Within its first month of release in April 2022, Heartstopper had been viewed for 53 million hours – swiftly becoming Netflix’s fifth most-watched English language show, and was even voted NME’s favourite show of that year. Adapted by Alice Oseman from her YA webcomic of the same name, it was a tender coming-of-age tale that followed the burgeoning schoolboy puppy love between bisexual rugby captain Nick Nelson (Kit Connor) and gay outcast Charlie Spring (Joe Locke). Although aimed squarely at younger viewers, it managed to win over older members of the LGBTQ+ community too, some of whom vacillated from the happy-sad feeling of “I wish I’d had this story when I was growing up” to grieving a fairy-tale wholesome teen romance experience they never got to have.
Season one ended with Nick coming out to his accepting mother Sarah (Olivia Colman), and the new episodes pick up immediately afterwards. On the precipice of telling his friends, Nick is studying for his GCSEs, and is forced to sit next to Charlie’s closeted toxic ex Ben Hope (Sebastian Croft). This doesn’t go down well. Elsewhere, the will-they-won’t-they relationship between Charlie’s protective buddy Tao Xu (William Gao) and his arty trans crush Elle Argent (the brilliant Yasmin Finney – soon to be in Doctor Who) is also continued.
The eight unfailingly charming episodes broaden the focus onto the wider friendship group and family, introducing Nick’s homophobic elder brother David (Jack Barton) and his distant French father Stéphane (Thibault de Montalembert). It also admirably introduces a host of new queer characters, and explores asexuality through bookish Isaac Henderson (Tobie Donovan) – something perhaps close to Oseman’s heart as she identifies as asexual and aromantic. It’s all blissfully love-bubble innocent – alighting on teen touchstones like sleeping in a bed together for the first time, the perils of visible lovebites, Paris school trips and proms – all accompanied by a soundtrack of indie bangers. Of the new cast additions, comedian Nima Taleghani shines as stern teacher Youssef Farouk, and sometimes, despite its idyllic tone, it occasionally hits on a greater queer truth, such as a lovely moment involving seemingly-confident lesbian Darcy Olsson (Kizzy Edgell) revealing the pressure to be seen to be living her best ‘it gets better’ life.
Oseman conceived Heartstopper as a positive queer story to reassure kids that everything would be OK, so anything with the potential for drama tends to be immediately resolved by the characters having an emotionally-literate conversation, which can feel like watching an action film where the hero finds a bomb and, well, defuses it by cutting the correct wire straight away, with no tense music or drop of sweat expended. And yes, at times everybody speaks in stilted on-the-nose earnest dialogue that resembles an early-2000s video game cutscene. But here’s the thing: the cute middle-class carapace of Heartstopper is subversive in these increasingly intolerant times where Laurence Fox can burn a Progress Pride flag and face no sanction from his employers at GB News (whose HR Department seems as pointless as the Highway Code to the Fast And Furious films) and any innocuous gay material written for children is seeing its creators branded ‘groomers’ on social media. There is literally nothing in Heartstopper that would offend anyone, while it still acts as a Trojan Horse for representation. It’s the kind of show you know will make people feel less alone; pure bottled joy and a restorative tonic in these turbulent times.
‘Heartstopper’ season two streams on Netflix from August 3