Welcome to the very first episode of 17 Minutes, a Bojack Horseman podcast. Despite the fact that I believe I'd be a lop-eared bunny in the Bojack Horseman universe, my name is Kat. This episode is primarily introductory, although I'll be getting into some BoJack content later in the episode. This is my invitation to y'all to find out what I know. Do I know things? Let's find out. You may often hear me refer to BoJack as BoJack the Depressed Talking Horse, and let me tell you why.
This is just a short segment of an email sent on Monday, March 22nd, 2010 at 4.22pm from Raphael Bob Waksberg to Lisa Hanawalt, the main production designer for the show and one of Bob Waksberg's lifelong best friends. Hey, do you have a picture of one of your horse guys by himself? I came up with this idea for a show I'd like to pitch. Tell me what you think. Bojack the Depressed Talking Horse.
Bojack is a horse dude in a world full of humans and other animal people. He used to be the star of the 90s sitcom Horsin' Around, about a wisecracking horse who raises three precocious human preteens. Now he's a washed-up misanthrope who lives in a gorgeous bachelor pad in the Hollywood Hills, complains about everything, and wears colorful patterned sweaters. Insufferably self-deprecating, neurotic, abrasive, and stubborn.
Larry David meets Bender from Futurama meets a horse. He has burned all but a few of his bridges. That was from the book The Art Before the Horse, and I will be diving deeper into the book as we progress through the story in the coming weeks, and read you more of those early emails exchanged between the two of them that would lead to the development of the show, because they are fascinating and quite fun to read.
They honestly make me emotional seeing how it started and how far it came. In fact, you should prepare yourselves to hear me get quite emotional through the course of this podcast. The show makes me feel so many things and I'm so glad I get to share them with you.
A couple of things you should know about me, just to get to understand me a little bit more within the context of the show, is that my favorite character, and this was very difficult to choose as I love most of the characters deeply, is Princess Carolyn. And I'll be diving into why as we move through the series and explore her character. And my favorite episode, which was even harder to choose, near impossible, but I ended up going with for sentimental reasons, is Stupid Piece of Shit.
Obviously, I will discuss why more when we get to that episode. I hope this gives you a little idea of what kind of person I am. So, who am I? Well, I'm a 26-year-old woman living in Texas with a near-obsessive interest in BoJack Horseman. And a dog who really doesn't want me to record this podcast. Sorry if you hear her snoring.
This show means so much to me, and we'll get into why in a little while. You probably found me here from TikTok, and I just want to take a moment to thank y'all for inspiring me to do this.
I never thought anyone would be interested in hearing me talk about Bojack the Depressed Talking Horse as much as I like to, but y'all have given me life and I am so excited to start on this journey with you. I could never have guessed that making a video talking about my favorite show at warp speed Oh my god, it's a microphone. I guess Scout wanted to be on the show.
Anyway, for now, I'll be taking questions I get on TikTok as well as ideas I produce myself and diving into things like character traits, various plots, metaphors used in the show, general lore, and many of the various animal puns.
Most of it will be analysis from my own perspective, although I will occasionally pull from various social media platforms, with proper credit, of course, as well as the book BoJack Horseman, The Art Before the Horse. I've been in so many fan groups, and I've had a lot of these. discussions. I will trigger warn when necessary, but you can always expect spoilers as I will be speaking as though everyone in my audience has seen the entire series.
The reason I decided to bite the bullet and make this podcast is because I have so much to say and TikToks are only 60 seconds long at most. I do multiple parts on the app, but quite frankly, I feel a little bit like I'm spamming. And the long process of captioning due to TikTok's numerous captioning issues is very difficult in my executive function.
Not to mention that so many of my videos are under review all the time because I talk about such heavy things with BoJack. I don't listen to very many podcasts myself, but so many of you requested it that I was sent down a rabbit hole.
I spent several days researching how to make this podcast and eventually settled on using Anchor by Spotify because I use Spotify constantly in my daily life. Something you should know about me is that I'm ADHD and bipolar too, and I'm very open about those things. My level of executive dysfunction is pretty high most days, so I thought that a podcast would be an easier way to share my thoughts about BoJack with the world.
When I first recorded this, I said that I wouldn't be starting from the first episode, although I will occasionally do episode analyses and will instead just be talking about things that I find interesting, things you may have missed, answering questions from my TikTok. But in the iconic words of Tyler, the creator, that was a fucking lie. I sat down to write the script for the first episode, other than this introductory one, of course, and I found that I didn't know where to begin.
