Ayo Edebiri Transition Into Voicing Missy On Big Mouth
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“[Season 4 is] the beginning of what Missy’s journey is going to be like discovering not just her Blackness, but herself.”
Earlier this year, Jenny Slate — who voiced Missy during Big Mouth‘s first three seasons — resigned from the series.
George Pimentel / WireImage / Getty Images, Netflix
“Black characters on an animated show should be played by Black people,” she said in an Instagram post.
In a public statement, she apologized for playing a Black character and “engaging in an act of erasure of Black people.”
Later on in August, Netflix officially announced that comedian Ayo Edebiri would be taking over the voice of Missy and she would begin in the penultimate episode of Season 4.
Big Mouth co-creator Andrew Goldberg told Variety, “By the time we made the decision to cast Ayo, we had finished all of Season 4 and delivered it to Netflix.” Instead of having Ayo re-record everything Jenny had already done, the writers were able to find a moment in Season 4, Episode 9 that honored both actors and made sense for the transition from Jenny to Ayo.
Flash forward to this past weekend, Big Mouth finally returned to Netflix this weekend, along with its star-studded cast and newcomer Ayo Edebiri.
And now we finally get to see just how that transition from Jenny to Ayo happens:
Early on in the season, Missy visits her cousins in Atlanta and they urge her to get in touch with her Black heritage, but she has a little trouble being able to fully embrace it.
Netflix
The series even pokes fun at itself by showing that while Missy is voiced by a white actor, she can’t fully explore her Black identity.
Then in Season 4, Episode 9, “Horrority House,” Missy (who’s still being voiced by Jenny) meets her tethered in a funhouse mirror.
Netflix
Similar to the movie Us, Missy meets her exact doppelgängers, who she shares her soul with — aka her tethered. In every mirror there’s a different variation of Missy’s reflection. One of the Missys tells the real Missy that “There can only be one,” and the tethered battle it out.
Suddenly, all the mirrors shatter, and Missy pieces together the different versions of herself. She realizes she can be every single one of them.
Finally, in that moment, Missy embraces her true self, and Ayo becomes Missy!
Netflix
Now, no longer being voiced by a white actor, Missy can finally embrace her Black identity too.
Regarding Season 5, Ayo told the LA Times, “[Season 4 is] the beginning of what Missy’s journey is going to be like discovering not just her Blackness, but herself.”
So, it looks like Missy will get to explore her identity even more in Season 5 and we’ll get to fall in love with Ayo’s Missy all over again.
Be sure to watch the whole scene in Season 4 of Big Mouth, which is on Netflix now!
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