TV Database BoJack Horseman (2014)

OmegaMeistro · Feb 20, 2025

Started watching season 3 recently. Really amazing animation that never won an Emmy (what a sham). Season 2's "Escape From LA" was devastating. I just love depressing antihero shows, and this was definitely one of the most depressing ones. lol

OmegaMeistro · Feb 21, 2025

"But what is happiness? It's a moment before you need more happiness." - Don Draper, Mad Men

So, BoJack finally hit the big time. He's finally what he always wanted: a movie star. And yet, he's not happy. Instead, there's only the void, the loneliness.

This episode is all about the connections we have in our lives, the kind that BoJack tried to tell Kelsey Jannings about in the previous amazing episode, "Fish Out of Water". And honestly, after that artful masterpiece, it's really tough to top that one, but this episode is pretty decent regardless.

BoJack's moment of connection though was long gone - back when he had a chance to be happy with Charlotte in his youth, prior to the show's timeline - so all he could settle for is ensuring that other people don't repeat the same mistake with, once again, a self-loathing speech that coincidentally helped save the day:

"Settle. Because otherwise you're just gonna get older, and harder, and more alone. And you're gonna do everything you can to fill that hole, with friends, and your career, and meaningless sex, but the hole doesn't get filled. One day, you're gonna look around and you're going to realize that everybody loves you, but nobody likes you—And that is the loneliest feeling in the world."

It's almost cliched by this point how BoJack utilizes his own misery to better help others not stray the path that he's on, but I feel like it works, because that's probably the only way the self-destructive BoJack could be a "decent" fellow, in the form of decency that BoJack could muster. However, by the end of the episode, it's implied that BoJack's about to make another mistake again when he's alone with Emily before the camera cuts away... the same way the camera cut away from Don Draper at the end of Mad Men, season 5, as a lady asked a married Don if he's alone at the bar (with Megan shooting a commercial in the same building). What's text isn't shown, but we're all so familiar with the subtext of those scenes by now we know what probably happened.

Other connections shown in the episode are less cynical, but only so much. I feel like Todd's rejection of Emily was appropriate as I just don't see the chemistry between them at all. It all felt like a very one-sided crush from Emily, with Todd being too unorthodox for an orthodox relationship like Emily. It could be a misinterpretation on my part, and perhaps Todd was just a shy virgin that didn't know how to handle intimacy (especially since he seems to be regretting his decision back in the hotel room), but even so, Emily casually dismissed Todd's other zany ideas in the episode so that they could focus on his more normal and practical one. That just feels like a contradiction of vibes, and her more normal personality almost feels like she's dating someone with a child-like personality full of frivolous joviality, someone who would hop into a bin full of laundry pretending to be ghosts.

But opposites attract is still a valid rule in other parts of the episode, such as for Princess Carolyn when she gets into a trio of disastrous blind dates that ends with dating a mouse. However, it's that final seemingly unsuitable match that sparks a good connection for our cat as they both share laughter in their own misery of horrible dates. However, it's implied that Carolyn's work life will probably overshadow whatever connection she had with this surprise love interest. Whether she seizes that connection in the future as BoJack echoed is yet to be seen, but here's hoping.

And our final pair of opposites, Diane and Mr. Peanutbutter. After feeling out of place in a marriage counselling (hosted by the Oscar-winning Lorraine Bracco's "Dr. Janet", aka Tony Soprano's therapist), Diane yet again seeks validation elsewhere, doing drugs like a 40-something suffering midlife crisis, only to ultimately bounce back to Mr. Peanutbutter and seize the opportunity to tell him how much he means to her. Among the four pairings, Diane seems to be the only one who followed through with BoJack's advice accurately... at least until the final revelation that she's pregnant. Motherf-. Cut to black. From what was implied in "BoJack Kills", Diane seems to have an aversion to either children or motherhood, so this could very well mean storms are brewing ahead.