So this podcast will go through episode by episode, scene by scene, and talk about everything I can think to talk about. And when I say it's a deep dive, it's a deep dive. I'm only five minutes into the first episode and my script is already over 2,000 words long. Initially, I thought it would be cute to have each episode be 17 minutes, but unfortunately that idea quickly got away from me as my thoughts began pouring out.
You can expect my analysis of the first episode, BoJack Horseman, the BoJack Horseman story, chapter one, next Friday. In this podcast, I will often make a case for why I think certain things about certain characters or about the show. But you don't have to agree with me. I only ask that you hear me out.
I do not think my word is God, and although it would be hard to change my mind on a lot of the things I discuss here, many of you have already opened my eyes to new perspectives and theories on TikTok, and I'm excited to see what other takes you have as I go through each episode. If you have any questions or suggestions for the podcast, please feel free to send them to me on Twitter at KerzyCat. That's K-E-I-R-S-E-Y-C-A-T. Or at the same handle on TikTok, you can send in a Q&A.
there we can also have discussions there and you'll see me posting random things about other interests and thoughts I have part of the reason I love the show so much is that it helps me connect with my own mental health I can't tell you how many times I've walked into my therapist's office and said, Alana, you'll never guess what epiphany I had while watching BoJack Horseman today.
You'll occasionally hear me call it my Bible and that's not meant to be offensive to anyone. It's just because it's really touched me to my very soul. I'm a very a-religious person and I don't have many things that do that for me. It helped me learn to advocate for and deal with my own mental health struggles, which I definitely will talk about on here. Hopefully I can reach someone who can relate and maybe make them feel less alone, just like the show did for me, even if it's just one person.
I believe that the overarching message of the show is keep going no matter what happens. The show is deeply personal to me and I've spent a lot of time thinking about it. I'm currently on my 13th rewatch and I'm certain it won't be my last.
There's going to be significant discussion of mental health and trauma in this podcast. And although certain major specific traumas will be warned first, general discussion of trauma will not. So if you find yourself having a bad mental health day and unable to listen, That is completely fine. No worries. You need to take care of yourself first, and this will still be here when you're ready. Mental health will always be a number one priority for this podcast.
I hope to build a community based on mutual support, respect, and love for one another and this incredible show. I may even start a Discord someday if I ever figure Discord out. I've been in several BoJack fan groups over the years, and something I've noticed is that there are a lot of toxic fans.
I wanted to take this opportunity to look at this show through a woman's eyes since so many of the most vocal fans are men. And not that there's anything wrong with that. I'm certainly not saying that all fans who are men are toxic or all fans who are toxic are men. But I wanted to see more feminists. I'm an intersectional feminist who minored in women's and gender studies, and a leftist.
And I took nearly enough courses in college to be an RTF minor, so I'll occasionally talk about those things in this podcast as my beliefs and studies will inform my opinions on certain things. If there's something particularly interesting to me, I might share certain readings or articles with you. all that won't be necessary to understand what I'm talking about, but might augment your experience here.
All right, so enough about me. I swear that most episodes will be about BoJack, but I wanted to give y'all an idea of what to expect in the coming weeks. I'm not certain how much time will be between seasons of this podcast, as I'll likely need short breaks between seasons of the show, but it won't be like a year or anything.
You'll be accompanying me on my journey of how to do this since it's so new to me and I appreciate your patience and understanding as I figure out what works and what doesn't. Why is my podcast called 17 Minutes? Well, it's partially because the information I'm about to list was in the video that ended up being the catalyst for me becoming a Bojack Horseman content creator.
and partially because that theme has a lot of different layers within the context of the show, and this podcast will be exploring layers. Not to mention that the following is one of my favorite details about the show. We know that Bojack waited 17 minutes to call the paramedics after Sarah Lynn became unresponsive in the planetarium. In the season three episode, that's too much, man.
Although it's unclear whether or not she would have been able to be revived even if he had called immediately, he is most certainly at fault for not doing so, acting as the final straw in a long line of people in Sarah Lynn's life who failed her.
There are a couple of other hidden references to 17 minutes in the show, though. Almost everything in this show was a very intentional decision from Raphael Bob-Waksberg and the team, although he himself has said that certain things were just completely serendipitous. This is part of the magic of the show, I think. So much care was put into it that other things just fell into place without intention.
In the iconic season six episode, The View from Halfway Down, which is the penultimate episode of the series, Bojack is trapped in what he believes to be a dream, while in reality, he is slowly succumbing to death as he drowns in the pool at his old house after he breaks in on a drug. Now, the pool and water in general are a very important reoccurring theme in the show, and there will be regular segments touching more on that and doing deeper dives into it in different episodes.
The episode that we cover the view from halfway down will be very long because it's so rife with content. But today I want to point out one important thing. The moment that Bojack realizes he's drowning and that nobody is coming to save him occurs exactly 17 minutes into the episode. The first time I realized this, it gave me chills. This one was certainly intentional.
