Right, we’re back for the final episodes of Heartstopper, coming up:
Bully
With a title like that, you know you’re in for a treat.
Nick has invited Charlie around to the cinema with his
friends, Charlie eventually tells Tori that they’re dating, though tells her to
keep it a secret, he’s not even out to his mum yet.
“I know I know” what? How do you know? Alice Osman is
usually great a character dialogue writer but a few lines may have needed
another draft, like the random shout of ‘homophobia’ in the last episode.
Still, Tori warns him that Nick’s mates seem rather less nice than Nick.
Charlie also says they’re not ready to label themselves as ‘boyfriends’ yet.
Part of that insecurity comes from when he labelled him and Ben as Boyfriends
as got a flat out ‘we’re not boyfriends’ from Ben.
The day has come and Nick and Charlie meet up in the car
park. Apparently, Ben and Harry aren’t supposed to be coming but they’re there
anyway. Charlie refuses Nick’s offer of popcorn leading to a very funny
conversation when Nick calls Charlie ‘Char’. At the cinema, they’re watching a
horror film and Nick is jumping every 5 seconds, the two end up holding hands.
Coming out the cinema, Harry does his best to make Charlie
as uncomfortable as possible with the kind of questions you might expect. Again, I’m gonna veer back to something in
the adaptation review. Charlie runs off after Nick intervenes. Nick apologises for the way his friends have been acting, Charlie says he’s used to
it, which honestly makes Nick feel even worse. But for making Charlie
miserable, it appears Ben had left the group and teleported into the car park
to make a mean speech to Charlie. Again, I think I have to come back to this in
the adaptation review.
Nick heads in and confronts his friends, especially Harry
over their behaviour, Harry goes one step too far and uses the dreaded slur
that I will not repeat and Nick punches him, this moves into a full-on fight
that we don’t see, we just see Nick coming home with a bloody nose. Nick’s mum
asks him about it and we get the ‘fighting’s not the answer’ statement that
carries with it so little nuance it’s completely useless in the real world.
Charlie heads to school in a less than good mood. Not made
any better when he sees Harry’s split lip. Harry then begins egging on Tao for
a fight (they'd been exchanging a war of words for a while), time for Charlie to confront Nick, sporting a bruised eye on top of
his bloody nose. Nick tells him what happened, and he says he doesn’t really
want to be friends with them anymore, something Charlie is somewhat upset by,
so he goes to his happy place, the art classroom.
He stares at his lunch and we never see him eat it. Tao and
Elle converse about Harry to Nick. To no-one’s surprise Harry was a transphobic
dick to Elle. But as she said, he was far from the only one. Elle says she’s
not surprised that Nick punched him, clueing Tao in that there’s something
going on between the two of them, which Elle admits to.
He’s annoyed because he milkshake café was ages ago; it was
literally the last episode and Tao’s now going to sulk about it. Charlie texts
Nick, having a lost a lot of his self-esteem because of the fight. He asks Nick
to meet him for Lunch. Elle comes around to alleviate Tao’s sulking, they work
together on a drawing and he apologises for his reaction earlier. He thinks
Charlie hasn’t told him because he’s scared he’ll let it slip and out Nick to
all of Nick’s mates. He then adds that Charlie cares more about Nick’s feelings
than his. More on Tao in the adaptation review.
Tao asks Charlie to join him for Lunch, but once Charlie
says he’s having lunch with Nick, Tao tells him they’re barely friends anymore,
adding to Charlie’s woes. Nick arrives but we cut to Harry bullying Tao, Harry
finds the perfect way to push Tao’s buttons, by threatening the picture Tao and
Elle drew. Charlie’s on the verge of breaking up with Nick but whatever happens
is interrupted by the news of the fight outside.
Harry is the physically stronger of the two, but Tao is
somewhat resourceful, able to hold his own for a while until Nick comes in for
the rescue. Charlie gets him away where he breaks down that he’s upset that
Charlie didn’t tell him about him and Nick, blaming Charlie for the whole
fight.
This episode feels really forced. Like they needed to have a
lowest moment because that’s what narrative structure dictates but they have to
bend over backwards to actually achieve that in this story. It’s not terribly
written, none of it is terribly written but it is the weakest episode so far.
