The third season of “Sex Education” opens with a montage of characters primarily devoted to some frantic sex. People having it. People watching it. People planning it. Enthusiastically. Sometimes agitatedly. And a select few avoiding it. It goes on for a bit, cutting from different characters pre- then mid- and then post-coitus. We don’t meet all the main players of the season but we meet many of them and as a season opener it’s a reminder that the canvas for “Sex Education” is incredibly large and, of course, sexual.
Teen shows tend to be preoccupied with sex. “Sex Education” turns that obsession, at least on the surface, into its central force. It’s in the title, and it has been in the premise since the first season. The show, since the beginning, has set itself up as the story of Otis’ ambivalent relationship with his mother (Jean), a sex therapist, and the way that that ambivalence has nonetheless given way to him following in her footsteps as a voice of reason on issues of sexual health at his Moordale Secondary School.
For a show so open about sex and sexuality, “Sex Education” rarely feels like it’s trying to shock us. If television is a writer’s medium, creator Laurie Nunn (who writes a majority of the episodes) has emphasised writing “Sex Education” in a way that deemphasises any note of the things being unusual or risqué. Every sexual desire, every sexual thought, and every personal concern is treated as normal and natural. It’s a central way that the show manages to conjure a diffident tone that always feels like a gentle excursion through people that we know, rather than a salacious examination of sexual unusualness.
The show’s first season was built on a few specific arcs – Otis’ friendship with Eric, his sometimes-fraught relationship with Jean and his crush on Maeve. Those initial arcs have burgeoned into a show with a much wider scope with what feels like upwards of a dozen main characters. It’s part of the show’s approach to storytelling, which is empathetic and incredibly earnest about its world. The earnestness, though, is never cloying or insincere and the expansiveness is compelling for the way it grounds the show in a nuanced approach to its characters and their storylines.
This new season sees some key arcs – Otis’ new relationship with Olivia, a popular girl at school; his mother Jean’s pregnancy with her former lover (Jakob); Jakob’s daughter’s Ola developing a relationship with a fellow student, Lily; Otis’ best-friend’s Eric developing a relationship with Adam, a newly out gay student; Adam’s father (Moordale’s former head-teacher) and his adjustment to being newly separated from his wife; and a non-binary student who becomes close with Mooredale’s head-boy. The last one is a nice touch in a show that feels progressive in the ways it considers sex and identity without being overwrought. Now, if that all sounds like there’s a lot going on, it’s important to realise that this is only some of what’s at work this season. Each of the eight hour-long episodes feel packed with so much information that it’s always surprising how swiftly the episodes fly by. It’s extreme credit to “Sex Education” and its creators that even with the additions of new characters and arcs, the show still feels light.
Even as key romances are central to the show, the season’s strongest moments are those where characters reach out to each other in unexpected ways in filial, or platonic moments. It’s a sign of the show’s empathetic way of looking but it’s also a critical way that it makes good on its expansiveness. This is a lived-in world where the characters know each other but also know each other. Shows that are this expansive sometimes seem to struggle with internality, unable to make their discrete sections feel like part of the whole. But, “Sex Education” is winning in those moments – an awkward double date with Adam and Eric and Otis and Olivia reveals a tender moment between the mismatched pair. In one of the more thoughtful moments, Aimee (Aimee Lou Wood as a student who was sexually assaulted in season 2) begins doing therapy with Jean (Gillian Anderson). Anderson and Lou Wood have great chemistry and their interaction makes for one many moving moments in the show’s margins.
Jemima Kirke does her best with the role of the new head-teacher, Hope Haddon, but it’s a rare part of the season that seems to be telegraphing its intent rather than existing in relation to what’s going on around it. Hope exists as a way for the students to find themselves banding together to express their identity, but for much of the season her arc feels too leaden and feels out of place the otherwise empathetic approach to characterisation. In season 1 it helped that the tyrannical Mr Groff had a story linked to other characters, but for much of this season Hope feels too disconnected from the world of the show. It’s only until the final episode that a lovely moment with Otis and Hope makes the arc feel valid. The moment is the best scene for Kirke and for Asa Butterfield as Otis. It’s a reminder that amidst the frantic sex of the ensemble, Asa Butterfield’s Otis is a warm and winning lead. It’s easy to lose him in the frenzy around him but he’s an incredibly thoughtful performer. When the series tries to convince us that this is Jean’s son, who has the same approach to sensitivity and advice, it feels like something we can believe in. A final episode conversation between Anderson and Butterfield reaffirms this.
And it’s why the highpoint of the season is the affirmation of the Eric and Otis’ friendship. It is important that this friendship is a linchpin for the show. One of the most potent moments of the first season was a tender conversation between Eric and Jean, a moment of tension for the friendship between the boys, but also an indication that this is the type of friendship that made Jean and Eric feel like characters with histories. The final episode, a hospital scene as Jean gives birth, turns into a tender and moving moment between the two. Ncuti Gatwa (as Eric) and Butterfield are so good together, and their moments together punctuate the season (Eric’s gleeful realisation that Otis is dating a popular girl; Otis’ reticent acceptance of Adam for the sake of his friendship with Eric). It’s a lived in friendship that is devoid of histrionics and conceits but instead feels natural, and warm and gentle. This is the boon of the show, really, more than the sex and more than the overtures of education at Moordale. And so, the frantic sex montage of the opening gives way to a final episode that favours the emotional rather than the physical – three breakups that feel plausible, but are treated with grace, a series of confession and some important decisions about the future.
These teenagers have a long way to go, but they’re getting more thoughtful and more mature. In that final episode, an aching line from Adam to his mother suggests a new season of discovery. At the end of season 2, I had some worry about where certain arcs would devolve but season 3 has reminded me that “Sex Education” is incredibly clear on these characters and where they go. Even a final twist concerning Jean at the end, which feels like a moment from a weaker show, makes me cautiously hopeful that the creators know what they’re doing. They’ve done well by these characters until now.
Sex Education is streaming on Netflix
