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When the stars of Netflix’s Heartstopper Joe Locke and Kit Connor appear on my screen, my heart almost stops. I know that this is Joe Locke on a Zoom video call, not Charlie Spring. I know it’s Kit Connor, not Nick Nelson. I know that a flurry of animated leaves will not glide across their faces. But like most of the audience watching or about to start watching Heartstopper, I’ve spent eight episodes with these characters, and even longer when you consider Alice Oseman’s original webcomic. I’ve laughed with them and cried for them, and I’ve marveled at Euros Lyn’s direction of them. Expertly drawn — first in pixels, then in print, now larger than life — for a single moment, this is Charlie and Nick. And then we begin.
London native Kit comes to Heartstopper after portraying a young Elton John in Rocketman, and voicing Lyra’s daemon in His Dark Materials, while Joe, from the Isle of Man, makes his screen debut. Together, they headline a story that centers romance and discovery, in all its sweet, queer glory. Set primarily at Truham Grammar School for Boys, Charlie is the kid who was bullied for being gay, but now everyone’s sort of moved on from it. Nick, meanwhile, is the rugby lad who is perceived to be the straightest guy in school. Turns out, not everyone has moved on from it, and Nick isn’t straight. What unfolds across the eight-episode series is a myriad of laughter, angst, and joy bursting at the seams. Spoilers for season one of Heartstopper ahead.
“It’s so great that we’ve moved to a place in society where queer stories are being told in the forefront and being told by big studios like Netflix,” 18-year-old Joe tells Teen Vogue of making the show. “It shows that society is moving to a place of more acceptance.” It’s an honor for them to bring Heartstopper to life, Kit, also 18, says: “Although queer representation is definitely getting better, and we are starting to bring it to the front and center, I think there’s never too much. Hopefully, we’ll get to that point where it’s not a necessity to really improve it. Hopefully, we’ll get to that point where it’s like equal representation.” That’s the goal, he acknowledges, and this show is a step towards it.
It’s no small thing that Heartstopper exists “in the mainstream, not just in the fringes, but in the center of a big platform,” Joe notes. We see this with Charlie’s doting friend group, the “trio of borderline outcasts,” the ones who populate the fringes: Tao Xu, his straight and straight-up best mate played by William Gao, and Tobie Donovan’s Isaac, who is super chill and just wants to read a book, which is a whole mood. Charlie goes from being Nick’s deskmate, to being asked to join his rugby team, to growing closer as sparks fly between them.
But the show ventures beyond the white cis lead duo by exploring life for Charlie’s friend Elle, a recent transfer from Truham to Higgs, the local girls’ school. Black trans girls can turn on the TV and see Yasmin Finney as Elle Argent, complete with laid edges — an experience that’s steeped in culture, belonging, and feeling at home. Kizzy Edgell’s Darcy Olsson is an out and proud lesbian, alongside Corinna Brown as Tara Jones, adding a dark-skinned Black lesbian to the coming-of-age story canon. Everyone meets challenges as Charlie and Nick have their first kiss, Elle and Tao have heart eyes for each other, and Tara and Darcy navigate their new public relationship.
“Media plays such a massive part in people’s lives,” Kit says. “Especially now in this current day and age, I think Netflix is almost like a map for young people to find their way around the world.” Anyone can be the cartographer of their own life, as Heartstopper joins the ranks of Netflix’s other in-house productions Young Royals, Sex Education, and Elite, and their streaming acquisitions Gameboys: Level-Up Edition and Wish You, presenting different shades of queer stories.
“Growing up as queer can often mean that you don't really have as much representation,” Kit explains. “You don’t have as much guidance in the media [about] how life sometimes goes.” Of course, not all stories are true to life, he concedes. Representation is like staring into a still lake and ruffling the water — the reflection is distorted, but in some ways, still undoubtedly you. “It’s always good to have this kind of representation for not just educational purposes, but also so that people can see what it’s like to grow up and be a queer teen.”