★★★★

OmegaMeistro · Feb 23, 2025

Well, this one's gonna be a tough one to talk about, especially since the episode explicitly (and rather heavyhandedly) told me in one lazily-written "satire" that men like me have no business talking about the subject this episode is tackling: abortion rights. Doesn't matter that I personally think that the pro-life stance can lean into absurdity and can lead to problematic, even oppressing policies despite certain well-intentioned individuals' viewpoints on the sanctity of life. I'm a man so that means I have to just shut the hell up, dammit! Who cares what a man thinks in 2025? What do you think this is, toxic 1960?

See what I did? I said the thing that's offensive while also making fun of how absurd it is. That's essentially what the "white men panel" scene in this episode pretty much did. It's not a terrible scene, but it just kinda annoyed me because of how on-the-nose it was in shouting "Screw the patriarchy!" And yes, don't get me wrong, men in power have historically made bad laws, but reducing every debate to 'men bad, patriarchy evil' is just lazy satire, when BoJack has been more clever than that in the past.

The rest of the episode though is not too bad. Rather than taking a firm stance on women's agency over their body though, it feels more like it's taking aim at how celebrities, particularly female celebrities, take that 21st century agency for granted and manipulate the narrative for clout. Sextina's message was about as performative as any celebrity endorsements over the past year - fake as hell, and worse, it's giving the media ammunition to fuel the eternal flame that's political discourse in mainstream "journalism" (Dr. Evil air-quotes), a neverending circus of "If it bleeds, it leads," or in this case, "Pro-choice's trendy now, folks!"

Unfortunately, that ended up making the episode unintentionally more about THE MESSAGE™ than it is about its central character this episode, Diane. What do we know about Diane this episode? Why doesn't she want the baby? As an audience member, I'm interested to know as I want to know about her as a person - but oh no, nope, too toxic. You don't have to explain to anyone, Diane. Technically true as a life advice for any woman (or man)... but this isn't real life, it's entertainment; it's a show. Ah well.

But jokes aside (and as Ricky Gervais said, "They're just jokes; we're all gonna die soon and there's no sequel"), I am interested in Diane's development as a character, because I'm pretty sure that the show has been building up Diane to be rather phobic of raising children. I doubt she hates children, but perhaps it's the responsibility of it all and her fear of not being able to communicate well with them (see last episode, "Love and/or Marriage"), or maybe she just doesn't like settling down and raise children and has commitment issues (Diane being BoJack-lite seems to be a thing, similar to how Peggy Olson is often, though not always, a less toxic version of Don Draper; protagonist toxicity is contagious). But all this is just blind speculation on my part, because the episode didn't really spend much time exploring all of that. It's more interested in THE MESSAGE™.

Still, I like that very subtle little moment where Princess Carolyn seems to be pro-life when criticizing Diane, but she's actually more concerned with a) keeping her financially struggling company afloat, and b) she's probably somewhat jealous of Diane's family life and how Diane is seemingly taking that for granted (again, see the last episode for more of that context, when Carolyn had a failed date because of her career, while Diane's relationship with Mr. Peanutbutter seemed to have improved instead).

Not a terrible episode like some people said, but not really one of its stronger character-focused ones.

OmegaMeistro · Feb 25, 2025

Todd: Has a creepy driver ever given you his number or told you that you reminded him of his dead girlfriend? Or repeated your address slowly, like he was trying to memorize it? Unfortunately, if you are a woman all those things would happen to you every day.
Emily: That's right, Todd. According to my own research, nine out of ten men are total dirtbag creeps, just the worst.

Man, Emily's whole female ridesharing idea from BoJack just sounds so cringe in this context. It did "men bad" before "men bad" became a trend. Don't get me wrong, the idea has potential (see Japan's female-only ride cars on trains), but the way Emily worded it just sounded so sexist. But right, I forgot - you can't be sexist towards men, especially in 2025. My bad. Still, perhaps that's the joke, the woman that's preaching about men being creeps was a creep who cheated on a nice man (Todd) with another man (BoJack) who's actually a creep.

