History Main / MatureWorkChildProtagonists

So there's a new series out, starring a KidHero going on an adventure, and-- [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForKids wait, what do you mean, "it's rated M"?]]

* ''Literature/TheChrysalids'': The main characters are all young children at the start of the story, and still only teenagers by the end- however, the novel involves a lot of [[AuthorTract extended philosophical ruminations]] regarding the [[WhatMeasureIsANonHuman true nature of humanity]].

* The children's book parody ''Do You Want to Play with My Balls?'' is about two boys of about five playing with toy balls and trying to reach a truce with their mean classmate Sally. The humour comes from their phrasing [[BallsGag making it seem like they're talking about the other meaning of "balls".]]

* ''Literature/ToKillAMockingbird'' is a story about a black man accused of raping a white woman in the 1930s, written from the perspective of his lawyer's young daughter. Though it is narrated by her adult self (framed as her telling the story of how [[spoiler: her brother broke his arm]]), it doesn't go far beyond the child's perspective.

* ''Literature/VanasHeritage'': Even though the protagonists are mostly teenagers, when the first kids get brutally killed in a skirmish it is made clear that this is not a story for kids or even teens. And that's even before the second half ...

** "Fireflies" centers around two eight-year-old girls in 1975 who are torn apart by racial discrimination, with one going missing. [[spoiler: She was accidentally kidnapped, shot in the head, and presumed dead, but in reality survived with amnesia.]]

* ''Series/HouseOfTheDragon'' is a prequel to ''Game of Thrones'' and is just as graphically violent, dark and sexual as its predecessor. At the start of the series, the two protagonists are teenagers Rhaenyra Targaryen (who's desired by her own uncle and brought to a brothel by him, no less) and Alicent Hightower (who is forced to marry Rhaenyra's father and becomes a mother before she's 20). Even after they grow up, their children take centerstage too, with one episode prominently featuring Alicent's young son Aemond successfully claiming the gigantic dragon Vhagar and getting into a brutal scuffle with Rhaenyra's children that sees Aemond getting his eye stabbed out. The Targaryen children are set up as key players on both sides of the [[CivilWar Dance of the Dragons]] and the finale of Season 1 demonstrates that none of them are safe when [[spoiler:fourteen-year-old Lucerys is devoured by Vhagar]].

* ''VideoGame/Inside2016'': The follow up to ''[[VideoGame/Limbo2010 Limbo]]'', this game featured a child protagonist menaced by other humans and machines instead of the supernatural woods.

* ''VideoGame/Limbo2010'' has an unnamed boy searching the woods for his sister and everything is out to kill him. Horribly.

* "Manga/BarefootGen" is a semi-autobiographical manga about the bombing of Hiroshima during World War 2 and the aftermath. The titular protagonist begins the manga as an elementary schooler and finishes as a high school student. Despite many of the characters being young children and the characteristic [[ArtStyleDissonance 60's art style]], the subject matter is (understandably) very dark and does not shy away from the horrors of war including depicting the graphic, violent deaths in the wake of the bomb from people filled with glass or with their skin melting off to those who contracted "A-bomb sickness" (radiation poisoning) or cancer weeks to years later as well as wide-spread starvation.

* "Manga/{{BarefootGen}}" is a semi-autobiographical manga about the bombing of Hiroshima during World War 2 and the aftermath. The titular protagonist begins the manga as an elementary schooler and finishes as a high school student. Despite many of the characters being young children and the characteristic 60's art style, the subject matter is (understandably) very dark and does not shy away from the horrors of war including graphic, violent deaths in the wake of the bomb from people filled with glass or with their skin melting off to those who contracted "A-bomb sickness" (radiation poisoning) or cancer weeks to years later as well as wide-spread starvation.

* "Manga/{{BarefootGen}}" is a semi-autobiographical manga about the bombing of Hiroshima during World War 2 and the aftermath. The titular protagonist begins the manga as an elementary schooler and finishes as a high school student. Despite many of the characters being young children and the characteristic 60's art style, the subject matter is (understandably) very dark and does not shy away from the horrors of war including graphic, violent deaths in the wake of the bomb from people with their skin melting off to those who contracted "A-bomb sickness" (radiation poisoning) as well as wide-spread starvation and death.

* Literature/VanasHeritage: Even though the protagonists are mostly teenagers, when the first kids get brutally killed in a skirmish it is made clear that this is not a story for kids or even teens. And that's even before the second half ...

* ''Manga/MadeInAbyss'' features a very cute PuniPlush art style and initially presents itself as a light-hearted adventure story about a young girl named Riko and a robot boy named Reg exploring into the unknown titular abyss. It doesn't take very long before the series stops pulling its punches by having the main characters thrown into literal life-or-death situations; trying to survive against barely-known creatures who are absolutely ruthless in their own existence; having to deal with all manner of sickness, vomiting, nausea, [[PottyFailure involuntary loss of bladder control]]; BodyHorror caused by a literal curse created by the depths of the abyss; a completely deranged MadScientist who performs all manner or horrific experiments ForScience, and many more mysteries and horrors all PlayedForDrama the deeper they go down.

* ''Literature/KinosJourney'': The titular Kino has a VagueAge, but still clearly young compared to the adult characters who appear in the series. In the course of her travels, she encounters a group of slave traders who, when snowed in, ate their [[ImAHumanitarian "goods"]], a country where a brutal form of democracy saw the losing end of a vote subjected to the death penalty, a nation where travelers were forced to compete in gladiatorial games to the death, and a land where warfare between two nations had been turned into a competition to see who could slaughter the most members of a nearby native tribe.

* ''Literature/KinosJourney'': The titular Kino is a VagueAge, but still clearly young compared to the adult characters who appear in the series. In the course of her travels, she encounters a group of slave traders who, when snowed in, ate their [[ImAHumanitarian "goods"]], a country where a brutal form of democracy saw the losing end of a vote subjected to the death penalty, a nation where travelers were forced to compete in gladiatorial games to the death, and a land where warfare between two nations had been turned into a competition to see who could slaughter the most members of a nearby native tribe.