There could be a meta commentary in there about how school days pass so fast, but it doesn’t feel intentional. Instead of the steady pacing of the first two seasons, season 3 feels like someone pressed fast forward and forgot to let go. But this season has a time skip a few episodes in, jolting Devi and her friends into their junior year and hustling them along so that they can wrap up the school year and get everything in place for the show’s last season. The first two seasons of the show take place in the first half of Devi’s sophomore year. This time around, though, the frenzied pacing means that those arcs have less room. It’s particularly frustrating because these characters are still compelling and their storylines are still engaging - and the previous two seasons took great care in giving every character’s story enough time to gestate. When one of them gets a big story moment, it gets built up for an episode or two before being hastily tied up and put away so that someone else can have the spotlight. But this time, there are just so many characters that some of them naturally fall to the wayside. This is pretty in line with the previous seasons, where Fabiola’s coming out storyline and Eleanor’s complicated relationship with her mother helped to flesh out their character arcs. The show doesn’t just explore the lives of Devi and her friends, but also dives into Ben’s, Paxton’s, Kamala’s, and Devi’s mother’s journeys. Part of the reason is because the cast is just so much bigger. It’s not quite a “one problem per episode” sitcom formula, but it doesn’t have as much throughline this time around compared to seasons past. But this time around, the threads connecting the separate episodes seem thinner than ever. Never Have I Ever is a comedy made up of 30-minute episodes, so some level of episodic detachment is expected. This all seems like enough setup and plot to fuel a whole season, but the show resolves all of those separate plot points pretty quickly - only to introduce completely new problems that also get rapidly solved. At home, Devi’s cousin Kamala (Richa Moorjani) deals with their grandmother’s disappointment after she turned down a marriage proposal. Meanwhile, her friends grapple with their own relationship problems: robotics nerd Fabiola (Lee Rodriguez) tries to navigate a suddenly long-distance relationship theater kid Eleanor (Ramona Young) isn’t even sure if Paxton’s slacker friend Trent (Benjamin Norris) is into her and Devi’s academic rival Ben (Jaren Lewison) keeps flubbing his relationship with athletic Aneesa (Megan Suri). While Devi is finally living her dream of having a relationship with the hottest guy in school, she is still fixated on what other people think about her, which ends up causing her to doubt Paxton’s feelings. Season 3 kicks off with Devi and super popular Paxton (Darren Barnet) making their official debut as a couple - much to the shock and disbelief of the rest of the school, who can’t believe that a nerd like Devi is dating a hot jock. As a result, a lot of what makes the show so special gets lost in the race toward the end. This new season does have some of that, but the creators seem determined to put everything on the fast track to get all the characters where they need to be for season 4 and senior year.
With a fun, eclectic cast to round Devi out, Never Have I Ever succeeded in balancing over-the-top hijinks with genuine heart and really nailed the big feelings of being a teenager. After her father’s death, Devi spent freshman year as a social pariah, and the first two seasons of Never Have I Ever focused on her quest to gain some social status during sophomore year, continue excelling at her studies, and balance her strict mother’s expectations.
#Never have i ever season 3 series#
The Netflix series returns to the life of overachieving high school student Devi Vishwakumar (Maitreyi Ramakrishnan). And for better or worse, the new season of Never Have I Ever decides to speedrun through junior year too. In retrospect, no matter how long and arduous it seemed at the time, high school actually went by in the blink of an eye.
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