Welcome to Essex College, the prestigious university in Vermont on Sex Lives of College Girls. Essex looks to be a fictionalized version of an Ivy University in the likes of Brown, Harvard, Yale, or Cornell. In the fall of 2021, Mindy Kaling and co-creator Justin Noble brought to us this new comedy series on HBO Max. We are introduced to freshmen college roommates Whitney (Alyah Chanelle Scott), Kimberly (Pauline Chalamet), and Bela (Amrit Kaur) who are genuinely stoked to be assigned together. Leighton (Reneé Rapp), their fourth roommate, is a little less excited as she thought she’d be rooming with two friends from high school. The four come from very different backgrounds, but as most college roommates do, they wind up bonding and realizing that they have to be there to support each other no matter what. Season 2 premieres November 17th, but before we move forward, we have to look back. Here’s a reminder of where we left the girls in Season 1.
Whitney
Whitney is a superstar soccer player who also happens to be the daughter of a U.S. Senator (Sherri Shepherd). Whitney is by all accounts very talented on the soccer field, but it is clear that some of her new teammates believe she may just be there because of good old-fashioned nepotism. It also didn’t help that she was having a secret love affair with her assistant coach, Dalton (James Morosini). Dalton tells Whitney repeatedly that his marriage is over, even if it isn’t the slightest bit true. When he finally does break it off with her, she is devastated and decides to have a one-night fling with Kimberly’s co-worker, Canaan (Chris Meyer).
Soon enough, the rumor of her affair comes out and she decides to come clean to her best friend on the team, Willow (Renika Williams), and eventually Coach Woods (Jillian Armenante). She also finds out that she was not the only student that Dalton had been having affairs with in his coaching years. Dalton is fired, but unfortunately, so is Coach Woods in a devastating side effect. Afraid of how her teammates will react, she apologizes but is thrilled to find that they support her and remind her that he was in a power position over her, and it was his responsibility to stop it before it got out of control. Whitney, feeling more confident, re-examines her hookup with Canaan and realizes he may be more than just a one-night stand. When her mother finds out, she is also apologetic to her daughter that she made Whitney feel like she couldn’t come to her in her time of need. The two vow to have more open communication going forward.
Kimberly
Probably the most naive of the four, Kimberly hails from a majorly white small town in Arizona. She is very eager to prove to everyone that she is open-minded and an aggressive ally, sometimes in a harmless, but overbearing manner. She is definitely aware that she is the poorest of her crew and has to take a job at a campus coffee shop with Canaan and another co-worker, Lila (Ilia Isorelýs Paulino), who both constantly tease her about her naïveté. On her first weekend, her high school boyfriend, Max (Matthew Gold), comes to visit, and they lose their virginity to each other. Afterward, Max promptly breaks up with her, sending Kimberly into a rage. She finds herself with an immediate crush on Leighton’s brother, Nico (Gavin Leatherwood), and manages to get him to tutor her in her French class.
The two bond and wind up sleeping together.. a lot. Kimberly is so addicted to their sex life, she begins to blow off work shifts and classes. This results in her falling behind in her schoolwork. Nico offers her a copy of her upcoming Economics exam since his fraternity has files of exams from all professors on campus. Against her better judgment, she uses it and gets caught almost immediately. Even worse, she finds out that Nico has a girlfriend who has been studying abroad. Infuriated, she decides to steal the exams from the fraternity house and use it as collateral for the disciplinary board. It works. They don’t expel her, but she does lose her scholarship which puts her in quite a predicament.
Leighton
Leighton coming to Essex seems more like a family tradition than a choice. Her brother Nico goes there and her father, Henry (Rob Heubel), is an overly proud alumnus. Nico incessantly nudges her to date one of his fraternity brothers, but the truth is, Leighton is deep in the closet and instead has a whole secret dating life. When she’s caught vandalizing a campus statue, she is sentenced to 100 hours of community service at the on-campus women’s center. Leighton dreads her new assignment, but she winds up getting to know a lot of the people there who are all working through a variety of sexuality and gender issues. Although Leighton doesn't come out, she does learn a lot by hearing and aiding in others' struggles.
Leighton bonds with the head of the women’s center Alicia (Midori Francis), and even convinces her to attend one of Nico’s fraternity parties to show her that not all fraternities are bad. The evening goes pretty badly, but it does end up with Leighton kissing Alicia and the two striking up a relationship. The problem is, Alicia doesn’t want to get dragged back into the closet and Leighton seems to have no interest in coming out any time soon, if at all. Alicia breaks it off with Leighton. As hard as she tries, she cannot get over Alicia and winds up in bed depressed and crying. Even though she loves to push her roommates away, when Kimberly shows up to comfort her, Leighton lets her. She also comes out to her and confesses how scared she is about never getting Alicia back.
Bela
Bela is desperate to be a comedy writer and enrolled in Essex mainly to be a part of their famous Comedy magazine, "The Catullan" (which looks to be loosely based on The Harvard Lampoon). Bela’s strict Indian parents are under the impression that she is there to study medicine, but she only has comedy on the brain. She is outspokenly sex-positive and wants to know details of everybody’s sex lives all the time. She finds out quickly that The Catullan is very exclusive and majorly male-dominated. She uses unusual tactics to get noticed by the editors including giving hand jobs to six of the male members, one of which is the boyfriend of Evangeline (Sierra Katow), another writer.
The two begin as enemies but eventually form an alliance as there are so few females. Bela is overjoyed at being selected for the final round but is quickly uncomfortable as co-editor Ryan (Conor Donnally) forces her to watch a porn movie without her consent. She blows it off initially not wanting to harm her chances of being accepted even though her roommates are horrified when she tells them what happened. She does wind up being selected for the staff with another writer, Carla (Isabella Roland), who confesses that she too was sexually harassed by Ryan. Together, they decide to report him to the other Co-Editor, Eric (Mekki Leeper). Eric does not believe her but Evangeline does. Bela turns to Leighton who brings her to the women’s center where Alicia helps Carla and Bela report Ryan to the University. Eric holds a vote, and they decide to get rid of Ryan. Not all the (male) writers are pleased that Ryan was kicked out and blame Bela for the disruption. Bela decides to quit as she held The Catullan on a pedestal and basically, it just sucks. Evangeline goes with her, and they decide to start a new female comedy magazine for Essex.