I can honestly say that I never thought I would become this obsessed with a foreign tv show. And yet, here I am, completely in love with the phenomenon that is Skam.

For those of you who have never heard of Skam, it's a Norwegian show similar to the UK show Skins that's currently blowing up on the internet. There's three seasons, all online, and though, yes, they are in Norwegian, there's lots of kind people who have translated all the episodes and provided subtitles so the rest of us can watch it. And if you don't believe me that you'll be completely obsessed, I started Skam on Thanksgiving just to have something to watch, and proceeded to binge all three seasons in just under twenty hours. My family begged me to leave the couch, questioned why I didn't want to spend time with them while I was home for break. But Skam had pulled me in in too deep.

Spoiler: I've re-watched all three seasons in the week since, and I'm still obsessed. So for those of you looking to experience a tv show unlike anything I've ever watched, here's ten reasons why you should head online, search up some translated episodes, and hook in to the drip feed that is Skam.

1. The entire first season revolves around the creation of the coolest girl gang to ever exist.

Yes, that's right. This is a successful tv show with a plot that not only focuses almost entirely around girl friendships, but shows girls hanging out without their conversations revolving around boys. In so many tv shows before, girl friendships tend to focus on relationships- girls gushing late at night to each other about the boys they like, getting ready for parties where they plan to impress their crush. And as absurd as it might sound, Skam shows girl friendships as they genuinely are. Messy, and imperfect, and important. There are girls who've lost friends, girls who just want to belong, girls who will take no shit from any of the boys that try to push them around. The iconic girl gang of season one makes breakfast together, goes camping, takes each other to the doctor. They love and protect each other, and it's incredibly refreshing to witness girl friendships take shape like this.

2. In just thirty episodes, Skam has covered friendships, relationships, cheating, lying, bullying, drugs, alcohol, sex, violence, religion, spirituality, self-acceptance, date rape, following the law, feminism, the refugee crisis, war, body image, self-love, divorce and parents splitting up, questioning sexuality, teen pregnancy scares, eating disorders, and mental illness.

Most of the American tv shows I've watched haven't covered half of this list in their entire airing time. And the way Skam covers these topics isn't in an artificial, brief way. They're not overtly thrown into the plot for emphasis or attention- they're present because these issues are present in teen lives, and what Skam seeks to do is depict teen lives as they are. The characters have real discussions about these issues, and their differing perspectives really offer insight into the way teenagers are experiencing these issues in real life.

3. There's a hijab-wearing Muslim main character who is always ready to provide sass, advice, and an accurate portrayal of her religion.

Sana Bakkoush is a gift to this world. Not only is she beautiful and wicked smart, but she always has incredible insight to offer. When she's questioned about her religion, she replies honestly and openly, shutting down the stereotypes associated with wearing a hijab. In season two, she speaks to her friend Noora, who has fallen in love with a boy with a bad habit for violence, and explains to her that "war doesn’t start with violence. It starts with misunderstanding and prejudice. If you say you’re in favour of a world full of peace, you have to try to understand why others think and act the way they do. You have to accept that not everyone sees the world the way you do. You can’t just believe that everyone has the answers to what is right and wrong." A memorable quote for the time we currently live in.

And in a clip from this past week, when talking to season 3's main character, Isak, a boy struggling to come to terms with the fact that he's gay and terrified of the judgement of his mentally-ill and religion obsessed mother, Sana talks to him about religion and how people shouldn't use it to judge him: "No human being should be spoken ill about, violated, judged or ridiculed. So if you hear anyone use religion to argument/legitimize their hatred, don’t listen to them because hate doesn’t come from religion, but from fear".

4. Which leads me to my next point: this show is next to none when it comes to shutting down stereotypes.

In the current season (season 3), Isak realizes he's gay after falling in love with a boy from school and works to accept this newfound realization. In a memorable conversation, he speaks to one of his roommates, Eskild, an openly gay older man and Isak's self-proclaimed "guru", about how even though he likes Even, he doesn't want to call himself gay. He tells Eskild that he isn't "like him" because he doesn't like glitter, or wear tights, or talk about "Kim Kardashian and lavender scent"- essentially, any of the common stereotypes associated with being gay.

It's Eskild's response that makes the exchange so notable. Instead of telling Isak off or saying his words are offensive, Eskild recognizes that Isak is struggling to accept himself and instead offers some insight: "I need to tell you one thing about those people who you don’t want to be associated with, Isak. About those who have worn tights and mascara and went out and fought for the right to be who they are. They’re people who, throughout the years, have chosen to endure harassment, and hate, who have been beaten up and killed. And that’s not because they’re so insanely keen on being different. But because they’d rather die than pretend to be something they’re not.”

5. On the topic of season 3, let's talk about the fact that Skam features an incredibly realistic LGBT relationship.

You've seen the tropes. The queerbaiting (a network using a LGBT relationship solely to pull viewers), the injustice, the well-loved gay, lesbian, and bi characters who were unfairly killed off for no good reason (just remember The 100's fiasco with the loss of lesbian clan-leader Lexa). Sure, it's dramatic. Sure, it keeps the plot moving forward. But depicting queer relationships this way is incredibly harmful because it promotes the message that these characters are incapable of living normal lives- that they aren't going to get their happily ever after like so many other couples on tv.

