“Hubo solo esta hermosa apertura”: detrás de escenas de la temporada más candente de Heartstopper | Televisión”

But I think that Elle has really grown into her skin and has become more comfortable with her body and herself.”

As the cast and crew prepare to wrap up filming series three, the atmosphere on set is a mix of excitement and reflection. “It’s quite sad,” says Locke. “It’s like leaving school for the last time.” But they are all eager to see the impact of the show’s new direction. “This season is a lot grittier and darker,” says Gao. “I hope that we can do it justice and that people see that side of it.”

And perhaps that is the source of my unease – the knowledge that Heartstopper is taking a risk, moving into darker territory to explore the complexities of mental health and relationships in a way that is authentic and honest. But if the success of the first two series is anything to go by, it seems likely that the show will handle these topics with the care and sensitivity that has endeared it to fans around the world.

“And I think it really shows this season – it’s more about being comfortable with someone, but Tao and Elle have been best friends for so many years.”

“I’m so happy we’re telling this part of their story,” says Gao. “And we put a lot of work into discussing it first.” Rehearsals featured discussions with the team – including an intimacy director – on how to approach it in the right way. “ We were like: ‘Yaz, tell us about your experiences,’ and she led the conversation, which was really inspiring. That meant that when we came to shoot it, there was just this beautiful openness.”

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And after Elle’s artwork goes viral on social media, she is invited for a radio interview about her work, only to be unexpectedly cornered and asked to respond to transphobic comments. “This season we have an air of realism with what she goes through when she’s being questioned,” says Finney. “It’s not like some of the shows with trans representation, where you have negatives – they’re getting bullied, or hate-crimed. It’s more like small nuances of transphobia, sort of like journalism … all that stuff I have had to experience as Yasmin as well.”

Flowered up … Writer Scott Bryan on the set of Heartstopper. Photograph: Samuel Dore/Netflix

Bridgerton’s Jonathan Bailey also makes an appearance, cameoing as Jack Maddox, a celebrity and author who Charlie has a crush on. His appearance came about after Patrick Walters bumped into him at Glastonbury. “He came up to me and was like: ‘Oh my god, Heartstopper, I love it.’ He was so effusive. And he’s such a sweet, lovely man.”

It’s another lovely tale to hear. Yet this knot in my stomach just won’t quit. Then I am taken past a mural in the school hallway and I slowly realise why. The artwork is a gigantic blue wave painted on the wall. It is a classic Heartstopper image that looks as if it was hand-drawn by Oseman, bursting with colour and care. I’m told that as this is a filming location, sections of the school have to go back to how they were before. Murals are whitewashed, bright lockers painted back to grey. (“I was just walking through the corridor … and I was like: ‘This is so sad!’ Heartstopper has been literally painted away,” Oseman later reflects.)

Then it hits me. This is the first school I have been in since I left my own 20 years ago. It was a school I was keen to forget after two years of name-calling, homophobia and being singled out by pupils and, looking back, at times even teachers. The first series of Heartstopper caused me to face my own past, a realisation that things could have been better. With bad old memories looping in my head, I sent a letter to my school to ask what had changed. I received a response, highlighting a zero tolerance policy on bullying, adding “as a school, and hopefully as a society, we have come a long way since 2007” and suggesting I could visit.

I jumped at the chance to see first-hand what had changed, yet the correspondence faded to nothing. Perhaps term got in the way, I thought. But given I’m at a school that will slowly turn back to the greyness of my own, a question is racking my brain. Is Heartstopper just a fantasy or a reflection of where we are now?

“I don’t know because I think it varies so much,” replies Oseman. “When I was at school, it was nothing like Heartstopper, obviously. But having been an author of teen fiction, I’ve met a lot of teenagers … who clearly have had quite an accepting upbringing in their school environment that feels worlds away from what my school life was like.

“Heartstopper is, of course, more accepting, aspirational and what we wish all schools and queer experiences could be like.”

That’s the thing about this show. Whatever the world we live in, it gives you hope.

Heartstopper is on Netflix from 3 October.