#like yeah. ben from nhie has helped me through a lot.

[alastairstom]

im sorry but i share a very special bond with matthew fairchild that just cannot be replicated with any other character

[egyptian-sun-god]

Never Have I ever S2

SPOILERS.....Turn back now I’m serious.

I’m waiting....

Okay cool your fault at this point

I was fairly critical of NHIE S1, I won’t lie. And I’ll be real I still stand by the fact that NHIE S1 was fairly meh overall. 

But holy shit, they knocked this season outta the world man. The show really really found its proper footing this season. They were smart to keep the cheating for only two episodes and explore the repercussion for the other 8. 

1.Devi Vishwakumar.

Let’s start with the main character.  Devi still does immensely fucked up shit this season. Dating two boys and have them find out in the MOST humiliating way possible. Yikes. Being a really sucky friend to Aneesa and starting that rumour about her (inadvertently) and pretending to her. Stalking her mother and being possessive of her. The really awful apology that was pretty self centred, a bit not good. 

 But she really does do her best to improve and I am SO proud of that. She uses her father’s advice and apologizes better to Aneesa, she actually handled the Ben and Aneesa dating WAAAAY better than I’ve seen some people handle things like that. I might’ve blown a fuse if two of my friends had 4 tickle fights and had major PDA sessions when we were trying to do a group project. Like she handled that shit fairly well all things considered. Devi actually gets into the beginnings of delving into her trauma and her temporary paralysis and healing from it. I

 really see how the label ‘crazy’ weighs on her and how she blew up with it and the message of destigmatizing mental illness. (Crazy Aneesa and Crazy Devi)  Her properly bonding with her mother and watching videos of her father and remembering/honouring his memory hit REALLY HARD (since I lost many people in my family recently and that fear of forgetting them has been real). Devi is actually beginning to heal from the loss of her father by strengthening the relationship with her Amma. And the slap from Paati was so so needed, it really gave her a better respect of her mother and fixed the problem I had with Devi mouthing off so much to her Amma. I live to see good maamiyar marumagal relationships. Her relationship with Paxton is really good and it gets developed very logically and having her be scared of being pathetic but in the end she accepted her own self worth and stopped chasing after them which was good. 

Overall Devi really blossomed into her own developing person and I actually like her so much more this season. 

2. Paxton Hall Yoshida

I was honestly, like genuinely sad last season he was like 80% eye candy with not much else going for him. Paxton had so much faith as a character and Ms Kaling has really pulled him into such a better person this season. 

Paxton got hit by a car before swim season, lost his ticket to college and wow, got two timed by a girl he liked all in two episodes. If he was salty about that for more than one season I would’ve completely accepted it. Cause that’s a bad public humiliation. 

Paxton episode really really made me love him as a character (honestly more so than Ben) I think because I heard Paxton’s entire worry and irritation that he was being underestimated and no one really expected him to go to college from a friend of mine not more than a month ago. That shit is real, and it hurted my friends a lot that people were really underestimating them and just seeing them as a dumb athlete who has no hope of college. It’s really nice to see Paxton actually want to go to college and learn Japanese American side with his Oji-chan giving him advice and supporting him. And him bringing his grandfather to speak about the internment camps, that seriously do not get spoken about enough.

Also him putting effort and making a genuine effort to work hard and bring up his grades with Devi and therefore bonding with her was really nice to see. I wouldn’t mind them being endgame but Devi does really work a lot better as his pushy Indian mom/best friend/tutor.  And Devi getting mad at him for him expecting him to hold his hand throughout really hit well. Was it deserved yeah. But Devi also did blow him off after promising him to study so his anger is justified there. I’m just kinda vibing with Paxton like coming up and taking a better interest in school and being a full 3D character. And that one scene where he gives the extra credit presentation and Trent high fives the man. Classic. 

