So… at this point, I’ve written over 60 Growing Around scripts. I bring up “60” specifically because those are ones that I consider “canon.” There are many, many additional scripts that I’ve written that didn’t make the cut. Some of them have had their ideas blossom forward in future scripts, some scripts are better retelling of older ones, etc. But, 60 is where the count stands. Some of them do need more reworking than others, but they’ve at least got the bare basics of what I’m happy with. One thing that you have to know about any creative work is that it’s… never finished, just abandoned. No matter what you do, there’s always a “better” you can make any work of yours.
60 is also important because it’s just over one third of the 175 scripts that I plan to write total for this series. And if nothing else comes about, this is something that I will accomplish with even my dying breath. 50 episodes for season 1, divided into 25 summer episodes and 25 winter and fall episodes. And all of the other five seasons get 25 episodes each.
As I go on, I figured that I’d put down some of my thoughts into commentaries as such. It’s very tempting for someone to want to go into every single little detail about a project, but doing that within the text can really bog down the experience. There’s also a philosophy that says that you should let the audience arrive at their own interpretations. And… the audience can do that. If you have a specific interpretation of anything Growing Around, you do have the right to that. A large reason as to why I’m writing this is to help organize my own thoughts, and maybe to help convey what kind of show that Growing Around is slated to be.
And the first series of topics that I really want to talk about is the “Pinks & Blues” arc. It’s not necessarily a character arc, but a major player within it is Max Dunn, the son of the Dunn family and the “breadwinner.” The main theme does have to do with gender and identity politics, which can be a very contentious issue in the modern world.
There have been many pieces of media that have made gender, or other types of identity politics their main focus, and have greatly suffered for it. They may have been too preachy or too banal. A lot of them try using the identity of their main character as a selling point. “Female” reboots of things like Ghostbusters or the Ocean’s series are some notable examples, and we’ll be talking more about this as we go along.
In many cases, changing up the identities of the main characters was a selling point developed by marketing executives. I do not respect this, and I honestly think that both sides of the argument should be offended by these people. Not only do they create a further divide, and they often to disregard and disrespect their franchises, but they turn the identity into being a novelty. Talking about identity in media is perfectly acceptable, if you do it right. And there are ways to do it right.
The “Pinks and Blues” saga is divided into 6 different scripts. Chronologically, they are Tales of Childhood Past, Pinks & Blues, Sugar & Snails, Brave New Girl, Dress for Stress, and A Star is Scorned, with two episodes per the first three seasons. A Star is Scorned effectively ends this saga as more tense and immediate sagas rise up in seasons 4 and 5. Pinks & Blues and Tales of Childhood Past were written out of order.
The first script in this saga I wrote was Pinks & Blues. In this episode, Max is revealed to like a comic book series, entitled Sparkle Princess Adventures. It’s pink and glittery and incredibly feminine. Within it though, it is high fantasy and filled with political intrigue. Max is made fun of by a wide swath of people for liking this comic book series, because he is a guy.
Like most Growing Around stories, it takes a basic plot that has been done time and again and it sheds new light on it. The character who likes something out of their demographic plot is something that has been done time and again. Usually it has more to do with age (Arthur’s “That’s a Baby Show” or Phineas and Ferb’s “Nerds of a Feather”), but an age thing would not mesh well with the world of Growing Around, considering many characters are praised for acting younger than their age.
Most of these episodes though… end with the characters being well accepted for their hobbies. That is not the message that the show ends up teaching. Growing Around has one rule held above all else, in terms of its storytelling and messaging - honesty above all else. One thing that I abhor is morals that simplify reality to the point of being unrealistic, which we only seem to be getting out of recently. Morals like “be yourself” break apart when you start applying them to characters like Buford from Phineas and Ferb (a bully), Deedee from Dexter’s Lab (stupid and destructive), or Steve from Growing Around (a jerk).
When Max starts giving up his interest, one of his workers, Shelly starts giving up hers - her love for football, because she’s afraid of being being bullied. Max remembers that one of Princess Scarlett’s (the titular Sparkle Princess) messages is “YOU are a role model.” And being a role model is not easy. Max dresses up as Princess Scarlett in order to prove something to Shelly. Yes, you will be bullied and harassed and made fun of, but… you’ve kind of got to do that for people in the future who want to be accepted in hobbies outside of your own demographic, gender norms in this case.
