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I Just Feel Weird About Heartstopper [Patreon Exclusive] (Patreon)

Published:
2022-05-07 16:30:54
Edited:
2026-08-23 08:02:22
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Content

Hello my darlings, this video is an EXCLUSIVE JUST FOR YOU!This video talks about the sexual assault from Heartstopper and uses the f-slur,

Hello my darlings, this video is an EXCLUSIVE JUST FOR YOU!

This video talks about the sexual assault from Heartstopper and uses the f-slur, and is generally just uncensored in a way I can't usually do on youtube from fear of demonetisation. Here I didn't have to worry about it! But be warned, I use some very naughty words!

The next main verilybitchie video for the public is still in progress. Ada and I are working hard on it, I'm super excited about it and I think you will all love it! Our videos have been getting so ambitious this year, it's very exciting (and also slightly terrifying!).

In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this video just for you! This is the first time I've done a video exclusively for patrons. The 105k subs on the channel is quite intimidating, so it felt nice to write this JUST for you lot, much more chill! I would like to do more patron exclusive videos in the future, so we'll see where that goes!

Please don't share this video, its just for you lot!

Edit: I'm retroactively labelling this an appendix to "Good Representation is Boring."

Files

I just feel weird about Heartstopper

Patron Exclusive video, please don't share!

Comments

SolitaryIris

I’m so late to the party watching this but I would absolutely love if you would consider watching and analysing the Heartbreak High Netflix reboot. It’s honestly my hyperfixation at the moment and I think you’d appreciate the show based on the content of yours that I’ve watched 🥺

zet

i'm loving the exclusive patreon content!! as a queer gen z-er fresh in my 20s i want to say i completely agree with everything you've said in this video - i think many people my age DID get a bit brainwashed by the recent community policy (?) of pushing wholesomeness. i was exactly the same a few years ago - i even remember reading heartstopper back then and being all like "wow... finally some unproblematic representation... this is... this is honestly so important you guys..." well suffice it to say i'm here for the heartstopper ridicule now lol. i personally found it unwatchable for exactly the reasons youve outlined here, and only got through half the first episode. i guess i just grew up and now i like my queer characters messy and/or fun rather than ~wholesome~. and it feels really surreal seeing some of my peers stay in that "obsessed with love simon" mindset through the years, despite us not being 16 or 17 anymore. anw! i also wanted to say i love love LOVE your content, i've never subscribed to anyone's patreon before but i enjoy your videos so much, they're so thought-provoking, well-made and hilarious and some of my favourite video essays EVER. so when i was watching your recent video on lesbian gaze and you mentioned patreon i was like wait a second... if there's one person whose exclusive patreon content i *need* to watch, it's verilybitchie. (also i think what you do is so important and hearing your perspective on things, especially on bisexuality, makes me really happy.) so here i am and i wish you, Ada and Miško (hope i got it right?) a lovely day!

Verity Ritchie

Yes, Miško, you got it right! :D I imagine a lot of this pressure for "wholesome" morally pure representation comes from the fear of homophobic media and overcompenstaing in the other direction ... Hopefully we can collectively grow out of it soon! Anyway, thank you so much for the kind words, it means a lot and I'm really glad you're enjoying our videos! 🥰

MathClassWarfare

I got covid and decided to binge heartstopper specifically so that I could watch his video with sufficient context. Thank you for your service! <3<3<3

Verity Ritchie

Omg, I hope you feel better soon! And now you have Heartstopper season 2 to look forward to, yay! 😁

MathClassWarfare

Oh...goody... 😂 (seriously though, I wish we had more good shows with queer people in it to watch 😭 always appreciate getting your recs. I watched The Bisexual after you mentioned it in the other video and thought it was great!)

Verity Ritchie

Oh brilliant, I'm glad you liked it! I agree that it's tough finding shows that hit that sweet spot. So much queer representation on streaming services, but I'm honestly just watching DVDs from the 00s at this point!

Jam Doe

Love this video. My only criticism is that in Crush, I think the main character is suggesting that queer people wouldn't use glow-in-the-dark dental dams, not that they wouldn't use regular dental dams. EDIT: About the portrayal (or large lackthereof) of sex, Oseman has received a bit of backlash on Twitter recently for drawing a now-deleted comic about Nick googling safe gay sex tips. It's extremely tame but they've been accused of sexualising teens/mlm for it, ironically something Oseman has accused other forms of gay media such as yaoi/BL shows of doing.

Keziah Garratt-Smithson

I really enjoy the books, they are very cute and wholesome. I think a lot of my enjoyment stems from the facial expressions in the artwork and spotting Medway references. I tried watching the show and bounced off after one or two episodes, it felt very bland to me in comparison.

massivemuppet

your hair looks so good in this video, absolutely slays

MB

This reminds me of the movie tall girl… it is SOOOOO BAD, but I watched it anyway and kind of enjoyed it purely for the fact the leading role is played by a, well, TALL GIRL. (I was always the tallest girl in my classes and I wanted to see myself represented so badly… and I was.)

