From the beginning, Netflix’s tender, sentimental queer romance “Heartstopper” has been fated to answer that question. In its series finale feature film, “Heartstopper Forever,” there’s no time like the present to do so.
When shy wallflower Charlie Springer (Joe Locke) and charismatic rugby player Nick Nelson (Kit Connor) shared their first kiss after weeks of gentle and timid flirting, they defied all societal expectations about who should love who. The buff sporty kid couldn’t possibly be into the skinny nerd. But he was, and giving themselves over to this simultaneously electrifying and terrifying rush of feeling was affirming for the youth and adults watching at home. Young love, unencumbered by the jaded sting of lived experience and heartbreak, is moving at any age.
But Nick and Charlie were never going to be able to live in that bubble forever because the cruelty of life is that we grow out of our youth. So in “Heartstopper Forever,” writer/creator Alice Oseman places the inevitable on Nick and Charlie’s shoulders like a boulder — can they stay together long enough to grow out of the label of young love?
As Nick looks to his next chapter at uni, and Charlie blossoms into a Head Boy who looks out for those who suffer the brutality of ignorance like he once did, the boys aren’t in the same places they were when they leaned on each other like pillars. They have to grow up, and that could spoil the fun escapism that is “Heartstopper” — a series that has been heralded as both a necessary dose of representation and a queer fantasy that teeters toward unbelievability. In the film, Oseman, along with director Wash Westermoreland, don’t pay much mind to the criticism and continue their focus on why “love is love” is more than just a T-shirt slogan. But they are also keen on reminding audiences one thing: whether Charlie and Nick stay together or break up, young love does, in fact, last forever.
We wear the triumphs of it, the scars of it, for the rest of our lives whether it lives in the foreground of our minds or the deepest depths of our subconscious. So what “Heartstopper Forever” is, instead, asking is when do you stop calling it young love and decide if it is a lasting love?
Answering such a lofty question takes up every bit of air in this nearly two-hour film (the equivalent of almost four episodes in the previous seasons). It means that most of “Heartstopper’s” often championed and wonderfully diverse characters, all existing on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum, are sidelined for much of the film. If fans are hoping for quality time with the whole gang in equal measure, temper those expectations now. Tao (William Gao) and Elle (Yasmin Finney), always the secondary romance with the most screentime, retain that title here as they hit some rough patches — while Oseman also continues to rally for transgender rights through Elle’s activism. But characters like Tara (Corinna Brown), Darcy (Kizzy Edgell), Imogen (Rhea Norwood) and Isaac (Tobie Donovan) evolve through exposition rather than true character development.
This is, and always was, Nick and Charlie’s story. But here, it has to live in the bliss of their burgeoning maturity, their robust sex life, their doubts, their solo journeys and their eventual epiphanies about the future — all in two hours. It’s a lot to tidy up, but Oseman’s confidence in writing these characters never wains, using the limited time to test her creations by needling at Nick’s unhealthy reliance on Charlie for purpose in life; and in turn, Charlie’s troubling eating habits as a means of coping with stress of welcoming the very attention from which he used to flee.
Perhaps the biggest shift from series to film is the show’s depiction of sex. From the beginnings of a handjob on a pier to exploration with sexual positions, this is no longer the series that swept the Children & Family Emmys a few years ago. That, specifically, feels like a reaction to the discourse from older queer communities about the reality of gay relationships and how “Heartstopper” seemed a little too naive for its own audience. But now that it has cleared the hurdle of Charlie and Nick’s apprehension to exploring their physical relationship, it has gone headlong into embracing those insatiable desires of youth and even acknowledging the reckless ways in which we can use sex to fill the void of things unspoken.
“Heartstopper Forever” is best when it is willing to live in that maturity because if it wants to ask that aforementioned question, it has to shed its baby fat. Nick and Charlie can’t consider the future if they aren’t willing to let go of what was and fully vocalize what can be. It’s why the film revisits many (maybe too many?) of its hallmark moments to see them from a different perspective. Nick and his mother, Sarah (Anna Maxwell Martin steps in for Olivia Colman), have another heart to heart while she sorts through bills at the dining room table. Only this time, he isn’t choking on his words as he did when he came out to her in Season 1, but rather laying bare the makings of his own emotional growth. The boys also return to the beach, where they first declared themselves “boyfriends,” a once-joyful memory now the site of some big decisions.
“Heartstopper Forever” is a profoundly romantic, emotionally enlightened and essential viewing experience for anyone who has wept over the sweet simplicity of Nick and Charlie’s story before. But does it answer that question: can young love last?
Of course, it does. But only to remind audiences that there really is no such thing as young love because while youth has an expiration date, the pains and pleasures of these impossible emotions don’t. Thankfully for us, Nick and Charlie have always been more pleasure than pain, and their final chapter doesn’t let us down now.
“Heartstopper Forever” is now streaming on Netflix.
