Young Royals season 2 spoilers follow.
If you were pushed to sum Young Royals up in just one sentence, you might say that it's Heartstopper meets The Crown with a bit of Skam's Scandinavian angst thrown in for good measure. And that would be pretty accurate.
Young Royals is a gay teen love story, after all, and the Crown's machinations regularly impede that love, echoing the real-life problems British royals like Princess Margaret face in Netflix's other royal show.
Omar Rudberg, who plays Simon, has even told Gay Times how much he'd love to see a Young Royals/Heartstopper crossover, an idea he describes as "f**king iconic" and "amazing".
And that's true as well. Because it really would be "f**king iconic" to see the two shows connect. We're sure Simon and Wilhelm could learn a lot from how Nick and Charlie navigated their own love story in Heartstopper season one.
But Young Royals is very much its own beast still, and not just because it predates Heartstopper by a year (on screen, at least). Like Skam, Young Royals feels painfully real at times, capturing all the drama and awkwardness that sums up everyday life as a teenager.
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That's pretty remarkable for a show that revolves around Sweden's Crown Prince and the struggles he faces at an extremely posh boarding school. In the wrong hands, Young Royals could have felt far more elitist and removed from real life than it actually is.
Instead, we have a show that's perhaps even more relatable than Heartstopper — which is already very relatable — thanks largely to its more mature and realistic approach to teen sex.
That's not to say Heartstopper's innocent approach to love is a bad thing. For many, that show is actually very typical of teen experiences in the UK, worlds removed from the drug-addled horniness of shows like Euphoria. But said horniness does exist too, and Young Royals impressively straddles that fine line between these two extremes with what looks like ease.
Season one set that initial tone with awkward fumbles and cute little moments that feel like they were ripped straight out of someone's diary. Where else would you see teenagers joke about each other's morning breath or turn up the volume on their game so their parents can't hear them have sex?
And thankfully, season two continues this trend, fully aware that this was a key strength of the first season.
Young Royals season two spoilers follow — this is your final warning!
That's probably why the new premiere opens immediately with an intimate kissing scene. Sure, it turns out to be a dream, but given how Simon and Wilhelm left things in season one, anything else would have felt disingenuous at this point.
As the new episodes progress, we find Simon and Wilhelm struggling to cope without having each other in their lives. Simon briefly turns to someone new, a boy named Marcus, while Wil surprisingly hooks up with his best friend, Felice.
Again, watching them both stumble through their pain, desperate for physical comfort, rings very true for anyone who's suffered a devastating breakup with their first love. So basically, almost everyone who's watching this show then.
The consequence of this separation is that there's somewhat less queer content this time around, at least, in a physical sense. We're back again to awkward glances and simmering tension for the majority of this season. That is, until the end of episode five when Simon and Wil finally reunite — this time, with the curtains closed, thank goodness.
At the start of season two's final episode, the pair wake up together, but with the cold light of day comes the realisation that their relationship doesn't work still, not unless someone compromises in a big way.
Simon ends up being the one to do that, telling Wil later in the episode that he's willing to be a secret until they're 18 "if that's the only way." But there should be "no more secrets between us," he adds.
This scene is shot with a really beautiful intimacy, full of close-ups that pay attention to the loving way they hold hands or hug and even whisper "I love you" at one point in each other's ear.
But Young Royals isn't afraid to get a bit messy when it comes to intimacy too. In episode three, August and Sara bring the awkward energy of early kiss scenes into something more physical, and we even see August rip open a condom packet at one point too. Scenes like this might not appear often on other teen shows, but they sure do happen a lot in real life.
Malte Gårdinger, the actor who plays August, put it best during an exclusive chat with Digital Spy where he said:
"I think our idea of it was to make it fun and sort of awkward. Because it is sometimes sort of awkward. But in a good way. It doesn’t have to be cringey – that sort of awkward. It can be this sort of beautiful awkwardness. I hope we hopefully capture that sort of realistic awkwardness with the fiddling of the condom, and the little giggles, and the fumbling around."
Scenes like this or the hug shared between Wil and Simon are worlds away from the stylised sex scenes we've become so used to seeing on other shows that try and often fail to accurately capture teen experiences on screen.
But it's not just sex that sets Young Royals apart from other shows of its ilk. Huge swathes of time are also given to the emotions that bubble under the surface, the resentment and longing that Simon and Wilhelm swing between from scene to scene. There's a nuance here that's often lacking in other similar shows, aside from Heartstopper, of course, which also prioritises the inner feelings of its characters.
This all comes to the surface right at the end of the season when these emotions erupt, first in a tense hunting rifle scene, and then again at the end when Wilhelm breaks with tradition and announces his love for Simon to the world.
What makes this so impactful though is how Young Royals chooses to be so selective with these moments.
Aside from that final speech, there are no grand gestures here, no boombox declarations or romantic ferris wheel rides. Instead, the show's focus remains on these smaller details, those coy looks and secret kisses that characterise the innocent, sheer joy of teen love as it actually is, not in the movies.
During another exclusive chat, this time with Omar Rudberg, the star who plays Simon told us this is why he thinks the show appeals to so many people outside of Sweden:
"We really work on showing what teenagers actually look like, and what teenagers go through, how teenagers feel, and what they do when they feel some things... showing real teenagers, basically, and real love, and real relationships, and how it goes in life when you’re a young teen and you’re in love, or when a friend does something stupid and you get really upset about it."
It also helps that the actors playing these roles actually look like teens. Even the casting is geared towards this intrinsic need for authenticity, which helps make Young Royals even more special for young audiences watching back home.
As Rudberg puts it, "I just think that people can relate so much to this series because we’re trying to tell this story as true as possible."
And now that Wilhelm can finally be honest and open about his feelings for Simon, we're hoping to see a lot more of this unfold within a healthier relationship moving forward in season three. Now wouldn't that be "f**king iconic"?
Young Royals seasons 1 and 2 are now available to watch on Netflix.
Netflix/Left Bank Pictures The Crown season 3 with Amazon exclusive box artwork
After teaching in England and South Korea, David turned to writing in Germany, where he covered everything from superhero movies to the Berlin Film Festival.
In 2019, David moved to London to join Digital Spy, where he could indulge his love of comics, horror and LGBTQ+ storytelling as Deputy TV Editor, and later, as Acting TV Editor.
David has spoken on numerous LGBTQ+ panels to discuss queer representation and in 2020, he created the Rainbow Crew interview series, which celebrates LGBTQ+ talent on both sides of the camera via video content and longform reads.
Beyond that, David has interviewed all your faves, including Henry Cavill, Pedro Pascal, Olivia Colman, Patrick Stewart, Ncuti Gatwa, Jamie Dornan, Regina King, and more — not to mention countless Drag Race legends.
As a freelance entertainment journalist, David has bylines across a range of publications including Empire Online, Radio Times, INTO, Highsnobiety, Den of Geek, The Digital Fix and Sight & Sound.
