first season of Mating Season: When Being an Animal Isn’t Enough to Create Fresh Comedy
According to the CinemaDrame News Agency, Near the end of the first season of Mating Season, the four main animal friends sit down for a quiet night in front of the television to watch a show on “Miceflix” (an animal version of Netflix where mice perform inside a shoebox acting as a theater stage). Fawn, voiced by June Diane Raphael, asks, “What are we watching?” and Josh, voiced by Zach Woods, replies, “A show called Big Mouse Mouth.” A scene then plays showing a mouse acting as a Hormone Monster, urging another rodent to do inappropriate things. At this moment, the series cuts to the horrified faces of the audience. Penelope, voiced by Sabrina Jones, says, “This is disgusting,” and Josh adds, “My god, whoever made this should be arrested!” Meanwhile, Ray, a raccoon voiced by Nick Kroll, remarks, “To be honest, I think it’s pretty clever.”
The joke is funny in its own right. Mating Season was created by the very same masterminds behind the hit animated series Big Mouth—Mark Levin, Jennifer Flackett, Andrew Goldberg, and Nick Kroll—with animation production handled by Titmouse animation studio. Both are Netflix original series boasting star-studded voice casts, rapid-fire pacing, and a shared boundary-pushing approach to explicit humor.
However, Big Mouth had a higher purpose. By depicting the most awkward and uncomfortable aspects of puberty (from hormonal surges to physical changes), that series helped dismantle the shame and embarrassment associated with that stage of life. Its crass humor and bold fantasies always served to help kids, parents, and everyone else speak more comfortably about one of life’s most challenging phases.
Yet Mating Season, at least in its freshman run, lacks such a higher calling. This romantic comedy set in a world of anthropomorphic animals ostensibly aims to offer an empathetic look at the challenges of dating. Josh is a sensitive bear in search of true love. Ray is a high-strung raccoon who only looks for casual flings; one worries about missing out on life’s simple pleasures and dying alone, while the other constantly follows his primal instincts but might be suppressing deeper emotions.
Their female friends face similar relationship dilemmas. Fawn, a doe, discovers just how difficult it is to find a suitable partner. Penelope, a fox, battles low self-esteem while reeling from a bad breakup with a greyhound voiced by Abbi Jacobson.
Nonetheless, by adhering too strictly to human rom-com tropes, Mating Season fails to differentiate itself from the genre. Simply having animals use dating apps or attend their ex’s wedding isn’t enough to keep a series feeling fresh. The jokes are delivered with the exact same tone and structure as Big Mouth, merely passed through an animal filter.
To be fair, the show knows how to elicit laughs. June Diane Raphael delivers her lines masterfully, Zach Woods occasionally unleashes the wild side of his gentle bear character, and standout guest stars like Clancy Brown, Drew Tarver, Maria Bamford, Pamela Adlon, and Timothy Olyphant create highly entertaining moments.
The premiere episode features a genuinely clever premise where Josh’s girlfriend dumps him because he overslept during hibernation. While this might seem brutal to humans who enjoy resting on weekends, in the animal kingdom, it is a fair rule. Josh failed to meet her needs and stands accused of sleeping through his entire life.
Unfortunately, the series fails to maintain this momentum. While Josh’s overarching goal throughout the season is to find a new mate before his next hibernation, individual episode plots quickly devolve into repetitive rom-com clichés, without the animal perspective making a distinctive difference. In the end, the experience mirrors watching a fresh but mediocre season of Big Mouth or its conventional spin-off, Human Resources, lacking both originality and a clear purpose.
Are there disgusting scenes in the show? Absolutely. But there is nothing in Mating Season wild or jarring enough to make you want to call the police—or even animal control.
