YMMV / Molly of Denali

• Accidental Innuendo: Merna says she's known as "Churnin' Merna" in the Big Gathering short "Soapberry Fury." The nickname refers to her ability to whip soapberries into a stiff foam using a traditional soapberry spoon. But older viewers might question where she actually got that nickname.
• Adorkable:
  • Molly is a Genki Girl who loves learning new things. She's super upbeat and sometimes awkward, but that makes her all the more endearing.
  • Oscar because of his unfamiliarity with social cues. In "Fiddlesticks", he puts his hand on Molly's fist when she was really trying to fist bump him.
  • Tooey is sweet and sensitive. He gets shy and tongue tied when put on the spot, which is pretty adorable.
  • Kenji may be a down-to-earth guy, but he can get silly at times, especially his angry face when trying to solve the puzzle in "Puzzled". These traits make him very lovable.
• Awesome Art:
  • The backgrounds almost look like paintings.
  • The aurora borealis in "Turn On The Northern Lights" was gorgeous.
  • "By Sled or Snowshoe" adds lava fountains to a backdrop of auroras.
• Awesome Music: The theme song for the show is very catchy and gets viewers hyped for their adventures with Molly.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: In "It Came From Beyond," Trini has some pretty surreal dreams involving a talking bird vetch who starts invading Qyah and chanting "YOUR HOME IS OUR HOME." These weird scenes don't quite fit in with the usual tone of the show, and it's the one of the only times the show has dipped into trippy territory.
• Broken Aesop:
  • In "Native Youth Olympics," Walter emphasizes to Molly that the key to doing well in any of the Native Youth Olympic events is to keep practicing. In the end, Molly wins a gold medal for the Greased Pole Walk, an event that she signed up for at the last minute and didn't practice at all because she was naturally good at it.
  • In "Not a Mascot," Walter says he didn't like his school's original team name of "the Fighting Athabascans" because he didn't think it represented who they were; "[they] don't fight, [they] work together." Yet he fought to change the team name to the Northern Lights, and he encourages Molly to fight to change the name and mascot of a team she barely has any connection with. It makes the message of, "even if you didn't mean to do so, you misrepresented me, and that offends me," less impactful when the name did, in fact, represent who it was given to; Walter is Athabascan and he does fight for what he feels is right (to his credit, he also opposed the name on the grounds that it excluded his teammates who weren't Athabascan).
• Diagnosed by the Audience:
  • Oscar is interpreted by a number of fans as autistic. Has a heavy fixation on playing the fiddle, and also makes random references to his favorite stuff, such as The Butler of Finicky Manor. He also doesn't seem to understand social cues very well, as shown when he failed to give Molly a fistbump in "Fiddlesticks".
  • Willow from the episode "Story of the Story Knife" may also be on the autism spectrum. She misses social cues, is chronically shy, is sensitive to loud or sharp sounds, and relies heavily on her own facial expressions to communicate while simultaneously struggling to understand others' facial expressions. While it's made clear that Willow's facial expressions are specific to her Yup'ik tribe, she seems to rely on them so extensively that she's confused when others besides her mother fail to understand her. She is also generally quiet until she's engaged in one of her passions, which is another common neurodivergent trait.
  • Travis Hightower likely has the hyperactive/impulsive variety of ADHD, which is more common in males than the inattentive type. He's very excitable, gullible, impulsive (especially with money) and clumsy. He has a tendency to interrupt people and to hyperfixate on his interests. Since he's also an extrovert, he's written to be more an example of the Hollywood version of ADHD. But he still exhibits actual symptoms of the disorder.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: A lot of the supporting cast are pretty popular with fans, especially Shyahtsoo, Nina, Oscar, Jake, Vera and Kenji (Tooey's dad).
• Estrogen Brigade: A lot of the older female fans really like Kenji (the father of Tooey), because of his incredibly kind personality and his voice. Likely because of his fangirls, GBH (who is very fandom- and internet-savvy) made him appear less frequently in the second season.
