Heartstopper: Netflix renews hit show for two more series

Heartstopper, Netflix’s massive LGBTQ+ romance hit, is going to be renewed for two more series, and fans are over the moon.

The show only premiered on April 22, but it has already been making waves for its comprehensive yet delicate display of queer teenage romance.

It beat Friends, Game of Throne and Breaking Bad to become one of Rotten Tomatoes’ best-rated shows and soared to the top 10 English series on Netflix just two days after its premiere. It then reached the Netflix Top Ten list in 54 countries.

Now, after less than a month since its initial release, two more series of the show have been renewed.

‘I’ve never been this happy in my entire life,’ tweeted one fan.

‘HEARTSTOPPER FOR 2 MORE SEASON’S !!! I Literally SCREAMED at my friend ear when I received the NEWS !! Im so so happy,’ said another.

‘I need like 5-10 business days to recover from this,’ said another fan.

The central storyline follows two boys, Charlie (Joe Locke) and Nick (Kit Connor), as they turn 15. They meet at school, become friends and fall in love.

The show follows all the usual ups and downs that you might expect with a teenage romance show, but it also “represents a great step forward” in the presentation of teenage queer love – which is often either badly handled or simply lacking from TV.

The show also explores themes of first love, friendships, coming out and mental health, and follows parallel storylines of friends Tao (William Gao), Elle (new Doctor Who cast member Yasmin Finney), Tara (Corinna Brown), Darcy (Kizzy Edgell) and Isaac (Tobie Donovan).

The drama is based on Alice Oseman’s webcomic and graphic novel of the same name, which amassed a giant 52.1 million views on both Tumblr and Tapas (a South Korean prose publishing website). After a limited crowd-funded print run, Hachette picked up Volume One in 2019.

The success of the TV show has also had reverberations on Oseman’s novels: Volume 1 is now featured on the New York Times bestseller list and is currently the number one YA fiction book in the US.

To top off all the good news, there are six more of Oseman’s novels waiting in the wings, ripe and ready to be developed. Netflix, we’re looking at you.