Young Lions is an Australian TV police drama shown on the Nine Network in 2002 and in Ireland on RTÉ Two. The storyline of the series revolved around the professional and private lives of four rookie detectives, the Young Lions, of South West 101, an inner city Sydney police station.
The program rated poorly and was not renewed after its first season. Competition from other new drama series and several timeslot changes also contributed to the show's demise.
The series ran from 17 July through 18 December 2002, and consisted of 23 episodes.
The Age television critic Ross Warneke criticised the show, writing, "it seems unable—or perhaps unwilling—to break the shackles of copshow cliche. ... It may be flashier, faster and more crowded than the cop shows of yore, but there's not much else."[1] Comparing it to another Michael Jenkins show, Wildside, Amanda Meade of The Australian called Young Lions "another slick urban police drama with flawed cops, dark beautifully filmed cityscapes and, occasionally, characters who repeat their lines".[2] The Courier-Mail's Jackie Sinnerton found the series to be "edgy, sexy and urbane, the 22-part drama has Jenkins written all over it".[3]