Crazy Ex-Girlfriend: Diversity, Social Responsability and Mental Health Awareness

Broadcast TV seems to get more progressive every season. For a few years now, we’ve seen an increase in LGBTQ+, racial and gender diversity. Although the least watched Big 5 broadcast network, The CW is responsible for being the lead in said efforts. The network is responsible for introducing the first ever transgender superhero, while having an amazing number of diverse characters in its current slate.

This TV season also saw the culmination of one of the network’s most diverse drama: Rachel Bloom’s Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (2015 — 2019). Co-created by Bloom and Aline Brosh McKenna (The Devil Wears Prada), the musical dramedy started off as a Showtime pilot, and (thankfully) landed on The CW, where it had the chance to last for 4 seasons, as intended by the creators. The network gave the chance to an inspiring group of writers to tell the complicated story of Rebecca Bunch (aka the crazy ex) and her individual pursue of happiness.

The name may be cringe worthy to those who haven’t watched a single episode, but makes total sense to anyone that gave a chance to this small but extremely rich musical production. In the end, while not being a ratings success, the show brought to life 62 concise episodes, that also included 120 original songs.

During its run, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend seemed to care deeply about the stigma around mental illness, racial diversity, sexual freedom and female empowerment.

The cast diversity

The premise of the show didn’t give away its commitment to being actually diverse, and not just checking boxes. That effort translated to a very diverse cast of main and supporting characters, that span for various backgrounds.

For starters, we can highlight Vincent Rodriguez III. He is a filipino actor, with broadway credits, that plays one of the show’s male leads. The character, Josh Chan, is a straight sex symbol who, for once, is not played by a white straight actor (Vincent also happens to be openly gay).

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is also the first TV show ever to depict the life and culture of an Filipino-American family in a single episode, with a full cast of filipino actors as Josh’s relatives appearing from time to time.

The slew of supporting characters also happen to include other non-white actors such as Vella Lovell, Gabrielle Ruiz, Erick Lopez and Burl Moseley.

All women are inherently different (and real)

TV shows often resort to one-dimensional conventionally sexy woman as their lead character, except when the show tries to make a point otherwise. In this case, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend made sure to add layered women all around its main and supporting cast, spanning from all types of character goals and backgrounds. I’ve decided to highlight the show’s main female characters to prove my point.

Heather Davis (played by Vella Lovell)

Let’s start with the stoner-neighbour-turned-bar-chain-manager. Heather is a very no bullsh*t character at the start of the show. She’s Rebecca’s neighbour and seems to rely on the fact that she’s just a student to navigate an easier life. Through the years, she becomes one of the most intelligent and focused characters on the show, come out of her shell to be front and center in her life decisions. From living with her parents, she creates her own independence, stepping out of her comfort zone to taking charge of her destiny and achieve things she never thought before. By the end of the show, she’s a completely different character in the best way possible, while keeping her personality and social awereness.

Valencia Perez (Gabrielle Ruiz)

While presented as a stereotypical latina mean girl, Valencia also gets to grow out of its shell to be an amazing independent woman. At the beginning of the show, you can see her struggling while realizing she’s no more than a romantic interest, and with the help of Rebecca and her news friends, she learns valuable lessons about being a strong feminist. She never loses her innocence to a certain point, while becoming the succesfull and driven woman we can see flourish in seasons 3 and 4. In the end, she gets to fulfill her dreams in the most unexpected ways, while getting to be the kind of woman who lifts other women.

Paula Proctor (Donna Lynne Champlin)

This is one of the most sincere examples of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s commitment to being a diverse and progressive show. In season 1, Paula is a paralegal who befriends Rebecca mainly to watch her own wild ideas come true. In season 2 we see drastic changes, where she starts to grow into her own separate character that has goals, dreams and ways to achieve it. Although being a 40-something mom, she’s not confined to playing the mom stereotype, getting to express her sexuality and hopes as anyone of the younger characters. She also faces some of the most difficult challenges presented by the show, and succeeds in making decisions with grace and precision. By the end of the show, she finally realizes everything she can truly accomplish by putting the work.

Rebecca Bunch (played by Rachel Bloom)

The titular crazy ex-girlfriend starts the show as a successful new york lawyer that leaves everything behind to follow her summer fling to a small town. Through the show, we learn about her past and mental struggles, while she tries to find herself.

After many doubtful decisions, we can see Rebecca growing to be a self-aware powerful woman. She also gets to be herself through all episodes, quirks and all. She also gets to understand and be the example of a main female character that fights to not be defined by the men around her.

Real sexual representation

Crazy ex-girlfriend also gets to showcase the sexual diversity observed in society today. Through characters like Darryl, White Josh, Valencia and Maya, the show gets to tell different stories involving LGBTQ+ characters, while not letting those character arcs being defined only by their sexuality.

While other TV shows shy away from explicitly saying their characters are bi, Darryl literally sings a song about how out and proud he is as a bisexual man. He also gets to tell the important story of someone who discovers something about themselves later in their life, as he’s a middle aged dad. White Josh and Valencia are also great examplesLGBTQ+ characters that aren’t defined by their sexuality. They get to have healthy and adult relationships that only adds to their story.

On the other hand, Paula and Rebecca get to represent real human sexual desires. More than once, the show lets the characters talk about their periods, their experiences and their sexaul freedom. Rebecca is an example of a sexual active woman who doesn’t feel ashamed of expressing and exploring her sexuality. She gets to talk about sex in many ways, escaping the fact that main female characters aren’t often defined as sexual beings.

Paula also gets a storyline involving abortion, which is handled with grace and intelligence by the writing team and the cast.

Mental health awareness

In the end, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s main theme is mental health and social responsibility. While the show title has the world “crazy”, and starts with Rebecca looking for meds to interrupt an imminent panic attack, the situation is literally “a lot more nuanced than that”.

We see that Rebecca’s problematic reactions are part of a complicated mental state that has absorbed many traumas and hasn’t received proper attention to actually heal and move on.

Through four seasons, we see the character evolve out of the crazy stereotype to become a responsible person that understand the work needed to actually grow and be a healthy person.

Although she’s the main character, the show also cares to develop the mental state of many of the other characters, like Josh Chan.

Network TV rarely gets to tell profound stories like this. The humor and depth Crazy Ex-Girlfriend puts in its story is admirable, and shows the creators’ commitment to being truthful and helpful.

While normally Hollywood goes about mental health issues in a very superficial way — calling everything “depression” or “anxiety” — the show gets to talk about really important topics. That’s something brilliant that isn’t celebrated enough.

In a way, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is a carefully written story of self discovery, growth and redemption. And the best part is that it takes place in the real world, with real people.

All 62 episodes of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend arte available on Netflix.