Preachy messaging aside, the rest of the episode itself was less eye-rolling. The individual story format fits the theme as it plays out like you're reading individual stories off a newspaper. Largely, it's a comedic episode that leads up to Emily's confession to Todd, but also some very interesting development between BoJack and Ana. I doubt that relationship's gonna last long if we're going by antiheroes' track records (see "Mad Men" and Don Draper), but at least BoJack is willing to open up and embrace the imperfection of relationships.

OmegaMeistro · Feb 26, 2025

After "Fish Out of Water", BoJack gets a second chance of redemption to make it up to Kelsey Jannings, but unfortunately, due to a series of events involving Princess Carolyn, that ship has once again sailed.

And while I do loathe Vanessa and Rutabaga, technically, Princess Carolyn's failure this episode is attributed to herself. You can't even blame BoJack for unintentionally spreading his toxicity this time; PC straight up lied to her assistant Laura pretending to be a good boss, thus digging her own grave. Her ambition not only affected Laura, but also Kelsey.

It would be a pretty solid episode if it focused solely on that and Todd's Cabracadabra B-plot (which he ironically turned into a more sexually objectifying version of Uber), but this episode got a little busy with a C-plot about Mr. Peanutbutter and his brother, Captain Peanutbutter (voiced by Weird Al) suffering from a twisted spleen (which is lethal for dogs, I've read). The Peanutbutter side of things did bring out the ironically more bitter side of the jovial dog, but it also made him sound kinda toxic (he lashed out at Diane, bringing up her shitty family relationship), something I've been noticing a lot more throughout this season. It also feels like a plot that's stuffed into an overstuffed episode rather than let it breathe on its own, not to mention how it doesn't connect well thematically with BoJack's plot (not that TV shows always need to have a connected throughline to be great, but it can make for a more engaging viewing).

BoJack's asshole moment of the episode, in case you think he was a decent person this episode, comes with Bradley Hitler-Smith (weird middle name)'s return to visit BoJack for a Horsin' Around spin-off idea, but instead of rejecting him, BoJack led him on (unintentionally, of course) and asked PC to blow it off for him, but Ana ended up being the one who pulled the trigger (relentlessly, I might add). Perhaps his attempt to make up for Kelsey (which is really just about making himself feel better, let's face it) blowing up is just karma biting back for his mistreatment of Bradley, but then again, Vanessa and Rutabaga ended up okay by the end of the episode, so I highly doubt it.

In the end, everyone is an asshole this episode, including the foolish Todd that mucked up the rideshare service, except maybe Judah, who's just trying to do his job in a failing agency.

OmegaMeistro · Mar 1, 2025

“I do love you, by the way. As much as I’m capable of loving someone. Which is never enough. I’m sorry.”

Well, it's better late than never. Did BoJack do what he did this episode because he knew being with him leads to tragedy and toxicity? Or was this just one of his petty moments? To be honest, it's probably both. People love to peg these characters into simple boxes, but characters like BoJack and Don Draper aren't black and white versions of good or evil, but a vessel in constant struggle against their worst selves.

So regardless of BoJack's intent, perhaps this is a good thing. Secondary characters in shows like this would love the chance to get away from the toxic protagonist (see Sopranos and Breaking Bad), so PC's practically been given the golden ticket.

It doesn't resolve the hurt for both of them, but let's face it - despite her flaws, PC could do better than BoJack.

OmegaMeistro · Mar 3, 2025

"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. Fuck, man. What else is there to say?"

And here it is, the f-bomb of the season, and a well-deserved one that's a long time coming. If I have a penny every time Aaron Paul is cast in a role that calls out an emotionally manipulative older friend, I'd have two pennies, but it's funny that it happened twice. Todd's speech could very well have been said to Walter White with a few words switched out, particularly the part where he went, "You can't keep doing this!"

