[mrguyorama]

I disagree. "Adults are stupid and we have to fix everything for them, sometimes with them even working against us" is an old trope. It was common in the 90s, like with rugrats and pretty much every made for kids movie, but I'd argue it even goes back to movies like Goonies and matilda and Little Rascals.

The mid 2000s dystopia fest in young adult stuff is just follow the leader with Hunger Games. The oppression is used not for it's own sake, but because its an easy excuse for your teens to be more "mature" and more in control of their own lives. It's escapism for teens who think parents "just don't get us"

[toyg]

Teenage rebellion goes back to James Dean, arguably, with baby-boomers reacting to a calcification of postwar societies they inherited.

I think the difference now is that happy endings used to be the norm, whereas now they are not necessarily there, or the protagonists are pushed through such extreme losses that the win ends up looking pyrrhic.

This might simply be a function of the amount of productions - in the history of mankind, we've never seen so many new stories circulating so widely on so many different media. Smart authors want to look different and "real", so they might veer dark more liberally than they used (or rather were allowed, by public and editors) to.

[mrguyorama]

I mean, we can look all the way back to romeo and juliet, where rebelious teens were being unfairly oppressed by adults who just don't get it and they have to figure things out for themselves and in the end everyone dies.