It’s not sunshine and rainbows and there is no guarantee of acceptance, but… someone has to do it. This is how even small bits of change occurred all throughout history. Society tends to protect its current form and what it considers “normal,” and it takes a lot of force to move a still object.
Steve and Anna are another piece to this episode. Steve is a jerk. He makes fun of Max for liking something girly, and he tends to lead the crowd. Anna is the more interesting piece here, and it’s something that I have noticed. Anna gets… a little bit too excited and doesn’t seem to directly care for Max’s feelings, at least at the start. They’re both insensitive, but in different ways. In one part of the episode, both Steve and Anna buy Max a Princess Scarlett dress… for different reasons, but with the same result.
This is a theme that I go a lot more into towards the end of the arc, but it is something that I’ve noticed. People of certain identities or who break out of the traditional mold ending up being put on a pedestal that they didn’t ask for, which can do a lot of damage. A different kind of damage than the Steve damage, but damage nonetheless. There is a difference between pushy and supportive, and Anna tends to straddle that line in this episode.
Pinks & Blues had one problem from the start though, and that’s the world that I created. I said earlier that being made fun of for watching “a baby show” didn’t make much sense. Well, being made fun of watching something… girly didn’t either. In the world of Growing Around, we’ve seen that the genders are largely equal up until this point. Talula, the mayor of the town, was a girl, for instance and no one batted an eye at that. There was this sticking point of boys liking to do something girly though that didn’t gel well.
So… we needed to think of a solution and that solution brought this arc to life. Tales of Childhood Past was the next episode I wrote, and it’s chronologically the first episode of this series. This is important. Incredibly important. It’s a backstory episode that takes us back to what appears to be colonial times. In this time, girls dominate everything. People have described it like being KND’s “Operation F.U.T.U.R.E” but in the past, and I can definitely see that in a way.
The plot goes like this: for several generations, the royal family has only given birth to girls. And as time went on, they made things girlier and girlier. One notable thing was mentioned was that the royal guard uniform was made pink, and so no boy wanted to touch it. Some other minor things were unicorns being made the national animal.
So, I gave girls an upper hand in the whole gender dynamics, and I think that makes a lot of sense in the world of Growing Around. And not just because of the whole “role reversal” idea, although it is thematically fitting. A lot of the reason that men and women have uneven rights in many places and all throughout history is because of the biological differences between the two: namely, women have babies.
In history, childbirth was a lot more complex and a lot more all encompassing. If you didn’t replace your population, goodbye to your civilization. Giving childbirth was also a lot more dangerous without modern medicine, and infant mortality was incredibly high. Like less than half of infants made it to the age of six (which is why the “average age” of bygone eras was so low; it had nothing to do with people dying in their thirties). That there determined women and men’s legal and social roles all throughout history. I’m not saying it’s a good thing; it’s just… what happened.
In the world of Growing Around though, none of the people in charge had to worry about this kind of stuff. That would be the responsibility of “the adults.” So, in glimpses of the past, in episodes like The “B” Word we have seen boys and girls on more even footing. However, those are only glimpses and it’s safe to assume that things haven’t always been that equal, because kids aren’t immune to prejudice. Many kids do go through a “boys/girls are icky and have cooties” phase. Also, girls do mature (physically at least), faster than boys - there is a period of time where girls are taller than most boys their age - so it makes sense that in, maybe even most cases - girls would be on top of society.
This episode is more straightforward than most of the other episodes in this arc. That’s fine. Being straightforward isn’t always bad. I mean, it is the basic moral of “sexism is wrong.” But the plot is kind of a straightforward revolution plot. The girls in charge use laws to regulate “boyishness” and start forcing the boys to act more and more like girls, starting with forcing them to play with dolls and then to wear dresses “for their own good and to civilize them.”
I guess that… another subtle message of this episode is that “boyishness” and boyish activities are… okay. Like it is an increasingly common criticism aimed at parents and school systems that boys are treated like defective girls. This is because, compared to girls, boys tend to be more hyper, loud, boisterous, and gross, and other things that aren’t considered “proper.” Which is… an entire discussion for another day.