Of course, reality is never that pretty or simple, and even though Todd is right about BoJack's lack of accountability, even though we'd love to think that it's just merely BoJack's fault and that karma hit him where he deserves - which it did - the nuance of the matter is that BoJack's had enablers throughout his life, perhaps those that more deliberately and knowingly drove him down a toxic path than Skyler did with Walter White, whether it's Princess Carolyn during his "BoJack Horseman Show" days in the late 2000s (albeit for the sake of just doing her job as his agent) or the predatory Ana Spanakopita during his Oscar days (who ghosted him after learning that BoJack was wrongly nominated, dumping the man after sexually violating him in a previous episode), or even just the Hollywood system in general, BoJack and countless celebrities (especially child stars) have been told that they were special, that they're not like everybody else, that they deserve this golden statuette that's given out by a committee of out-of-touch elderly thinking they know better than the common people. Yes, BoJack shares at least 90% of the fault in that he could have made a better decision on his own (though I really doubt he could, given his upbringing; I'd know as I'm similar to him), but the full picture is never that simple.

Coincidentally, I just saw the Oscars 2025 yesterday, and that coincidentally viewing was totally unplanned, but the timing of my viewing is just so appropriate, reminding me once again that Hollywood never changes, willing to give out their pat-on-the-back accolades not to the most deserving, but to the trendiest and those that would win the most clout. A poster in this episode hilariously pegged the Oscars accurately: "Please watch the Oscars", it said, knowing full well how little crap normal people have given the Oscars. And this episode came out in 2016. Yikes.

And now, at this point of the series, BoJack is all but alone. Even the usual cast of suckers that stuck around with him, Princess Carolyn, Diane, Todd, even the guest appearances like Penny and Bradley Hitler-Smith, had all abandoned BoJack to his own vices. When BoJack has officially hit rock bottom, where else could he go to at his moment of crisis?

Well, if the next episode title tells us anything, I'm guessing that's Sarah Lynn. And from what I accidentally learned from the spoilers? Yeah, it's only going to get worse from here...

Shout out to Mr. Peanutbutter's B-plot that had ninja turtles in the sewers, except they're blue-collar workers with different colored band hard hats. It's not BoJack Horseman unless you have an absurd plot mixed in with existential crisis.

OmegaMeistro · Mar 5, 2025

"And I realized people don't change because they want to change; they change because they have to change."

As someone who's emotionally damaged and self-destructive, I could often relate to the many antiheroes of prestige TV, for better or worse. It's also one reason why I actively sought out self-destructive protagonists like Gregory House and Tony Soprano, all in the hopes of perhaps, as Ana Spanakopita put it, "fetishizing my sadness," albeit subconsciously.

And usually, they would carry a similar message: "People don't change, they just become more of who they really are," perhaps recited with different wording here and there. The line at the start of this review from BoJack the show, however, proposed that people will only change once they're forced to change with this episode, but I'm not so sure that's true either, at least not the case with BoJack the person. As someone who's similarly damaged, I know from experience that it takes a lot of willpower to even want to change, let alone change your entire worldview and lifestyle. It just... doesn't happen to that many people, despite the existence of all the motivational speakers out there.

Because even though this episode's ending implication is probably the bottomest of rock bottoms that BoJack could sink to... I just don't think it's gonna amount more than a shrug, a "Well, that went well," as the next episode's title indicates. Even if the reality of what happens hits BoJack by the end of the next episode, how is BoJack ever going to change if we have three more seasons of this show anyway? He's not, and I'm not even sure if he's ever gonna be able to by the end of season six.

I was spoiled regarding the ambiguity of this episode's ending by the way, and I was just so pissed at the fact. But I guess when I think about it, it's not even a really ambiguous moment at all, all but spelling out the text of the subtext. Still kinda annoying, but I guess it's no more worse than suggesting that Skywalker and Vader are somehow related.

But the truth of the matter is that I was spoiled about a certain Sarah Lynn's fate long ago on Reddit; I just wasn't told which episode it was. And then I saw the season 3 trailer for this show, and there was that planetarium scene in the trailer... and then comments for that trailer kinda winked at that scene... so they might as well have said it out loud long before I got spoiled about what the ending of this episode means.

