The 11 most disgusting (and heartwarming) moments on Big Mouth

No series better captures the horrors and humiliations of puberty than Big Mouth, simultaneously TV's most repulsive and adorable show

TV Features Big Mouth
The 11 most disgusting (and heartwarming) moments on Big Mouth
Big Mouth (Images: Netflix) Graphic: The A.V. Club

Created by Andrew Goldberg, Mark Levin, Jennifer Flackett, and voice-actor extraordinaire Nick Kroll, Big Mouth is an animated comedy that Trojan-horses in trenchant social commentary, from destigmatizing masturbation to celebrating body diversity to chronicling “Vagina Shame.” But frankness can be obscene, and committing to that balance requires visual gags, punchlines, and wildly imaginative debauchery that, six seasons in, remains some of the raunchiest stuff you can see on Netflix (or anywhere). Here are the series’ most foul—and thoughtful—scenes to date.

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I Love My Body

Let’s start on the positive side of the disgusting-to-heartening spectrum: ’s musical numbers have been a highlight ever since composer Mark Rivers voiced a tampon singing “.” Often packed with unabashed joy, off-kilter jokes, and genuine pathos, the songs are proof that there are too many feelings involved in growing up to confine them to dialogue. The most uplifting of Rivers’ tunes is “I Love My Body,” sung with full-throated glee by the masterful, Emmy-winning Maya Rudolph as hormone monstress Connie. A body positivity disco anthem for the ages, it celebrates femininity in all its natural forms, and the magic of animation enables Big Mouth to render that body diversity with refreshingly playful frankness. A central theme of this show is the ubiquity of shame—there’s even a Shame Wizard (David Thewlis), a villain for characters to defeat again and again—and Big Mouth is at its best when it demonstrates how to combat it.

8 Comments

  • atlasstudios-av says:

    i think one of the most disgusting scenes was in the latest season of jessie’s yeast infection. :/

  • rob1984-av says:

    Oh wow, I guess I never realized that Jay doesn’t have a hormone monster.

    • cnstgrad-av says:

      He is his own hormone monster.

    • worldwideleaderintakes-av says:

      I get the idea he probably has a hormone monster, but that guy figured out Jay will be just fine without him, so he’s just hanging out at a bar or Eyes Wide Shut-style sex party or something.

  • gterry-av says:

    I am surprised the disgusting list didn’t include everything with Andrew and his cousin, like the making out, the dick pic, and him fantasying about her and the whole thing in the room where his grandfather’s coffin was.The stuff with Marty Glouberman from season 1 where he loves to eat scallops even though they cause him to shit himself was really gross too but very funny.

  • drinky-av says:

    What? No “Jizzscuit”?!?

  • phonefixnicole-av says:

    Quite speechless

  • divinationjones-av says:

    I couldn’t do this show anymore. I thought it and Human Resources were funny when they initially came out, but there’s just so many “children in graphic sexscapades” stories I could handle. It quickly went from outlandishly funny to tired and gross

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