It is important for this series though. Most of the other episodes of this arc showcase male characters embracing femininity. I don’t want to spread the message that masculinity is bad, or isn’t valuable, or is lesser than femininity. And I have a feeling without an episode like this counterbalancing the rest of the arc, some people might get that impression. It is actually a nice counter piece to Pinks & Blues - bullying a boy because he is engaging in feminine behavior is wrong; forcing a boy to engage in feminine behavior is equally wrong. Same goes with forcing girls to engage in masculine behavior or preventing them from doing so.
This episode also does touch upon the idea of “going along with a prejudicial system.” That’s the character, Arthur. His brothers are more rebellious, doing things like “feeding their dolls” worms or “wearing a dress” like a hat or a cape. Meanwhile, Arthur goes along with the rules as given to him. And… it does not get better for him. Things continually get worse. Someone somewhere is going to rebel, and compliance to these kinds of systems do not benefit you in any way whatsoever.
Not bad for an episode that was originally written to be the backstory of another one. Yeah, this was only meant to be like… a third or less of another episode “Sugar & Snails.” But when I was two minutes in and like only establishing the conflict… it needed to be its own thing. And in turn, it does establish why the world is like it is in the modern day. Of course Max is going to be laughed at if he puts on a dress… look at what that got Arthur (although on rewrites, I am going to need to make that kind of sentiment a little bit more clear).
So… the civil war ended civilly. The princess at the time recanted many of the girl-biased laws. Then she cut her hair and she established a new holiday, where boys and girls got to experience the other side. In the modern day, that means fear factor contests for girls, and beauty contests for boys. Most of the thought went into the holiday itself. As for the social commentary ideas it’s more in the background than the foreground. If I could describe it, it’s kind of a smorgasbord of everything that exists in all of the other episodes.
This one came around because a lot of people were asking me to do a “genderswap” episode like Fiona and Cake from Adventure Time, and I had a problem with doing that. I don’t believe that… gender is just this superficial thing. What I mean is that… every individual person has their own individual relationship with their gender. It’s the same with race, sexuality, economic status, mental capabilities, etc.
If Max, for instance, was a girl, he would be a different character. That’s not because girls just behave differently. It’s because society treats boys and girls differently, and how you are treated by society can affect your attitude and behavior. I do think that if Max was born a girl, he would probably be happier. And before you ask, no he’s not trans. Anything that Max dislikes about being a boy comes from external factors, not internal factors.
With Sally, I’d have the opposite problem - there would be next to no difference at all if she were to be born a boy. She’d be too similar. So… my team and I decided that a genderswap holiday would be a perfect way to actually explore this idea, and I think that it worked out really, really well.
Sugar & Snails touches on a lot of things, and one of them is what Talula does. Talula exploits historical pain for her own political gain. In the episode, the boys haven’t won this holiday in several years (it is a bit of a contest with points awarded to each side), and that causes… a lot of conflict. Because… this is something that politicians actually do, and they do it more and more and it is disgusting.
There is a reason that “identity politics” rubs a lot of people the wrong way. They are divisive, and some people intentionally use them to divide. I’m not saying that there isn’t any pain that needs to be healed from the past. I’m just saying that there are snake oil salesmen (or women) who claim they want to do just that.
Brave New Girl is the next episode, and I think that it’s the most interesting. The basic premise is this - “what if the girls won the civil war?” Well… the world becomes a pink glittery paradise… not really. In this episode, Sally wakes up in this world. Max is dressed up like a housewife in a 1950’s world, and she owns Lemonade Land.
Tales of Childhood Past explored the people on the bottom of an oppressive system; this episode explores what’s on top, although in some areas they mirror each other. And this episode goes on about one of the less popular nuances in this dynamic - oppressive systems, like rigid gender roles are bad for everyone. Whether you’re on the top, or not.
We can see how the boys are treated badly in this episode, and in Tales. Many of them have a hard time finding a job, despite legally being allowed to. And that is… a point that I do want to make to the whole argument. Just because men and women are legally allowed to do the same things… doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re equal there. For example, men are legally allowed to be elementary school teachers, but society tends to view them as perverts.
