#daria mack

[mom77ii]

doodles and wips

[something-truly-evil]

Rewatching Daria and I’m just struck by how good the story-telling is without things being laid out plainly. For example, I was thinking about the popular/brain dichotomy that’s present throughout the entire show, with the only characters who do not fall entirely into one or the other category being Jodie and Mack. They are both frequently seen hanging around and associating with the cheerleaders and the football team, but are not portrayed as the same kind of, speaking frankly, brainlessness that most of the popular kids are shown. Mack is the captain of the football team, but he’s basically the only one who feels like a person as opposed to a caricature. Jodie frequently hangs around Brittany, but doesn’t feel the social burden of occasionally talking with and associating with the Brains.

The reason for this (in memory, I watched it ages ago and am only like halfway through my rewatch) is because Mack and Jodie are black, and because of that, the social setting of Lawndale High looks much different for them than it does for our main characters. Jodie even tells Daria as much when she talks about how much pressure she’s under. I’m just really glad that the creators made a conscious decision to portray Lawndale as a school that feels more realistic than just the nerds/populars, even if that satire is what makes it so effective. Yeah, for Daria it feels rigidly dichotomous, but that’s because of the color of her skin.