Rating 6.5/10
In the exciting season finale
- Isaac throws a Javelin
- Nick and Charlie catch a train
- And Tao and Elle look at some pictures
Boyfriend
Charlie is feeling low and begins letting his feelings out
through his drums, apparently so loud that Tori can hear him through the walls,
it’s a digital drum set. Tori is there to be the supportive older sister. He’s
begun to think that he’s ruining people’s lives by his very existence. Tori
offers him Pizza but he turns it down.
Charlie heads back into school and Tao is still being pissy.
Harry got suspended for fighting and Tao somehow got away from scot-free
despite instigating the fight. They’re reminded it’s the school sports day on
Thursday and because Charlie’s on the rugby team, he’ll be playing the rugby
match as opposed to joining Tao and Isaac on whatever it is they do.
After brushing off an encounter with Nick, Charlie sees the
rugby coach, Mrs Singh, and tells that he’s quitting the team. Nick goes to see
Tao, who goes off on another rant and like… Nick, please tell him that you
asked Charlie not to tell anyone and it was you who told Tara, Darcy and Elle,
please!!!! Nope, he tells Tao that Charlie cares a lot about his opinion.
And yeah, about the whole coming out thing, Tao tells him
that Charlie probably wants to be in a more open relationship. He decides he’s
gonna stay pissed off at Charlie for a bit longer. I get what they want to do,
but putting the onus on Charlie to fix what is entirely Tao’s problem is
unfair. Nick tries to get through to Charlie but isn’t having much luck.
Charlie can’t bring himself to say anything.
We cut to the school sports day, and since it’s a Truham/Higgs event, the girls are here as well. Elle is not overly happy about going
back to Truham after everything that happened. And we get the return of Stephen
Fry as the school principal. Maybe it’s because this is set in the UK, but can
I just breathe a sigh of relief that they don’t have a teacher character
talking about their sex life in explicit detail or getting overly involved in
students relationships in spite of obvious discomfort.
Tao hasn’t signed up for an event as he and Elle meet up.
Charlie heads to his safe zone in the art classroom but Mr Ayaji is now
starting to get worried at how often this is happening. Miss Singh has caught
up with Tao and signed him up for running. Charlie arrives to save him from
such a fate and who else is running but Ben.
Charlie, they remember, is a fast runner, and naturally wins
the race, creaming Ben and he finally tells Ben to piss off. I mean he did that
in episode 3 but this time he’s saying pretty please with a cherry on top, so
I’m sure it’ll work out fine.
Tao and Elle go running around the school, exploring the old
classrooms, Tara does the high jump and Isaac does Javelin, not especially well
but he does it. Elle and Tao are in the art classroom, reminiscing about art.
They sit on the table together and hold hands, but I think she stops short of
telling him how she feels, maybe there’s development room here for season 2.
It’s time for the big rugby match, accurately described by
Stephen Fry. I’m not a fan of rugby, as you might be able to tell. Charlie is watching
from the sides like much of the audience. The match begins and Nick scores a
try for his red team. He’s about to kick the ball to go over the goalposts but
sees Charlie and immediately abandons the ball, walking to Charlie instead. He
takes Charlie back toward the school building.
Nick tells Charlie that he doesn’t want to break up, that
his life is better for having met Charlie, and all of the hardships are worth
it. Charlie is flattered enough that he believes Nick and the two embrace. OK,
now all the bullshit’s over, we cut to the weekend as Nick takes him on a
surprise date to the beach. The only thing is, probably because of COVID, half
the place looks shut.
They eat chips, they go in the photo-booth, and they sit by
the sea, with no-one else there on what looks like a really nice day. Nick says
he’s ready to come out, maybe not as a public announcement but he wants to tell
people who matter and in return wants Charlie to be able to tell people too.
Charlie is ecstatic and asks if it means they’re officially boyfriends. Charlie
confirms that it does. Then declares it louder having picked Charlie up and run
into the sea.
Nick comes home, having dried off from his trip in the sea
and decides the first person he’s going to tell is his mother and it’s a truly
adorable scene. We get a montage of clips from the series as the show ends.
I’m a tad conflicted about this episode, it’s dragged down
by the problems the last episode presented but it’s retains the fun charm this
series is known for, the last 10 minutes or so are great and Stephen Fry is
there so that’s an extra half point from me just for that.
Rating 7.5/10
But we’re not done on the Heartstopper train yet, come back
next time and we’ll talk about adaptation.
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