Hacker Cinema
Sex Education
2019 · TV series · 4 seasons
Created by Laurie Nunn
Inexperienced Otis channels his sex therapist mom when he teams up with rebellious Maeve to set up an underground sex therapy clinic at school.
5 positive3 negative1 neutralfrom 9 commenters
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10 comments on Hacker News
On Netflix (probably other platforms too, but definitely on the latest Netflix shows) just about every episode about high school students is about sex. Shows like “Sex Education” beat kids over the head that sex is almost a requirement and there are some definite Weinstein vibes about how obsessed older producers and directors seem so insistent on having minors talk about anal and other sexual topics under the guise of “wow we are so progressive, look how open and free these 15 year olds talk about sex”
I think it’s great to have open communication but at a certain point it seems like perverted old men getting off to making young actors and actresses obsess over sex and tell other other young people that is the behavior to follow.
I thought so too coming from the same generation. But there was a moment, few years back, where I stopped worrying about it.
My kids made me watch Sex Education on Netflix. My initial reaction was just irritation. There is so much content that uses sex, shock and awe to capture attention. And once achieved, there is no further message delivered. My initial reaction was here we go again with this crap. It also took me straight back to my days as a kid, waiting eagerly with the neighborhood gang for episodes of the Wonder Years. It was innocent. It was beautiful. It was dealing with day to day stuff kids dealt with. At least that's what I thought kids needed to see. And was I annoyed at what they were getting instead.
But as Sex Education progressed, and it pulled me in quick, I was just blown away, by how the writers were handling so many complicated subjects. Not with the usual cynicism (think fight club or the wire) but with humor, imagination and loads of innocence and beauty. It was just so heartwarming. I was looking forward to the new seasons as much as my kids were :) And I cant imagine it being produced in the 90s.
And it showed me, as complicated as the world is getting, there is so much more possible today. And beauty isn't dead. It just looks different.
https://www.parentstv.org/blog/how-does-a-film-critic-justify-dismissing-criticism-of-a-film-that-sexually-exploits-children
These guys did:
As for Netflix, how can the company possibly reconcile a “coming-of-age” film, and one that centers entirely on 11-year-old girls, with a TV-MA rating? This is not a random decision – it has become corporate practice.
We have frequently called on Netflix to stop hosting content that sexualizes children, such as Baby, Big Mouth, Sex Education, or that glamorizes rape and sexual assault such as 365 Days.
And Netflix habitually markets adult content to young audiences. Parents Television Council research of Netflix programming designated as “Teen” reveals that nearly half was rated either TV-MA (104 titles, or 40.8%) or R (23 titles, or 9.0%); and every single program that carried a TV-14 moniker included harsh profanities.
While we may not always see eye-to-eye with film critics, the criticism of the critics is telling. Cuties is not the first time Netflix has blatantly promoted programming that sexualizes children, but we’re calling on them for this to be the last.
The Sex Education aesthetic is explicitly inspired by John Hughes films: https://www.popbuzz.com/tv-film/sex-education/what-year-set-in/
I had to go down that rabbit hole after watching Sex Education and thinking "this high school atmosphere feels very American."
I remember that feeling, watching John Hughes films as a teenager in northern England. Though sometimes part of his gift was that the sense of adolescent angst was so universal, I could identify with some of the characters despite the exotic setting. And in some cases (e.g. Pretty in Pink) Hughes managed to show us this world of spoilt rich kids through the eyes of someone less privileged.
Tangential, but I think part of the genius of the more recent Sex Education (Netflix) is that the setting is definitely British (accents, landscape) and contemporary (smartphones, fashions) and yet brilliantly evokes a British kid's fantasies of what a High School should be like after watching too many 80s American movies.
Readers here love to crap all over Netflix, but it's still the service I use most. Yes, the movie selection is lackluster and yes, they make a lot of mediocre shows (though often for niches where fans of that content may have few other options). But they also make some of my favorite shows of all time like Bojack Horseman, Big Mouth and Sex Education. And they've revived some of my favorite content of all time like Arrested Development, W/ Bob & David and Wet Hot American Summer (with mixed results, but still). Not to mention a lot of fringy comedy that may have otherwise never been produced, like I Think You Should Leave, Aunty Donna and Middleditch and Schwartz.