In Brave New Girl, Tom and Paslow - with their sister not yet born - are forced to degrade themselves to just get by. The “girlworld” Sally has hired them to do that and Sally has a hard time knowing what’s worse. Either Tom and Paslow would be on the streets… or they’re forced to degrade themselves with humiliating jobs. And Sally is looked down on for hiring boys like them, or like Niall.
The girls in this world… also suffer. Sometimes it’s clear in the text. Anna is having a hard time supporting both her and her brother, Neven. But sometimes it’s a little bit… more on the level. It’s a type of normalcy bias. When all April sees is how the world is, she comes to the conclusion that that’s the way the world SHOULD be.
Societies like this also don’t just make the oppressed role rigid; it also makes the dominant role rigid. Sally ends up burping, and it’s treated like a felony. She gets taken in and ends up faced with “re-education”. When I first posted the concept art for this episode, people wondered “what about the tomboys.” Well… that about the tomboys. I mean, what happens to janegirls in the real world? Society tends to train that out of you, sometimes by force.
For the record… I don’t think that our world is unbalanced as the Growing Around world in Tales of Childhood Past or Brave New Girl. They are largely made more over-the-top for a dramatic effect to tell a story. I’m not saying that everything is totally equal socially or legally in the real world, it’s just not… at such a dramatic, unliveable extreme.
Dress for Stress is what you might call a landmine episode. It’s our second episode on Girls & Boys Day, and it starts a couple of interesting characters: Riley and Radiant/Ray-Ray. Something that you need to know off of the bat is that Riley is agender and Ray-Ray is trans, which I can tell is going to be controversial in some circles.
So… lemme put something to bed before it wakes up. Growing Around has a diverse set of characters, from all walks of life. But I don’t have “diversity” for the sake of diversity. In all cases, a character’s identity is only a part of their character. No character is there just to be “the gay one” or “the black one” or “the trans one.” And their identity is rarely the focal point of the episode. Riley, for instance, was introduced in episode 3, but the first episode that delves into this aspect of them is in season 3. Ray-Ray is a former member of Eternity Forever, which was also established in season 1.
If you’re wondering, Riley has a masculine sister and a feminine brother. Both of them have gotten incredibly bullied for their hobbies, similar to Max, so Riley decided to just… write the whole thing off, and dresses in an adrogynous way. Dress for Stress is the episode I think most needs rewriting here. Because I think that… Ray-Ray and Riley absolutely need to interact. In the end… that’s what this episode has to be about.
The final two episodes are… I don’t want to say critical… but they go into more directly left-leaning aspects of identity politics. A Star is Scorned is more critical, but this one is a bit more of a discussion. I can feel that just… writing parts of this commentary has peeved some people off. A lot of people complain that… “the rules are always changing” and “it’s impossible not to offend anyone.”
I mean, depending on who you ask, someone’s gender is so personal and important that getting it wrong is traumatizing because it’s endemic to the core of your being (trans), or it’s something that can change from day to day like fashion, depending on how you feel on that particular day (genderfluid), or gender doesn’t exist at all and the notion of it is made up by society (gender critical).
These philosophies… conflict… a lot. Which is one of the reasons that anyone who talks about anything in the realm of gender and transgender tends to be blasted. “Dress for Stress” goes into this. Girls & Boys Day is a holiday that allows someone to experience the other side. For someone like Riley, this is their least favorite holiday. It reminds them of something that they just want to forget completely. Meanwhile, you have Ray-Ray, who before this episode goes by Raymond (or just Ray). Girls & Boys Day, to them, is the only day of the year that allows them to truly be themselves and comfortable as themselves.
I do see a lot of protests and no one ever agreeing because of this dichotomy and these very different, conflicting notions of what gender is because it is very different to a lot of different people. I think that this is a topic that… needs to be explored. It’s not a monolith, but… people tend to treat it like it is, when it’s clear that… how one person defines themself is entirely offensive to another person in what, to everyone else, is treated as the same philosophical branch.