Quite a lot of people do know that fact about the 17 minutes and the view from halfway down. But another reference to it that I haven't seen many people discuss is that in the very first episode, BoJack Horseman, the BoJack Horseman story, chapter one. Bojack is in the hospital for what turns out to be a mild anxiety attack, and he brings his Horsin' Around DVDs with him like he brings them everywhere. The episode gave us clips from Horsin' Around throughout, but at exactly 17 minutes in...
The clip that's playing is one of the horse dying of a broken heart in the hospital in the Horse and Around series finale. At 17 minutes, we hear and we see the heart monitor flatline and the doctor pulls a sheet over his head.
It's set up to make us think that it's present-day BoJack, and it's unclear whether or not this is intentional or one of those moments of serendipity that Bob Waksberg spoke of since the episodes are so far apart. But either way, it is a powerful parallel and instance of foreshadowing. The show is chock full of parallels, and that's another thing that I'll discuss throughout the course of this podcast. Now let's switch gears for a second.
I want to talk about how to get your friends and family and even your therapist into the show because my ultimate goal is to get as many people as I can hooked on it since it's such a deeply important and awe-inspiring and funny show.
A lot of people have told me that they find it intimidating, that they don't understand the point, that they think it looks silly. I do understand that it's not for everyone and that the humor won't strike a chord with everybody nor will the discussions of mental health and trauma.
and especially the generational trauma, which is a big aspect of the show that we'll be exploring. One of the things I suggest if someone does want to watch it but is intimidated is letting them know to remember that if it gets too intense at any point, It's alright to stop and take a break. There is no time limit on how long it should take you to watch it. Take days, weeks, even months between each episode if you need to.
because it's important to take care of your mental health before anything else since the show does deal with such difficult and realistic topics, don't be afraid to let yourself cry. I cry nearly every episode and much harder in some episodes. I cry sometimes just thinking of certain episodes. I think it's almost necessary for the catharsis that the show can provide.
What I don't recommend for new watchers is to binge it on your first watch. I think it's important to tell them to take a moment to sit with it and digest what happened in each episode for a maximum understanding and enjoyment.
I also recommend trying to dedicate time to watch it without doing something else like art, cleaning, or just looking at your phone, and this can apply to rewatches too, because so many of the background jokes add a rich tapestry of comedy and of metaphor into the experience.
an ADHD-er, I know that that can be really difficult, but I promise you that if you give it a little time, you'll be hooked and won't want to look away. Have you watched the show and felt like you need more BoJack in your daily life? Me too.
I want to take a minute to plug a playlist that I made, which you can find on Spotify, that is full of BoJack-themed lo-fi music, as well as other slow songs from the show, such as soundtrack songs from episodes like Fish Out of Water and Excuse my French pronunciation, but Gymnopédie and Mr. Blue.
Be prepared to cry if you're anything like me. It's about two hours long and some people like it to study. I like to use it to go to sleep because I guess I'm a masochist. It's called Sarah Lynn. Sarah Lynn. and you can find it on my link tree or just search Sarah Lynn Sarah Lynn on Spotify. It's the one with a still from the planetarium on the cover. Music makes the show so much richer, and I'm always stunned at how good the soundtrack choices are.
I have music playing at every possible moment in my life, so it only felt natural to find a way to immerse myself in it even further throughout the day. Lately, I've been listening to Blood in the Cut by Kay Flay from the Stupid Piece of Shit episode almost non-stop.
Thank you so much for sticking around through this first episode. Once again, future episodes will have far more content from the show and far less about me personally, but I wanted to get you all to know me a little bit and know what to expect from this. I'll be doing my best to get an episode out.
every friday and like i said earlier i love it if y'all wanted to interact with me on platforms like tiktok and twitter for discussion and to give me suggestions and ask questions about the show even ones about my personal relationship with it and again you can find me on this platform at KerzyCat, K-E-I-R-S-E-Y-C-A-T. My link tree is linktree.com slash KerzyCat for an easy way to find all of my content in one place. I am beyond thrilled with how many of y'all are excited for this.
I am too. And I thrive on validation, so every single one of your encouraging comments really and truly does make me feel so warm and happy. I appreciate every single one of you that enjoys my content, especially those of you who go out of your way to comment and tell me, and those of you who encouraged me to step out of my comfort zone and start this podcast. I truly hope that I can live up to your expectations.
I can't stress enough how much I appreciate y'all for lightly pushing me to do this. This was 17 Minutes, a BoJack Horseman podcast with me, Kat, and I'll see you in the next one.