Never have we ever…remembered exactly what happened last season when a TV series is set to drop a brand new chapter, even if we love it with all our hearts. Yes, we’re specifically referring to Mindy Kaling’s teen smash Never Have I Ever, which is returning to Netflix for Season 3 on Aug. 12.
Who got together with who — did Devi pick Ben Gross or Paxton Hall-Yoshida or no one? Why was Kamala pretending to like BLACKPINK and video games at work? What happened at the dance again? We remember something about Fabiola and Eve winning Cricket Queens…
For your convenience, we’ve gone back and recapped the biggest things you need to remember from Season 2 of Never Have I Ever so you’ll be good to hit the school hall running.
*takes deep breath and puts on John McEnroe voice*
1. Devxtoneesaben: The love, uh, rectangle?
Credit: Isabella B. Vosmikova / Netflix
OK, let’s try and summarise the entire Devi-Paxton-Aneesa-Ben situation from Season 2.
Devi (Maitreyi Ramakrishnan) and Ben (Jaren Lewison) kissed at the end of Season 1, but then Paxton (Darren Barnet) confusingly showed up to her house keen as mustard after earlier kissing Devi then icing her out. Devi couldn’t decide, so dated both — without telling either of them. When it all came out at Devi’s party, Paxton stormed out and was hit by a car, which affected his swimming college scholarship chances, so he was begrudgingly paired with Devi for tutoring, and he played on her guilt to get her to do his homework for him. When he decided to actually study, both Paxton’s GPA and their chemistry soared. Devi bailed on him a few times, but that didn’t keep him from crawling in the window later on to kiss her right on the face.
Meanwhile, when Aneesa Qureshi (Megan Suri) joined the school (see section two), sparks flew between her and Ben, and for some reason, Devi didn’t tell her about their past — but she still tried to keep them apart due to lasting feelings. When Devi betrayed Aneesa, Ben requested Devi’s help to get her to stay at Sherman Oaks. It worked. Ben and Aneesa started officially dating, and he asked her to the dance.
Meanwhile, Devi and Paxton kept meeting in secret on Paxton’s request. Devi asked Paxton to the dance but he publicly rejected her, after which Ben gave her a lovely pep talk in the bathroom. Devi realised she deserved a real relationship, and she ended things and went to the dance solo. There, Ben seemed about to ask Devi out but was interrupted by Aneesa. Feeling alone, Devi went outside only to be hit by Paxton’s car. In the street, they decided to make it official and had a big smooch at the dance. Ben looked on in horror, and Eleanor (Ramona Young) delivered a stone cold truth about Devi’s actions this season being fuelled by her feelings for Ben. PHEW. — Shannon Connellan, UK Editor
2. Aneesa joined the crew, Devi betrayed her, then they made up
Credit: Isabella B. Vosmikova / Netflix
Devi was used to being “the one and only nerdy Indian girl at Sherman Oaks”. That didn’t last long. Enter Aneesa!
The new transfer student quickly charmed her peers, much to Devi’s chagrin. In class, Trent (Benjamin Norris) went as far as referring to her as “Devi 2.0” (ouch). Aneesa was indoctrinated into the crew thanks to a sleepover, and Fabiola (Lee Rodriguez), Eleanor, and Devi’s mom Nalini (Poorna Jagannathan) instantly took to her — Aneesa even helped Devi cover up a late night adventure to the piercing parlour.
It was all going well until Aneesa and Ben became interested in each other. This was the last straw for hot-headed Devi, who exploded at the school’s 24-hour relay, accidentally telling the Sherman Oaks’ resident gossip girls, Shira Liedman and Zoe Maytag (Hanna Stein and Aitana Rinab), that Aneesa suffers from an eating disorder. The rumor spread like wildfire. It was frankly not Devi’s best moment, maybe even falling into one of her worst. She was ironically recruited by Principal Grubbs (Cocoa Brown) to find the culprit, hiding in plain sight and letting Shira and Zoe take the fall. Unable to contain her guilt, she finally broke and told Aneesa the truth.
It was frankly not Devi’s best moment, maybe even falling into one of her worst.
This throws a spanner in the works: Devi’s friends were severely unimpressed by her actions, while Aneesa’s mother, Noor (Pooja Kumar) wanted to pull her out of Sherman Oaks. Devi was suspended and forced to spend time with her grandmother, Nirmala (Ranjita Chakravarty), which McEnroe describes as “boring as hell”. Devi snuck out and attempted to apologize to Aneesa. It was very public, very upbeat, and did not win Aneesa over. She eventually delivered a heartfelt, genuine apology that got Aneesa to forgive her — but Aneesa’s mom still wanted her to leave. Finally, Devi got Nalini to intervene with a mother-to-mother conversation, which worked. The whole debacle lasted a few episodes, but Devi and Aneesa’s friendship was eventually salvaged (yay, brown girl power!), even if Devi had to appear OK with Ben and Aneesa dating (see section one).— Meera Navlakha, Culture Reporter
3. Paxton grew up, getting serious about school and himself
Credit: Isabella B. Vosmikova / Netflix
Paxton is a lot of things: primarily, he’s popular and beautiful, as his well-suited narrator Gigi Hadid explains. But he is not a dedicated student, which everyone from his guidance counselor to his parents seem to recognize. Since Devi inadvertently injured him (in addition to two-timing him, see section one), he had to get his grades up for a chance at a good college. This wasn’t easy. Paxton’s school counselor, Jennifer Warner (Alexandra Billings), paired him with all-star student Devi for academic help, and while he cheated at first, Devi motivated him to make an effort and care — instead of just blowing up watermelons with Trent while Devi did the work.
