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Sex Education Season 3 Review

The third season of Sex Education was a disappointment. It wasn’t as good as the first and especially its magnificent second season as it has many problems that bothered me.

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“And do you think having a king-size arsehole

for a father had a negative impact on their lives, too?“

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Let’s first state that I definitely enjoyed this season. It is inferior to its predecessors, but not to a degree that it’s a massive disappointment, but just a small one. The main issue that I’ve had with this season are the new characters introduced, especially Hope played by Jemima Kirke.

She is this new headmistress who tries to impose draconian laws on the school, basically attempting to minimize anything sexual going on within its walls. Needless to say, the character was beyond caricaturist and even cartoony in the instances where she physically fought the pupils. The final revelation about her felt tacked on and didn’t help to make her character realistic whatsoever.

I also did not care for the Cal character. The treatment of the non-binary addition was expectedly problematic. I still have problems understanding this made-up identity, but the show did not help me understand whatsoever as it only tackled binding the chest in the finale and just briefly. The rest of the character’s arc was just fighting with Hope in a cartoony manner and having a complicated relationship with Jackson that was fine, but ultimately it did not lead to anywhere.

Let’s talk about the regular main cast. Jean Milburn continues to be awesome. I love Gillian Anderson on this show and her arc in this season is fantastic. Her fraught relationship with her family was very well explored and her health scare was quite intense. Ola and Lily also continue to be charming with the emphasis on the latter’s weirdness being quite welcome in this season.

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Otis at first wasn’t all that likable in this season, but eventually he became more redeemable. I found his romance with Ruby very well developed, but it was very sad how Ruby’s heart was crushed. She was humanized in this season in a wonderful way and ended up being one of the strongest characters here, which I did not expect.

Otis ended up with Maeve, but she decided to go to America anyway, which was expected, but overall I find their on and off relationship much better realized than most in most other shows. It’s clichéd, but solid. Maeve’s relationship with her biological mother was beautifully explored here and how she ended things with Isaac was definitely quite realistic.

Let’s talk about Eric and Adam. At first, I found their relationship to be wonderful. The sex roles of gay couples was particularly well explored at the beginning of this season. However, the breakup was annoying as it was your typical “I need to breathe and live fully while you are just starting to be gay” cliché. I did not care for it, but Ncuti Gatwa continues to excel the most among the younger cast while the friendship that develops between Adam and Rahim was quite welcome.

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Other characters also get their fine moments on Sex Education’s third season, but Michael is the best of the bunch and so well developed. He is among the best adults on the show. This season ended on a strong note, but it started off roughly with the soundtrack continuing to be overly present with way too many songs utilized. The season humanizes and develops its characters superbly as usual, but the annoying and cartoony moments took it down a notch for me.