Romance Gets Feral in the Best Way

Read Time:5 Minute, 12 Second

TV SERIES REVIEW
Mating Season
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Genre: Adult Animation, Comedy, Romance
Year Released: 2026
Runtime: 10 x 30m Episodes
Writer(s): Jennifer Flackett, Andrew Goldberg, Nick Kroll
Cast: Nick Kroll, Zach Woods, June Diane Raphael, Sabrina Jalees
Where to Watch: available streaming on Netflix May 22, 2026

RAVING REVIEW: Raccoons, and foxes, and bears… oh my… There’s a version of MATING SEASON that could’ve been completely unbearable. The premise alone practically invites disaster, taking the idea of shows like BIG MOUTH and its spinoff HUMAN RESOURCES, an adult animated comedy about sexually frustrated forest animals trying to find love, connection, and someone to reproduce with. It sounds like the kind of concept designed entirely around shock value and memes, something built to survive for a week online before disappearing into the endless content void. Instead, the series turns out to be much deeper, stranger, and more self-aware than its setup suggests.

That doesn’t mean the show abandons chaos. MATING SEASON is aggressively horny from the opening seconds and rarely lets up. Characters obsess over sex constantly. Relationships implode in spectacularly embarrassing ways. Bodily fluids become punchlines with alarming regularity. The show knows exactly who its audience is, and it commits hard to the bit. What separates it from other adult animation, though, is that the writing underneath the vulgarity actually has a point of view about loneliness, insecurity, dependency, and the humiliating things people convince themselves to tolerate just to avoid being alone.

The BIG MOUTH DNA is obvious, which makes sense given the creative team behind the series. The dialogue moves at a relentless pace, conversations pile joke on top of joke, and emotional vulnerability often arrives wrapped inside absurd sexual humor. If someone already dislikes the cadence of BIG MOUTH, MATING SEASON probably won’t convert them. The difference here is that the animal setting creates enough separation from reality to let the show experiment with behavior in ways that feel less constrained.

The animal world gimmick initially seems like an excuse to make nonstop mating jokes, but the series gradually finds smarter uses for it. Different species bring different instincts, territorial habits, mating rituals, and emotional dynamics into their relationships. Some of the funniest material comes from the way the writers merge recognizable human insecurities with exaggerated animal behavior (and vice versa). The show mines surprising amounts of character comedy from those overlaps without turning everything into one-note stereotypes.

Nick Kroll’s vocal performance as Ray gives the show much of its instability. Ray exists in that familiar space where overwhelming confidence and desperate insecurity constantly crash into each other. He’s loud, impulsive, needy, selfish, and occasionally pathetic in ways that somehow remain entertaining instead of exhausting. Kroll has always understood how to weaponize awkwardness, and the series leans into that heavily.

Zach Woods ends up being the real secret weapon, though. His style works perfectly within this world because he sounds like someone unraveling in real time. Josh becomes one of the show’s funniest characters precisely because Woods understands how to stretch discomfort into comedy without overplaying it.

June Diane Raphael and Sabrina Jalees also help ground the series emotionally more than expected. MATING SEASON would fall apart quickly if every character operated at maximum absurdity constantly. Raphael especially brings a sharper edge beneath the comedy, giving certain scenes a level of sincerity that prevents the show from collapsing into pure noise. The writing occasionally surprises itself by slowing down long enough to let emotional consequences settle before launching into another avalanche of jokes.

What impressed me most was how aware the show becomes of modern dating exhaustion beneath all the insanity. For all the sex jokes and ridiculous scenarios, MATING SEASON repeatedly circles back to characters struggling with validation, intimacy, fear of aging, emotional compatibility, and the pressure to feel desirable. That emotion gives the series surprising staying power. The best episodes aren’t just funny because they’re outrageous. They work because the emotional panic underneath the humor feels recognizable.

MATING SEASON is crude in ways that are intentionally abrasive. Some viewers are going to find the endless sexual material repetitive or juvenile, especially during the earlier episodes before the dynamics deepen. Above all else, what keeps the show afloat is its commitment to emotional messiness. Nobody in MATING SEASON feels put together. Relationships are chaotic, communication is terrible, and nearly every character keeps sabotaging themselves in recognizable ways. Underneath the absurdity, the show understands that romance often turns intelligent adults into irrational disasters.

More importantly, it’s actually funny. Not occasionally amusing. Not “pretty good for any adult animation.” Genuinely funny. The show understands timing, discomfort, escalation, and contradictions in ways that many adult animated comedies never quite do. Beneath all the fur, pheromones, mating rituals, and emotional breakdowns is a series that recognizes how embarrassing love can make people look. Turns out that’s easier to admit when the characters are raccoons, bunnies, deer, foxes, bears, and other woodland creatures.

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[photo courtesy of NETFLIX, BRUTUS PINK, GOOD AT BUSINESS, TITMOUSE]

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