Heartstopper (2022) - Alice Oseman’s graphic novel turned series is sunshine in a box
Credit: allocine.fr
No one can deny that we’re in dire need of feel-good. In the age of pandemics, war and recession, I’ve personally reverted to the likes of century-old rom coms, Adam Sandler films that seem to exist for the sole purpose of evading reality and entering a bad joke-enthused, mediocre chaos and ensemble sitcoms for comfort. We make do with what we have.
Enter Heartstopper, a warm and wonderful coming-of-age series that effortlessly surpasses even the happiest and lightest of comedies. It is a tale of love, friendship, and growing up that on the page, doesn’t exactly sound novel, and yet, in its portrayal of kindness and empathy, just is. Based on Alice Oseman’s webcomic-turned-graphic-novel, Heartstopper follows quiet, nervous Charlie Spring (Joe Locke), an openly gay Year 10 student, who meets and falls for Nick Nelson (Rocketman’s Kit Connor), Year 11, rugby jock, popular, and “the straighest person alive” according to Charlie’s tight-knit group of friends. It sounds like an opposites-attract cliché fest, but Heartstopper is a lot more than it claims to be. It’s fundamentally and inherently good. Its characters are kind, confident, happy people who support and cherish one another, and it only takes a couple of episodes to realise that Oseman’s creation is a rare find (depressingly so), one that alters the often depressing, tumultuous LGBTQ+ narrative previously established in film and television. With the exception of some bullying - which highlights homophobia without making it the centre of attention - Charlie and his peers navigate their school life aware and supportive of one another, their arguments nothing more than a little bump in an otherwise sunny road. Locke and Connor shine as the main couple, persistently adhering to the show’s unconscious rule that everything, in the end, will be absolutely fine. Constantly, I awaited a heart to be broken, a nose to be punched. When Charlie finds out that Nick is going on a date with his friend Imogen (Rhea Norwood), it is like the ball has dropped - something was bound to go wrong, of course, I had expected it all along. And yet within half an episode, the situation is resolved in a calm, orderly manner, and the series returns to the warm fuzzy atmosphere I had missed for all of twenty minutes. No one gets hurt, people apologise profusely to one another, rekindle and agree that it was only their love for one another that made them misbehave. The beauty in this is that it’s not even wishy washy: it’s just literal sunshine in a box, held up by its batch of exceptional newcomers, all as perfect for their role as the next.
Credit: allocine.fr
Connor is especially moving as the rugby jock in the process of reevaluating his friendships and discovering his sexuality. He is charming, adaptable to everyone, a golden retriever of sorts, and yet he is vulnerable, prone to outbursts (all in the name of Charlie of course). Locke, on the other hand, has this self-effacing, giggly quality that is a little worrying if you happen to be friends with him, but endearing if he is on a television show like Heartstopper, where everything works out for you as long as you are kind.
Another stand-out performance is Yasmin Finney as Elle Argent, Charlie’s friend who has recently moved from the all-boys school to the all-girls. Here again, one expects a broad span of problems ranging from body issues to bullying. But Heartstopper doesn’t make Elle’s journey her main character trait, as so many other portrayals of transgender people have done in the past. Instead, she is spotted by Tara (Corinna Brown) and Darcy (Kizzy Edgell), Heartstopper’s beautiful resident lesbian couple, and safely taken under their wing, establishing an unforgettable trio whose only squabble consists of Elle gently telling the other two she isn’t ready to tell Tao (Charlie’s other friend, played with moody and stylish panache by William Gao) she has feelings for him.
No doubt this makes for a slightly thin plot, where Charlie and Nick’s stakes are indubitably low - a texting conversation (exceptionally carried to the screen) or a rugby match are perhaps the most critical events that take place over the course of Heartstopper’s eight short episodes. But in the end, does it matter, when Charlie and Nick like and care for each other? Does it matter, when they are surrounded by people who like and care for them? Does anything even matter, with a heartwarmer of a show like this?