Bojack’s Purity: The Underwater Episode
Season 3 of Bojack brought us a beautiful silent episode — — one I actually had to watch instead of leaving Netflix open in another tab while working on something else. Yes, it’s colorful, beautiful, and filled with beautiful, musical tones.
But it’s also a period of purity and insight for Bojack.
While underwater, Bojack cannot drink, eat, or smoke. We see him enter his hotel and immediately try to drown out his mind with his usual vices. His drink floats and dissipates into the water around him. The cigarettes won’t go through the bubble that gives him air. And his bag of chips spin around in zero gravity, reminiscent of the time Homer Simpson tried to eat chips in space.
Bojack also cannot speak underwater (so he thinks). This prevents him from going on his usual childish tirades — “Am I good?” He can’t complain about his mortality, about being forgotten, or draw anyone in with his toxic self-destruction. He has to do something we haven’t seen him do yet — He has to keep all of that to himself.
And then, as though that weren’t enough, Bojack ends up with a child he did not ask for in the middle of the ocean. The seahorse baby resembles Bojack just enough — it even looks a little bit like the dream-daughter he had at the end of Season 1. Bojack then has to do what anyone who has been a caregiver has to do . . . realize that while he is childish, he is not actually a child. Even though he is lost and has nothing, he still has the means to care for this creature who slightly resembles him.
Physiologically, he cannot feed the baby, so he goes off in search of formula. He finds it and has no money, so he steals. We have seen Bojack commit crimes before, but usually for his own end with disregard to others: Stealing the D was more of an attempt to defeat Mr. Peanutbutter than it was an act of love; Getting the scene for Secretariat was more about his own acting legacy than anything else, and led to Kelsey being fired; Even Bojack’s apology to Herb was more about Bojack than Herb (as Herb was quick to point out).
He steals no food for himself. Why would he? He cannot eat.
A sober, hungry Bojack steals for a baby that is not his, and then brings that baby home. Then he stands there. The baby does what babies do — their memories are as long as a piece of string, and the seahorse baby begins to play and mix with the others and wait for its dinner. The baby does not look back at Bojack. It does not say goodbye, nor does it reassure Bojack, or tell him he did a good job.
No one tells Bojack he is good.
Bojack stands there with his greatest fear realized. He’s forgotten. Not because he’s dead, or because his movie was a flop, but just due to the natural cycle of life. The baby will not remember who he is or the day they shared together. There are no photos of it, and no witnesses. Unlike his TV shows or movies, his acts are not immortalized.
Bojack sacrificed for this baby, and then it just walked away, happy, healthy, and none the wiser. Bojack isn’t angry with the infant for not being appreciative, but he is sad. He will not be remembered. He faces that fear in this episode, and faces it soberly and swiftly.
This pilgrimage is what he needs. Some people interpret this episode as evidence that Bojack wants to be a father. I still think he’s a long way from that. This episode was a quest for Bojack to reach inside himself and discover emotional muscles he didn’t know he had, and to stretch his heart.
