"Oh my god, I'm the problem!"
Starring: Will Arnett, Aaron Paul, Amy Sedaris, Allison BrieCreated By: Raphael Bob-WaksbergStreaming/AiringOn: NetflixOriginal Release: September 8, 2017Content Warning:
This post contains discussion on suicide, suicidal ideation, and mental illness.
For the last couple of years, Bojack Horseman has been a show that never fails to send me sailing into another depressive, disassociative episode. However, even though I know the consequences to devling into a show like this one, I still keep watching because I don't think I've related to a character as much as I have to Bojack. And that's honestly what worries me the most...
Set in the world of Hollywoo, a world filled with anthomorphic animals and humans alike, the show's titular protagonist is a horse named Bojack (Will Arnett) that is just trying to figure out who he is and what the hell he's doing. For the past three seasons, Bojack's has gone through hell trying to reclaim the fame he once had in the nineties as a famous TV actor. However, through starring in the movie of his dreams and even becoming nominated for an Oscar for that performance, Bojack still finds that he feels nothing. Season Three began with him stating that if he was to win that Oscar, he finally would have meaning in his life, but he soon realizes that there's much more to life than fame because before he's an award-winning, television star, he's Bojack and having to deal with yourself and the things that you've done is honestly one of the hardest things to accomplish, especially when you feel like you're not that great of a person. During Season Three's episode "That's Too Much, Man", Bojack and Sarah Lynn (Kristen Schaal), who is also a famous actress/singer that Bojack views as a daughter-figure, come together to acknowledge their faults and ponder their existence after a drug-fueled bender where she eventually dies in his arms. This was Bojack's breaking point and Season 4 picks up during the aftermath of her death.
Choosing to begin the season without Bojack was a smart decision. Even though we're caught up with everyone else's endeavors in the wake of his absense of the show, we're met with so many more questions. The first thought that always crosses my mind with every season preimere roles around is whether or not Bojack has killed himself, I was almost very certain that he'd actually done it this time. However, even though he appeared as the same narcassistic, self-obsessed horse-man that he's been for the last three seasons, I was all-too relieved and excited to see a familiar face that I could directly relate to amongst the likes of Diane (Allison Brie), Mr.Peanutbutter (Paul F. Tompkins), Princess Carolyn (Amy Sedaris) and Todd (Aaron Paul). However, even though we meet Bojack again as the same man he's always been, this time he is on a different mission: to become a better person. The largest challenge for Bojack over the course of the last three seasons was comprehending the ramifications of his actions and fully feeling remorse for them. Whether your coping mechanism to feeling bad is by heavy drinking or drug use like Bojack's or self-destructively pushing everyone away via hostility and reveling in your own sadness and subcoming to self-harm like mine, doing any of those things always seems to be much easier than admitting your sorry or that you're wrong. Julia Alexander of Polygon writes that:"BoJack is obsessed with himself and his own sadness, desperate to figure out why he feels so hollow. He wants to be both loved and left alone, adored by millions while sitting at home, stewing in his own self-hatred and wallowing in his paralyzing self-doubt."
And the thing that is so different about Season 4 from any other season is that even though everyone around him, including the audience, has already realized this about Bojack, he's finally realized and accepted this fact himself. During an episode ironically titled "Stupid Piece of Shit", Bojack says this to himself. "You're a piece of shit, but at least I know I'm a piece of shit, that makes me better than those other pieces of shit who don't know they're pieces of shit." Though the quote didn't really resonate with me the first time I watched it, it finally clicked yesterday.
Yesterday, I sat in my car with the windows rolled up for a very long time. As I usually do when I get depressed, my first instance was to Google "how long does it take for you to suffocate in a car with the windows rolled up." That, unfortunately, takes quite a while, so my thoughts then moved to crashing my car into a tree, slitting my wrists in a bathtub, or burning myself with cigarettes. Though these thoughts may be alarming to most, they've become quite a comforting normality to me, but this time, they felt so comforting I almost went through with them. After hours of contemplating how I planned to end my life, I dialed the Crisis Hotline. Though I've never done this before and I don't know what prompted me to do it in the first place, I don't regret doing so. After describing my predicament and chatting for a couple of hours on the phone with a delightful young man who I will not name, he told something very similar to what Bojack says to himself. He told me that the best step forward in managing your mental health issues is recognizing that you have them in the first place. I've always been very self-aware when it comes to my mental illness and the instability in my emotions that come along with it, but until yesterday, like Bojack, I've always related them to myself and not to everyone else around me. While it's easy to recognize moments our own self-hatred and self-doubt (and even Bojack's), it's very hard to see just how the mind braces itself for the fear of abandonment, loneliness, and disappointment with self-destruction instead of clarity or hope. Bojack finally realizing this is the first step in the right direction. However, meeting Hollyhock and reuniting with his mother, send him spiraling back down the rabbit hole he's been trying to climb out of for the last three seasons.
