I recently binged watched Bojack Horseman and I can say, I wish I discovered it sooner. When starting Bojack Horseman, I didn’t expect much. Just another comedy catered toward the adult audience. I didn’t think a show about a Hollywood famous, narcissistic horse, would drop so many truth bombs and insightful quotes. The show portrayed addiction, depression, and life in general, in the most realistic way I’ve ever seen in an animated series. Bojack may have everything he dreamed of, but he does not have the life/validation he always wanted.
“I need you to tell me that I’m a good person. I know that I can be selfish and narcissistic and self-destructive, but underneath all that, deep down, I’m a good person, and I need you to tell me that I’m good. Diane? Tell me, please, Diane. Tell me that I’m good.” -Bojack Horseman
Bojack, voiced by Will Arnett, lives in a world where humans and animals coincide. His circle of friends include his agent, Princess Carolyn (Amy Sedaris); best friend Todd Chavez (Aaron Paul); acquaintance Mr.Peanutbutter (Paul F. Thompkins); and book writer Diane Nguyen (Alison Brie). Each of them play significant roles in the series and become more liked than the star of the show, Bojack. Personally I like Todd and Princess Carolyn the best. Bojack often gets himself into poor situations, but does not realize when he goes down he is dragging everyone else down with him.
He displays behaviors of narcissism, self-sabotaging, abandonment issues, etc. and the ones directly impacted by his antics are the ones closest to him. Bojack is a lazy drunken addict and no matter how many times he tells Todd to get his shit together, Bojack himself needs to get it together as well. Todd is his only true friend, and yet he hurts him the most. Bojack is an unsupportive friend, kicking and keeping Todd down whenever he can. It is later discovered that Bojack does this to keep Todd around, because without Todd he has no one. When he leaves, Bojack will truly be alone. But even Todd eventually has enough of his abuse,
“No! No, BoJack, just stop. You are all the things that are wrong with you. It’s not the alcohol, or the drugs or any of the shitty things that happened to you in your career or when you were a kid. It’s you. All right? It’s you.” -Todd Chavez
Bojack is made to be the most hated character; he acts with only himself in mind, self-sabotages, refuses to take accountability, puts others down to keep them around and so much more, but somehow through all of that the viewers end up caring for him. After all the horrible things he has done, once knowing Bojack’s backstory and knowing the drugs and alcohol are used as coping mechanisms, you understand why he does it all. In the series it is prevalent that Bojack’s behavioral problems stem from childhood trauma. It’s no excuse but you understand. Bojack is a complete asshole, but he exhibits behavior we are all guilty of and his need/want to become better makes him more human, thus making the unlikeable character, likeable.
In seasons five and six viewers can see his battle with addiction and depression more closely. His spiraling downfall is sad to watch. From him getting heavily addicted to painkillers to finally being able to go home, only for everything to remind him of his past and all things he has done wrong. He recognized his bad behaviors and put in the effort to change, and yet he still could not find balance in his life. Because, that’s the thing. No one can control what happens in life and no matter how much effort Bojack put into bettering himself, life had other plans for him.
“Sometimes life’s a bitch and then you keep living.” -Diane Nguyen
The amount of thought and writing put into this show is amazing. The writers had an idea of what they wanted this show to be and hit the mark right on the head. It’s parallels to real life are not sugar coated, and shows hard truths in topics others either try to avoid or glaze over. Each character is well put together and brings their own story lines that do not revolve around the main character, which I like. I am glad I found this show and highly recommend others to watch. I enjoyed watching every episode and even avoided watching the last episode. For an entire day I refused to watch, because I didn’t want it to end. Very few shows have that impact. And although, it may not have ended how many wanted, it stuck with its premise. The ending felt right. It didn’t feel happy or sad, it just felt right.