And no, I don’t mean, let’s talk about you and me. I’m talking about the Netflix gem, Sex Education. If you’ve been hiding under a rock and have not managed to catch this yet then please crawl out from under your rock and give it a watch. I’ve been a bit of a latecomer to this one and I’ve been binge-watching it ever since until I rather guttingly reached the end of series two. Okay, I know, guttingly isn’t a real word but it should be. I typed it therefore it is real.
Now back to the sex. Now don’t get put off by the fact that this show is centred around a sixteen-year-old boy, Otis, whose parents are both sex therapists and are divorced following his father’s numerous affairs. This kind of screwed Otis up when he was a young kid and because of this he has some kind of weird hang-up about masturbating. He’s also a virgin and yet despite all this, he somehow allows himself to get talked into starting a business with Maeve giving sex advice to fellow school kids (and I’m talking about British school kids as this show is British). As you can imagine, all sorts of weird and wonderful questions get asked. This shows gives you all the answers to questions about sex you were afraid to ask or even didn’t realise you wanted to ask. It’s either aimed at similar aged teenagers to help them with their sex education or it’s aimed at adults who can identify with some of the cringe-inducing things that the rampant kids get up to.
There are many hilarious and laugh out loud moments. There are some do I really want to watch what is a teenager though probably played by an adult actor doing what they’re doing moments. There are many did they just really do that moments. There are also some deeper and more serious themes explored such as bullying, racism, and sexual harassment. It is a very well-acted, written and directed. It also stars the rather brilliant Gillian Anderson as Otis’s mother Jean. I don’t remember seeing her in anything other than The X-Files but I think she is absolutely perfect for this role as are indeed all the other actors. Do yourself a favour and get some popcorn and let the binge-watching commence.
