Every BoJack Horseman Episode, Ranked

Netflix’s BoJack Horseman is about many things. How we make sense of a senseless world. How we find happiness amid constant crisis. How we assert and give others power. That’s a lot for any show, let alone the animated misadventures of a famous horseman, one whose life stands on the razor’s edge of celebrity privilege and deeply internalized emotional self-abuse. Contending with BoJack Horseman, now as it comes to its conclusion, has meant contending with my own life these past six years, which have been made markedly better by this series. This exercise would have been much more difficult had the final episodes failed to deliver. (Spoiler alert: They don’t.)

77. “BoJack Hates the Troops,” Season 1, Episode 2

First, let me be clear: I love this episode, which feels like an early performance by a beloved artist who went on to greater and more daring things. Maybe there’s a note or two out of place. Maybe they aren’t stretching their talent as much as you think they can. BoJack’s (Will Arnett) profound pettiness makes him an asshole to many—here, it’s the contested dibs over a box of muffins at the grocery store that lands our remorseful horse in the national spotlight—and it’s admirable how this episode leads the charge in painting that fact unambiguously. In a way, it feels like a foundation stone of sorts (one of several), featuring as it does BoJack’s decision to open up to Diane (Alison Brie) for his memoir. Full truth: From here, mountains are made.

76. “Sabrina’s Christmas Wish”

The mere existence of this holiday episode made it unambiguous that BoJack Horseman was created out of love. Further enriching the world so thoughtfully laid out in the first season, this metatextual holiday episode, in which BoJack and Todd (Aaron Paul) watch one of the Christmas episodes from Horsin’ Around, came as an unannounced Christmas gift in 2014. It also, hopefully, satisfies those who will inevitably be curious about what a proper episode of the show-within-the-show looks like, and Todd’s four-word refutation (“I can’t, can’t I?”) of BoJack’s faulty logic stands with the funniest moments of the series.

75. “The BoJack Horseman Show,” Season 3, Episode 2

A novel exposition dump, this episode goes back to 2007, when BoJack and Princess Carolyn (Amy Sedaris), a cat, first slept together. Its title refers to the name of BoJack’s sophomore TV series, a vulgar satire that tanked and was promptly canceled. This episode also lays general groundwork for episodes and seasons to come. Lots of obvious references abound—e.g., Princess Carolyn pitches scripts for No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood, though films actually being shopped around at that time instead of those just arriving in theaters might’ve been a better touch—not unlike a Trojan horse for the ongoing world building. The highlight herein is an updated version of the show’s end credits song, adapted to underscore BoJack’s much less successful follow-up to Horsin’ Around.

74. “The BoJack Horseman Story, Chapter One,” Season 1, Episode 1

This first episode doesn’t get its due. Brilliantly juxtaposing scenes from BoJack’s interview on The Charlie Rose Show with a gotcha shot from this world’s version of Maury, this first look at BoJack’s anxiety-ridden existence had the difficult task of establishing the show’s very particular tone (think Chuck Jones meets Don Hertzfeldt meets Albert Brooks) while also making blatant the sadness beneath it. The serious and silly rub shoulders here, like travelers on a crowded bus trip. It’s subversive, too, in warning against the dangers of over-binging; BoJack re-watches his old show obsessively, including the finale in which his character dies, at the expense of almost everything else in his life. This episode features Patton Oswalt in three parts, a Sellers-esque stunt that will prove to be one of the show’s regular hat tricks, while the closing gag exhibits the raw confidence required to deploy both guffaws and sobs with such simultaneous precision. In hindsight, it’s no surprise.

73. “Zoës and Zeldas,” Season 1, Episode 4

It was a small stroke of genius to introduce early in the series a pop-cultural dichotomy specific to this world. Leonard Cohen sang of a bird on a wire, and here the either/or stems from characters on Mister Peanutbutter’s House, a knockoff of BoJack’s sitcom in which the eponymous canine raised two little girls: Zelda, a fun extrovert, and Zoë, a cynical introvert. This episode features some of BoJack’s funniest quips and nastiest deeds. As for Todd’s rock opera, I’d be lying if I suggested that I didn’t want to see it brought to greater fruition. This episode does a lot of prep work for the season and the series, and does it well, while Wyatt Cenac’s performance as one of Diane’s exes provides a weary vantage point, effectively underscoring what makes this world feel so emotionally real in the first place.

72. “BoJack Kills,” Season 3, Episode 3

Plot-wise, this is a lowkey key episode in the series, establishing the source of the heroin that ultimately causes Sarah Lynn’s death. That would be Richie Osborne (Fred Savage), former Horsin’ Around cast member and current proprietor of Whale World, a family-friendly strip club that doubles as a drug front. BoJack and Diane get to catch up and establish a greater understanding of themselves (“I can’t keep asking myself if I’m happy, it just makes me more miserable,” says Diane, summarizing my 30s so far in 14 words), but my favorite moment is probably the chef’s-kiss perfection of Mister Peanutbutter’s LL Cool J reference (a close second is Angela Bassett’s line delivery on “you betcha”).

