{"id":1366,"date":"2016-03-19T05:19:20","date_gmt":"2016-03-19T05:19:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=1366"},"modified":"2016-03-19T05:19:20","modified_gmt":"2016-03-19T05:19:20","slug":"bojack-horseman-netflix-tv-show-animated-dark-comedy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=1366","title":{"rendered":"BoJack Horseman Does What The Simpsons Can\u2019t"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

T<\/span>oward the climax of season 3 of <\/p>BoJack Horseman<\/em>, the titular half-man, half-horse film actor wakes up on the morning the Oscar nominations are about to be declared. After a personal redemption arc that saw him bag a dream role in an award-bait biopic, he was on the cusp of attaining the validation he\u2019s been seeking since he began his career as a struggler. The nominations come around. His name isn\u2019t the first. Or the second, or third, or fourth. And then, sneaking into the last slot, BoJack\u2019s name is announced. He\u2019s finally made it! His publicist, watching with him, asks him how he feels. He jumps off the couch, the music swells, the viewers gear up for a cathartic moment and wait for the moment of triumph before BoJack deflates all that.\n\nHis answer? \u201cI feel\u2026 the same.\u201d\n\nAt first, I felt cheated of a happy ending, but then it reminded me of my first day ever at work. Starting as a humble content writer, I spent the morning getting ready with a spring in my step, imagining all the exciting work I\u2019d be doing in the coming weeks. I was finally going to be an adult; a respected, tax-paying member of society. But this euphoria was tempered by a sense of dread about whether I\u2019d be able to live up to my own expectations.\n\nHowever, much to my disappointment, my first day didn\u2019t answer any of the niggling questions about my potential that had stalked me since graduation. There I was, getting a job I\u2019d trained myself for over the course of my education, doing what I said I\u2019d do, and just like BoJack, I felt no different about myself.\n\nAlmost every person I know, myself included, has eagerly been awaiting the release of BoJack Horseman<\/em> season 5. Yes, the cartoon adventures of a half-horse, half-man and his entourage of human and animal supporting characters is exactly the kind of stuff millennial adults concern themselves with. Despite its overtly absurd premise, it\u2019s not half as ridiculous as it sounds on paper. BoJack Horseman<\/em> is a cutting reflection of life in the 21st century, except that it\u2019s brought to life by talking animals. To everyone who is rolling their eyes and labelling us, yet again, the generation that refuses to grow up, I have only two words: The Simpsons. We\u2019re only following a well-established precedent.\n\nBeginning with the animated sitcom in the \u201980s, there has always been room for adult animation (which does not mean Homer and Marge\u2019s sex tape, eww.) With The Simpsons<\/em>, Matt Groenig and his team of writers took cartoons out of the realm of kiddie entertainment by using animation as a medium to parody the life and times of America<\/a>. Over the years, it paved a path that led to other seminal animation series as South Park<\/em>, Family Guy<\/em>, Archer<\/em>, and finally, BoJack Horseman<\/em> in 2014. And with BoJack<\/em>, the genre finally has a transcendent work that can rise above the standards set by all the shows that came before it.\n\nStill, ever since Mickey Mouse first<\/a> sprang forth from Walt Disney\u2019s imagination in 1928, a cartoon has been regarded as children\u2019s entertainment. From the flipbook-style line-drawings of the previous century to today\u2019s CGI-driven spectacles, generation after generation of kids has been reared on brightly coloured, whimsical, and fanciful cartoons. For me, it was Fred Flintstone and Scooby Doo, and today\u2019s chillar party has an affinity for Chota Bheem and Beyblade (or something).\n\nI thought I’d outgrown my love for anthropomorphic animals. One day you suddenly decide cartoons are just infantile distractions. But shows like South Park<\/em> and Family Guy<\/em> aren\u2019t the same as the cartoons your momma would let you watch when you were five. There\u2019s cursing, sex, violence, and everything else that you watch Game of Thrones<\/em> for. Yes, even incest.<\/a> These shows exist as parodies of our world, where emotions are cranked up to the maximum and long-term consequences are non-existent. Whether it\u2019s Kenny getting killed (by some bastards, of course) for the billionth time, or Peter Griffin\u2019s seasons-spanning feud with an angry chicken, shows like these reflect the most ridiculous aspects of our world back at us.\n\nBoJack<\/em>, for all of its absurdity on the surface, doesn\u2019t go for the laughs, even though it elicits a healthy amount of those along the way. Instead, BoJack<\/em> goes straight for the feels. For the first time, here\u2019s a cartoon that\u2019s not trying to up the stakes in hilarity every season. The show slowly, sometimes painfully, dwells on themes that resonate with its audience of quarter-life-crisis-facing millennials. The central characters, BoJack, Princess Carolyn, Diane, and Todd are all equally rounded and fleshed out, and the fact that only two of them are human characters hardly matters. Each of them represent a different facet of the millennial experience in 2017.\n

