrealistic. But the portrayal of how drugs can ruin a life is realistic, it also shows that adults aren't needed to kick a drug habit (as seen in Waterloo Road). This demonstrates a high level of responsibility and teenagers can relate to certain situations.

‘Skins’
Despite its far-fetched, pushing boundaries approach, Skins is quite realistic. Teenagers can remember, or at least relate to, situations shown and the characters are approachable in a way that many teenagers aren't in TV dramas.

‘The OC’
The OC glosses over drug use immensely and is therefore the most unrealistic in its approach. There is no drug use actually shown on screen it is only implied, and then the effects are too OTT for anyone to relate to.

'Waterloo Road'
Waterloo Road plays along the storyline that only adults are able to (or responsible enough) to help with drugs. They also see it as an inherently bad habit which isn't present within many pupils, using the character you would least expect (and would never do it in real life) to be the person using drugs. This makes it unrealistic as the characters who are involved in the storyline are not believable as ever wanting to use drugs.