I think when I do rewrite this, I am going to have Riley protest a little bit more to it, and have them get to know Ray-Ray and come to an understanding on the importance of this holiday to some people. Getting Dress for Stress right is probably going to be more difficult than any other episode in this series, but I think that it’s most important. Because… I can see the conflict and it becomes more touchy from day to day.
The final episode in this arc is A Star is Scorned, and it’s about false progressivism, and like I said, it is on the more critical side. The entire thing is a satire of the Ghostbusters 2016 debacle, because good lord was that a shit show. In this episode, Max meets the creator of Sparkle Princess Adventures, Crystal Colt. And she becomes inspired… by dollar signs. If she could get boys to enjoy Sparkle Princess then she’d double her money, in theory.
This episode is about how identity politics advocates… kind of take advantage of people with marginalized identities. Most notably “putting YOU on the screen” as a marketing stunt. Because it is. It almost always is. This is why people complain about it. It’s a politically correct marketing stunt. They don’t care about marginalized identities, they only care about their money.
But any jackass could probably point that out. I had to go a little bit deeper to show how damaging this really is. Before Ghostbusters 2016 came out, I saw so many people saying how… socially important it was. How it would be the movie that finally determined that women could pull in audiences and be financially viable. A lot of activists hyped it up. And then the movie bombed.
The movie that they associated with being the epitome of social change… ended up being something mainstream audiences didn’t want. That’s Jules’ purpose in this episode. I don’t… begrudge people for doing something like this, in real life, whether it be things like Ghostbusters, Ocean’s, or Battlefield V, but I don’t think it’s the wisest thing to hype them up. Because… when it fails, it does massive damage to your brand.
And we see this time and time again. The Last Jedi, whether you like it or not, sunk Star Wars’ reputation. The Gillette ad, whether you think its progressive or not, was an 8 billion dollar write-off. More and more progressivism and political correctness is becoming a product to be bought and sold. And… let me put it like this. When an actor is in bad movie after bad movie, they stop being hired after awhile, regardless of how well they can act. It’s the same thing with a message. If it’s in bad product after bad product… it doesn’t matter how good the message is.
Movies like Ghostbusters 2016, things like the Gillette ad… they really do hurt progressive movements. This is showcased within the episode. Boys are starting to become warmer to Princess Scarlett and her adventures… until the trailer comes out and looks like a total piece of shit. The movie ends up being so bad, that even the girls want nothing to do with it anymore. And the franchise dies.
Then there’s how Max is treated in this episode, by Crystal and her publicist Charity. They pervert the moral that was taught in Pinks & Blues:
“Charity: I understand that, really I do. But you’ve got to get over that. Role models like you shouldn’t feel so boxed in by boy’s clothes. You need to feel free to dress as pretty as you want to.”
And yeah… there are people like that in the real world. Those are the people who think that “women should be able to do whatever they want” until they decide to be a stay-at-home mom. Max gets used as a prop in this episode by nefarious actors, and it is something that I think is damaging in the real world. People, products, or events just turn identity into a novelty when it’s not. And a “novelty” is the worst kind of representation that you can ask for.
They say that history… repeats itself, but that’s inaccurate. History rhymes more than it repeats itself. This episode is a book end on much of this saga. It began with girls forcing boys into dresses and feeding dolls “for their own good.” It also ends with girls forcing boys into dresses and feeding dolls “for their own good.” Max is a “role model” in both Pinks & Blues and in A Star is Scorned.
It’s a very… complex topic, I think. I mean, most shows just stick with “don’t be sexist, idiot” and… while that’s a good moral, definitely… there is a lot more to it. There are multiple ways to be sexist or prejudiced, as most of these episodes have showcased. It’s not all “boys/girls are gross, throw rocks at them.” No, some people want to make you feel special, to take your money. Some people want to make you feel hurt to take advantage of you for political power. Some people want to make you their version of “better.” Sometimes, people have two conflicting definitions of acceptance.
I think though… with the six episodes I’ve written, I’m satisfied with the nuance on this topic. I mean, that’s more than 2 hours of screentime, so… But there’s always more to talk about. I can imagine like in the far future, Max or Jules have a heart-to-heart with their daughters, because… by their actions, dresses are now considered a “boy thing”, and now they’re afraid to express themselves in that way. Because history rhymes.
