This Supernatural Mystery Teen Series Should Be Your Next Binge

The Big Picture

• School Spirits is a fresh and invigorating supernatural teen soap that combines spooky thrills with deadpan humor.
• The show stands out by subverting typical ghost story tropes and focusing on a crime-solving journey in the afterlife.
• The breakout performances of Milo Manheim and Sarah Yarkin, along with Peyton List’s impressive dramatic chops, make School Spirits a must-watch series.

For high schoolers, there’s nothing worse than being doomed to return to the same school, every day, each year, for an endless seven hours of tests, heartbreak, and hormones. For other students on the Paramount+ series, School Spirits, it’s a literal death sentence. When a dead girl wakes up among other dead students in the high school cafeteria as they bare their souls to each other, it is not the John Hughes‘ The Breakfast Club movie moment most would hope for. Instead, high schoolers are sharing stories of the various ways they died on school property, and are now doomed to live out the rest of their eternity among the living. School Spirits is an invigorating, fresh take on the supernatural teen soap genre, starring Cobra Kai‘s Peyton List as Maddie Nears, a 17-year-old loner who wakes up dead with no memory of her death. Determined to solve the crime, she enlists the help of the various other ghosts who have inhabited her high school to help solve the gruesome murder.

School Spirits is based on the graphic novel written by Nate Trinrud and Maria Nguyen, and is set at a high school in the small fictional town of Split River, Wisconsin. Managing to be a genuinely spooky thriller with twists and turns, the series is also charmingly goofy and fun, with lots of deadpan humor to go around. Debuting on Netflix in December, the series has quickly begun to trend on the site. When School Spirits series originally debuted on Paramount+ in March 2023, it was buried among Taylor Sheridan‘s flashier series with big names attached to series like 1923 and The Tulsa King. Luckily, Netflix has revived it by giving it a vibrant afterlife.

‘School Spirits’ Is a Fresh Take on the Supernatural Teen Drama

School Spirits feels like a combination of Stranger Things, Teen Wolf, and The Vampire Diaries all at once. It’s the perfect concoction of otherworldly teen love, scary small-town vibes, and magic. Set in a small Midwest town, it can’t help but call back nostalgic memories of Netflix’s monster hit, Stranger Things, especially because it focuses on a group of small-town kids banding together to solve a paranormal mystery despite the odds. Peyton List stars opposite a fantastic Kristian Ventura, who plays Maddie’s grieving best friend, Simon. Both self-described as artistic weirdos with dreams of attending Northwestern, their friendship is a classic staple within the supernatural teen genre as two unlikely misfits who have to become heroes, like Scott and Stiles’ dynamic duo in Teen Wolf.

Where School Spirits differs from other supernatural thrillers is that it’s not a typical ghost story. The ghosts don’t actually haunt anything as they wander the school aimlessly, and have no actual hold on the real world. They cannot open doors, whisper chilling threats into people’s ears, or write bloody messages on the wall. That is until Maddie dies, and her friendship is so strong with Simon that he is able to see her, and together they work to solve her murder.

The series also features Maria Dizzia as the grieving, alcoholic mother Sandra Dears, Kiara Pichardo as Maddie’s friend Nicole Herrera, Spencer MacPhearson as Maddie’s sketchy boyfriend Xavier Baxter, and Rainbow Wedell as cheerleader captain, Claire Zolinski. Dizzia gives a performance reminiscent of Winona Ryder‘s Joyce Byers in Stranger Things as a single mother determined to find out the truth about her daughter, despite all the odds. The series can also feel like a Twin Peaks fever dream at times, as the small town holds inexplicable magic and wonderfully strange humor that comes out of traumatic events. But Maddie is no Laura Palmer, and sympathy is hard to find in the small town as everyone becomes a suspect. As the kids in town race closer to the truth about who Maddie’s killer is, it leaves the teen drama behind to become an intense whodunit, and viewers will not see the ending coming.

Milo Manheim Is a Fan-Favorite in ‘School Spirits’ Among Breakout Performances

What makes the series stand out among its supernatural TV teen drama predecessors is its sense of humor. The Paramount+ original deals with some dark, heavy material as viewers learn of the various deaths the teens suffered to land themselves in the strange no man’s land between the living and the dead, but somehow there is always a lightness to it. No one carries more charisma on screen than Milo Manheim as a dead jock doomed to wear ’80s workout clothes for the rest of his life. Playing football legend Wally Clark, he died on the 5-yard-line in the ’80s while attempting to deliver a touchdown, and is forced to relive his glory days again and again until they become a sour reminder of his shortcomings. Wally is an upbeat, goofy guy who moonwalks and dances all across the school, and forms a special bond with Maddie as she solves her murder. He’s quickly become a fan-favorite among viewers as School Spirits continues to trend on Netflix, and for good reason. He breathes life into the show and delivers funny one-liners like an old pro despite this being one of his first leading roles in prestige television.

Though Manheim may be the brightest breakout star of School Spirits, there are plenty more breakout stars on the roster. Sarah Yarkin steals just about every scene she’s in as a sweet-talking, tough-as-nails ’60s retro teen who gives Rizzo from Grease a run for her money. Originally making a breakthrough with Texas Chainsaw Massacre in 2022, she plays Rhonda, who like Maddie, was murdered on school grounds, and her sarcastic wit also contributes to the show’s cutting-edge humor. There’s also Nick Pugliese, who gives a nuanced performance as the ringleader of the ghost pack, Charley. And last but not least, there’s a drugged-out ’70s hippie named Dawn, played by a show-stopping RaeAnne Boone. Proving no role is too small, her cartoonish portrayal delivers most of the comedy as the students pass her in the halls. Both Boone and Manheim give deceptively comedic performances, but have their moment to shine as they grieve the youth that has been stolen from them as the season continues, making it one of the best coming-of-age series currently streaming.

Season 2 of ‘School Spirits’ Is On the Way

As Season 1 progresses, Peyton List gives a career-best performance as Maddie Nears, and shows off her dramatic chops instead of just her jab punches and high kicks that she is known for thanks to Cobra Kai. List dives deep into the depths of grief and anger playing Maddie, and she’s a charming teen misfit who holds a maturity way beyond her years.

Receiving generally favorable reviews and a dedicated fanbase, School Spirits was picked up for Season 2 by Paramount+ after Season 1 aired. Now reaching a broader audience thanks to Netflix, it is certain to garner more fans by the time the next season of the supernatural thriller arrives, as it has consistently stayed within the top 10 most-watched series on the streamer since it debuted at the beginning of December. Consisting of eight episodes, each one has nail-biting cliffhangers that will force you to click the next episode button. It was a genius move to feature the series on Netflix, and will have you rooting for plenty of jocks, burnouts, and geeks as they are doomed to an eternity of detention.

Watch on Netflix