71. “Our A-Story Is a ‘D’ Story,” Season 1, Episode 6

If BoJack Horseman’s flair for wordplay wasn’t already clear, this episode is tantamount to a flag planted on the moon for all to see. Hollywood becomes Hollywoo when BoJack steals the “D” from the Hollywood sign in a drunken stupor, all in the hopes of impressing Diane after squaring off with Mister Peanutbutter—and buying the restaurant Elefante in the process. Todd, having found himself in prison at the end of the previous episode, navigates the various gangs courting him in sublimely naïve fashion, while BoJack’s backup plan to fix the “D” situation results in a tragedy befalling Beyoncé and, relatedly, one of the very best verbal gags in the entire series.

70. “Brand New Couch,” Season 2, Episode 1

Season two leans hard into everything distinct about the show, and it goes straight for the throat in a cold-open flashback to young BoJack, watching an interview with Secretariat (John Krasinski), only to be interrupted by his parents fighting before his mother tells him, “You ruined me,” and to enjoy his “dumb little TV show.” Ouch. Now fulfilling his dream of starring in a movie about the hero he watched as a child, BoJack finds himself unsure of his talent, his first line of dialogue in the part—“What are you doing here?”—becoming a mantra of sorts for the rest of the season. The final shot cuts with the precision of someone well past the point of throat-clearing.

69. “Higher Love,” Season 2, Episode 6

During a particularly awkward conversation with BoJack, Wanda (Lisa Kudrow) asks him if he wants to talk about the elephant in the room—not meaning to offend the elephant literally also in the room and who promptly scoffs and walks out. This bit almost feels like an encapsulation of the series as a whole, hilariously underscoring the ways communication runs awry and can hurt people without intending to. BoJack is afraid of his feelings in a new relationship, literally exclaiming “No, I don’t!” after first saying “I love you” to Wanda maybe a little too soon. The episode also stands out for introducing J.D. Salinger (Alan Arkin) as a character, the kind of absurdly genius touch that’s helped elevate BoJack Horseman to masterpiece status.

68 “The Light Bulb Scene,” Season 5, Episode 1

Taken as a whole, season five feels like BoJack Horseman’s version of Inland Empire, which means that its premiere episode has a hell of a job to do in setting things up, establishing multiple “realities” (there’s BoJack’s house, then there’s the set of his new TV show, Philbert, which looks…exactly like his house) that will soon be sloshing about together like brains sharing the same jar. BoJack and his new co-star, Gina (Stephanie Beatriz), are at it sexually, and Todd and his new girlfriend, a salamander named Yolanda (Natalie Morales) who’s also asexual, are happily not. Also, Mister Peanutbutter and Diane’s divorce gets finalized. BoJack tries to go over on his new boss, Flip (Rami Malek), and ends up getting Todd promoted to president of ad sales. These are just a few of the dominoes that will be knocked down across the subsequent episodes.

67. “Hooray! Todd Episode!,” Season 4, Episode 3

We hear about many more of Todd’s adventures than we ever see, and this episode teases the possibilities of those stories untold via a framing device in which Todd also turns out to be a triangle player in a renowned orchestra. A lion (Keith David) tells of Todd’s legendary accomplishments, and of a hope that will by episode’s end come true in poignant fashion. This episode also stands out for the introduction of Hollyhock (full name Hollyhock Manheim-Mannheim-Guerrero-Robinson-Zilberschlag-Hsung-Fonzerelli-McQuack, voiced by Aparna Nancherla), a horse girl with eight adopted dads who thinks BoJack is her biological father, but who turns out to be his sister.

66. “BoJack the Feminist,” Season 5, Episode 4

This episode introduces us to Vance Wagoner (Bobby Cannavale), a big-shot Hollywoo(d) type known for racist tirades and destructive behavior, and whose persistent acceptance by society and enabling by the media despite his behavior ultimately, well, enables BoJack to survive too. But as always, there’s a cost, and BoJack’s penchant for drunken oversharing yields some information that eventually makes its way to Diane, who’s coming to realize that she has to contend with her own role in possibly enabling BoJack’s behavior. Here, BoJack accidentally brands himself as a feminist and likes the attention, seemingly blissfully unaware of just how much he needs to deal with personally on those very grounds.

65. “Stop the Presses,” Season 3, Episode 7

Count the framing device of this episode as one of those batshit-crazy ideas that BoJack Horseman pulls off like a stunt performer in an early Edison short. Unhappy with the newspaper subscription he doesn’t want and didn’t order, BoJack’s calls to cancel, and is transferred to a representative known as “The Closer,” Candice Bergen), an unseen woman with a Blarney stone on her desk who councils him with wisdom and kind inquiries. In tandem with this exposition catch-up is the business endeavor between Todd and Emily (Abbi Jacobson), mistakenly undertaken at BoJack’s house, where a rift forms in the aftermath of her and BoJack’s tryst. The ending gag—involving a misbegotten billboard design—is a hilarious warning of the dangers of solipsism, but perhaps the funniest moment is BoJack’s benign acceptance of Esteemed Character Actress Margot Martindale (voiced by Margot herself) stealing his boat.

