BoJack Horseman: See Mr. Peanutbutter Run

September 9, 2017 12:46 PM - Season 4, Episode 1

Mr PeanutButter starts his campaign for Governor of California and starts by challenging the current governor to a ski race while Bojack is no where to be found.

Other seasons have been posted by individual episodes, so too shall this one.

posted by rhizome (13 comments total)

I had trouble with this episode. I understand the desire to comment on the election, but man it's exhausting enough to deal with the political climate righ now without it showing up on both AHS and Bojack. Casting Peanutbutter as a clueless, but amiable well intentioned character who accidentally wreaks havoc with the democratic process-I can't quite articulate it and I hope someone will do so-while there's a clear condemnation of what h appened-the zany fun of it really...didn't work for me.

And Princess Caroline. I'm waaaaaaaaay too involved her emotional well being for a character. The whole episode I was like "DO NOT SCREW THIS UP!"
posted by miss-lapin at 2:04 PM on September 9, 2017 [3 favorites]

I just finished it and the entire season was tremendous.

FilmCritHulk has already done a series of quick-takes on each episode. Here is the first.

FCH seems to be particularly interested in characters that explore the ways that we are broken, the ways that we break others, and the legacy of these breaks, and so he has a lot to say about the new season.
posted by absalom at 6:54 PM on September 9, 2017 [2 favorites]

It was odd to have an entire episode with no Bojack, even if it's only Diane who seems to miss him. It still has a talent for going from hilarious to poignant in a split second, which is good. 2nding that this entire season is great. My main problem with this one as a separate episode was that it was all setup. It feels like the first half of a two-parter.
posted by Gilbert at 8:48 PM on September 9, 2017

“This D'Onofrio has had enough-rio!”
posted by Pronoiac at 10:11 PM on September 9, 2017 [12 favorites]

I would like to think he leaves all meetings with that line.
posted by Going To Maine at 10:14 PM on September 9, 2017 [5 favorites]

At a basic level, if Katrina is already potent enough to get an amendment passed that allows the governorship to be decided by a ski race, she doesn’t really need to put a cipher into the governor’s mansion.
posted by Going To Maine at 10:16 PM on September 9, 2017

FilmCritHulk has already done a series of quick-takes on each episode. Here is the first.

[Bojack Horseman] can casually tackle the subject of asexuality with more understanding and kindness than all other shows put together, touching on the duality of not being into labels and understanding how labels can help in the simplest, best articulation of that idea I’ve ever seen — and it does it in 30 seconds of screen time.

Man, if explaining that labels are both simplifications that we hate ascribing to ourselves and useful time-savers is considered to be brilliant writing, I can’t but think that TV critics have lowered their expectations.
posted by Going To Maine at 10:23 PM on September 9, 2017 [2 favorites]

I don't think Mr. Peanutbutter is intended as a satire of Trump, although obviously Trump is inescapable when we start talking about political satire (and, like some demon who haunts a dream world out of PKD in which we are all hopelessly trapped, he's just inescapable in general). Mr. Peanutbutter seems more broadly to satirize our conflation of likability with worthiness. Mr. Peanutbutter is likable as hell, so how could we not all be better off if he were in charge? But it turns out what he's really good at is being a likable dude. He's really much more of a Hollywood celebrity turned politician than anything like Trump -- a Reagan, or an Ahnuld. A leader who is pure charisma and nothing else isn't the face of our current national nightmare, but it's certainly a face we've seen before, and one that seems appropriate for this show to dunk on.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 6:28 AM on September 10, 2017 [5 favorites]

The political stuff reminded me much more of the California Recall with a side order of "Better Off Dead."

"Woodcharles"
posted by rhizome at 9:37 AM on September 10, 2017 [4 favorites]

So I just watched the whole series while traveling today, and it's hard to explain to the guy in the seat next you why you're tearing up over a cartoon of a horse and a cat, but holy crap the emotional hits and devastation of this season.
posted by Suffocating Kitty at 4:31 PM on September 10, 2017 [8 favorites]

For reals, this might be the straight-up happiest episode of the season.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:10 PM on September 10, 2017

My friend (who has watched the whole season already) says that, unlike Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, BoJack Horseman is actually very good this year, but on the other hand, it feels like come ON Netflix does EVERY SHOW have to start this new season with an election
posted by DoctorFedora at 10:01 PM on September 10, 2017

"So I just watched the whole series while traveling today, and it's hard to explain to the guy in the seat next you why you're tearing up over a cartoon of a horse and a cat, but holy crap the emotional hits and devastation of this season."

So, like every season of BoJack Horseman?

I didn't care very much for this episode mainly because it seemed one-dimensional, more of what you'd expect from a cartoon about a horse and a cat (and a dog).

Actually, I was thinking earlier today about this episode and Mr. Peanutbutter in the context of the GTF2I and GTF2IRD1 genes, dogs, and Williams-Beuren syndrome -- Mr. Peanutbutter is a very good characterization of the hypersociability of dogs. I've not met anyone with Williams syndrome, but I've seen a few people in documentaries and I think that MPB has that vibe.

I enjoyed the second episode more, and now I've just finished the sixth. It seems like every season is sort of the same as there's a slow increase in layered meaning and melancholia as the season goes on. I basically love this show for so amazingly and weirdly being both hilarious and heartbreaking. I think I've said that before in an earlier thread, but it bears repeating. What this show is doing, it's doing extremely well and it's not like anything else -- even other (many) comedies that recognize how fine the difference is between comedy and tragedy.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 2:58 AM on September 11, 2017 [2 favorites]