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Jenny Slate stepped down from voicing Missy on 'Big Mouth'. But Missy is just one of several problematic characters on the animated series.

All the problematic ‘Big Mouth’ characters needing to be written out

Big Mouth has made a name for itself over the years for its outrageous portrayal of middle schoolers as they deal with everyone’s favorite struggle: puberty. Naturally, with that territory, the show has had its moments when it crossed the line. 

But one big question mark was the casting of Jenny Slate as Missy, a Big Mouth character that is biracial. Slate herself is white, which led to questions from keen-eyed viewers as to why she was cast. On June 25th, Slate posted to her Instagram resigning from the role, stating that she recognizes she’s contributing to the problem of diversity in Hollywood. 

Nick Kroll, co-creator of Big Mouth, also released a statement on behalf of the creators agreeing with Jenny’s decision. But if they’re going to fix the issue with Missy, there’s plenty of other problematic Big Mouth characters they need to either rewrite, or just write out of the show. 

Jenny Slate stepped down from voicing Missy on 'Big Mouth'. But Missy is just one of several problematic characters on the animated series.

Ali Wong’s Ali

From the minute she said she was pansexual, Ali needed to be taken off the show. No amount of apologies from the creators would make up for the poor description of pansexuality she gives during her introduction. Pansexuality doesn’t make people better than bisexuals, and the description of gender she gives is a disaster.

The show hasn’t rectified anything they did about her introduction either. In the world of Big Mouth, it still seems like bisexuals are transphobic, when that’s far from the case, and trans people are only those who transition from one binary gender to another, instead of being a spectrum. Do better. 

Jenny Slate stepped down from voicing Missy on 'Big Mouth'. But Missy is just one of several problematic characters on the animated series.

John Mulaney’s Andrew

You sent a Jewish kid to a neo-Nazi meeting?! It doesn’t matter how edgy Andrew was becoming, that is not the way to make the kid wake up to his toxic masculinity. Especially when his Jewish heritage is key to his character. 

Even though he woke up to how he was acting after Missy shot him down, that doesn’t excuse the behavior of him in season 2. Heck, even the show glosses over the actions of Andrew at the end of season 2, acting as if the other characters are perfectly fine with him being a jerk. That’s not the way to handle having an incel character.

Jenny Slate stepped down from voicing Missy on 'Big Mouth'. But Missy is just one of several problematic characters on the animated series.

Nick Kroll’s Coach Steve

When will we stop the trope of teachers trying to sleep with their students? Though Coach Steve is a lonely man desperate for a friend, his attempts to hang out with people come off as overtly sexual. Especially when some of his attempts are against students, it’s disturbing. 

Jenny Slate stepped down from voicing Missy on 'Big Mouth'. But Missy is just one of several problematic characters on the animated series.

All of Jay’s family

Jay is strange, but at the end of the day his heart’s in the right place. On the other hand, his family needs to go. Between the abusive relationship with his brothers, his mom more focused on her sex life than her son, and the neglect from his father, it’s a miracle Jay doesn’t have any longstanding trauma. 

His family life doesn’t add anything to the show, except make people pity Jay. But his whole bisexuality plot from season 3 really added something to Jay’s story. Maybe season 4 can focus on that and skip all the dumb Blitzerian family scenes?

Jenny Slate stepped down from voicing Missy on 'Big Mouth'. But Missy is just one of several problematic characters on the animated series.

Nick Kroll’s Rick

Sure, he’s no longer Nick’s hormone monster. But can he be retconned out of the show? Somehow we actually feel bad for Coach Steve for being stuck with Rick as his hormone monster. He’s useless, and offers terrible advice. 

 

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Comments
  • No sis❤️

    October 11, 2020
  • Lol…snowflakes will rejoice over these critiques.

    October 15, 2020
  • I honestly can’t tell if this is satire or not, but for the sake of my sanity I’m going to assume that it is.

    May 24, 2021
  • Nah jays family love scenes absolutely need to stay in. Idek if this is satire or not but if it isn’t, I’m gonna ask a question. Do you really not see how the scenes of Jays family life affect the show? If Jays family life wasn’t shown he’d just seen like a douche who isn’t very smart. Not to mention how later in the show it’s shown that Jay has ADHD which was neglected by his family. If you never seen how dysfunctional his family was, you wouldn’t understand why two parents who weren’t his gave him meds for his ADHD instead of his own Family. You honestly can’t have Jay without his family or else it’d make much less sense. Not to mention, it’s funny. And regarding the times where it supposedly overstepped the line, it honestly didn’t. This show is full of small scenes that are a representation for much bigger problems and even the problematic things can be part of that. All in all this show isn’t something you should watch if you aren’t a fan of dark humour, and definitely isn’t one you should criticize cause well..

    The people watching just don’t care.

    August 29, 2021
  • not gonna lie all these reasonings feel extremely stupid, for an example. Ali’s description of pansexuality was SUPPOSED to be bad because it was supposed make the students misinterpret what the meaning is, not to mention at her age its common to mess up the definition of a lot of sexualities (and this show is supposed to be relatable, at middle school thats normal)

    October 3, 2021
  • Ok, Karen.

    November 15, 2021
  • Lol

    December 6, 2021
  • You’re failing to see the point of all these characters.

    Life is not always rainbows and butterflies. It can be very ugly. Jay’s family shows everyone that not all families are happy and loving. It shows us that some people shouldn’t be parents. It also shows us that just because you grow up in a toxic house does not necessarily mean you will become toxic yourself.

    Andrew’s character shows us that it’s very easy to fall down a rabbit hole of toxic thinking, and it can lead to messed up and dangerous situations. Andrew began thinking a certain way about women, and had his feelings validated by a group of what seemed to be smart and understanding men online. It took him going to one of their meetings and discovering they were Nazi’s for him to open his eyes and realize he was completely wrong. It’s easy to fall into that way of thinking, and it took a very shocking revelation for Andrew to get out of it.

    Coach Steve is autistic. Him wanting to hang out with the children is solely based on the fact that he is of the same mindset. He has the mind and thought process of a middle schooler, which is why he gets along with them so well, and tries to hang around them so often. He also isn’t inherently sexual. He rarely thinks about sex, only mentioning it a few times.

    Ali presents herself as Pansexual in the way she does because she’s in middle school. Middle schoolers blow things out of proportion and normally make a big deal out of something that isn’t. This also proves it’s point when the entire school freaked out about her sexuality, and even had her on the school news.

    As for Rick, he’s senile. He’s just an old man who’s still working. They even pulled him out of retirement. It’s also a very real scenario. Very often the elderly need to reenter the work force (mainly due to needing more income other than retirement funds). This is mainly used as a gag in the show, but is also something very real.

    Please rewatch the show, because I think you’re missing the majority of it.

    December 31, 2021

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