yeah, it does actually do that. also, I knew I was forgetting something! I forgot that Models begin to compress themselves as you get further from them. I'll try to temporarily move the mouth opening further from the face and see if it lets up. I'll edit reply this with the results.
Alright it worked! at that distance, I don't think people will notice the mouth opening is hovering slightly above the face, it's something I can do manually every time the bug appears too. I wonder though if the textures compressing is just a built-in space saver in Mine-imator to help it run smoother? But anyway, thank you, this really helped! I feel dumb that I forgot about the model compressions when you move away from them though.