Bojack Horseman, the character, is unlucky in love. But Bojack Horseman, the show, argues that it has little to do with luck— it’s all Bojack’s fault.
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Transcript provided by Youtube:
00:02
Bojack Horseman, the character, is unlucky in love.
00:06
But Bojack Horseman, the show, argues that it has little to do with luck
00:10
His romantic misery is all Bojack’s fault.
00:13
[I’m responsible for my own happiness? I can’t even be responsible for my own breakfast.]
00:17
The series follows the former star’s search for meaning and happiness, and one of his
00:22
essential coping mechanisms is filling his inner void with romantic relationships.
00:26
[I actually kind of hate myself a lot of the time. But when I’m with you, I, uhh, don’t hate myself.]
00:34
But in fact, Bojack knows very little about love is.
00:38
He received none as a child, and as an adult became accustomed to the superficial kind
00:42
that accompanies fame.
00:43
[If I’m going to sacrifice my journalistic integrity, it’s because I’m having sex with a movie star.]
00:49
For real love, people have to be willing to adapt and compromise in order to find success
00:53
in a partnership.
00:55
And some of the characters in Bojack’s Hollywoo are willing and able to work on themselves.
01:00
Bojack, on the other hand, is stuck in an endless loop: he seeks validation from others,
01:05
but feels unworthy of it.
01:06
[I don’t know how you can expect anyone else to love you, when you so clearly hate yourself.]
01:10
He wants to be reassured that he’s a good person, but he only ever does bad things.
01:15
[I kind of think all you are is just the things you do.]
01:18
He thinks he could be happy if someone would love him, but he has to love himself first–
01:22
and he can’t until he accepts the mundane, unglamorous, everyday work of doing decent things.
01:28
[You can’t force love you blockhead. All you can do is be good to the people in your life.]
01:33
This is actually a lesson Bojack taught himself during a drug-fueled vision back in season one.
01:38
You have to do good to be good.
01:40
[But you gotta do it every day. That’s the hard part.]
01:43
But it’s a lesson that he continues to struggle with, as the series continues to teach us
01:48
that love, and life, are hard work that we have to wake up every day and repeat.
01:52
So here’s what we’ve learned — even if Bojack hasn’t — from his failed romantic endeavors so far:
01:57
When we first meet Bojack, he’s in an on-again off-again casual relationship with Princess
02:03
Carolyn.
02:04
This arrangement gets Bojack the love he claims to want.
02:06
[You’re my lighthouse. My Garmin. You’re the little plastic table they put in pizza boxes to keep the
02:11
pizza from getting smushed.]
02:12
She’s always there when he needs her, enabling his self-obsessed dependence on others.
02:17
None of this satisfies Bojack, though, because he only knows how to take more from people.
02:21
He can’t be fulfilled when a woman gives him everything, because everything’s not
02:25
enough.
02:26
Unsure, Princess Carolyn may be partially to blame here:
02:29
[And I compulsively take care of other people when I don’t know how to take care of myself.]
02:33
But she shows signs of growth as the series progresses, grappling with her struggle to
02:37
balance work and love.
02:39
Bojack, on the other hand, won’t take responsibility for his mistreatment of Princess Carolyn until
02:43
he’s high:
02:46
And by then she’s already moved on.
02:48
Watching her grow while he makes excuses why he can’t change reveals to us that Bojack
02:52
is choosing to remain stuck in his self-indulgent ways.
02:56
[Sometimes I feel like I was born with a leak, and any goodness I started with just slowly spilled
03:01
out of me, and now it’s all gone.
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And I’ll never get it back in me.
03:04
It’s too late.]
03:06
Bojack says it’s too late because the other option would be actually become a better person,
03:10
and that’s hard work.
03:11
Princess Carolyn is all about hard work, though, so she and Bojack were probably never meant
03:16
to be.
03:17
The first woman we see Bojack grow close to is Diane, who remains an elusive romantic
03:22
partner, while becoming his most intimate relationship.
03:25
[Am I attracted to her? Sure. Are my days better when I’m around her? Yeah.
03:29
[Does she get me in ways no woman ever has? indubitably.]
03:32
The series continues to explore their deeply felt connection but maintains that they’re
03:36
not meant to be lovers: Diane and Bojack are, counterintuitively, far too similar to ever
03:41
make it work.
03:42
They both suffer from anxiety and depression, and they’re both aware of how their shortcomings
03:47
can negatively affect others.
03:49
Their pairing would only enable both of them to wallow in self-pity and self-loathing.
03:53
[I’m not like you, okay? I don’t fetishize my own sadness.]
03:57
[I don’t fetishize my own sadness.]
04:00
Diane needs the opposing positive force of Mr. Peanut Butter’s optimism and kindness,
04:05
and she knows it.
04:06
She works on her marriage through several obstacles because she wants to.
04:10
[I know I don’t always have the right words, and I don’t always have the right feelings,
04:13
But I love you so much, and I need you to know that.]
04:16
Bojack also needs Mr. Peanut Butter to be his ideological rival, and to potentially to help
04:22
him learn to become a better man.
