My girls were desperate to watch this as they’d seen lots of trailers for it. It would be almost impossible to stop them (as it’s on CBBC) so I watched all 4 episodes with them, pausing whenever they had a question or didn’t understand something.
I didn’t want to turn it into a big issue for them by banning it.
The style of the program felt quite similar to previous shows my girls have watched and loved in the past - new kid in town/school has an issue/secret, makes new friends, issue/secret gets revealed, all turns out “ok” in the end.
I explained to my girls that the laws might be different in Australia to the UK, but here, the law says that schools have to provide separate toilets for girls and boys over 8 years old. They asked why and I said it was to do with the 3 Ps: puberty, periods and privacy. They asked if Hannah was a girl now and I said that Hannah wanted to be treated like a girl. They asked if Hannah still had a willy and I said probably, because it wouldn’t be right to operate on an 11/12 year old child, would it? They agreed and my 9 year old said that Hannah still has the body of a boy but wants to look and be treated like a girl. I replied that it was quite complicated for a CBBC show, wasn’t it? My 12 year old was very confused as to whether Jasmine was being nasty or not by not carrying on her friendship with Hannah. I explained that it was complicated because Hannah lied to her and that some people find it hard to carry on a friendship if they can’t trust them.
I found the show very one-sided. Hannah’s feelings were portrayed as vastly more important than anyone else’s throughout. Hannah was desperate to attend a sleepover party but Mum wouldn’t allow it “for Hannah’s protection” as the other girls and their parents didn’t know that Hannah was transgender. So Hannah was encouraged by Mum to lie about the reason for going home early. There was no mention of how the girls at the sleepover would feel. A few things really irked me: the bullies shown and initially blamed for outing Hannah on social media were all girls but it was later revealed that an anonymous older boy had actually done it after overhearing two teachers talking about Hannah. The main bully Isabel seemed to have bruising on her arms purely to provide Hannah with an opportunity to show how generous Hannah could be by offering a long-sleeved rash to Isabel. There was no delving into the origin of her bruising.
Also, when they were on camp, when Hannah’s best friend (Olivia) made a comment about another friend (Natalie) having been well prepared as she’d brought enough sanpro “for every girl in camp” the situation of another friend unexpectedly having her first period was immediately spun round to Hannah’s trauma of not being included and how Hannah would dearly love to suffer with them. My 12 year old who has just had her first painful period was as gobsmacked as me by that!
In the last episode there was a girl with very short hair whose mother won’t listen to her and she’s scared of “getting further away from who she really is.” She asks Hannah for advice about how to get mum to listen. Hannah replies with “I’m going to help you.” Not, I’ll help you talk to the teachers at school or anything constructive...
One last thing that struck me was how the actor who played Hannah seemed to be about 11/12 but most of the others in the year group seemed a lot taller and older - closer to 14/15. I wonder whether there will be more series when the bodily differences between the sexes or the suppression of them will be discussed. Wearing board shorts over a swimming costume might not be enough.