The 14-part series first sees Emma Morley and Dexter Mayhew meeting after graduation and after a failed one-night stand becoming best friends in the following 20 years. The series explores the development of their friendship, from anger to jealousy to love to heartache, and the exploration of this relationship has resonated with most viewers.
From anger to jealousy to love to heartache [...] the exploration of this relationship has resonated with most viewers.
Both Emma and Dexter explore their adult life, both with and without each other. The two begin their adult lives in completely different directions to each other, with Emma struggling with her writing, whilst Dexter’s life is consumed with drugs, fame, women, and alcohol, causing tension within their friendship. But as they get older, viewers’ persistent screaming at the tv, begging for them to fall in love, get married and move in together comes to fruition. All the angst wondering will they or won’t they fall away, and they have their fairytale ending.
At least this is what I, alongside other viewers, thought.
After a tragic accident, Emma Morley dies. And Dexter Mayhew was never the same again.
The last two episodes see Emma die and Dexter’s life afterwards. These two episodes induced tears, heartbreak, and anger from myself and multiple other viewers as Dexter tries to wrestle with his emotions and try and survive a life without Emma. By the end of the last episode, Dexter celebrates his life with Emma, remembering the first time they met at Edinburgh University and their first day together where Emma turned from a “footnote” to the main character in the story of his life.
Emma and Dexter had been in love with each other for 20 years, but they waited to tell each other, whether that was because they weren’t ready, too immature or too scared, they both waited and by the time they ended up together they only had a few years of intimate love together, but Dexter was left with a lifetime of regrets, heartbreaks and what-ifs.
Dexter was left with a lifetime of regrets, heartbreaks and what-ifs.
This series may seem from the outside like a typical chick flick or friends to lovers trope that we have all seen a hundred of times before, but the writing and the acting portrayed something much more exciting, heartbreaking, scary and upsetting. The story of One Day portrayed grief, sadness, and loneliness but most importantly it portrayed the rawest form of love and emotion through their relationship and then Emma’s death, as well depicting the power of time: how much time is wasted and how little time that life has to offer.