Can I also just say, it’s kinda valid that Paxton didn’t want to date her in public. Is it a dick move...yeah? But he’s within his rights to ask and she’s within her rights to deny. And he didn’t press her once she said no, he went along with it. And what Devi pulled on him is awful, and speaking as someone who’s seen popular kid cliques. Reputation really is important. Like what Devi did made Paxton lose face, if he gets back with Devi he ain’t gonna have any respect left in him. And Paxton was pretty right in deciding to not date her publicly, like even in the end he knows that his reputation is shot for what he did. Do we even know if Paxton has friends that aren’t fixated on his social status? Because becoming a social pariah without having any support of friends is gonna hurt like a bitch. Lord knows how Paxton gonna deal with it. I think Trent might be his only homie after the social downfall he will inevitably face. 

I’m just gonna say, Paxton is my favourite now and I’m really rooting for him. Something I decidedly did not do last season. I’m happy Ms Kaling developed him so much and got me interested. 

3. Ben Gross

Ah. Ben. Ben’s not my faaavouriteee.......like he’s fine. But I don’t love him. I can definitely see him and Devi becoming an almost endgame couple though. Especially with S2 ending. 

Ben is fine and he’s pretty developed, especially with his episode in S1 and it was good he took a backseat this season and let everyone else star. I feel like he’ll come back strong next season though. 

Personally do I ship him with Devi? No. I’ve been in a friendship with the similar competitive dynamic as Ben and Devi. And it was terrible. We loved to argue and we got each other’s super brainy side as Devi puts it. But we pushed each other faar too much and even the small things became arguments and each pthers achievements became jealousy. So yeah....I don’t have too much faith in the dynamic due to personal bias, but I’d love to see how it gets handled. 

Also my brother Ben, PDA is a thing and it is common courtesy to refrain from it. Man’s really going at it with Aneesa half the time. But also the moment where Aneesa sort of choked on the presentation and Ben’s irritation at it gave me BAAAD vibes. It feels like while Devi can match him, they might push each other too far, 

4. Kamala 

I LOVE KAMALA. Girl is an ENTIRE vibe. My sweetheart, love of my life. I could go on. I really like her development as well and the banter between her and Nalini. The part where Nalini practically said she looked like a call girl and she was like ippadi potathaan velaila mariyaatha kidaikum. I legit had to pause, scream in laughter for a good few seconds. 

They had such a good story with her and wanting to fight against the fact that they took her work and didn’t credit her and everyone was telling her to like take it bowing. Prasanth’s advice unfortunately checked out to me, because I’ve been told that all my life. My dad says it a lot and I know he doesn’t say it cause’ he doesn’t believe in me, but he loves me and wants my life to be easier and for me to succeed and his experience is that he’s had to deal with things like this and fighting won’t help. So yeah, what Prasanth said did not rub me the wrong way at all and I agreed with it and I’m fairly disappointed about that. I get that she got nervous and had cold feet about marriage but I do hope she and Prasanth can work this out through communication. Because I really don’t feel like Prasanth is the bad guy here. It’s just a miscommunication. 

So yeah, a LOT of Kamala’s storyline continues to really hit me hard. 

5. Nalini Vishwakumar

Nalini really had so much more screentime to blossom. I love that she has a good relationship with Mohan’s amma. It’s wonderful and I love it. Also I was shocked to see the house in Chennai. Like this house...in Chennai. The Chennai I’m used to and the Chennai they are used to are different Chennai’s. Basically wealth gap is crazy as hell and I was lowkey highkey confused if the actually shot this shit in Chennai. But props to the directors for putting some proper Tamil vibes in there. Like the scene where they kaala thottu kumbudurathu (touch the elder’s feet) before they leave for the US is so real and so vibes. I like that they decided to bring paati back. I was like hoping for it.

Also they really went at developing Nalini’s character as a workaholic mom who doesn’t get her daughter. That’s also a really common thing in Indian households with one working parent so I’m happy they portrayed that. I’m happy Nalini actually has a life outside her family portrayed and is still such a typical mother that it hits HARD. I love Nalini and she really developed as a character dealing with grief from Mohan’s death, the wish to move on with Dr.Jackson but knowing that she isn’t ready yet. 

