Review: Heartstopper, "Girls" | Season 1, Episode 6
Middle-school love birds reconnect to compare notes on their complicated sexual awakenings
The first three episodes of Heartstopper kept the “chapter” headings of Oseman’s comic: Meet, Crush, and Kiss are the three pieces of the puzzle that bring Nick and Charlie to an important turning point. But technically, everything that happens after that in “Volume 2” of Heartstopper happens under the label of “Kiss,” and the reframing of the different episodes has reflected the expansion of the story beyond simply Nick and Charlie’s relationship.
“Girls” carries two meanings, centering itself on the two middle school love birds: Nick and Tara, who imagined as 12-year-olds that they would be boyfriend and girlfriend because they had no other framework to draw on. Tara is absolutely certain how she feels about girls, but that doesn’t mean that she doesn’t feel social pressures when her public coming out is met with incredulity from stray Instagram followers, and indirect homophobia by others around her. While the comic’s Tara is comparatively confident in her sexuality, the show has Tara feeling the weight of all of this in part so that Nick has someone to confide in who can relate to what he’s feeling. It’s not that it makes Tara question whether coming out was the right decision; she had simply underestimated how it would feel to truly be “out.”
Shifting Tara’s point-of-view to draw a parallel with Nick makes a lot of sense. She and Darcy are further along than Nick, but their relationships are marked by one core similarity: this is newer for one of them than it is for the other. Darcy has been out for years, and according to her version of events it took kissing six times for Tara to accept that she was a lesbian (Tara says it was only two). And Nick notably asks Charlie about when he understood he was gay, a question carrying the weight of the fact that Nick did not know he was anything but straight until Charlie came into his life. No matter how much Charlie or Darcy might say they understand that it might take their partners more time to come to terms with being out, or being whatever they are, there is always the sense that they are “behind,” and that they need to work extra hard to catch up.
Shortly after I watched this episode, I was at a virtual academic conference, and there was a panel exploring bisexual representation in film, and the various ways one signifies or represents bisexuality in visual media. And the reality is that this is primarily achieved through someone being physically intimate with both men and women, often at the same time. But Heartstopper is not interested in that form of signification, and when it committed to drawing out Nick’s self-discovery over multiple episodes it clearly invests in the idea of how, exactly, an audience that may not have a clear conception of bisexuality will accept Nick coming to the conclusion that this is the term that best describes him.
Initially, I had thought introducing Imogen was a way to accomplish this, but the show notably has him avoid intimacy in that case, pushing back against expectation. Instead, when we first encounter Nick in the wake of him letting Imogen understand what he was going through, he’s preparing for movie night, googling LGBT Movies as a potential tool to expand his understanding of a topic he’s never really explored and to also do so within his connection to his mother. She suggests Mamma Mia—which, while immensely queer, doesn’t quite deliver what he’s looking for—before heading out to get the pizza, and when she returns she’s solved it: Pirates of the Caribbean (she leaves out the “The Curse of the Black Pearl” part, but we know what she meant).
This suggestion seems at first like a triggering one: it’s a movie that he was obsessed with during his childhood, and his mother prods at him that it was because he was in love with Kiera Knightley. He bristles at this because in his head, he’s started the work of unwriting everything he thought he knew about himself: how can he trust something he now knows was built on a flawed and limited view of his sexuality? But when he starts watching the movie, and there’s a scene where the camera pulls us intimately into the chemistry between Elizabeth and Will, he realizes that he still feels the same way about Kiera Knightley as he did when he was 11. He just also feels that way about Orlando Bloom, a new feeling that can coexist with the one that came before.
It’s a simple but effective way of actualizing bisexuality in practice, and combined with the YouTube video he watches and rewatches in the episode Nick finds enough information to say that this is the term that best describes him. While Tara and Nick’s situations might be similar, Nick’s carries the extra weight of erasure, wherein many simply don’t believe that bisexuality is a real phenomenon, or question whether it is simply a stepping stone to coming out as gay. It is immensely hard to push back against binary understandings of sexuality, and it’s critical to latch onto any moment that helps the puzzle pieces fit together. Using Knightley and Bloom to accomplish this is a smart addition to his story, creating a new origin point out of a text that Nick had mentally written off as reflective of his “old self” as though that isn’t a crucial part of who he will be in the future.
Using the band concert from the comic, “Girls” is otherwise invested in bringing the three couples fully together for the first time, with Nick’s choice to confide in Tara creating what Darcy calls a group of “meddling gays” who conspire to set up Elle and Tao for some pre-concert milkshakes. Whereas Elle and Tao’s relationship in the books is fairly balanced Oseman is definitely foregrounding Elle’s perspective here, as we see her confide about her crush to Tara and Darcy, and then adamantly insist that she doesn’t want to impact their friendship and tell him about it. It becomes a point of tension for Darcy—who is pushing the love connection most strongly—and Tara, in many ways connecting Elle’s transness to Nick and Tara’s need to adjust to the change they’re experiencing more than Darcy is. With how much change has gone on in Elle’s life, there is more at stake in a crush than anyone else realizes, no matter how many cartoon hearts flutter above her head as she shares earbuds and expresses her love for her best pal.
In the end, what Nick, Tara, and Elle all want is to be able to do what they feel is right for them without the fear that pervades their lives. None of them are necessarily unclear about what they want: even Nick, who is the newest in his journey, is adamant with Charlie that he wants to be at the concert to support him. But they need a support structure in place that gives them the confidence to do so, and “Girls” is really about this found family coming together for the first time…well, almost coming together, as Elle rightly points out that Tao is the last one to know the truth, a tension that will need to be resolved before anyone can feel fully grounded in this friendship.
Stray (Adaptation) Observations
Maybe it’s just me, but it felt like the casting on Young Nick and Tara for that flashback to their kiss made them seem like 9 instead of 13, but I guess this is in part because I know what 13-year-old Kit Connor looks like from Rocketman so it was always going to feel a little off?
Tao’s insult about Harry’s last brain cell seems to strike a nerve, although the show isn’t going so far as to try to humanize him, which I appreciate.
Continues to be fun to see the various conversations that Nick and Charlie have immediately after their first kiss in the comic pop up, like the “When did you know you were gay?” that merges with the interrupted kiss at the park.
Along similar lines, having Nick start his process of talking to others about his sexuality in vague terms with Imogen laid good groundwork for him starting the conversation with Tara and realizing almost immediately that he was going to tell her.
I’m with Charlie, that Bubblegum milkshake looked like a monstrosity. (The show is inherently on the verge of twee at all times, but that pop-up artisanal milkshake stand situation was A Lot).
I don’t know why I didn’t do it before now, but I did search for Tara’s instagram, and they did create an actual account to capture the graphics for those sections, although it’s now protected and I presume not something they intend to use as transmedia in the way something like SKAM did. I think it’s just good verisimilitude, and for that I am appreciative.
The show has never hesitated to give Nick and Charlie some dramatic lighting, but the golden hour spotlight situation while Charlie was teaching him how to drum again was that extra bit of emphasis.
The artisanal milkshake pop up was indeed A LOT. What killed me (besides the obvious blech of a bubblegum ice cream milkshake) was these kiddos were all like “SECONDS PLEASE!” as if drinking two milkshakes is normal behavior. Then on top of that they realized they were short on time and decided to CHUG THE SECOND MILKSHAKES. I cannot fathom,
Ok, now I want a fucking milkshake. But a proper chocolate one, not that bubblegum bs.
This episode's nitpick: What kind of school designs rooms that lock from the outside? That's a lawsuit waiting to happen.