Someone in the art department for the animated Netflix children’s series Maya the Bee thought it would be funny to draw the outline of a penis in the background of a scene in one of its episodes. Maybe it was funny, maybe it wasn’t. But the production studio is publicly appalled and all we want to know is who did this.
Before the Netflix remake of Maya the Bee—a story based on the European cartoon and children’s book—the Nickelodeon version was popular during my childhood. I recall having a very deep familial connection with the bee. The Hollywood Reporter describes it as the story of “a rebellious young bee named Maya who leaves her hive to discover the beauty and mysteries of nature.” Among the 150 employed artists at the studio, one of them took that theme to the extreme.
After screenshots of the Maya the Bee D surfaced online, Netflix was forced to pull the offending episode. The studio issued an apology on Friday that states:
“An absolutely inappropriate image has been discovered in a four-second fly-by scene in one episode of the total of 78 episodes of the series. The origin of this image obviously results from a very bad joke from one of the 150 artists working on the production. This is indeed unacceptable to the Studio 100 Group as owner of the brand and all its partners and doesn’t reflect the quality of its work and its values. Legal action has already been started. Studio 100 very much regrets this incident and would like to offer its sincere apologies to all Maya the Bee fans. At the same time the company is taking all suitable technical measures to remedy the situation.”
Whomever it is will be reprimanded.