They gave her character a life and proper working outside Devi and it really has shown to develop her character and impact her relationship with Devi. The advice to “just say yes” works with cousins and younger siblings as well, I’ve heard it before and used it..and it saves so much time. Especially with small children. 

(A memory I have is of my younger cousin going on and on about a princess and a castle and fighting a dragon and the witches and so much fantasy shit and ended with do you wanna come? I just clocked off my CCA’s and I had no energy left to question it so I just went yeah sure. Easiest decision, and 10/10 advice. )

6. Aneesa

I’m not gonna lie. I was skeptical of Aneesa and I didn’t like how Devi saw her in the trailer. But Aneesa reminds me so much of me....and its killing me. 

Also the scene where she charms the hell out of Nalini and paati ma has literally happened to me before. Most of my Indian friends hate it..because I was raised with a lot more traditional manners with my grandparents so me and my siblings all are old fashioned which parents LOVE. And I really saw that Aneesa charming them and Devi also realizing, Damn none of my friends actually treat my family the way they should be treated, perks of having an Indian friend. 

Also the scene where she gets Devi out of trouble is so so real. Because if you have one responsible friend that you parents trust, you could lie the hell to them, get you homie to back you up and it will work. Personal experience. So yeah, Aneesa character resonated with me a lot.

I also like that she wasn’t just a popular 1D Indian girl but she was genuinely cool and actually had proper issues and development where she gets more open to Sherman Oaks and actually kinda properly rebels against Noor, with having Ben as a boyfriend. 

I feel like Aneesa has a lot more potential for growth, especially with the relationship with Ms Noor and Aneesa acting as a foil to Nalini and Devi’s. Also, I feel like Aneesa can grow within her social status at school as well and have Devi maturely handle it. Aneesa I feel will really really challenge Devi’s ability to be mature. 

7. Eleanor and Fabiola’s plotlines

Okay like actually, major props to Ms Kaling man. This show touches so so many teen issues in one goddamn show. Emotionally manipulative relationships. So SO good. A lot of newer age relationships have a much more subtle and dangerous line of abuse that’s hard to find out. Like honestly it took me a while to see it as well and I realized oh fuck. oh fuck...I see it it’s bad. They really got the essence of Eleanor’s flamboyance matching with Malcom? (is it Malcolm..fuck it it’s Malcolm now) his “suaveness” and traditionally charming tendency. It made sense and it’s very realistic how Eleanor got played like a damn fiddle. I also again feel that the make up was faar to quick but I really appreciate that Eleanor got her own storyline with her step-mom and understanding of relationships instead of the show hyperfocusing on just Devi. I respect that a lot.  Petition to get a Eleanor narration episode. 

Fabiola’s storyline also was well taken. It’s an interesting added layer to the queer experience and how queerness can be expected to be performative and but really its all about being more of yourself. The idea that queer people don’t owe nobody anything or have to perform an ideal version of queerness and Fabiola struggling with that kinda hit. The part where they talked about her mother learning to support them and being Cricket? Queen/King. Like being trailblazers for the POC community and the LGBTQ+ community having overlapping struggles. Again, I liked that Fabiola was getting more personal screentime and less of her story revolving around Devi’s. 

8. Everything else

I liked that there was more Tamil being casually thrown around. Like the Kamala vaadi to hold the suitcase down as they zipped it together was funny and relatable. The accents were really interesting because I promise you, I had no clue what they were saying sometimes. Nalini’s dialogues in Tamil were like immensely difficult to understand, and my Tamil is fluent. This isn’t a criticism... I’m fairly certain the difference is to do with the regional difference. American Tamil and Malaysian + rural Tamil slang are going to have huge accent differences so there’s no surprise that I found Nalini’s Tamil hard to understand. 

I’m really really really meh about the Kamala and Manish/Mr Kulkarni thing. I still think she should sort it out with Prasanth maybe but I’m open to seeing where it goes. I might change my mind with it. 

This show like any other show had its highs and lows. But I really really do feel that NHIE season 2 managed to truly figure out what the hell it wants to do and developed into a very strong and very entertaining show in terms of representation and diversity. I’m looking forward to season 3.