Welcome to Multiversity’s coverage of Heartstopper, the eight-part Netflix romance series, adapted by writer Alice Oseman with director Euros Lyn, from her own webcomic of the same name. The British series follows Charlie Spring (Joe Locke), a Year 10 school student, who finds himself seated next to Nick Nelson (Kit Connor), a rugby player from the year above, during the new term. Charlie has a boyfriend, Ben Hope (Sebastian Croft), but he’s still in the closet, and Charlie finds himself drawn to his new classmate…
1. What an Animated Adaptation
With all due respect to their fans, I find a lot of live-action series based on comics really dull, lacking any of the style and panache of their source material. That’s not the case with Heartstopper, which embraces the sequential panels of comics with splitscreen transitions, and animation as a way of illustrating Charlie’s feelings and daydreams: it’s really nice to see a comic adaptation embrace splitscreen after it became tainted by association with Ang Lee’s Hulk, and the visual effects — which are strongly faithful to Oseman’s artwork — lends it the air of a student’s mixed media art project. The half hour runtime of each episode also makes it seem as bite-sized as a comic chapter.
2. L, G, B, and the T
As well as Charlie and Ben, there’s a subplot revolving around Elle (Yasmin Finney), a trans friend of Charlie, who has recently transferred to a girls’ school, and is struggling to make (any) friends. For those unaware, the British press, “left-wing” or right-wing, is strongly hostile to trans rights, so to see a trans teenager be portrayed so normally (by an actually trans actress no less), is really striking, and suffice to say, it could save lives. Similarly, given how hard red state governments in America are coming down on LGBTQ acceptance right now, I can only imagine what a balm this might be for a kid who’s being targeted by Christofascists.
3. Supporting Supporting Cast
The biggest names in the cast are Olivia Colman as Nick’s mother Sarah, and Stephen Fry as Headmaster Barnes, and the show does a great job of making sure they don’t eclipse the largely young, unknown cast: Colman quietly debuts at the end of this episode driving her son home, while Fry’s appearance is just a voiceover over the intercom. Of the older cast members, Fisayo Akinade gets the most screentime as Mr. Ajayi, Charlie’s supportive (and out and proud) art teacher.
Similarly, newcomer Joe Locke is front and center as Charlie, which is great given how Connor and Croft have had a lot of exposure in previous projects like Rocketman and Penny Dreadful. However, the scene stealer here had to be Jenny Walser as Charlie’s laconic sister, Tori, who has blue piercing eyes that stare into your soul — she brings to mind Alice Lowe (Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, Prevenge), and I would not be surprised if she similarly headlined a great dark comedy in future.
4. Homo/Biphobia Isn’t Just Hatred Towards Others
I recently read a comment from a writer on another series, where they explained they didn’t make a character bisexual because he turns out to be a villain, and that’s actually a huge cliche. I thought about this seeing Ben’s behavior, cheating on Charlie with a girl, pretending to not know him, and then forcing himself on him when he ends their relationship, but (and I know this doesn’t excuse it) it’s all rooted in his anxiety about his sexuality, what others think of him, and whether he’s gay or bi — would he be such a vile arsehole if there wasn’t so much toxicity about gender and sexuality at school? It’s certainly an interesting villain origin story, and worth pondering as much as the presence of the bi villain trope.
5. The Soundtrack Gets an A+
This show has a great soundtrack, which is important given how much it relies on tranquil montages of the characters just being together, without any dialogue. On that note, what better way to win me over than the use of “Don’t Delete the Kisses” by Wolf Alice (one of my favorite bands) at the end:
Continued belowThe juxtaposition of “What if it’s not meant for me? Love…” against Charlie deciding whether he should have feelings for the (presumably) straight Nick, deciding he is in love with this boy with “Me and you were meant to be,” and not deleting the kiss (x) at the end of his text? Absolutely sublime.
School Notes:
– To be clear, Year 10 is basically ninth grade in the States.
– Props for Tao (William Gao), Charlie and Elle’s best friend, being Asian.
– What does Nick mean Charlie should stop apologizing so much, we’re British, that’s what we do!
Later friends! We’ll continue with our thoughts on each episode in our weekly Boomb Tube column, which goes live every Monday afternoon.