• Friendly Fandoms:
  • With the fandoms of Ready Jet Go! and Let's Go Luna!, due to all of them being educational PBS shows that don't talk down to the audience and all have strong characterization, good animation and clever dialogue. All 3 of these shows are thought to have brung about the 'Edutainment Show Renaissance'. This "where y'all sitting at?" meme made by KLRU (the PBS station in Austin, Texas) even shows Jet, Molly and Luna sitting together at lunch. Coincidentally, Jake from Molly looks exactly like Sean from Jet. Also, with Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum.
  • With another WGBH kids show, Martha Speaks, because the show also follows a curriculum of literature with a combination of comedy antics, as well as the fact that some of the voice actors from Martha Speaks are also well-known for Molly of Denali.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: GoAnimate users complained about this show supposedly ripping off Wild Kratts. Three years later, the Kratt Brothers would guest-star on Molly of Denali.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Since when did Sean leave Washington? ^ExplanationA lot of fans ask this in regards to Jake, who looks exactly like Sean. One fan suggested that he had gotten tired of Mindy's crap, so he moved from Washington to Alaska.
  • In "Visit Qyah", Maurice recounts the various sights he's seen in his travels, mentioning a meeting with the celebrity Clark Newman. The thing is, Newman looks almost exactly like Arataka Reigen. Content-starved Mob Psycho 100 fans proceeded to explode, especially after one of the show's artists on Twitter confirmed that it was an intentional reference. The general consensus seems to be that Clark Newman is either a) an alias used by Reigen to escape punishment for tax fraud, or b) a real celebrity that Reigen was mistaken for and, enjoying the attention too much to correct it, pretended to be.
• Moe: Molly is an adorable ball of energy. Tooey also counts due to him being very sweet and sensitive.
• My Real Daddy: Invoked by the two creators, both of whom are white, who know that this isn't their story to tell and hired many Alaska Natives to work on the show. Everyone can agree that crew members like Princess Daazhraii Johnson and Uwe Rafael Braun really mold the show into what it is.
• Periphery Demographic: The show gained a following of teens and adults, since not only does it represent Alaska Natives positively, but it also has great animation, smart writing, and lovable characters.
• Platonic Writing, Romantic Reading: By the way Molly and Tooey act around one another, it's easy to assume that they may have crushes on each other. Though the writers never intended for there to be any romantic feelings between the two, it's safe to say the fandom isn't afraid to ship them.
• The Scrappy: Travis Hightower is probably the least popular of the recurring characters, with his episodes increasingly flanderizing his Florida Man status. In particular, he's disliked for trying to apply urban Florida landscaping ideals to the Alaska wilderness—something that most people would see as an obviously terrible and pointless idea.
• Signature Line: "Mahsi cho" ("thank you" in Gwich'in).
• Squick: In "Sticker Shock," it is mentioned that Jay and John accidentally used each other's toothbrushes in college, meaning that they shared germs.
• Sweet Dreams Fuel: The show is very laid-back, fun to watch, and sweet.
• They Copied It, So It Sucks!: Some GoAnimate users called it a ripoff of Dora the Explorer before Molly of Denali even aired, although the shows have nothing in common besides Molly and Dora looking somewhat similar. There are also some people who somehow think this show rips off Wild Kratts, even though anyone with a functioning brain who has seen both shows will tell you that they have nothing in common.
• Toy Ship: Molly/Tooey are shipped together for their habit of hugging, holding hands and linking arms, and being undeniably loyal to each other.
• Watch It for the Meme: Quite a few people only learned about the series due to the infamous "Clark Newman" meme, and watched "Visit Qyah" just for that moment.
• Watched It for the Representation: The series focuses on Alaska Native characters, stories, and traditions, and has indigenous people at every level of production, making the show very authentic and genuine. The show gained a lot of positive press for its native representation and a ton of Native teens and adults watch the show.
• The Woobie:
  • Grandpa Nat. When he was a kid, he was forced into a boarding school, where he was openly shamed due to him being Indigenous. He was even banned from singing native songs at school. He gave his drum away to Shyahtsoo, and forgot his songs over time.
  • Trini. Her mom Joy serves in the military, so she doesn't have time to visit her and Daniel. Joy stays in Qyah for a little while during "Molly and the Great One", but soon she has to leave again. This breaks Trini.

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