Joanna Franklin

* Season 4
* Teen

**Joanna Franklin** is one of the recurring characters in *Sex Education*. She is portrayed by Lisa McGrillis.

Joanna is the younger sister of Jean, who comes live with her in order to help her with taking care of her newborn baby, Joy.

## Early Life

The situation in Joanna's family house was rather complicated. Her mother presumably divorced her father and started dating a man called Pierre, who inappropriately touched and (implied) sexually abused Joanna. Hence Joanna's older sister had to protect her from him, not wanting her to get hurt. After moving out of her family house, Joanna started having multiple affairs with many men, couldn't establish a serious relationship with any of them.

## Throughout the Series

### Season 4

Joanna moves into the Milburn house to help her sister, Jean out with taking care of Joy. In reality, she had no other place to go, splitting from her boyfriend and having huge debts that she can't pay off. She also gets to know her sister's former sexual partner as well as the father of her daughter, Dan, with whom she goes on a couple of dates.

Joanna's debts are eventually paid off by Jean. The two also reconcile, putting the past and all of their arguments behind them. Joanna also decides to let Dan go, as she finds out about him being the biological father of Jean's baby.

## Relationships

### Romances

#### Dan (former love interest)

Joanna and Dan met for the first time at the bank where Dan was working. During their first meeting Dan asked Joanna out and later the two went out for coffee. During their first date, Dan really impressed Joanna as he was the first man who was actually thinking about setting up family. Before their second date, Dan stood Joanna up. She got mad at him and later found out that Dan used to sleep with Joanna's sister, Jean and that he's the father of her daughter, Joy. This eventually caused them to call things off, as Joanna wanted Joy to have a real father by her side.

#### Patrick (ex-boyfriend)

Patrick is Joanna's ex-boyfriend. After the two broke up, Joanna had no place to live in.

### Family

#### Caroline Franklin (mother)

Caroline was Joanna's mother. Ever since she started dating Pierre, she stopped caring about both Joanna and Jean. She also was unaware of him having weakness for a 12 year-old Joanna.

#### Jean Milburn (older sister; former enemy)

Joanna and Jean had quite tense relationship. Joanna often called Jean ''turtle'', knowing it was very annoying for her. Despite this, when the two were teenagers, Jean was protecting Joanna from Pierre, their stepfather, who had a tendency to touch Joanna in her private parts. After moving out of their family house, Jean and Joanna lost touch and weren't huge parts of each other's lives.

The two reunited after Otis called Joanna to ask her to come and help Jean with taking care of the baby, as she wasn't getting by with it. Joanna moved in with them for some time, which let the sisters to spend lots of time together. Meanwhile it also turned out that Joanna had huge debts and she had no other place to go, so she decided to stay with Jean. After all, Jean decided to pay off the debts for her sister and eventually reconciled with her, talking things out.

#### Otis Milburn (nephew)

Otis is Joanna's nephew. The two have a good relationship, as after Jean stopped getting by after having Joy, Otis called his aunt to come and help his mother out with everything. Once, when Otis and Maeve went out for a movie date, Joanna decided to join them as she was stood up by Dan, who had an accident. Joanna ended up getting drunk with Maeve, ruining Otis and Maeve's date.

#### Joy Milburn (niece)

Joanna moves to the Milburn house to help her sister out with taking care of Joy. She spends a lot of her time playing with her, and she seems to be enjoying it.

#### Pierre (step-father)

Pierre was Joanna's step-father. At least once during Joanna’s childhood he molested her.

### Friends

#### Maeve Wiley (friend)

Joanna and Maeve first met on the day of Otis and Maeve's first official date, when Joanna was stood up by Dan and decided to accompany Maeve and Otis at the movie theater. Joanna also calls Maeve a goddess referring to her look. During the movie, Maeve takes out a bottle of tequila she stole and starts drinking it with Joanna, who later starts throwing popcorn at the people sitting in front of them and because of that, all three are eventually kicked out of the movie theater.