Netflix’s “Insatiable” is a new dark comedy that follows Patty Bladell (Debby Ryan) through her revenge story after an adolescence of bullying. It leads with an overweight and acne ridden Patty struggling through gym class, asking a boy out and difficulty accepting herself in her body. This changes when she gets her jaw wired shut after a homeless man punches her in the face and she comes back to school traditionally beautiful. She then enters the pageant scene with her coach, Bobby Armstrong, who was wrongly accused of molesting a former client of his in an attempt to make a comeback story for them both. From there, the plot touches on Patty’s best friend’s homosexuality being discovered, Bobby’s potential bisexuality, exorcism, healthy body image and, of course, how being “pretty” affects day to day life.
However, while all these topics are relevant, the show’s use of fat and assault jokes is heavy handed and mindless. To put a thin woman in a fat suit for the sake of some laughs and to portray her life as miserable until she looks like a Hollywood actress and wears a full face of makeup every day is destructive to the audience this show panders to. It follows a seventeen year old high schooler, and it is marketed to high school age people, and now, those viewers get twelve episodes telling them that they are not beautiful at a size 16. Moreover, Patty lost that weight by not eating any solid food for three months. Medical leave is not a weight loss regimen, and advertising this “jaw locked shut” miracle is critical throughout the show as to what defined Patty— even after Patty lost weight, the jokes continued, with Patty regularly say that even though she’s beautiful now, there’s still a “Fatty Patty” inside of her.
Along with fat jokes, the show regularly included jokes about assault as well. Bobby Armstrong, Patty’s coach, was facing a lot of heat for his accused assault of former beauty pageant contestant, Dixie Sinclair. Bobby takes Patty as his client to try to shake this reputation from his name, but Patty uses it as a chance to seduce Bobby, saying that if he has had relations with a minor once, he can do it again. Dixie Sinclair’s mother engages in a statutory rape-type scenario with Bobby Armstrong’s son, and that is made into far more of a joke than an issue. What tries to be satire is just heavy handed and cringe worthy in characters that are so unlikeable that getting through the show’s dialogue could be an immense struggle.
“Insatiable” tries to push the envelope. The jokes are extreme, and they touch on both being fat and fat shaming, sexuality, assault, Christianity and so, so much more, but to individually cover every piece of that show that was unsavory would take far longer. Satire is difficult, and “Insatiable” took twelve episodes to miss the mark. Its edginess was crude and it’s humor was unintelligent, and the thread weaving it all together was the promotion of weak body image and the toxic mindset that “skinny is magic.” For the sake of the viewers’ sanity, Insatiable does not need a renewal any time soon, or at least, not until the long, long list of criticism is pared down enough for this show to be stomachable.
