While I was looking for something refreshing in a TV series, I stumbled across this one which was shown on Netflix and categorized as comedy. I read a bit about it and felt it seemed like an interesting series that I should be able to enjoy, plus it had two quite well known stars in it. So I will just get to it now.
Brief Story Line
Otis (Asa Butterfield - Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, The Space Between Us etc) was a seemingly invisible teenager whose mother was a famous sex therapist named Jean (Gillian Anderson - The X Files TV series, The Spy Who Dumped Me etc) and always made him uncomfortable. He sometimes felt ashamed of her profession and also felt a bit intimidated due to his lack of practical experience in terms of sex. But it did make him very knowledgeable for his age. His best friend was a gay named Eric (Ncuti Gatwa) who despite being bullied all the time, especially by the school bully Adam (Connor Swindells - The Vanishing etc) was still a positive and cheerful person.
One day, Otis somehow managed to solve a sexual problem for one of the student and the school's outcast and bad girl Maeve (Emma Mackey) realized she could make money by running a "sex clinic" for the high school students. And with her wit and smart mind, Maeve and Otis finally started their business. Maeve also had an on-off relationship with the school's popular swim athlete named Jackson (Kedar Williams-Stirling).
So how would the story proceed? Find them all in this interesting teen drama with a touch of sex "education".
End of Brief Story Line
Well that was really fun! I finished this series so fast because it only had 8 episodes for the first season. The episodes ranged from as short as 40 something minutes to longest 52 minutes. Those who are accustomed to Netflix original series would know that they usually had few episodes per season. And it was also easy to complete because from the first episode, I was already intrigued by it and wanted to see what was next for this odd couple of socially awkward boy with the school's bad girl and his attraction to her.
In each episode, there would be a so called "case" or problem that should be solved by Otis but it was not the main focus. And the cases were not only related with sex but sometimes also relationship. The series actually had a lot of side stories involving the cast. There was the personal problem faced by Adam the bully, or Jackson the jock and the hardest of all seemed to be the challenges faced by Eric (though funnily enough, I felt a similarity of his problem with Chris Colfer's character Kurt Hummel in that famous Glee TV series). But Ncuti Gatwa who played Eric really stole the show. I really liked his character in here and that episode 5 was really the best. I had to agree with most of the critics who loved his performance and characterization in here.
Now another character that was obviously fun to look at was Otis' mother Jean who was played brilliantly by Gillian Anderson. She was so convincing as the mother who had no boundary with her boy and also a person who loved to have occasional sex without attachment. It was so refreshing to see her playing this completely different character from her time as agent Scully in The X-Files. Her relationship with Otis was very entertaining to watch indeed. There was also another character of Aimee (Aimee Lou Woods) as one of the popular girls but secretly loved to hang out with Maeve who sometimes provided fun moments as well.
The first half of season felt quite light where the problems faced were not so complicated plus we were just getting to know the characters. But as the story progressed, it somehow transformed itself into a much more serious series, with problems that felt heavier than the standard teenager problems (including LGBT issues). Although there was also the occasional love relationship problem. I also felt that towards the end, the problems became a little bit more complex and wider with a fantastic ending which truly made me excited for the second season.
Btw, since this is a British series, it should come as no surprise that the humor was quite the standard British jokes. Being a series with such title, it had some scenes that might be too vulgar for the conservative audience (love making scenes, nudity, and graphic pictures plus crude languages). But it was certainly not to the level of series like Game of Thrones (early seasons) where there would be so many of such scenes. Another nice thing that I loved in here was the music which were mostly good and nice to listen.
Overall I personally think this is a wonderful series. A light enough series to enjoy but serious enough with some deep and heavier issues involved. A great story which I think is more suitable for the adults viewers. This is not a soft porn series, even if the title was Sex Education. It is more like a teen drama with sex & relationship problem (not only between the teenagers but also with the parents) plus amazing characters to watch. It is definitely one of the best one I have seen and enjoyed. So if you are looking to have some fun moment, just give this a try. But be warned about some of those graphic scenes, cause if you are uncomfortable with such, then it might be too disturbing. However, if you could see beyond those, you would see there is a lot of high quality moments in it. The choice is yours.
Mike's movie moments rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
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