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Marvel's 'Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur' episode leaks online after alleged removal for LGBTQ+ plot
The episode of the Marvel animated show was set to air on the Disney channel before it was pulled.
Just as Marvel and Disney are making strides in LGBTQ+ representation with shows like The Acolyte and Agatha All Along, they just took a giant step backward by refusing to air an episode of an animated show allegedly because of a trans plot line.
An upcoming episode of the second season of Marvel animated series Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur won’t air on the Disney Channel like the rest of the show because of the LGBTQ+-centric plot, according to people who worked on the series.
While the episode was pulled from the Disney Channel, artists who worked on Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur took to social media earlier this week to voice their disappointment with the episode being “shelved because of which party that won the recent election,” in a clear reference to the network likely self-censoring because Donald Trump won the election and the anti-LGBTQ+ Republican Party took control of both the House and Senate.
Viewers may never have gotten a chance to see the episode, but today, DisneyToon (@owlphibia) leaked the episode by posting it on X (formerly Twitter) and uploading it to YouTube so that fans can watch it. The episode has since been removed from YouTube by Disney for copyright infringement, though it can still be downloaded from X at the time of publication.
The episode, titled “Gatekeeper,” focuses on a rival women’s basketball coach Greer trying to get Brooklyn — voiced by trans and nonbinary actress Indya Moore — disqualified after she overhears the teen player mention that she used to “play on the boy’s team.” When confronted about Brooklyn being trans, he defends her, saying, “Brooklyn is a girl, and she’s gonna play.” Coach Greer then uses a magical key to lock Brooklyn and her teammates in the girls’ locker room.
Then, the teens on the team — including a nonbinary player — have to work together to escape. “We’ve been trying to play by the rules, but when the game is rigged, that doesn’t work, so…,” super genius Luella says before Brooklyn finishes her sentence, “We make our own rules. Instead of playing the game, we have to break through this whole system.”
Not only does the episode feature a trans character who wears rainbow flag knee pads and carries a water bottle covered in a “Trans is beautiful” sticker, but it’s also clearly calling out the ridiculous bigotry at the heart of the current right-wing rhetoric around trans women playing in women’s sports.
The episode is not only entertaining, but it also explores themes of anti-trans hate and is a bold statement about trans inclusion. While we don’t know the exact reason Marvel and the Disney Channel decided not to air the powerful episode, it’s looking a whole lot like they took the coward’s way out.
Ariel Messman-Rucker is an Oakland-born journalist who now calls the Pacific Northwest her home. When she’s not writing about politics and queer pop culture, she can be found reading, hiking, or talking about horror movies with the Zombie Grrlz Horror Podcast Network.
Ariel Messman-Rucker is an Oakland-born journalist who now calls the Pacific Northwest her home. When she’s not writing about politics and queer pop culture, she can be found reading, hiking, or talking about horror movies with the Zombie Grrlz Horror Podcast Network.
