Tayo the Little Bus

The very first episode alone has so many issues. Here are a few subliminal messages that stood out most: 1. Brown is an ugly color to be. (the car doesn’t get “adopted” from the dealership because she’s tan) 2. You should change your appearance to be happy/be accepted. (the tan car decides to be painted pink, then gets adopted into Tayo’s family by the mechanic she stalked…which leads me to the next point) 3. It’s okay to get into the strange car that was following you. (and the car literally says to the human mechanic “you were nice to me so I followed you” …..uhhhh!?!) 4. It’s okay to talk to strangers about where you live. (literally happens in the same conversation about being followed by the car) Parent to parent, I say nope. We won’t be watching this show.

I liked how it is a girl who is the mechanic and in charge of the bus station, so I watched the first episode with my 4yo daughter, but I couldn't even finish it. The gender-normative messaging is everywhere. The girl has super skinny long legs and wears ridiculously short skirts. There is a female car who doesn't get chosen because she isn't a nice colour (kind of a light brown, which my daughter also happens to be!), and is only happy when she gets her colour changed to pink! I feel like this show has missed the last 40 years of trying to create positive female role models and is completely tone deaf. Whatever other positive messages there might be were overwhelmed by these bad ones for me.