BoJack in episodes that are about him: I'm addicted to fame to the point where I will pursue it at literally any cost. I have lost everyone I have ever loved because of my bad behaviour. I have been raised to believe that I am inherently unworthy of love and will continue to believe this no matter how many people love me in spite of it.
BoJack in episodes that aren't about him: I was forced to wait in line with regular people. Todd is reconnecting with his ex instead of talking to me. Diane is involved in a press scandal and I'M NOT.
so obviously we all know that the penny situation is probably one of bojack’s worst actions. but something to consider is his motive. not to justify his actions, they are inexcusable. but it is important to consider when analyzing his character.
now, the most popular consensus i’ve seen is that bojack did it because he couldn’t get with charlotte, so he went with the next best option. but another option to consider is...what if it was out of revenge? what if he wanted charlotte to find out, because he knew how much it would hurt her? charlotte wouldnt sleep with him, so he sleeps with her 17-year-old daughter. sa isnt a crime of attraction, it’s a crime of power, and bojack has been known to exploit power dynamics in his relationships. just something i’ve been thinking about, sorry if this was incomprehensible.
One of the BEST things about this godforsaken show is how it completely deconstructs the naive, sunshine friend trope both times it happens.
First, we see it with Mr Peanutbutter. From the very first episode, BoJack is shown to despise this man. He thinks his entire existence is irritating, he sees him as an overbearing presence, and the only thing PB has actually done to warrant this in any capacity is by being Diane's boyfriend, and even that's a dynamic that manifests itself later on.* Mr Peanutbutter spends season 1 and much of season 2 ignoring this behaviour at best and being completely naive towards it at worst, always treating BoJack with the excited behaviour that you would expect to see from a dog who loves you. And, if you actually think about this, it's completely unrealistic! Because why would he just not care? Even if he did love him unconditionally (which he does, but that deserves to be spoken about separately), SURELY it would get to him? And then Let's Find Out happens, and we see truly and properly for the first time that it Does. It does get to him. He is truly hurt by BoJack's constant berating. Of course he notices. Why wouldn't he take this new opportunity to humiliate him. Doesn't he deserve it? After all these years???
Then, we see it with Todd. BoJack's relationship with Todd at the start of the show is a much more complicated situation, because the show hints at the relationship being toxic straight from episode 4, but essentially, BoJack's view of being a dad is extremely fucking warped based on 1) his parents (unhealthy) and 2) horsin around (unhealthy but in the other direction). In the case of the latter, he also believes that as long as he just uproots everything and rides his boat to the middle of the sea, he can savour their relationship. The grand gesture means more than the day to day. But it doesn't. And unlike with Mr Peanutbutter, Todd is shown as this really getting to him very early on. In Downer Ending, Todd explicitly says to him that, after 5 years of literally LIVING with him, he's officially given up on BoJack being a good person. Lest we forget, this man's first line in the ENTIRE SHOW is "morning, sunshine!" Now, I understand why this might be difficult to recognise, because even though he's much less tolerant at this point in the story, he's still living with him. He still takes it. But then we see more and more Todd pov episodes. BoJack doesn't come to Todd's improv show. BoJack sleeps with Todd's kind of girlfriend. And THAT'S when Todd finally properly flips out. That's when Todd says "fuck". And you can say it was unexpected all you like but it wasn't. It was inevitable.
Both "Let's Find Out" and "It's You" show turning points in both of these relationships, and both of these are for the better. BoJack's relationship with Mr Peanutbutter becomes much more open after this episode, although they still have their bumps in the road. And BoJack and Todd's relationship has taken so many bumps up to this point that they basically have to start an entirely new relationship from scratch, eventually cumulating in Nice While It Lasted, as they have their first genuinely friendly conversation they have in the entire show.
And the thing about both of these relationships is that they stop being sitcom tropes and start being real.
