The shows creators on making a trippy, death-obsessed penultimate episode.
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Throughout its six-season run,BoJack Horsemanhas regularly delivered stand-out experimental episodes.
The View From Halfway Down represents the major traumatic events that have weighed most heavily on BoJacks psyche.
In short: BoJack confronts death in The View From Halfway Down.
Heres how it all came together.
Whats going to happen to BoJack now?
Bob-Waksberg:In concept form, we didnt quite know what it was.
The original idea was that it was just going to be one long conversation with six people.
It really was like, Oh, Ive gotta pick someone.
Alison will do it!
Bob-Waksberg:I think my dream has always been to be a theater professor.
I just gradually turned my television show into people in rooms having conversations.
Bob-Waksberg:Zach Braff was real confused.
He came in and hes like, Im dead, right?
I thought I died on this show, but you want me back?
He was delightful and thrilled to be there and so funny.
Why am I a butler?
I dont know, because its a dream!
Is it a dream, or is it purgatory?
Youre a butler and youre on roller skates.
That was actually the crux behind another episode,the one where [BoJack]s giving the eulogy.
He initially wanted that one, too, to be one blocked shot the whole time.
In both cases, we decided that that might be a little too boring for a cartoon.
I assigned a different storyboard artist to every character because it was just such a long conversation.
My assistant director, Chris Nance, did BoJack through that entire scene.
BoJacks the hardest because he had so much to do.
Its almost like an action scene.
Just that part would have been a difficult episode.
Lets go that way.
That is much more resonant.
It felt like a nice pay-off.
Hollingsworth:This whole episode takes place probably over 30 seconds, as hes drowning.
But that fireplace starts to dim.
The fire is going out.
Its very subtle, but it was just a nice little touch.
I pitched the idea of this doorway that opens into nothingness.
Raphael said, We should insert some jeopardy so its not just a surprise at the end.
So, from this blackness came this idea that theres actually stuff coming out of that door.
It starts out with these drips, and then its inside of [BoJack].
Hes coughing it up.
I believe it was written like drips of water and burning and blackness.
Hollingsworth:We had our effects animator, Karl Pajak, develop how that black ooze moves.
We really wanted it to have an uncanny valley chirpiness to play up the unsettling nature of its movement.
It looks almost like some kind of octopus out of water.
Tafel:I pitched that everybody was changing at all times.
I was like, Now its older Beatrice, and now its older Herb, now its younger Herb.
And sometimes its Secretariat and sometimes its Butterscotch.
I sent it to Raphael and he was just like, Calm down, its too much going on.
Of all the ones to be aging, Sarah Lynn felt the most fitting.
Bob-Waksberg:We were way over budget this year.
We were constantly having to simplify and cut things down.
Often that is really helpful because it forces you to focus.
What is the story were telling?
Are there interesting things that we can do with that?
How does that affect our storytelling?
For Sarah Lynn, we have the opportunity to really show a trajectory.
Hollingsworth:In that main purple room, the paintings are changed in subtle ways.
We have ourHockney that was always in BoJacks officeand instead of swimming, the horse is dead.
Hes dead in the water.
Hollingsworth:This was not in the script, but Amy put it in.
At that meal, everyone is eating something that is tied into their death.
I thought a can of carrots would be fun, like rations.
Youre thinking youre going to see his dad and instead its a person that hes idolized.
That was Raphaels idea.
Bob-Waksberg:I wanted things to feel not quite real.
Its not like BoJack is in purgatory with these people.
We wanted it to be loose and dream-logic-y.
BoJacks father would be Secretariat, but he wouldnt really comment on it.
BoJacks not like, Wait, youre not my dad.
Ive always thought of Butterscotch as someone who gave up before he even started.
BoJack is a far more evolved human being than Butterscotch, which doesnt say a lot for Butterscotch.
Hes a much harder person.
Tafel:I was really proud of the scene of Butterscotch/Secretariat talking to BoJack.
Just him saying something to his son that he always wanted to hear.
But did he ever really feel that way?
So there is a blurriness there.
Bob-Waksberg:We wanted the lines to be super muddy.
To me, there was so much weight to it on many levels: Is it a shitty poem?
Is it a good poem?
It was so sweet.
I actually taped that poem to my computer screen so I could write the first draft.
The cadence of his little love poem became the cadence in the original draft of the poem.
So I always feel like, Oh, what a love story about this suicide poem I wrote.
And then, as Will did it, it felt like, Oh no, thats what we needed.
His performance was so brutal and gorgeous.
So I dont even know if the offer ever went to John Krasinski.
I hope hes not mad.
Tafel:Dont get me wrong, I would love to meet Jim fromThe Office.
But it was like, Oh my gosh, that was incredible.
Why would we make a run at top that?
Arnett:I have been the beneficiary in this experience of so much wonderful writing.
If I can do that, it usually turns out okay.
When its finally BoJacks turn to walk through the door, he panics and runs away.
Maybe, replies Diane.
Or maybe lifes a bitch and then you keep on living.
So I was like, Yep, hes dead.
Arnett:I was pretty sure that he wasnt, but I wasnt exactly sure how.
Theres the [Herb Kazzaz] line: Oh, BoJack, no.
There is no other side.
To me, more than whether or not thats true or false, that is a very scary feeling.
Theres the flatline, and then if you stay for a little bit longer, it starts beeping again.
Bob-Waksberg:Ive been telling people, you gotta watch the credits!
Youre gonna miss stuff.
Hollingsworth:We were working on these last two episodes at the same time.
They were tied together, the dark and light.
The final episode is certainly melancholy, but it is light compared to this dark.
Episodes 15 and 16, in a way, are a little microcosm of the whole series.
Thats this very dark thing and this very optimistic thing all tangled up together.
Theyre doing the episode where he dies, but then theyre also doing the episode where he doesnt die.
Thats some real Nick Fury ass-shit.
Arnett:[Raphael and I] did have a conversation about what would be the mostBoJackending.
I thought the way Raphael ended it was the mostBoJackending.
There will be unanswered questions and thats okay.
Its like any lesson.
At the end of it, what have you really learned?Hmm.
I think I have more questions.
