Surprising Plot Twist: How The Big Bang Theory Truly Impacted Amy

Let’s rewind a bit. Amy is introduced during an online date with Sheldon Cooper, portrayed by Jim Parsons. Both characters share a disinterest in traditional dating, which makes their pairing seem fitting. Despite this, they develop an unexpected romantic relationship, much to the surprise of their friends, including Sheldon’s roommate Leonard Hofstadter (Johnny Galecki), neighbor Penny (Kaley Cuoco), close friends Howard Wolowitz (Simon Helberg) and Raj Koothrappali (Kunal Nayyar), and Howard’s future wife Bernadette Rostenkowski (Melissa Rauch). So, where does Amy’s career fit into all of this?

Throughout the series, Amy transitions from being a successful neuroscientist to becoming more of a sidekick to Sheldon, culminating in their joint Nobel Prize win. This shift is more troubling than the show’s often disparaging treatment of Amy’s normal desires for intimacy. It’s a disservice to the field of neuroscience and to Bialik herself, who is a neuroscientist in real life. Allow me to elaborate.

Sheldon Cooper is well-known among fans of “The Big Bang Theory” for his condescending and judgmental nature, believing himself to be intellectually superior to everyone he encounters. This attitude extends to Amy, as Sheldon, a theoretical physicist, frequently dismisses biology as a lesser science compared to physics. Initially, Sheldon seems to respect Amy’s impressive scientific credentials. In one episode from Season 5, he even suggests that Amy would never consider dating someone like comic book store owner Stuart Bloom (Kevin Sussman) because of her esteemed career. However, the writers later inexplicably shift Sheldon’s attitude to one of disdain.

Something that even casual fans of “The Big Bang Theory” know about Sheldon Cooper is that he’s an extremely rude and judgmental weirdo who thinks that literally everybody he’s ever met in his life is beneath him intellectually. (Am I editorializing? Yes, but I’m allowed to do that!) This, unfortunately, extends to Amy, especially because Sheldon, a theoretical physicist, regards biology as an “inferior” field to physics (which he says, to Amy, a lot). The weird thing, though, is Sheldon seems initially impressed by Amy’s career bonafides — even claiming in a Season 5 episode that she would never consider going on a date with comic book store owner Stuart Bloom (Kevin Sussman) because she’s such an accomplished scientist — until the writers bizarrely reverse course and imbue him with plenty of disdain.

Take, for example, another Season 5 episode called “The Shiny Trinket Manuever.” When Amy finds out her work is going to be published in a prestigious neuroscience journal, she’s understandably mad that Sheldon literally doesn’t care — he’s way more excited about his paltry 100 followers on the site formerly known as Twitter — forcing Penny to step in. Even though Sheldon gets Amy a gift to celebrate both their relationship and her accomplishment, he still tells Penny that he has to fake his excitement, because he doesn’t care about her work. Then, in the subsequent episode “The Vacation Solution,” Sheldon spends time at Amy’s lab during an extended hiatus from his own work but just bashes her profession before trying to slice into a brain, cutting his finger, and passing out. This kind of stuff isn’t just disrespectful to Amy, but to real neuroscientists who deserved better representation.

In Jessica Radloff’s 2022 book “The Big Bang Theory: The Definitive, Inside Story of the Epic Hit Series,” two of the show’s writers and eventual executive producers, Steve Molaro and Steve Holland, specifically cited Mayim Bialik’s real neuroscience career as inspiration for Amy’s portrayal on the show. (Bialik studied neuroscience at UCLA across several years, eventually earning a PhD in the field.) As Holland put it, the character of Amy was basically crafted around Bialik’s career:

“I think Amy only turned into a neuroscientist because we cast Mayim and she was a neuroscientist in real life. In fact, in the episode where we first meet her, I don’t think we ever say what she does. It just became a matter of writing to those characters’ strengths. As [creator Chuck Lorre] has always said, we have to treat these characters like human beings first and foremost. The jokes will come later.”

As for Molaro, he revealed that Kate Micucci, who went on to play a love interest for Raj, also auditioned for the role of Amy … but Bialik’s real-life experience won out. “Because Mayim could bring an authenticity to the science and to the intelligence of the character, Chuck was like, ‘I think that’s so cool. Let’s go with her,’” Molaro recalled.

Okay, this is all well and good, but what was the point of any of it if they were just going to throw Amy’s career in the trash? I suppose the jokes do “write themselves,” because by the end of “The Big Bang Theory,” that’s precisely what Amy’s career in neuroscience was: a joke.

Even though Sheldon and Amy work together on a neurobiology project in the Season 10 episode “The Collaboration Fluctuation,” the tide eventually turns entirely toward Sheldon’s extensive work in the field of physics … because Amy just pivots with little to no explanation of how she can change scientific fields at the drop of a hat. This all comes to a head in the Season 11 installment “The Bow Tie Asymmetry,” which just so happens to be the episode where Sheldon and Amy get married.

As Sheldon struggles with his titular bowtie, Amy notes that it actually looks pretty good if it’s just ever-so-slightly off-kilter, leading Sheldon to come up with a new line of thinking regarding his work in string theory. Together, Sheldon and Amy start working on a study involving super asymmetry (which, by the way, is a fictional concept created by the series) to the point where it delays their wedding, and they tie the knot glowing with the realization that they may have concocted something very special.

This sounds nice, and I’ll be the very first to admit that I don’t know jack about complex scientific fields. What I at least suspect is that a hard pivot from neuroscience to string theory sounds pretty nonsensical, and it gets even worse … because the two win one of the biggest scientific prizes in existence for physics. For the millionth time, Sheldon is a physicist and Amy is a neuroscientist, but her entire field gets shoved to the side.

In the penultimate episode of “The Big Bang Theory” — titled “The Change Constant” — Amy and Sheldon definitively learn that they’ve won the Nobel Prize in Physics, and in the subsequent series finale “The Stockholm Syndrome,” the whole gang flies to Sweden to celebrate the couple’s massive victory. Still, my entire hang-up about this comes down to the fact that Amy gave up her own career aspirations to be Sheldon’s sidekick.

Plus, Amy gets disrespected by Sheldon all the time. As their relationship proceeds at a snail’s pace and Amy seeks physical intimacy with Sheldon, the show doesn’t let him gently tell her that he has fears and boundaries so they need to take things slow. Instead, he just mocks her for having any interest in kissing her boyfriend and treats her like she’s some sort of freak. This is a throughline on the series that continues for, if we’re all being honest, an embarrassingly long amount of time. Still, the most egregious thing is the professional shake-up, because Amy was always really proud of her success in the field of neuroscience.

When Amy gives her “part” of their acceptance speech — she’s really just opening for Sheldon — she says, “I would just like to take this moment to say to all the young girls out there who dream about science as a profession: go for it! It is the greatest job in the world, and if anybody tells you you can’t, don’t listen.” That’s such a nice thought, but it’s empty now that Amy has abandoned her career goals for a boy who’s not always that nice to her.