BoJack stubbornly resists all temptations to turn into a generic animated adult comedy like Family Guy or The Simpsons.<\/blockquote>\nBoJack<\/em>, for instance, is the very embodiment of existential dread. He exists in a vacuum of his own sadness, always focussed on reflecting on his failures rather than enjoying the present. His coping mechanism for dealing with this fucked-up, warped worldview is one we\u2019re all familiar with. Drown out the feelings in a haze of drugs, alcohol, parties, and other superficial shit until there is, in BoJack\u2019s own words, \u201cNothing on the outside, nothing on the inside.\u201d\n\nDiane, BoJack\u2019s former ghostwriter and friend, is the person we\u2019re all afraid of becoming. The kind of person who says they stick up for what they believe in and walks around with a chip on their shoulder, only to actually live a life that absolutely contradicts their ideals. We all know that person, who\u2019s vegetarian because they can\u2019t stomach the \u201ccruelty\u201d, but loves a nice leather belt or wallet.\n\nIt\u2019s not all doom, gloom, and stereotypes though. Princess Carolyn and Todd are more positive characters, especially in contrast to BoJack\u2019s and Diane\u2019s relatable, everyday awfulness. Still, no character is painted in shades of black and white, and the realism this entails leads to conversations that have an uncanny resonance in the lives of its audience. BoJack\u2019s nihilism is a metaphor for the emptiness of our modern existence. \u201cHow can I be responsible for my own happiness? I\u2019m barely responsible for my own breakfast!\u201d BoJack screams in the first episode of the show, snatching the words out of the mouth of every twenty-something struggling to make ends meet while trying to juggle a job, family, and a social life.\n\nThe show pulls no punches, dropping more truth bombs as it shows its viewers that happiness is fleeting, and life is largely unremarkable as a whole. BoJack, a washed-up sitcom actor can be in the middle of a phoenix-like career resurgence but still ends up drunk and watching reruns of his old show on his couch. In life, you don\u2019t always get closure and nothing, from joy to sorrow, is permanent. I don’t know if you get to hang around many millennials, but if you went to Doolally on a weekday evening, you’d probably hear five different iterations of the same sentiment.\n\nBoJack<\/em> stubbornly resists all temptations to turn into a generic animated adult comedy like Family Guy<\/em> or The Simpsons<\/em>. It actively rejects the \u201c30 minutes to closure\u201d approach of most cartoons and even live-action sitcoms, preferring a serialised approach to storytelling with a marked aversion for happy endings. The writing is delightfully self-aware, with jokes skewering every tired, stereotypical trope that manages to make its way into the script. The otherworldly factor of having talking animals as half of its cast is milked for throwaway gags, but never detracts from the realism of the story. It\u2019s a show that very clearly points a way forward for animated comedy, taking it out of the realm of ridiculous entertainment for stoners and putting it alongside thought-provoking, disruptive shows like Arrested Development<\/em> and 30 Rock<\/em>.\n\nIf you\u2019re one of those people who went down the boring fork in the road with no cartoons after childhood, I suggest you catch up on the show. Believe it or not, BoJack Horseman<\/em> has found a new way to flog a dead horse.\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A cartoon featuring a horse person is a better illustration of the millennial situation than most live-action and other shows with regular humans.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":1367,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[82],"tags":[2311,2312,542,2313,1341,2314,2315],"class_list":["post-1366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pop-culture","tag-animated","tag-bojack-horseman","tag-comedy","tag-dark-humor","tag-netflix","tag-netflix-originals","tag-series"],"yoast_head":"\nBoJack Horseman Does What The Simpsons Can\u2019t<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A cartoon featuring a horse person is a better illustration of the millennial situation than most live-action and other shows with regular humans.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, 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