Let me explain. In situations such as this one, it's extremely easy to relate to BoJack. BoJack is introduced to us as a very usual, grouchy, mean sitcom protagonist. That's what we Know coming into it. That's what He knows as we watch him. That's the only thing he knows. He genuinely believes this is charming behaviour. Hell, that's why grumpy x sunshine ships exist in the first place! And this is why it's useful to put ourselves in the shoes of the other parties. So I'm going to leave you all with a few questions to ponder in your own time. How would you feel if your closest friend kept berating you simply for existing? How would you feel if your kind of father kept betraying you and failing to make it up in the small actions he does every day? And finally, when was the last time you shipped a grumpy x sunshine ship and related to the sunshine?
*The Halloween party is obviously its own kettle of fish but I'm 100% sure not one person on the writing team knew it existed yet and therefore it does Not count.
Escape From LA: How BoJack Horseman deconstructs the sitcom
A LOT of BoJack's characterisation is based on the fact that he sees life as a sitcom. You can't separate BoJack the show nor BoJack the character from sitcoms. So much of the show is based on deconstructing sitcom tropes, and that BoJack thinks that the sitcom solution will work in his life. Take that episode in season 1 where Diane and PB are getting married: BoJack keeps trying to create increasingly complicated situations to sabotage their marriage because he has a crush on Diane, because that's what would happen in a sitcom. But none of them actually work. Diane and PB get married anyway because, why wouldn't they? And the episode ends with Todd telling BoJack that he should just give up.
The sitcom thing is played for laughs to varying degrees throughout the show, with Escape From LA being one example that is exclusively played for drama. The entire episode is set up like an episode of a 90s sitcom: BoJack is extremely close with Penny and involved in her life, there are characters with quirks and catchphrases, BoJack does his stupid BoJack dance at the dance, BoJack acts as the "cool grown up friend" to all of Penny's friends, the New Mexico leitmotif plays throughout the episode as a scene transition, the bjhm theme song is replaced by an 80s sitcom parody of a theme called "Kyle And The Kids".
But the thing about all of this is that the show isn't a sitcom, and everything I just listed has a real life consequence.
Much like bjhm itself does, at the start of the episode the show plays this sitcom subversion for laughs. Pete Repeat has an extremely stupid character quirk both in and out of the context of the story, and he never fucking says anything twice! Because that's stupid! BoJack's stupid dance gets him boo'd off the dance floor because realistically why would a group of teenagers do a 51yo man dance. Kyle And The Kids is immediately followed by a joke about Penny's younger brother Trip having an unprompted erection, which would crucially never happen in an 80s sitcom because, although normal, is not family friendly by any stretch of the imagination.
The rest of my points, however, are subverted in a darker way. BoJack's closeness with Penny means that he knows a lot about her life, and the scene where they go through their plan on what to do also has Charlotte in the room, who has no idea what they're talking about, showing us that this is not a normal level of what an adult knows (there's more to say about this one but I'll get to it later). BoJack acting as the "cool grown up friend" involves giving teenagers bourbon (bearing in mind these kids have only ever drunk beer), and eventually one of them gets alcohol poisoning and ends up going to the hospital. And every time the New Mexico leitmotif is used in the following seasons (i.e. every time New Mexico is mentioned), it is used as something to haunt BoJack. It's the equivalent of having an extremely dirty and terrible association with the Hannah Montana music.
It's difficult to decipher exactly what stereotypical role BoJack is supposed to be taking in this hypothetical episode of Kyle And The Kids, or whatever you want to call it. I think he's supposed to be taking the role of "father". "Father" is the role that he played on Horsin Around. "Father" is what he (at least originally) wanted to be in relation to Penny. "Father" is something that he has one frame of reference for: The Horse.
There is a line in Sabrina's Christmas Wish where Olivia is complaining about the boy she's talking to, and The Horse offers to take her to the dance. The funny thing about this line is that it's not at all out of place in Horsin Around, because it's normal for sitcom parents to have that level of involvement with their children. In fact, they have to, in a narrative context, because it's a dom com, and you have to have the characters interact with each other because that's just how stories work. However, it is out of place in Escape From LA, purely because we have Charlotte as a frame of reference. Charlotte and Penny are very close, and are shown to be very close throughout all of their appearances. But Charlotte is reacting to the conversation with comments like "who are these people?" because she's still Penny's mother at the end of the day. I would say I'm close with my mum and I've never given her that much information about my crushes (it took me half of my one relationship to even tell her that I was in a relationship). And because of this distinction, Penny doesn't see BoJack as a parental figure. She sees him as a friend, which is why she falls in love with him later on.
