Free Churro
— Aaditya Natarajan
“No one ever tells you that when your mom dies, you get a free churro.”
Disclaimer: This piece may contain some spoilers, for Bojack Horseman, even though I’ve tried my best to avoid them. Proceed with caution.
Bojack Horseman is described in most places as an adult animated comedy-drama, but I find that definition to be lacking. Bojack Horseman is a show with much more than just comedy and drama. The show primarily focuses on the impact of addiction and depression, but it routinely addresses various socio-political issues, often through heavy satire. The show has talked about abortion, sexual harassment and the #MeToo movement, mass shootings and the gun debate in America, the way the rich white man is treated (especially in America), asexuality and cancel culture, among many other issues. And, one thing that really helps the show’s case is the fact that it’s animated. Psychologically speaking, the human mind associates animation with fantasy, and things that cannot happen in real life. But, Bojack Horseman is a very real show, and after removing some of the satire, everything can happen in real life.
A cool little fact — the word f*ck, is used only once per season, to preserve the ‘integrity’ of the word. Basic concept of supply. Gold wouldn’t be as valuable if it was abundantly available. Each of the six occurrences of the word (once in each of the six seasons) is highly impactful. In five out of those six instances, Bojack is on the receiving end, and it signifies that the relationship between the person who says it and Bojack is permanently ruined. This is a recurring theme in the show. The sixth instance, despite not involving Bojack directly, still references something horrible that Bojack did and the impact of that action.
Each of the seventy-six episodes of Bojack Horseman is amazing. Each episode has been written beautifully and has been executed in an even better way. However, some of them are better than the others — much more impactful, written even better. Episodes like Stupid Piece of Sh*t (S04E06), The View From Halfway Down (S06E15), INT SUB (S05E07), Ruthie (S04E09), Fish Out of Water (S03E04), That’s Too Much, Man (S03E11), Hank After Dark (S02E07), The New Client (S06E02), Bojack Hates the Troops (S01E02), The Face of Depression (S06E07), Escape from L.A. (S02E11), It’s You (S3E10), The Old Sugarman Place (S04E02), to name a few. In hindsight, it wasn’t a very good idea to start listing amazing Bojack episodes. Coming up with this list took me half an hour.
One episode that stands above the rest is Free Churro (S05E06). If you think of it, it’s a very simple episode. It is the highest-rated episode from the show on IMDB, with a rating of 9.8 out of 10.
It has just two monologues — one around two minutes long, and the other around twenty-two minutes long. The first is by Bojack’s father, Butterscotch Horseman, and the second is by Bojack himself. Both characters are voiced by Will Arnett, so it’s practically just one guy talking continuously for an entire episode. That’s it.
The monologue is essentially Bojack giving a eulogy at his mother Beatrice Horseman’s funeral, and so it revolves around how her death relates to and impacts Bojack.
Bojack is a dynamic, flawed, ever-changing character. And his eulogy monologue was, in many ways, the same. The meaning of the Free Churro monologue isn’t easy to grasp, nor are its implications for Bojack. This is perhaps what makes the monologue, and consequently the episode, so alluring.
Something I particularly loved about the monologue is its visual imagery. The story Bojack tells and the things he says in the monologue are never actually shown on screen. Call it the Mandela effect or whatever, but for some reason, there is a distinct visual in my mind of everything that is said in the monologue.
A major theme of the monologue is being seen, and getting validation. Beatrice’s last words to Bojack are ‘I see you,’ which might as well have been her just saying ‘ICU,’ reading the sign on the door. There is an entire introduction-conflict-resolution arc for this theme alone. Bojack says “…maybe it’s dumb to try to attribute it to anything.” However, the writers of the show through the ‘I see you,’ and the monologue as a whole, are inviting us to think about its meaning, and to attribute it to something. The monologue is pretty rambly, and ever so slightly treads into obscurity, but we as the audience are snapped back, and the focus is back to this theme.
The episode also starts with Butterscotch saying, ‘Yes, yes, I see you,’ to a young Bojack waiting outside after practice, because his mother forgot to pick him up. This was probably the writers’ way of foreshadowing the theme of ‘I see you’ or ‘ICU,’ however you would like to look at it. Another bit of foreshadowing is somewhat of a meta-joke that takes place in the previous episode, The Amelia Earhart Story. Bojack says, ‘No show should have that much talking. TV is a visual medium.’ Bojack is talking about the show he is starring in, Philbert, but the writers are probably referring to the next episode. Despite being a monologue, the episode never becomes boring.
Thank you for taking the time to read this awfully written piece. I would like to end this piece with a quote/joke from the monologue, which probably summarises a lot of Bojack’s emotions towards his mother:
Ready for one more? Last one. What’s the difference between a first-year lit major and my mother Beatrice Horseman? One is decently read, and the other is a huge bitch!
[rimshot plays]