The introduction of Hollyhock (Aparna Nancherla), a girl who presents herself as Bojack's daughter, was an interesting turn of events not only the show, but for Bojack himself because now he's found something to give him meaning. Though she states that she's only come to Bojack to confirm his paternity and find her mother, some of the show's best moments come from the time that these two are together on-screen. As soon as Hollyhock settles into Hollywoo, her similarities to Bojack are uncanny. Not only are they both lazy and insecure about their own cosmic existence, but they both find something in each other, regardless of their faults. The only times that we've ever seen Bojack display and sort of organic happiness are when he is playing a father-figure to someone, even though he's not the best at it. The difference between him being a father-figure to Sarah Lynn and him being a father-figure to Hollyhock is that Sarah Lynn is bound to him of her own volition alone. Like Hollyhock, she also chooses to be around Bojack, regardless of his faults, and she does simply because she chooses to be. She can leave whenever she wants and often does, and while Hollyhock is bound to Bojack also of her own volition and can choose to leave when she can, she is bound to Bojack by blood and Bojack finds comfort in that. Especially since she's the only member of his family that's accepted him for who he is and more importantly, she relates to him. Right before "Stupid Piece of Shit" ends, Hollyhock asks Bojack whether or not the "tiny voice" in your head that tells you that you're worthless, stupid, and ugly goes away when you're older. Even though Bojack lies to her and tells her that it does, it's a very quiet and refreshing moment that highlights the idea the fact that, regardless of whatever you're going through, you're not alone.
And putting Hollyhock aside, Bojack isn't alone in his struggle to find happiness. Although most of the other characters' struggles to find purpose appears have often just felt like filler episodes that almost fade into the background. This time around, in really dissecting them, they're revealed to be some of the most beautiful and devastating parts of the show when you compare them to how they were portrayed in previous seasons. Todd has always strived to rid himself of his toxic friendship with Bojack. We've seen Bojack hurt him time-and-time again, but last season, he'd had enough. Though he's constantly pushing Todd away with his actions, his one fear is Todd actually leaving and in his final efforts to stop Todd from leaving, Todd says this:"You can’t keep doing shitty things, and then feel bad about yourself like that makes it okay! You need to be better! … 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."
This hurt my feelings! While this probably stems from my own narcissism, it really hit home for me because every time I've ever hurt someone, it is my own fault for not acknowledging that I've done whatever it is. It is my own fault for doing the things that I've done and letting the past control my life, but it's so goddamn hard not to. Once Todd finally lets go of Bojack in Season 4, he's free to begin his own life and even though he's struggled with doing his own thing and being himself in the past, it's even harder now that he doesn't have Bojack to blame for bringing him down. All along, he's never really known who he was and dealing with Bojack was not inhibited him from being able to do so, but it ultimately revealed that it was also an excuse for him to not have to. Diane and Mr. Peanutbutter have have their share of marital problems as well as their own internal issues. Diane struggles not only with her own cosmic existence like Bojack, but she struggles with being understood. She's frustrated with how the world treats women, it's gun laws and even the environment and though she voices her frustrations constantly, she still feels like she's not being heard, most importantly by her husband, Mr. Peanutbutter, who is solely focused on his own issues. Although Mr. Peanutbutter hasn't reached his breaking point yet (though I fear he will soon), last season both Todd and Bojack hit there's and this season it's Diane's turn. In "Underground" after Mr. Peanutbutter's puts his support into fracking, their whole house collapses and everyone, which includes Bojack, Diane, Mr. Peanutbutter and a whole gaggle of various celebrities (including a hilarious version of Jessica Biel, played by herself) and it's there that she has her breakdown. By being stuck underground without the likes of anything to distract her from her problems, she is confronted by everything she's both feared and been frustrated with thus far and that's the fact that she feels purposeless.
Even though she's tried so hard to feel otherwise by thrusting herself into her work and marriage, Bojack's attempt to find solace in his fame, it hasn't worked. She's tried so hard to pretend to be happy with her job and her relationship and it still hasn't worked because she's never really faced the issues head-on. She's just ignored them. The primary reason that her and Mr. Peanutbutter's relationship hasn't worked is because they're fundamentally different, which both of them have failed to realize. Unlike everyone around him including Diane, Mr. Peanutbutter finds solace in his meaningless and this is established early on in the show. In Season One's "Say Anything" tries to comfort Bojack by telling him nothing matters. He later on tells Diane episodes later that "The key to being happy isn't a search for meaning. It's to just keep yourself busy with unimportant nonsense, and eventually, you'll be dead." His only purpose is to make everyone else happy, but because they only find despair in trying to find their own reason for existence, he remains unsatisfied as well. After spending the past few seasons, trying to help everyone become as happy as he is, it's only now that he realizes that's the one thing out of his control because none of the characters know how to be happy.With or without Bojack around, all of these characters are fundamentally one-and-the-same. However, he represents the end-all-be-all for all of their emotional problems. Without him there, they've all fallen into the same twisted rabbit hole that he has because he's reminded them thus far, how not to act.
Looking past all of the witty, pop culture references and the intricately woven jokes that contain social/political commentaries on things like mass shootings, sexuality, and abortion, Bojack Horseman is one hell of an emotional roller coaster. The main reason that I always go back to this show is that Bojack never learns and not only does that send him spiraling downhill, but everyone else as well because they keep going back to him, fully knowing what will happen. But even though each season consists of him hurting the same people time-and-time again, even I go back to the show each season, thinking he will change. Deep down, I don't really think he will ever change nor do I think he's even capable of change, but at least he's trying now. I can only hope that if he does eventually change, so can I.
(For any of you or your loved ones that may have thoughts of committing suicide, please do as I did, call this number: 1-800-273-8255.You won't regret it.
