I watched the fifth season of Bojack Horseman how I watched every other season of Bojack Horseman; alone in my room in somewhat of a fever state while surrounded by ice cream sandwiches I had no intention of eating (side note: I’m pretty sure the ice cream sandwiches are just manifesting in my home at this point, but that’s a story for another day). I have watched every season of Bojack Horseman since 2014 like this, and I stubbornly adhere to my yearly ritual (and make no plans to change). I never really understood my odd need to binge-watch a Netflix original the same way every year, and it seemed that no matter how much I changed physically, emotionally, or even geographically, a part of me was weirdly locked in time solely when I watched this very specific show.
In a weird way I was acting out the very premise of Bojack Horseman: time changes but Bojack, and to a lesser extent myself during these yearly binge-watches, stays the same. To most viewers, having the titular character remain the same alcoholic cynic with a self-destructive streak season after season makes for bad ratings, bad reviews, and cancellation, but Bojack Horseman proves otherwise. The fifth season of Bojack Horseman boasts an impressive one-hundred percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes and previous seasons have never dropped below the ninety percent mark.
So what is Bojack doing right? The premise of the show is your somewhat standard sit-com fare; a washed-up Hollywood has-been navigates the complexities of life post-fame as he attempts to stay relevant in a world where anyone can become famous… and he’s also a horse. Aside from a large portion of the cast being anthropomorphized animals the premise of Bojack is pretty tame. Sure, there’s a lot of room to critique American celebrity culture and the inherent vanity of social media, but that isn’t where Bojack Horseman finds its voice. At the center of Bojack Horseman, and sometimes even overlooked, is Bojack himself.
Bojack rarely changes, to the point where a running gag throughout the show is Bojack expressing a desire to better himself but never putting the effort in, often relapsing into his old habits such as alcoholism, drug use, and other self-destructive behaviors. It’s through Bojack’s inherent inability to change that the writers of Bojack Horseman are able to work their magic; the backdrop of Bojack’s prolonged stagnation becomes a marker for other characters to grow and change, sometimes resulting in wacky antics such as creating a sex-robot that accidentally becomes the president of a website, or a nuanced storyline about the adoption process and the choice to become a mother. The real meat and potatoes of Bojack Horseman, and what makes it such a good show is how everything and everyone around Bojack changes while he stays the same. A show that can acknowledge some of the inherent and massive flaws of its main character, and portray them in a brutally honest way, is such a nuanced and refreshing concept for a sit-com that people keep coming back year after year.
So, here’s to my stretchy pants, my bottle of extra-strength Tylenol, and an unnecessary quantity of ice cream sandwiches; I’ll see you next year.