Paxton’s maturation in Season 2 culminated in one of the season’s most touching scenes. He voluntarily accepted an extra credit assignment, getting his grandfather, Theodore Yoshida (Clyde Kusatsu), to speak to the class about his experiences as a Japanese American, delivering a first-hand account of his wrongful imprisonment at the U.S. government internment camp in California, Manzanar, where over 110,000 Japanese immigrants were incarcerated during World War II. It’s an incredibly emotional scene. — M.N.
4. Kamala survived a sexist, shitty workplace and found her voice
Credit: Isabella B. Vosmikova / Netflix
Kamala had a terrible time in Season 2, but she got the hell out of it. Working in a research lab lab for her PhD, she both excelled at her job and had to pretend to be interested in (what the show thinks is) nerd culture to survive outright sexism from her coworkers. This included her misogynistic boss, Evan Safstrom (P. J. Byrne), who treated her like an intern and excluded her not only from social outings but left her name as a co-author out of the draft paper the team was working on, even though Kamala made the key discovery.
With the help of fed-up colleague Setseg (Eugene Prokofiev) and inspiration from Devi for never taking no for an answer, she found the power to rightly get her name in the paper published in the Journal of Cellular Biology and stand up for herself in this festering petri dish of privileged, self-serving white men. Can’t say the same level of support came from her fiancé, Prashant (Rushi Kota), though (see section six). — S.C.
5. Fabiola and Eve won Cricket Queens — and each other’s hearts
Credit: Isabella B. Vosmikova / Netflix
Yay! We love Fabioleve. Fabiola and Eve (Christina Kartchner) got together at the end of Season 1 after Fab came out, and in Season 2, they enjoyed a frankly delightful new teen relationship together. The only (tiny) problem? Fab was feeling out of the loop on lesbian pop culture references (specifically, Killing Eve, The L Word, King Princess) and struggled to balance finding her place among Eve’s queer friends and keeping her place in the robotics club. But everything worked out, and Fab and Eve were crowned Cricket Queens at the dance, where they told each other… they’re in love! Way to go. — S.C.
6. Prashant and Kamala did long distance but cracks appeared
Credit: Isabella B. Vosmikova / Netflix
Kamala’s office is drenched in misogyny and sexism, but she persevered (see section four). It would have helped, though, if her fiancé Prashant was a tad more considerate. On a visit to California, after doing long-distance for a while, Prashant visited Kamala and displayed a massive lack of empathy regarding her professional circumstances. Red flag alert. So when Prashant’s parents came to visit (for an alleged “proposal dinner”), Kamala made a choice.
Before Prashant could propose, she left the dinner and headed to Devi’s school dance, where Devi’s favorite teacher, Mr. Manish Kulkarni (Utkarsh Ambudkar), was delighted to see Kamala. Manish had expressed interest in her throughout the season, but this was her first time reciprocating. This happened in the final episode of the season, likely – or hopefully – foreshadowing a new romance on the horizon. — M.N.
7. Nalini and Chris started dating, Devi freaked out
Credit: Isabella B. Vosmikova / Netflix
Nalini and fellow doctor Chris Jackson (Common) had a bit of an enemies-to-lovers narrative in Season 2, initially bickering and competing, but slowly bonding. They formed an extremely sweet relationship, especially when Chris helped Nalini out with a parenting problem. But unfortunately for them, Devi discovered her mom “giggling like a thirsty teenager” in Chris’ car. In classic Devi style, she stalked her mom, found her on a dinner date, and later saw them kiss in his office. By then, Nalini had broken off the relationship for the sake of her daughter and for herself, still grieving her husband, Mohan. She tearfully told Chris she wasn’t quite ready. It was a short-lived relationship, but I’m sure most fans would agree that it was lovely to see Nalini that happy (even if Devi couldn’t take it). — M.N.
8. Eleanor dated teen star (and complete tool) Malcolm Stone
Credit: Isabella B. Vosmikova / Netflix
Our girl Eleanor made some choices in Season 2, one of which saw her leaving dear sweet Oliver Martinez (Martin Martinez) for former Disney channel star, fake Shakespeare utterer, and total prick Malcolm Stone (Tyler Alvarez). He’s a controlling, narcissistic, and manipulative boyfriend. When Fabiola thought Malcolm might have been cheating on Eleanor, Devi and Fab confronted her, but she flipped and iced them out. Malcolm later dumped Eleanor via text (extremely rude) and the three all made up. So, by the end of Season 2, Eleanor went to the dance solo like Devi — catching the eye of a certain surprise sommelier/YouTube reaction reactor Trent in the last few moments of the finale (even though he got her name wrong. Dude, seriously?). — S.C.
This piece mentioned a Never Have I Ever storyline involving an eating disorder. If you feel like you’d like to talk to someone about your eating behavior, call the National Eating Disorder Association’s helpline at 800-931-2237. You can also text “NEDA” to 741-741 to be connected with a trained volunteer at the Crisis Text Line or visit the nonprofit’s website for more information.
