Ratched age rating: Is it okay for kids?

The first season of Ratched premiered on Netflix on September 18, and viewers are loving it. The show is currently #1 on Netflix, with good reason. The new series is beautiful to look at and every scene will keep you on the edge of your seat. It stars Sarah Paulson as the titular character, and may I just say, the actress looks fabulous in period clothes!

If you have kids, you might be wondering if Ratched is appropriate to watch with them. Want to know if Ryan Murphy’s new show is meant for children? You’ve come to the right place.

What is Ratched rated?

According to IMDb, the official rating for the Netflix show is TV-MA.

Is Ratched appropriate for children?

The answer to that question is a resounding no. The series is definitely not appropriate for kids of a certain age.

Ratched violence and gore

Several priests are brutally murdered in the first five minutes of the premiere episode. Viewers see one man lying dead in a bathtub with his throat slit, and shortly afterward another man’s head is smashed to a pulp against a toilet seat. The killer is Edmund Tolleson (Finn Wittrock), who is subsequently arrested and sentenced to spend 120 days in Lucia State Hospital, the very same institution where Mildred Ratched has blackmailed her way into a nursing position.

Ratched nudity and sexual references

How did Ratched procure the job, you ask? Almost immediately after arriving at Lucia, she witnesses Nurse Amelia Emerson (Emily Mest) having sex with a patient. It takes very little convincing for Amelia to quit her job and she soon begins working at the hospital.

There’s also a conversation between Ratched and Dr. Richard Hanover (Jon Jon Briones) where they discuss patients throwing excrement and ejaculate when they’re upset. This action doesn’t manifest on screen, but the scene definitely leaves you picturing things you’d rather not.

Throughout the series, bare buttocks are shown and sexual acts take place, however there is no full frontal nudity.

Is Ratched scary?

Perhaps the most terrifying moment in the first episode is when Ratched manipulates the emotions of an emotionally unstable patient named Salvatore, which prompts him to commit suicide. Not only does she tell Salvatore that he’ll never leave Lucia, but she also brings him to Dr. Hanover’s office so that he can use the doctor’s letter open to kill himself.

Most of the horror in this show comes from psychological thrill and violence.

That being said, I started watching American Horror Story when I was in high school. AHS is gruesome, but that’s to be expected from a horror series. If your teenager really likes the horror genre and has seen other Ryan Murphy projects, I’d say that it’s safe to watch with parent supervision.

Ratched was marketed as a psychological thriller and, generally speaking, most of Murphy’s projects are not suitable for children. You can pretty much surmise from the trailer that the new show is meant to be the origin story for one of the most infamous villains in cinema. Younger children are not the show’s target audience. It is suitable for mature teenagers.