And they've brought content into the mainstream (in the US) that we otherwise may have never seen, like Black Mirror and Squid Game.
Throw in some flagship nature documentaries, a ton of stand up specials and the occasional cultural phenomenon like Stranger Things and I still feel like Netflix is easily worth the cost. And just because they produce a lot of crap doesn't negate any of the above. There is no number of Adam Sandler movies that will change how much I loved Michael Bolton's Big, Sexy Valentine's Day Special.
not the OP and not so much politics but I found it decidedly weird how Sex Education which is set in a fictional town in the UK, is filmed in Wales, with an almost exclusively British cast is completely Americanized.
As far as politics goes Bridgerton is probably the best example which has American racial and gender politics bolted onto some weird fairy tale version of the British aristocracy in the worst way imaginable.
edit: another thing I just remembered, Netflix removed what is probably the best episode of Community from its catalog because of a blackface character, despite the fact that the character is explicitly used to address racism in the fantasy genre.
Are you saying Netflix hasn’t made quality shows that will last through 2039? I’d like to know which company you think has made close to the amount of quality shows Netflix has since 2014. Here’s part of a list I have for a content project. No company comes close to this output in recent history.
House of Cards launched February 2013 (7 seasons, finished)
Orange is the New Black launched July 2013 (7 seasons, finished)
Stranger Things launched July 2016 (3 seasons, 1-2 more)
—
Dark (2 seasons, 3rd is last)
Glitch (2 seasons, 3rd might never come)
Russian Doll (1 season)
Haunting of Hill House (1 season, anthology)
American Vandal (2 seasons)
Black Mirror (anthology, last season not that good)
The Crown (3 seasons)
When They See Us (mini-series, 2019)
Unbelievable (just came out)
—
Glow (3 seasons)
Kimmy Schmidt (4 seasons, finished)
Arrested Development (they tried, hard to get it all back together after years of being done)
Sex Education (1 season)
Bojack Horseman (5 seasons?) #animated
Mindhunter (2 seasons)
The OA (2 seasons)
Maniac (mini-series)
Wet Hot American Summer (2 seasons, but season 1 is the top notch one)
F is for Family (3? seasons) #animated
Big Mouth (2? seasons) #animated
—
Documentary mini-series
—
Staircase
Making a Murderer
Evil Genius
The Jinx
Wild Wild West
——-
There’s more I’m missing and I didn’t include a number of shows Netflix helps finance but isn’t the main financier or producer or original place of distribution. Shows like Glitch.
Wild. I think some of the best tv of the past couple of years is on Netflix. Dark, Haunting of Hill House, Glitch, American Vandal, Sex Education, just off the top of my head as top shows in recent history. Solid shows like Now You See Me just having come out. Solid movies like Always Be My Maybe just come out. Then guilty pleasure shows that are good too like Sabrina. And shows on networks that likely aren’t going to pull content for their own service like BBC shows with top notch content like The Fall are on Netflix too.
If I was stuck with one companies original new content. I don’t see how I wouldn’t pick Netflix for now.
Same here. I find that I've turned to Youtube to satisfy any content cravings. It's not perfect, suggestions sometimes never have anything to do with what I've been watching the past 12 hours, Youtube's algorithms have a clear bias against certain content and sometimes I can't bother to wade through pages and pages of slosh to find what I know fits my tastes, but at this point I have a good idea of the search terms to use when I want something to watch, and if all else fails I can always just rewatch an ancient creator's old content.
Meanwhile on Netflix, it is nearly impossible to find what interests me by just turning it on and flipping through the initial feed. It also feels like there is never enough of the content I want to watch. I found 'Kingdom', 'Love,Death and Robots' and 'Sex Education' completely by accident, and on ending each series and falling in love with their concepts, I get exhausted when I see there is no season 2, because it means it will probably be a while until I hit the jackpot again. Even one of my favorites - 'Black Mirror', seems to be dropping in quality.
I haven't opened Netflix in 2 months and probably will cancel my sub soon because the wait it just not worth the price.