Shortly before the pandemic, I binge-watched all of BoJack Horseman from the dark cave of my late-night living room. I became obsessed with it. I talked about it to everyone…
Archive for November, 2020
The Lost Futures of BoJack and Diane
Just before the credits roll in BoJack Horseman’s final episode, the camera tilts leaving BoJack and Diane visible from only the mid-chest up. If we weren’t already paying attention to…
Good Boy Gone Bad: The Rot in Mr. Peanutbutter’s House
He’s a man who has suffered no consequences. His is a recklessness born of experience. He’s like a malevolent Mr. Magoo. He always knows the I-beam is going to swing…
“Now this is television! Turn on the rain!” BoJack Horseman and J. D. Salinger
In Season 2 of BoJack Horseman, Hollywoo agent Princess Carolyn learns that J. D. Salinger is alive, hiding out at Joe Nobody’s Shop for Tandem Bicycles, having faked his own…
It’s Not Ibsen
Back in the 90s, BoJack Horseman was on a very famous TV show. It wasn’t a very good show, but the characters, BoJack tells us, were good people.1 BH: I…
Major Falls and Minor Lifts: The Character System of BoJack Horseman
BoJack Horseman is set in a cartoonish world where hybrid beings satirize familiar behavior and in which backgrounds keep up the visual equivalent of a laugh track. We notice moles…
Only Connecting in Pacific Ocean City
For the past few years, I’ve been teaching the BoJack Horseman episode “Fish Out of Water” in my writing courses. The episode forgoes dialogue for about 23 of its 26…
BoJack and #MeToo
For the last three years, I’ve studied masculinity in the context of very public instances of sexual violence, collecting newspaper articles, tweets, documentaries, and books that detail allegations of sexual…
“How do you not be sad?”: Sadness and Communication in BoJack Horseman
Like many recent sadcoms, BoJack Horseman offers viewers a gloss on a hostile affective world in which connections between people are easily shattered.1 BoJack is a horse in pain “all…
Good, Likeable People Who Love Each Other
“Hey, you see those people?” BoJack says to ten-year-old Sarah Lynn at the start of BoJack Horseman’s third episode, looking out at the live studio audience of Horsin’ Around. Sarah…