The interesting thing about this episode is that because it's so sitcommy by design, it's extremely easy to root for BoJack on your first watch. Because the "father" or the "cool adult/uncle/whatever" role in a sitcom is one that's known, and the father in the sitcom would never do anything wrong. Especially considering the background information we have that Charlotte is the one who got away. We, at least to a degree, expect BoJack to actually end up with Charlotte at the end of the episode. When BoJack says things like "you look just like your mother", on our first watch of the episode we connect that to his want to be Penny's father, because that's also BoJack's intention. But then everything gets shattered, both in and out of universe, when Charlotte rejects BoJack. Because suddenly, both we and BoJack are supposed to deal with the fact that, actually, why would she have an affair with Kyle? What information do we have that she and Kyle are not happily married?* This is not a sitcom. So then, BoJack starts to panic. He starts to think irrationally, as this illusion he has been creating for himself for 3 months and/or 29 years starts to crumble. He starts to see Penny, not as a daughter, but as the next best option to being with Charlotte, the next best option to keep living this lie he keeps telling himself.
Sure, it seems like shock value the first time you watch it. Because it's a subversion. It's not what you expect by definition. But then after you rewatch the episode, you can't unsee it. Everything is recontextualised. It's no longer a sitcom.
Escape From LA is my second favourite penultimate episode in the entire show. Other than being one of the biggest parts of the show that wasn't spoilt for me, it's so beautifully constructed and subtle and genius that it remains gripping every time, and I love noticing a new thing about it every time.
*For this very reason, Kyle's lack of appearances and an active role in this episode is genius.
One thing the Polish dub has going for it is that the raw energy of "ssijcie pałę, jełopy" has SO MUCH MORE going for it than "suck a dick, d*mbshits".
Doesn't have the word "d*mb" in it
Everyone puts their CUNT into this line whenever they say it (as they fucking should)
Even with that in mind, just. The way Diane delivers it. Fuck. The sheer PASSION that comes from 34 years of being abused is SO SO GOOD I love her and I love this
Sarah Lynn's VA in this dub is incredible I will be following Agata Skórska's career very closely from now on
Ok but. The scene in s2e09 "The Shot" fucking breaks me and here's why. BoJack sees Kelsey as a merge between his parents and Herb, what with her being older than him and jaded but also she's a boss figure. And for this reason, BoJack spends a lot of time (shown most in "Chickens" but also a lot of the season tbh) trying to win her approval because she's not giving it to him willingly. He keeps going about it in the wrong way, as we see in Chickens when he is trying to turn her actual literal daughter being in danger into a fun day out, but I think the biggest issue with this is actually that he doesn't really have anything to prove. Kelsey purposefully sought him out for the job because she genuinely believed him to be the best actor there, and although she shows frustration at him not being able to do his job properly, she does still keep this image of him in mind. Which is why the thing that actually does lead him to win her approval is him delivering a genuinely good performance, and said approval just comes in a simple recognition of his skill. BoJack has been in desperate of simple appreciation from his parents (reflected in stuff like the "I see you" theme from Free Churro) and he has been missing the attention and extremely intimate love of his performance that Herb gave him while he was directing him, and Kelsey's "no, I knew" quote manages, in three words, to deliver both to him perfectly. And THAT'S what breaks him. Between the sheer emotional connection he feels towards this woman, and the lack of this connection that he received from the people he wanted it from the most, it just becomes too much for him, and THAT'S what leads him to start crying. It is one of the most layered, emotionally intimate moments of the entire show, and it breaks me every time I watch it.
Just realised the subtle genius of lampshading how insane it is that sitcom parents know as much as they do about their kids friends by having BoJack, someone who knows the relationships and personalities of all of Penny's friends, v Charlotte, a mother who knows a realistic amount, and then has the added bonus of being weird on first watch and then Extremely uncomfortable on all subsequent watches
