Summary
Sex Education Episode 2 sees Maeve and Otis trying to implement their underground sex therapist business, continuing an engaging series.
This recap of Sex Education Season 1 Episode 2 contains spoilers. You can check out our thoughts on the previous episode by clicking these words.
Now that we have been introduced to the core characters, Sex Education Episode 2 gave us a slice of what the Netflix series is all about – the pains of growing up and sex. The second episode finds the characters putting their business plan together – putting an underground sex therapy clinic in place for the students at their school.
The one problem is, Otis (Asa Butterfield) is not the type of person you would associate yourself with getting relationship advice from, so when Maeve (Emma Mackey) sets up the first counseling session, which looked like a confession in a church, the start of their business ultimately fails.
Otis’s best friend Eric (Ncuti Gatwa) comes up with the idea to sample to the students free advice sessions, in the hope that would kickstart their business. The newly formed gang decide the best place to start this marketing plan is at Amy’s (Aimee Lou Wood) house party, making Otis highly anxious and Eric uncontrollably excited.
Sex Education Episode 2 sells the premise further as Otis manages to perform a counselling session to a torn drunk couple in a bathroom. Otis is beginning to understand the knowledge he has gained by listening to his mother’s therapy sessions.
Meanwhile, Maeve gets sidetracked in Episode 2 after she randomly throws up in the sink. She decides to take a pregnancy test, and the writers choose to frustratingly not confirm the results. However, she is seen later in the episode reading a magazine about babies, which could be a significant giveaway or a way to throw the audience down a specific path.
Interestingly, Maeve throws a line at the person she is sleeping with that I feel holds truth – “I like complex female characters”. I think this line was inserted to prove the point that her peers misunderstand Maeve, but the audience will try and measure her personality fairly. I fully believe that Maeve is a more wild, extroverted version of Otis.
As Sex Education Episode 2 ends, Eric shows the entire party how to perform a blowjob, which is embarrassingly recorded on video for the whole school to see and Otis is getting harassed by worried students who need advice; realising that the sampling worked, he excitedly tells Maeve that the business is up and running. He still has his controlling mother to contend with, but I guess that will be explored further in the later episodes.