And I know what I said about BoJack's enablers for my review of last episode, but I don't think there's even anything more to be said for Sarah Lynn in this one, particularly since we saw specifically in a flashback that BoJack was definitely responsible for Sarah Lynn's ruined childhood, if not entirely (bear fur, 'nuff said). And it all adds up, all of Sarah Lynn's enablers and abusers to this one moment in her life here in this episode, where she watches the lights at a planetarium snuffed out in the ever-progressing circle of life. We all saw it coming when she reached for the drug that was literally featured in an episode titled, "BoJack Kills". Again, not so much subtext as there's just text. It's poetic, if only in a tragic Shakespearean manner.

Or as Sabrina put it, "That's too much... man."

OmegaMeistro · Mar 6, 2025

BoJack: "I don't know how to be, Diane. It doesn't get better and it doesn't get easier. I can't keep lying to myself, saying "I'm gonna change." I'm poison."
Diane: "BoJack."
BoJack: "I come from poison. I have poison inside me, and I destroy everything I touch. That's my legacy. I have nothing to show for the life that I've lived, and I have nobody in my life who's better off for having known me."

Across many prestige TV with antiheroes, you would usually get season after season of all the secondary characters getting sucked into the toxic vortex that's the protagonist's presence, and in said vortex, they'd be morally compromised to the point where they might not even resemble their original selves in season 1.

BoJack Horseman's season 3 finale, however, seems to take a different path, if the season 4 trailer is to be believed. With BoJack having cut off every of his peers from his life (or just inadvertently killed them), the secondary characters have taken various paths to (seemingly) greener pastures in their life. Todd is finally reunited with Emily again and confessed to the world his asexuality. Princess Carolyn finally has the best of both worlds - someone who appreciates her, but also a promising career as a celebrity manager. And Diane and Mr. Peanutbutter seem to both excel on their own as well, with Diane also having a new thriving career as an editor for a feminist newsletter and Mr. Peanutbutter set to become governor of California.

From the season 4 trailer, Todd's future seems to be the most unchanged, but perhaps his asexuality will be explored further. Princess Carolyn's "newfound" career will probably remain as toxic for her new life with Ralph, so that will make for some interesting conflict down the road. Diane's new boss, Stefani Stilton (Ralph's sister), seems just a tad obsessed with taking Mr. Peanutbutter down a notch or two (something Diane raised a brow to), or perhaps just men in general as she gives off that misandric vibe, so it'd be interesting to see how Diane the feminist handles a boss that wants to take down her man. And as for Mr. Peanutbutter? Given how the opportunity to become governor came from his toxic ex, Katrina, and given how messy the political landscape can be, especially for someone as airheaded and naive as Mr. Peanutbutter, things don't seem to bode well for him and, by extension, Diane.

The point of the matter is that, with BoJack running off to the countryside possibly going on a spiritual journey like Cuddlywhiskers (after a young star named Chloe, during his genuine attempt to have "Ethan Around" produced, said she wanted to become famous like BoJack, sending him into a PTSD thinking that he's going to wreck another young child star's life like he did with Sarah Lynn), the secondary cast members don't really have "it's BoJack's fault" to lean onto anymore. From here on out, it's the wild west and all their successes... and failures, it's all on them. I do think they might be better off without BoJack. But at the same time, I see a storm brewing from next season's trailer.

Despite some pretty decent comedy bits (like making every loose plotline from previous episodes pay off in the spaghetti shipwreck B-plot this episode), this felt like the heaviest episode in the series so far, largely because of BoJack's speech that I quoted at the beginning, but also because of his later PTSD panic attack at potentially endangering another child star's future. It's gotten to a depressing kind of mood that lacks the kind of quirky, cringeworthy comedy vibe that you could still laugh off for how stupid BoJack's acting. Instead, this episode feels relentlessly grounded in BoJack admitting the existence of his darkness and being shaken by what he sees, having a genuine nervous breakdown by the dark path that he almost returned to.

It's just not fun anymore, but perhaps the show's all the better for it. I could only wonder if it gets more depressing from here on.

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