Skam, on the other hand, centers the plot, quite simply, around two boys falling in love. There's angst, there's jealousy, there's the awkward first-kisses and rumors floating around their high school. But there's also two boys cuddling together and sharing each other's clothes, cooking breakfast and playing video games, meeting each other's friends and sneaking kisses in the locker room. It's not racy, it's not scandalous, it's not a subplot or a side-story. It's two teenagers realizing they're in love and exploring what that means, and it's one of the main reasons this show is blowing up on social media platforms such as Tumblr and Twitter.

6. The characters look like real people.

That seems strange to write, but I can't tell you how refreshing it is to be watching a tv show and see teenagers with acne, with messy hair, with the kind of clothes and makeup that I might actually wear to class. The girls are not all stick-thin or perfectly dressed all the time; there's characters who are curvy, who are tall, who have pimples and dark circles, who cry on screen and aren't afraid to look ugly doing it. There's boys in makeup and girls without it, people in both sweatpants and sweatshirts and party dresses. Watching these characters feels like watching real life; I can see myself in them. It's a reminder that I don't have to be the perfectly put-together model-like girl in order to fall in love or be happy. Unlike the many American shows I watched growing up- many of which helped to give me severe self-image issues and unrealistic life expectations- Skam reminds me that I don't need to change who I am in order to have my own incredible narrative. And I think that's beautiful.

6. It updates in real time.

This is probably the coolest- and most addictive- aspect of Skam. Short clips are posted to NRK (Skam's network) as they're meant to be happening to the characters throughout the week. On Fridays, the clips are then compiled into a single episode. What this means is that you get new content almost every day. It keeps you constantly refreshing the webpage hoping to find out what's happening, and makes the characters feel even more like real people since you're experiencing their stories as they happen. It's like a reality show, but better.

7. It's basically an interactive tv show.

This goes along with the fact that they update in real time, but is something unlike anything I've ever seen before in a tv show. Along with posting clips throughout the week, NRK also posts text messages sent between the characters, Instagrams, and facebook messages so that you can see what goes on outside of the camera. You see characters making plans to meet up, flirting over text, posting photos of each other to their Instagrams. Not only that, but almost every character has their own Instagram and they're all active. You can follow them and get their most recents photos and stories as you scroll through your feed, only making the characters feel more and more like real people.

8. They actually cast age appropriate actors.

One of the most annoying things to be about tv shows geared towards teenagers is the fact that real teenagers are almost never the ones playing the roles. I can't tell you how frustrating it can be to watch a 25 year old attempt to take on the persona of a 17 year old- it's just not the same. They're older, prettier, and always seem more put together- far from what teen life is really like. Because let's face it, as teenagers ourselves, we understand how messy and imperfect our lives are. The actors who play the characters on Skam are our age, and so they understand; they look like teenagers because they are. Tarjei Sandvik Moe and Henrik Holm, the actors playing Isak and Even, the main characters in Skam's current season, are both 17 and 21 in real life. Tarjei is even still in high school. When you watch the way they portray their characters so realistically, you understand just how incredible that is.

9. I've never seen such poignant teen issues handled in such a realistic and sensitive way.

Skam knows what its viewers want to see: real life. They want to see their struggles brought to the forefront of a show and not backed away from. They want to stop seeing things such as eating disorders, rape, mental illness, or societal pressure to be someone you're not cast aside as though they can't be talked about. So many tv shows gloss over these issues because we don't like to talk about reality. It's not always the perfect happy ending we want to see, and so it's far easier to avoid it. But when you're 17 and you're coming to terms with the world, it's not as if you can simply turn off all these thoughts and fears running through your head. To have a tv show that gives representation to these issues and proves that you can not only overcome them, but go on to live a happy and meaningful life is almost unheard of to me. The fat girl who falls in love and maintains a happy relationship without ever changing herself, the feminist learning that all the concrete ideas she thought she had about people were wrong and that she can learn to love anyway? They're all there. I almost cried last night watching a character who suffers from bipolar disorder break down because it all felt so real- it felt so similar to things I've seen before in my own life. Not stylized or overdone for television as mental illness so often is- raw and real and heartbreaking.

10. It's currently blowing up online. This show is going to be huge.

This past week, Skam was the #1 trending tv show on social media platform Tumblr. I found out about it through an article on Dazed praising the show and how it breaks stereotypes and appeals to teens through giving them an accurate representation of their lives. Remember, that this is a tiny Norwegian show that was designed to appeal to Norwegian teens. And now it's spreading like wildfire across the internet, fans begging for subtitles to be added so they can watch it as it's posted. I love Skam with all my heart and I can't wait to see how it continues to grow in the future.

BONUS: And as if you still needed another reason to watch this tv show, it has a great soundtrack full of angsty teen indie, 90's hip hop, and Norwegian pop. Plus, NRK posts it all to a Spotify playlist so that you can follow along. What's better than that?