Editor’s Note: The following contains spoilers for Season 4 of Sex Education.
The final season ofSex Educationhas arrived, bringing the arc of every major character in the series to an end. But the main relationship of the show, the one that has been constructed over the course of almost five years, doesn’t really work for anyone involved. Otis (Asa Butterfield) and Maeve (Emma Mackey) were always teased like the ultimate pairing of the story, only for them to lose their momentum as the series moved forward with various storylines.When it was time for the final credits to roll, they didn’t even end up together, while they had already ruined better things in an attempt to come back to each other.
Otis and Maeve Were Never Ready To Have a Relationship in ‘Sex Education’
The first season ofSex Educationintroduced Otis as an awkward teenager with plenty of knowledge about the relation between sexuality and psychology thanks to being the son of remarkable sex therapist, Jean Milburn (Gillian Anderson). Said knowledge allowed the protagonist of the series to give advice to the other teens who studied in Moordale, only for Maeve to come to an agreement with him to charge for any session given. The two were happy with the business they were running, but they were also secretly falling in love with one another.
While Otis' best friend, Eric (Ncuti Gatwa), had reservations about the relationship between the two friends, Milburn continued to believe that Maeve was the perfect partner for him. However, Maeve’s emotional state, due to her complicated family life, couldn’t allow her to accept her feelings for Otis in order to begin a romantic relationship. In the meantime, Otis wasn’t mature enough to find common ground between Maeve’s needs and his own, meaning that their love story couldn’t even begin properly.
And while classes under the supervision of headmaster Groff (Connor Swindles) continued, Otis and Maeve took different paths as soon as they realized that they weren’t on the same page. The characters simply weren’t ready to have a direct conversation about their feelings for each other, and they began seeing other people as a way to stop thinking about what could blossom between them under different circumstances. By the time they realized what they actually wanted, perhaps it was already too late.
A Waste of Time for the Characters
As the relationship between Otis and Maeve simply refused to work, the pair began seeing other people without taking into account a crucial factor about their individual love lives. Time wasn’t going to wait for them to admit they liked each other, looking beyond their pride to allow themselves to live happily. While Otis was focused on getting to know Ola (Patricia Allison) and Maeve was planning to give Isaac (George Robinson) a chance, their lives began to take on a different shape. What seemed to work when they first met one another wasn’t going to be present forever, and if they didn’t capitalize on the opportunity they had in front of them, it could be too late.
Otis and Maeve were becoming different people, and it was noticeable as they continued to grow up over the course of the seasons. At one crucial point, Maeve was tired of being burdened withthe complicated family lifeshe had a home, while Otis wasn’t being considerate to her and an immature friend. In addition to them not being on the same frequency, it started to look as if the series itself was positioning them to remain as the pairing the entire story was headed toward when the characters themselves weren’t in that position anymore.
Their time apart allowed them to discover things, and Maeve didn’t have time tofall in love with anyoneas she was figuring out what she wanted to do with the rest of her life. In the meantime, Otis had to focus on becoming an adult capable of helping his mother with the birth of his sister, and realizing that if he truly wanted to help the students of Moordale (or Cavendish) with their issues he shouldn’t have to charge them at all. But the final nail in the coffin of the doomed relationship was the introduction of better alternatives.
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Otis Did Ruby Dirty Just for Maeve in ‘Sex Education’
When Ruby Matthews (Mimi Keene) first made her way toSex Education, she was introduced as a borderline stereotypical popular girl who didn’t have time to talk to anyone who wasn’t her limited number of friends. But as time carried on, she was actually revealed to be much more than that, becoming one of the more developed characters on the show. During a fateful party where Otis got drunk beyond his mind, the two woke up next to one another, with Ruby confirming that they had slept together the night before.
The characters didn’t seem like a match for one another after their unpredictable encounter, but as they got to know each other better thanks to their casual relationship, it was clear that Ruby was the person who could prove to be a healthy partner for Otis. Not only was the chemistry between the two characters off the charts, but Ruby was confident about her feelings for Otis from the very beginning, while it took Maeve ages to do something about Otis' advances towards her.
Even during the final season of the show, where Otis just used Ruby as a resource to help him in his campaign against O (Thaddea Graham), she still cared deeply about him, but even someone with a big heart like Ruby has a breaking point. When all was said and done by the end ofSex Education, Ruby had decided to look after herself, telling Otis that she didn’t even want to be friends with him anymore. After losing Ruby because he didn’t respect her, Otis also had to deal with Maeve leaving to chase her dreams. Otis and Maeve were never going to work, and they hurt a lot of people in the process of trying to force a relationship thatwouldn’t last for long.
The final season ofSex Educationis streaming on Netflix