Radclyffe Baker

I came for the roast and stayed for the call to action. I love your work; stay grumpy 💖

KayTen

Great video. Everything was spot on, especially the part about "good representation." Even 4 years later, it feels as though a lot of queer media is praised merely for existing, the quality notwithstanding. Which in some ways I understand because representation is important but the way people talk about it is so patronizing and sometimes harmful. The rave reviews queer media receives always feels so conditional and shallow. Which it is. I've noticed this pattern in critique and fandom spaces where every new piece of queer media that comes after the other gets pitted against each other. Once audience members feel they don't "need the representation anymore" or something they deem better comes along, the queer media gets discarded like a broken toy for the next shiny one. I remember some months ago there was this twitter/tiktok beef between the Red, White, and Royal Blue fandom vs Heated Rivalry fans. Some HR fans were claiming that RW&RB was cringe, corny, and the actors had no chemistry unlike HR which was brilliant in every way especially the writing and casting. Some of them really were implying that something like RW&RB can't or shouldn't exist anymore, that we "don't need it anymore," just because HR was "better." Regardless of how you feel about the quality of the movie/show (I didn't really like either of them), that is an extremely petty way to interact with media from marginalized communities. To be ok with it until it no longer personally serves your needs and switch up on a dime. Which is exactly why they're turning on Heartstopper now. For many reasons but particularly because it was once pure and wholesome but now it's too sexual. It's sad that queer media has been stuck in this limbo for the past decade or so where viewers feel as though they must heap praise on and consume as much of them as possible lest they won't get produced anymore. Or that queer media is conditional and it's existence only serves as representation and not much else. It ruins discourse and reinforces this consumerist mindset that is only getting worse.

Muireann McGlynn

I've kept away from heartstopper for some reason so this is an interesting watch! Thank you 💕

Serena Lukas Bhandar

I actually love Imagine Me & You. Sure, Piper Perabo's character is a bit bland, but the dynamics between Lena Headey's character and her mom and best friend are so sweet and funny. And I mean, Lena Headey is very attractive 🥵

cady

Every word of this video is exactly how I felt about Heartstopper, starting with the animations that tell you what's happening onscreen as if you can't tell from, like, what's happening in the story. Thank you for this, the universal praise is honestly doing my head in. Is it an escapist romcom and that's why there's no meaningful conflict, or is it a gritty realistic drama and that's why the singular source of conflict is homophobia? It tries to be both at once and ends up less than the sum of its parts, IMO.

blusocket

I really enjoyed Heartstopper but I am one of those insufferable millennial queers who was raised by fanfiction lol. I think your criticisms are spot-on; I found the show charming, well-acted and well-paced, but the question of why sex and swearing should be removed from teen dramas for younger audiences but homophobia and sexual assault is A-OK is truly perennial, and I agree that the answer isn't to completely remove anything resembling conflict in the name of good representation but to just write better shows. I also feel frustrated with online discourse that treats the creation of commercial art about queer people for a mass audience as just a checklist of good things to include and bad things to avoid rather than something deserving complexity, nuance and care for the ways queer people actually live, warts and all, so I really appreciate your videos. Thanks for the food for thought!

Verity Ritchie

Haha no one can blame you for enjoying anything Lena Headey is in!

Helen

These are really good critiques, although personally I did really like heartstopper. But I love the comic so I came to the show really ready to love it. I do wish they’d kept the profanity and drinking and acknowledgement that teens have sex (the comic, as you pointed out, does include these things), but I do like that Charlie and Nick wait to have sex until they’ve been together for a while because that does happen too and a lot of tv about teens has everyone having sex really early in their relationships (which is fine, that happens, I just like a variety of types of relationships and ways of engaging in sexuality). I hope they censor the second season less, since they do drink in the comic when they go to Paris. I also agree I would have loved more body type diversity. And maybe an acknowledgment that Tara and Darcy are probably fucking. Still liked the show though and look forward to its second season whenever that happens

Denni

I became a patron just now because of this video, so you successfully baited this queer! It‘s interesting to me how i almost never have the same perception of series/films as you but i can totally see it now that you pointed it out. I really liked heartstopper but it also left a bitter taste for me, probably because it‘s unrealisticly sweet compared to real relationships. Also: what the fuck is isaac?? How can you make someone a part of the main friend group and bearely give him any lines.. he really feels like a token character for more body diversity

Verity Ritchie

I am curious where the second season goes! Maybe it'll mature with age like a fine wine!

