The best romantic drama on Hulu isn't the one everyone is talking about

Ever since it first started airing on Hulu (and Disney+) in February, Love Story has been one of the most talked-about dramas on the platform. And why not? It’s about the romance between John F. Kennedy Jr. (Paul Anthony Kelly) and Carolyn Bessette (Sarah Pidgeon) in the 1990s, a romance that still lingers in the American imagination. Who doesn’t love watching the imagined intimate moments of the rich and famous?

While that can be fun, there’s also a time for romance that’s a bit more…normal.

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Normal People is the best romantic drama on Hulu

An achingly quiet story

Normal People is based on the 2018 book of the same name by Sally Rooney. It’s about a pair of Irish teenagers, Connell (Paul Mescal) and Marianne (Daisy Edgar-Jones), who are pulled and pushed together over a period of years. They meet when they’re in secondary school (which is European for high school), when Connell is a popular rugby player from a working class family and Marianne a social outcast from an upper class one. They’re attracted to one another, but Connell insists on keeping the relationship secret lest his friends think less of him. It’s a stupid position to take, but teenagers are often stupid, so it tracks.

After that situation predictably ends badly, Connell and Marianne reunite later at university, where they’re a little wiser and their positions are switched: Marianne is finding it easier to make friends while Connell is anxious and awkward in this more elite, affluent environment. Nevertheless, their attraction persists, and they try to make another go of it despite being stymied by obstacles like money, miscommunications, and other realities of young adult life. The show walks us through their lives as they mature out of adolescence, and finally leaves them as they take another big step into their futures.

There’s a lot of yearning in Normal People, which is the engine of any good romance story: desire deferred. With the help of directors Hettie Macdonald and Lenny Abrahamson (who brings the same sense of intimacy to his episodes of Normal People that he brought to the 2015 movie Room, which earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Director), the show sees both Connell and Marianne with a lot of sensitivity. They only seem to completely be themselves when they’re together, but they’re held back by insecurities a lot of viewers can identity with. And because they’re so young, who they are is changing all the time. We want them to get together, but sometimes it’s hard to get the timing right.

There is a still, patient, literary quality to Normal People that a lot of romance stories lack. The show luxuriates in the conversations between Connell and Marianne, finding meaning in quick glances and subtle gestures. There are a lot of intimate scenes, but they’re there to develop the characters, not for their own sake. What emerges is a picture of a complex, well-developed romance, with Edgar-Jones and Mescal ably stepping up to the plate the whole way through.

Normal People vs Love Story

“Truth” vs “Reality”

And it’s not that Love Story doesn’t have moments of sensitivity and grace, but it’s also a bit drunk on its own importance. Love Story seems to want to be the American version of The Crown, part tender romance and part epic historical drama, the Kennedy family being the closest thing the United States has to British royalty.

But the show catches itself in a trap. As a historical drama, it doesn’t pass muster, with some of the real-life figures it portrays even calling the show out for getting it wrong. That’s not too surprising, as executive producer Ryan Murphy has a history of exaggerating the truth in the name of entertainment, as seen on other shows like Monster and American Crime Story.

But as a romance, Love Story is sullied by the fact that it also has to be a history biopic. Love Story doesn’t try to reckon with the wider meaning of the Kennedy legacy or with John Jr.’s tragic romance with New York City fashion publicist Carolyn Bessette. It concerns itself mainly with details of their private lives, details it often makes up. But if you’re going to make up the story anyway, why choose to center it around actual public figures at all, and ones who can no longer weigh in, at that? As historical dramas go, there are definitely better options out there, including better period romances.

Love Story has its moments, but the show can feel a lot more like fantasy than Normal People, even though some of the things in Love Story actually happened and everything in Normal People is made up.

Normal People is beautiful and bingeable both

There’s room for everybody at Hulu

And there is a place for glossy fantasy; far be it for me to pass judgment on anyone who likes soaking up Love Story’s rarefied vibes. But I think that Normal People is the more careful, intense, and meaningful show. Add it to the list of great Hulu series that should be better known than they are.

Plus, every episode of Normal People is around 30 minutes or less, so it’s an easy show to binge. If you watch it in the right mood, you might find that all 12 episodes fly by without you realizing.

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Thank you to Normal People for launching Paul Mescal’s career

It’s also worth noting that Connell was the breakout role for Paul Mescal, who’s gone on to star in stuff like Gladiator II as well as the Oscar-winning film Hamnet, where he played William Shakespeare. It’s fun to see him just starting out. But even without that little factoid, Normal People is more than good enough to recommend itself.