04:24
[I want to feel good about myself. The way you do. And I don’t know how.]
04:31
Mr. Peanut Butter analyzes his own worldview, while Bojack’s stubbornness prevents him
04:38
from changing how he thinks about life.
04:41
His complacency of thought is to his detriment. He proceeds to ruin a relationship
04:45
with a woman who could have been, for him, what Mr Peanut Butter is for Diane, an uplifting
04:50
force of positivity.
04:52
Bojack gets a fresh start when he meets Wanda.
04:58
The blank slate gives him an opportunity to be his best self:
05:01
[I want to DO things with you. Fully clothed. Sober. In daylight hours. Do you want to go to Disney Land?]
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[Okay.]
05:10
But Bojack’s true nature is quickly revealed to the owl:
05:14
[My life was ruined by a network executive like you.
05:18
[Well, I’m sorry that things have been so hard for you. But that doesn’t give you the right to be shitty to me.]
05:25
Bojack doesn’t use Wanda like he did Princess Carolyn, and her optimism makes her a foil to Diane,
05:30
but because Bojack won’t change his cynicism, he loses her anyway.
05:34
With this relationship, the show argues that love at first sight can’t always survive
05:38
upon deeper inspection of your partner.
05:40
With Wanda, he had the chance to be anyone, including the good person he claims he wants
05:45
to be. But instead he just wants someone to make him feel better, while he continues
05:49
taking the easy path, which, ironically, makes him hate the life he’s chosen.
05:53
When his relationship with Wanda fails, Bojack retreats from reality and seeks comfort
05:58
away from LA, in his fantasy about the one that got away and the life that “could have
06:02
been.”
06:03
[What are you thinking about?]
06:05
[Just how nice things could’ve been if you had chosen this life.]
06:10
With Charlotte, and her daughter Penny, Bojack seeks the love he believes he could have had
06:14
if only he’d made different choices in his life.
06:16
In trying to relive and recapture his past, however, Bojack only makes more selfish choices
06:21
in the present.
06:22
By giving in to Penny’s advances, and his own desires, Bojack once again reveals the
06:27
depravity he’s capable of.
06:29
By nearly sleeping with his former girlfriend’s daughter, Bojack destroys his relationship
06:33
with Charlotte, and his mental picture of a more blissful divergent life.
06:37
The errors Bojack makes here are emblematic of his truest self:
06:41
[It doesn’t matter where you are, it’s who you are.]
06:45
Bojack is someone who hurts others, not considering any ramifications
06:48
other than immediate gratification.
06:51
What becomes clear is that Bojack fails at relationships because he can’t place someone
06:54
else’s needs first– he can’t even work toward his own long-term well-being because
07:04
he doesn’t understand that lasting happiness is progressive, built over time on a firm
07:08
foundation.
07:09
Being happy isn’t instant, but Bojack’s philosophy of life that feeling good now is all that
07:14
matters ultimately leads to his suicide attempt.
07:20
Instead of doing the work, he keeps trying to press a “do-over” button on his life,
07:24
either by ending it or by meeting a new woman to fill the hole.
07:28
Bojack wants a relationship to make him feel happy, but the show maintains that it has
07:32
to start with him.
07:33
[You need to be better.]
07:36
[I know.]
07:36
Bojack Horseman is aware of his problems — that he’s self-destructive, weak, and too dependent
07:41
on others for his own happiness– and he knows that he’s doing everything we’re talking
07:45
about here, yet this awareness doesn’t itself lead to change.
07:49
[I can’t keep lying to myself saying I’m going to change.
07:51
I’m poison.]
07:52
Bojack has been taught since his childhood that he is not worthy of love, and so far
07:56
he hasn’t been able to surmount this deeply ingrained belief.
08:00
[You can fill your life with projects, your books and your movies and your little girlfriends
08:05
but that won’t make you whole. You’re Bojack Horseman. There’s no cure for that.]
08:12
Perhaps the way out of his misery could be through a more healthy experience with
08:15
family.
08:16
We’ve seen throughout the series that Bojack cares about his television family, and bears
08:20
some of the burden for the death of Sarah Lynn, so perhaps the newest woman poised to
08:25
enter his life– a teenaged horsegirl that’s very probably Bojack’s daughter — could
08:29
be just what he needs to make a change for good.
08:32
[It’s never too late to be the person you want to be.]
08:35
Yet if we’ve learned anything from his relationships, it’s that a new and exciting person entering
08:40
his life isn’t enough.
08:41
The change has to come from within, and he has to grit his teeth through the boring effort
08:45
of being better, every day.
08:47
Otherwise, no luck in the world can save Bojack’s personal life, and he’s doomed to repeat
08:52
the same mistakes, over and over, while expecting different results.
08:56
[There are going to be times when you’ll see someone in trouble. You’re going to want to rush in there and
09:02
do whatever you can to save them. But you have to stop yourself. Because there are some people you can’t save.]
09:10
[What does that have to do with me?]
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This post was previously published on Youtube.
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Photo credit: Screenshot from video