Verity Ritchie

Oh that's really interesting, Denise! And yeah what the fuck is the deal with Isaac, that bothered me a lot. I had expected he would pull a Silent Bob and be a big deal in the final episode or something, but he just faded away...

August

It always makes my day to see a new video from you, thanks for this one! I haven’t watched Heartstopper yet (unclear if I will) but it’s good to hear an opinion that isn’t just “it’s the next best thing in queer rep”

Luciiamone

I loved your take, I hadn't thought about any of that after watching Heartstopper. Honestly I just watched it for the fluffy feeling, and it delivered. "We have low standards" uff yesss. When I first started looking for lgbtq+ movies online (illegally) I would watch anything! The amount of bad quality films I have seen just because they are centered around queer characters is insane. I forgive them cause they were mainly low cost productions, but mainstream stuff can do better!

Alex

That comparison to Eighth Grade was really effective!

Bestlaf

Finally someone dares to say it: Kids are valid! More seriously, and as a lot of people have already made good points, and I haven't watched Heartstopper (yet?), my own self-centred two cents: coming from a country that barely censors with respect to language, seeing shows being marked as 14+ on the basis of two swear words is always hilarious.

Juls K

I haven't seen Heartstopper because I don't have Netflix, but I read the first two volumes of the comic. I didn't hate it, but I also didn't love it, and ultimately gave up on it, so I was curious to see what you thought of the show. Everyone has been saying it's great and I suspected this was because the show is extremely cute, sweet and non-threatening which, ok, but that bothers me. It bothered me about the books, too, even though there was more swearing, drinking and sex. It just reads like a heterosexual love story in many ways - a particularly "nice" one - and I'd rather see heterosexual people expand their conceptions of romance, sex, gender, and relationships than see queer people conform to cis, heterosexual standards. And also expand their ideas of what's "good," "cute," or "wholesome" for that matter. I won't tell Jessie about Discovery. I burst out laughing when I saw that!

gal fieri

I really enjoyed Heartstopper but I totally see your points. I think perhaps given all the similarly selectively sanitized network 80s/90s/early 00s teen/kids shows I watched, it didn't seem ALL that strange to me. Of course, we're a good number of years past that era AND it's on a streaming network, so it doesn't make much sense and doesn't really do the show any favors. Had a nice time enjoying the cotton candy fluff, but I wouldn't mind something stronger next season!

Verity Ritchie

For sure, I will definitely check out the next season to see if they stick to this way of doing thing!

Verity Ritchie

Its interesting to think, if this *was* a straight romance and Charlie was a girl being rescued by Nick...I feel like it would register as quite sexist? I think some of these things would seem even more inappropriate maybe.

Verity Ritchie

Someone has to stick up for the kids 😔 No awards, please!

Verity Ritchie

I will definitely watch anything regardless of budget and quality (classic doctor who fan after all!). But some of these choices were just bizarre, I think!

Emily Kugler

Yay for time lapse flowers dying.

Emily Kugler

I also finally joined your Patreon because of this video.

Ju Lucent

This is so good and eye opening, thank you.

Verity Ritchie

if you xray my heart, that's all that comes up on the screen 🌸💀

Lexington Katzakian

Loved this. You elegantly put into words the way I feel about a lot of these uncompelling fluffy queer stories. I struggled through Red White and Royal Blue by Casey McQuinston because, although it does have plenty of swearing and sex, it suffers from this same problem of the only conflict coming from low-stakes homophobia. Maybe I'm just too bitter for very fluffy things, but there's something about stories like this that feel vague and unsatisfying.

The Children of Jack Acid

I once got to ask Chuck D of Public Enemy why he had supported Vanilla Ice back in the 90s, when his style was so commercial. And he said "there was strength in diversity"--that he was trying to promote hip hop as a genre, and he knew it would be more successful if there were artists of all stripes, so people could pick the flavor of hip hop they liked best. MAYYYYBE the same can be said for queer teen coming-of-age dramas? Even if it doesn't seem logical to me that teenagers would find solace in a representation that seems so milquetoast, clearly many do. Perhaps, in fact, some young people were PINING for representation that was as chaste as a Disney kids program. I still don't think this excuses why the show leans so heavily on anti-queer violence versus, I dunno, ANY OTHER PLOT DEVICE (whatever happened to "we wrecked the car and my parents will be home in 3 days, how are we going to get out of this pickle!! Hey, look at YOUR pickle...). But it does make sense to me that it does not weaken queer TV for there to be a show for the prudes.

