Bojack Horseman: Animals being more human than real life — review by Candy

by Dogpatch Press Staff

(Patch): It’s a special time to be a fan of this alcoholic, washed-up actor who’s also an anthropomorphic horse. With 5 seasons under his belt (saddle?) Bojack Horseman’s show is in the middle of its sixth, and final, season. 8 episodes arrived in late October 2019, with the final ones coming on January 31st, 2020.

I have to confess to being a bad furry reviewer, because I only got half way into the first season before I heard it got really good. I got too distracted to keep up and it’s been bugging me to watch everything. It’s not just for enjoyment — If I had hooves, I’d be able to kick myself extra hard for missing an interview opportunity with show creator Raphael Bob-Waksberg. He asked in 2015 when I interviewed Adam Conover, show cast member (and his former roommate), but I was too busy covering other furry stuff to reply in a timely way.

Which reminds me that the show designer Lisa Hanawalt‘s spinoff show, Tuca & Bertie, had a single season this year. It was canceled to fan dismay. This would be a good time to ask her what upcoming projects she may have — let’s see if her agent gets back to me. I can pay in carrots!

BoJack Horseman — a review by Candy

Season Six has Princess Carolyn adopting a porcupine baby, which she handles with oven mitts, while Todd takes on the day care. It’s an adorable sight gag.

I’m new to the furry scene, but this hilarious Netflix series totally reminds me of it when it features both humans and animal-like personalities, and incorporates animal traits into each of their characters. For example: Princess Carolyn is one of my favorite characters, and one of her tag lines is: “Oh Fish!” when something goes wrong. The show is full of a bunch of little clever puns like that.

I was recently introduced to the world of Furry by Patch, so I might be missing the mark some. But what I do know is that taking on a Fursona is allowing people to be more of themselves, and some of us identify with cats or dogs or squids or  birds or whatever more than 100% human all the time. Sometimes it’s nice to step into a different personality/animality? Just to show how you really feel or just to let things go. I’m not sure in all honesty. I personally enjoy costuming for the same reason, but I change costumes a lot. It’s super fun and stress relieving to be someone/something else even if it’s for a day a week or a few hours.

BoJack Horseman definitely isn’t for everyone, it’s very sarcastic and 18+, but if you like cartoons and anthropomorphic creatures, it’s definitely a show to check out. It deals with a lot of adult issues like relationships, substance abuse, self-worth, depression, work, sex, death and more. It’s not a show made by furries (as far as we know) but some of the themes cross over.

That’s why I wrote this for DogPatchPress, because there are a lot of cross-overs within “mainstream”  culture, even though a lot of furries feel afraid to tell people that that’s what they’re into. I don’t totally understand why, but I think people can be ashamed about some of these issues, with a huge stigma in popular culture about people who want to have multiple personalities/fursonas. Those can help to personify unspoken things that are otherwise unexpressed, in a sort of therapeutic way. But we don’t always have to be totally serious about everything all the time! Sometimes it’s just about having fun as your “other self”.

BoJack reminded me of the furry community not only because of the art and acting, but also because it deals with how people see themselves. And how empowering it can be to truly just be yourself/do what you feel like/not give a fuck about whatever other people think or say about it.

< 3, Candy

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