BoJack Horseman

Many Season 3 episodes are definable in simple terms (“the one where BoJack goes on a press tour,” “the one where BoJack fights with Princess Caroline,” “the flashback episode”). They actually function as stand-alone on a level that you honestly don’t see too often. This leads to some jaw-dropping installments, which iris in on character on levels that range from hilarious to heartbreaking.

There’s a precision in the show’s expansion, a sense that the creative team wants to explore every corner of their comedy world--and every corner of the character’s psyches. Season 3 builds to one of the funniest, weirdest, and most profound moments I’ve ever seen in a television show--and that’s before the season finale.

Because the writing and characterization on this show has been consistent (and superb), failures are often as hard-won as progress, a revelation that’s all the more stunning for its relatability. Most of the disasters are the result of minor missteps or oversights that snowball into untenable, albeit hilarious, situations.

The third season of the show isn’t a masterpiece like the second: a few plot gears grind. But it lands powerfully, with an earned tragedy that’s as potent as anything on TV this year.

This season proves once again that this show’s success is thanks to its incredible visuals just as much as its writing.

With its mix of curveball innovations and very BoJack elements, season three of Raphael Bob-Waksberg’s cartoon sitcom set in a species-mixed world of humans and animals might be its best overall, though it necessarily lacks the aspect of jaw-dropping surprise that made it so beguiling in its first two outings.

Bojack continues to inventively satirize its own industry, while deepening the anguish of its main cast, and building out its surreal, animated world in ways that dazzlingly reflect our own.

The absurdist comedy and hallucinatory visuals match the series’ take on Hollywood as a reality-distortion field. But the series never takes an attitude of easy superiority to its showbiz characters. At heart, BoJack Horseman is a comedy about lonely people (and animals) who are never by themselves. That melancholy spirit comes through beautifully in the stunning fourth episode of the new season.

BoJack Horseman ends up becoming a thrilling, rueful study of the psychological games and uniquely vain, notably capitalistic decision-making that powers the entertainment industry. And yet, through its venomous jokes and unrelenting, uproarious gags, the series also recognizes how charming, joyful, and galvanizing entertainment for entertainment sake can be, no matter how stupid or silly it may seem.

The third season isn’t nearly so neatly constructed [as the second]; the end of the season feels less like a conclusion and more like a plateau. But without the smooth lines of deliberate plotting, the show is able to find some really brilliant sweet spots.