Sex Education: Season 1: Episode 7

"Sometimes the people we like don't like us back, and it's painful, but there's nothing we can do about it."

This penultimate episode is extraordinary- full of depth in terms of both theme and character. It seems to have shifted gear into something more serious and philosophical. The comedy hasn't gone, but by this point it's just a natural part of the drama.

And the drama is about very deep feelings and passionate longing, beginning with Liam, client of the week, who is being a bit creepy about unrequited love- and quite rightly gets the "no means no, so back off" talk from Otis. Interestingly, though, we get a lot of ironic banter about the innate stupidity and sexism of the upcoming school prom- very much an American import and not so big a thing in this country: I never went to mine in '95 and nor did many of my friends. But a reluctant Maeve is persuaded by Jackson, and a similarly reluctant Otis is persuaded by Ola, in both cases rather sweetly.

Also sweet is how Jean and Jakob are falling for each other, with Jean teaching for ever more transparent excuses to see him... but, when they stop shagging and start talking, the sex therapist proves to be utterly like insight. She tells him she thinks of him as divorced and bored of monogamy. But she is describing herself; Jakob is a widower, Jean is the first person he’s slept with since the bereavement, and he wants more than just the physical.

But the ball is awkward; Maeve isn’t fully happy with Jackson, and there are in resolved and mutual feelings between her and Otis that are very much lampshaded by the case of the week- Otis’s speech to a suicidal Liam at the end is very much heard by Maeve. It seems our two leads may get together.

But, of course, it is not to be, as Maeve is disgusted when a drunken Jackson reveals the confidential advice Otis gave him. And Jackson himself is far from a bad bloke, with one of his parents living her dreams of sporting glory through him. It's a terrible burden for one far too young. And, to complete our triptych of things going wrong, Oris stupidly upsets Ola, seeming to lose her. This is nicely structured storytelling. And throughout the episode we have Sean, Maeve's very human but dodgy drug dealing brother, as a worryingly damaging catalyst.

Eric has a better time this episode, however, starting to reconcile his very Christian, African family background (let's hope it doesn't remain just generically African, which would be dodgy) with his sexuality- and there's a lovely conversation with his concerned but caring dad. He arrives at the party looking fabulous, and gets cheered (yay!), finally accepting Otis' frank apology. But we can't have a happy ending to a penultimate episode; Otis sees the book his mother has been writing is... about him.

This is superb; it's extraordinary that a short series in its first season should develop it's characters so well by this point.