The trick is not only the cast, a list of new discoveries headed by ASA Butterfield, Ncuti Gatwa and Emma Mackey, accompanied by an always brilliant Gillian Anderson. The series created by Laurie Nunn, in her first credit in both film and television, is a beautiful stylistic mix, brave both in the themes it presents and in the forms, daring to show sexual scenes that are as funny as they are personal, and that leave glimpse the clumsiness of its protagonists.
But it is much more than that. Unlike other teen series, ‘Sex Education’ has a unique ability to trace the spectrum of both sexual and gender identity. It is not an incandescent signal to show off its diversity, nor is it a tragedy, the series understands that its target audience, surely younger than its ‘over 18’ classification indicates, sees it as something more and more normal and although there are characters that certainly clash with their identity most simply exist, which is already quite revolutionary.
GOODBYE ON TIME
Now the series is approaching its end. With a third season that tied up most of the loose ends of the first two it makes sense that it is in its final stretch. It is true that in fiction it has been a year of farewells, with the endings of ‘Succession’ and ‘Barry’ still quite fresh, but that is also worth appreciating. The memory of television fans may still have the trauma of series that limped to the finish line without much more to tell, which was noticeable in quite forgettable final seasons in cases such as ‘Game of Thrones’ and ‘House’. Of Cards’ that showed that knowing how to say goodbye on time is important.
But perhaps the best example of a series that has lasted too long is precisely ‘Elite’. The cast change has allowed it to continue, but at the cost of losing the tone of mystery of the first seasons and becoming a full-fledged soap opera. At this point, no one watches the series by Carlos Montero and Darío Madrona because of the story, but because it is easy-to-digest content, and it is good that the British series has escaped this fate.
WITH ‘SEX EDUCATION’ NETFLIX SAYS GOODBYE TO ANOTHER OF ITS FLAGSHIP SERIES
Although the fact that the series ends by decision of the creative team is good news, it is still interesting to see how several of the streaming giant’s flagship series continue to say goodbye. ‘Stranger Things’ and ‘Cobra Kai’ also have just one season left, and even the oddball ‘Big Mouth’ is crossing the finish line. It is true that these endings will still take a while to arrive, but that does not mean that they are not important losses for a platform that will have to look for a replacement.
In addition, ‘Sex Education’ had the advantage of being much less expensive than other of its traveling companions on the platform. The cost of putting a group of actors on a school set will always be less than the crazy adventures of ‘One Piece’ or the eighties nightmares of ‘Stranger Things’.