Verity Ritchie

I mostly agree, although I think the straight equivalent netflix coming of age dramas are much less prudish? I don't want a sexy version of heartstopper or anything, but this does seem to be *more* censored than any straight equivalent, and that is odd. But hey, if people enjoy it, that's fine too ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Asaf Sagi

Excellent video! I personally wouldn't mind if this went public. I think it's a great take that many viewers can benefit from.

evergardenwall

I'm only halfway through this video and had to pause it to leave a comment because... wow. Your criticism is on point and you are making many important points. I wouldn't mind if it went public, either- like Asaf Sagi, I think it's a breakdown viewers like me (who had watched and loved Heartstopper) would benefit a lot from. Like, really. It made me rethink my opinion of the show and question what might have influenced it :)

evergardenwall

Also! the youths (me, age 19) love listening to you shitting on things; getting to hear a different perspective even allows them to think about these things in more depth :D so, thank you so much for your work, it is valued 💌

Verity Ritchie

Haha, thank you evergardenwall! I will do my best to continue to be the grumpiest old cow I can be! 🤣

Ami

I was thinking about becoming a patreon and when I saw this video, I was sold haha As a 28yo demi-bisexual, I really loved the show, but I do see your criticism! I also loved how you presented it and I can totally see it not being for everyone! I for example did love the animation callbacks to the comics or how fluffy the show was. I do think that Alice being aroace shows through in the characters a lot but that's what I liked about it, even though I didn't realise it at first.
I did find it odd though, that they cleaned up the swearing so much but left the homophobia in and also made Ben a more reaccuring role. I do hope they let Nick and the others swear in season 2+3 or let them drink in Paris like in the comics haha Also yes!! where is Isaac? I think Alice mentioned that they planed an aroace story line for him in season 2 so I’m very excited for that. I also agree that body diversity isn't great but I do love the cast so much and I liked their performances. It's clear that it's the first time in front of the camera for some of them, but honestly I love that they were given a chance and I can only imagine that they'll get better with more seasons to come. Anyways these were just some of my random thoughts! I do love seeing opinions on things I love that are different to mine so I appreciate your video a lot! And since it’s the first time for me commenting on your content after being a youtube lurker for a while - thank you for the amazing videos you put out there! Can’t wait to discover and watch the extra content here <3

Verity Ritchie

Thank you, Ami! And thanks for the support! :D Yeah I am curious about season 2, I will at least check out the first episode. People keep telling me about this Paris storyline from the comics, that does sound intriguing!

Chewylea

I agree with all of this Helen. Out of 5 planned volumes for the graphic novel, volumes 1 and 2 which make up season one of the show, are like a very slow 1st Act.

Chewylea

So I have been a fan of the graphic novels for a few years, but I am fully aware that I like stories that are sometimes crap (partner refers to my favorite genre as "sexy supernatural" and we all know what sort of shows are prevalent there 😒) . Anyways I think the biggest thing here is tv ratings boards... Possibly in planning for a global release and wanting to keep this in teen brackets limited what language was allowed. PG-13 movies in the US get maybe 1 pre-approved f-bomb. Books have different ratings policies so a YA book can be less sanitized I guess.

Vicky P

Have to say, as a bi mummy to two tween/teen boys who are still building their sexualities, I loved this show and the choices they made. Fuck, I loved this show as a middle-aged woman who just needs a break from the the world imploding. Haha.

Hope (bladesandstars)

Been thinking about not watching both of these, and these reviews confirmed that I probably don't want to. Always love your thoughts on things and this is no exception.

Bram

From the perspective of a queer 20 year old: I adored Heartstopper. Exclusively because of its 'innocence' and purity. I grew up watching shows like skins and euphoria and those damaged my perception of queerness completely. I thought it was refreshing to watch a show from a completely different point of view! But I agree with your analysis and appreciate it as always! <3

Inês Silva

i always love your videos because it's refreshing considering most of the stuff i see on twitter boils down to "it's gay so we have to watch it" i would love to hear your thoughts on the amazon prime series "a league of their own"

Verity Ritchie

Thank you Inês! I haven't actually started A League of Their Own yet, but I look forward to it!

Mel Venn

So many feels. this middle aged queer got to the end of high school without even knowing we existed, and gulping down ever little bit of trashy mainstream representation she could find... it's interesting to adjust to a world where we have access to such a spectrum of quality of queer representation that skipping the problematic stuff is a thing. That said, I might have cried through Heartstopper wishing my high-school self had known it was ok (or real) to be in love with another girl.

Verity Ritchie

I mean, who skips the problematic stuff? I don't! I think it's okay to enjoy whatever you enjoy, and if Heartstopper means something to you then that's totally okay! :D

Mavka

Omg yes! I did like heartstopper cause I like cute stuff, but I read the comic too, and some changes(like flashing out side characters) were nice, fun, but some are a bit weird. For example, in comic Charlie was popular, even though he was bullied before - people liked him. I guess they needed to make it more dramatic. But why do we always need to watch queer people suffer? The assailant is also different - more aggressive, serious, more scary id say. They could 'enrich' the plot in another way. Disappointing..