By: Persephone Pond

‘Heartstopper’ is a Netflix original series based on the Webcomic written by Alice Oseman. Directed by Andy Newbery, season 3 of this show released all 8 episodes on Thursday, October 3rd, and received overwhelmingly positive reviews. This article is a quick, spoiler free review from the perspective of a long time fan.

Seasons 1 and 2 focused largely on building foundations of relationships between characters and expanding on the experiences of coming out as queer, while season 3 dives deeper into mental health issues that teens deal with and the experiences of moving further into a relationship. From the perspective of a queer teen who has been through much of the same things these characters in the show have, the writing deals with these heavier themes incredibly well.

Good representation of the lived experience of queer people is not an easy thing to find, luckily more and more writers have been incorporating these sorts of themes into media nowadays. In contrast, representation of mental health issues, especially eating disorders and obsessive compulsive disorder, are still largely stigmatized in today’s society. Charlie Spring, the protagonist of ‘Heartstopper’, deals with these issues in season 3, which changes the atmosphere of the show from lighthearted to kind of depressing. Although these heavy themes make the season more sad, it’s so important to spread awareness, especially in today’s society where these problems are not uncommon, they’re just repressed.

Charlie and Nick, the protagonists of the show, deal with the stress of mental illness, while side characters still get enough attention to grow an attachment to them. Season 3 also brings up more controversy about binary transgender teens, non-binary gender exploration, and asexuality, which weren’t elaborated much on the past 2 seasons.

Overall, these characters have a way of pulling on anyone and everyone’s heartstrings, and season 3 of this show is so powerful. I highly recommend sticking with ‘Heartstopper’, or starting from the beginning.