Heartstopper marinates in conflict that can often punctuate the queer experience, such as coming out and facing homophobia, but Alice Oseman never surrenders to a bleak narrative; their hands are outstretched, welcoming, as if to say that queer people can be happy too. “It’s a queer story told through an optimistic lens,” Joe says. “It’s important that we tell queer stories that have a more serious and hard-hitting background, but it's just as important to teach young queer kids that they deserve happiness and they deserve all this positivity. And that just because they happen to be queer does not change any of their rights to happiness and love.”
“On a slightly different standpoint, I think that a lot of people react to the show and see it as very much a safe space for the LGBTQIA+ community,” Kit explains. “It’s for queer teens and queer people in general. It’s a safe space for them, the novels and also the show.” Young people watching aren’t seeing the depths of despair or the trauma of a potential future that might transpire, they’re seeing a story that they can (and may even want to) insert themselves into.
Kit is cognizant of the near-saturation of darker queer narratives in media. “If you look at a cis heterosexual viewer, so much of the queer representation that they see is very negative,” he says. “It’s seeing it in a very dark, gritty way. And I think that it will be really powerful, I hope, not only for the LGBTQIA+ community to see [Heartstopper] but also for straight people to see it.” This show is just as much a voyaging map to navigate queerness as it is a map of the world, to broaden horizons, and eliminate distance between people. “And also just to see how happy people who are queer can be, and how amazing and beautiful queerness is,” he adds.
Near the end of our interview, I share my screen to reveal a collage of beach shots from BL dramas — Blueming and Light On Me from South Korea, Bad Buddy and I Told Sunset About You from Thailand, Gameboys from the Philippines, Cherry Magic from Japan — and then right in the center, Charlie and Nick’s proclamation to the ocean in Heartstopper. It’s a moment of triumph for the couple, the culmination of a season’s worth of story, but what is it about gay characters and the beach? “That’s the question of the ages,” Kit says. Luckily, Joe has the answer: “Beaches are like spaces between spaces,” he says. “The sea is like traveling so it’s sort of, almost like it’s their own space.” (Kit’s smile widens, “That’s a very poetic way of putting it.”) “Beaches are like spaces of freedom, aren’t they,” Joe adds. “It’s a place of safety and comfort and security,” Kit says, “and [a] kind of separation.”
Bisexuality is explored in Heartstopper with the reverence it deserves, with Nick Nelson. He isn’t “kidding himself,” he doesn’t have “one foot out the door,” and he isn’t “secretly gay.” Nick’s lightbulb moment — Pirates of the Caribbean footage panning from Keira Knightley to Orlando Bloom — required permission from both Hollywood franchise leads. “It’s such a pure, innocent presentation of Nick’s feelings and sudden realization that, ooh, maybe it’s not just girls, maybe it’s not just boys,” Kit says. “And there isn’t much representation for male bisexual characters, and I think that's something that hopefully, Heartstopper will change a little bit.”
If Heartstopper were to end here, the pair would remember this time with fondness, having learned more about the world and themselves. “This whole experience has changed my life completely,” Joe says. “I've learned so much about myself, and what I want from my life. And also I’ve met some incredible people that hopefully will be in my life for a long time. I think Heartstopper made me a better person.” He credits playing Charlie and learning about the other stories in the show for deepening his understanding of tolerance and being a better person.
Meanwhile, it’s been a life changing experience for Kit. “It’s somewhat pushed me to be more myself and be proud of who I am,” he says. “And be more genuine and authentically myself.” Not to mention acting opposite Academy Award winner Olivia Colman as Nick’s mother, casting that was kept a closely-guarded secret before release. “She was incredible, effortlessly talented and [it was] a real honor as an actor to be able to work with someone like her. But she also just had this utter passion and it just felt so genuine,” Kit says. It’s clear that a world with no more Heartstopper is not a world we care to live in: “We still want a season 2,” Joe laughs.
Somewhere out there is a little Charlie Spring, or a little Nick Nelson. Somewhere there’s an Elle Argent or a Tara Jones or a Darcy Olsson. Think of all the queer journeys this show will ignite for them, or the healing it will inspire for adults who never had Heartstopper there to light the flame. “Just be you,” Joe says. “Don’t let anyone change you, to make you fit in, because your differences are what make you special.” Sincerity blankets Kit’s face as he says: “Just please be authentically yourself and nothing else.”
Heartstopper is streaming now on Netflix.
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