hey i just finished pen15 and i fucking love it so much it perfectly captures the preteen girl experience like i was deadass shocked watching it bc no other piece of media has reminded me so much of myself
i really related to maya bc growing up as a non white girl at a mostly white school was a very interesting experience!! having maya constantly feeling like an outsider because she wasn’t white and struggling with fetishization was so painful to watch bc of how much it reminded me of my middle school days. i also connected with how she always felt like she was the ugly friend and how she just had to sit back and watch as her best friend got into relationships and had her first kiss
shit i also liked how well written anna was when it came to her parents’ divorce like i was about to cry watching those scenes because they really really hit home
overall it’s a really good show but i will admit it has bits of cringe but it’s also about 13 year olds so what do you expect lmfao go watch it rn!!!
Maya and Anna are typical teenage girls in 2000, with a typical American attitude on circumcision. In the episode First Day, they find out from a girl that gave Maya's crush a handjob that he's "uncircumzized," and tease him to the point of tears about his "aardvark dick."
While Maya still has a crush on him after this, it's clearly in spite of his aardvark, not because of it.
Why is Maya Ishii-Peters always the butt of the joke with the other white girls? Maria and Liv break down the way PEN15 (along with Ginny & Georgia and All American) represent the many microaggressions and macroaggressions of growing up mixed race. Leftist Teen Drama #10 available wherever you get your podcasts.
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