I didn’t realize until I checked my television tracker that Tuca & Bertie was back—and two episodes deep—on Adult Swim. The adult animated sitcom was created by cartoonist Lisa Hanawalt and follows the lives of two anthropomorphic birds: Tuca (Tiffany Haddish) and Bertie (Ali Wong), a toucan and song thrush who are best friends and riddled with mental and physical health issues. It first aired on Netflix but was canceled, only to be revived by Adult Swim (as they are wont to do).
Season three opens with “Leveling Up” and “The Pain Garden,” which show our titular bird heroines in yet another liminal space. Tuca has a new job and a new relationship, but years of low self-esteem and belittling from others have made her think she is doomed to fail and let people down—even as she is being praised and enjoying her new tree boyfriend, Figgy (Matthew Rhys).
The other major thing we see Tuca dealing with is her painful menstrual cycle. In “The Pain Garden,” it is shown that from puberty, Tuca has had debilitating pain and symptoms that coincide with her period. Finally having health insurance, she goes to the hospital and is treated by a hive of Bee doctors, who possess terrible bedside manner and deliver the advice of “Have you considered losing ten pounds?”
Much like its spiritual predecessor, the ability of Tuca & Bertie to hit directly on the cold truth of things is like an arrow right through you, from the fatphobia of medical professionals to how women and people with uteruses are socialized just to accept pain as part of their everyday existence.
Speaking with The Daily Beast, Hanawalt said that the storyline came from her own experiences with chronic pain.
“I was in a lot of pain and didn’t know why,” she said. “Tiffany [had also] had a similar experience in her life—just trying to find an answer and talking to so many other people who have had a similar medical issue and haven’t been able to find a solution.”
Even after an exploratory surgery in which doctors removed a fibroid, Hanawalt said, her medical concerns remained unresolved. When it came to Tuca’s medical issues, she said, “I didn’t wanna make it super specific. Some people will watch it and say, oh, this is clearly about endometriosis. I think that’s a really strong analogy, but we never fully like identify it as any particular.”
On to Bertie, she has finally opened her bakery, but it is overwhelming, and even when she hires an employee, it feels like she is doing most of the work.
Things change when Chef Winter Garcia (Justina Machado) offers to mentor Bertie if she’s willing to give up her business. Bertie’s not sure if she’s ready to give up her business, but when I heard Chef Garcia talk about not living your life holding on to the dreams of your 20s, it really hit me—not that you should give up, but we can sometimes get so attached to ideas that we don’t pay attention to the path.
That tension is what Hanawalt finds most interesting about Bertie and Chef Winter Garcia’s relationship. “Is this gonna feed her? Is this gonna be a good path for Bertie, or is this gonna be another kind of dead end? Winter’s interesting because I relate to both her and Bertie in this relationship.”
“As a woman who’s getting a little older and now I have women in the workplace who look up to me and I’m like, ‘Oh, you look up to me? Yikes.’ Part of me is like, ‘Why would you? I’m just an idiot.’ And then part of me has to reckon with whatever power or influence I do have… I just think both sides of that are interesting.”
Tuca & Bertie is a gem, and as someone who often wishes for BoJack Horseman to be back because of its commentary, this fills that void perfectly.
(featured image: Adult Swim)