64. “Prickly Muffin,” Season 1, Episode 3

Sarah Lynn (Kristen Schaal) was no fool, even when she made bad choices, and in this early, deceptively savage episode, she articulates her own eventual demise so precisely, one imagines Bob Fosse raising a glass somewhere to toast the effort. This episode feels like an upgrade in terms of both the frequency and audacity of the show’s gags, from background jokes to BoJack’s leaning on his nostalgia for end credit bumpers in hilarious fashion to, my personal favorite, a well-timed lemur aflame. Telling, also, is how both BoJack and Sarah Lynn confuse moments from their TV characters’ lives as their own memories.

63. “Start Spreading the News,” Season 3, Episode 1

Season three becomes such a maze of twisted tunnels that, in hindsight, it’s astonishing how effortlessly the groundwork is laid out. BoJack is having a tough go of it on the press circuit for Secretariat, getting drunk and opening up too much to a reporter, while Mister Peanutbutter has misinterpreted the desperate pleas of his accountant and purchases an entire warehouse of spaghetti strainers for…something. The best part of this episode may be Mara Wilson’s turn as Jill Pill, a New York playwright who likes dreams in her omelet and whose devilish edge suggests whole lives lived beyond the borders of the frame.

62. “After the Party,” Season 2, Episode 4

Diane’s freak out at and subsequent fight with Mister Peanutbutter in this episode serve as exquisite distillations of her anxieties. She and her husband ultimately end up together in a pool filled with green Jell-O, almost like something out of a Guy Maddin film, but before that happens, their verbal fisticuffs really get at the ways contempt resides beneath happy exteriors, like some rotten apple core. Just about everyone in this episode is dealing with rocky romance, from Princess Carolyn and Vincent (Alison Brie) breaking up to, in what feels like an outtake from Her, a brief but panged romance between two cell phones. Wanda’s joke to BoJack, about a bag of mulch, is a classic, but the beautifully used cameo by a Beatle is a mic drop of legendary status.

61. “See Mr. Peanutbutter Run,” Season 4, Episode 1

Mister Peanutbutter’s improbable bid for the California governorship begins with an unlikely skiing competition, eventually wreaking havoc on his home, marriage, and the state economy. His populist impulses and pleasing personality are shown to take root in the early ’90s when he catches the eye of David Chase for a new sitcom then titled Untitled Horsin’ Around Knockoff, paving the way for his popularity for decades to come. Maybe it’s a salient commentary on how television personalities warp the political landscape in ways we might take for granted, on how reality should not be like a reality show. Maybe it’s a coincidence. I’m not saying his name if I can help it.

60. “Love and/or Marriage,” Season 3, Episode 5

BoJack gets ahead of himself once again here, learning how easily he can mess with other people’s lives after leveraging his celebrity status to crash a wedding reception on the weekend of Secretariat’s successful opening. Diane learns that she’s pregnant after breaking her arm during a bad drug trip with Alexi Brosefino (Dave Franco), one of the stars she works for, giving Brie the chance to share screen time with her husband, further complicating BoJack’s sublime meta-ness. This episode is also key in fleshing out Todd’s character, namely the way he’s clearly put off by the possibility of sex with an old and clearly amorous friend, as well as Princess Carolyn’s inner life, after a rare night off affords her three dates and a most unlikely suitor.

59. “Thoughts and Prayers,” Season 4, Episode 5

One of the movies coming up on Lenny Turtletaub’s (J.K. Simmons) docket features a shooting at a mall, rendering the production radioactive and unsalvageable after the latest real-life gun massacre also happens at a mall. This too-real scenario is contrasted with the similarly true comforts a that a TV show might provide, as BoJack attempts to recreate an episode of Horsin’ Around live for his mother, now in a nursing home and unable to recognize her son in person, only on the television show that launched him two decades ago. Meanwhile, Diane uses a gun and finds out that she likes it, a delightful complication to her views as a third-wave feminist finding her way in a world of unforgiving extremes.

58. “The Shot,” Season 2, Episode 9

Feelings of betrayal abound in BoJack Horseman, and they come to a head in “The Shot,” which opens in flashback to Secretariat, having been drafted into Vietnam, cutting a deal with then-President Nixon, who will instead send the famed horse’s brother to war—and to his ultimate death. BoJack pilfers one of his mother’s cigarettes after seeing Secretariat smoking on TV, but upon discovering his transgression, Beatrice (Wendie Malick) forces her son to finish it instead; “I’m punishing you for being alive,” she tells him, before the show devastatingly cuts to adult BoJack taking a drag. In the present, Diane returns to L.A. but doesn’t go home, Wanda feels betrayed by BoJack, and BoJack feels as though he’s betrayed another ally after a guerilla movie shoot turns sour. As always, though, hope shines through, here in the moment BoJack finally allows himself to cry, the emotional high point of the series up to this point.

57. “Live Fast, Diane Nguyen,” Season 1, Episode 5

Because the series is firstly about BoJack, and him being a mess, Diane—who’s there specifically as his ghost writer in the first season—seems especially organized and well put together by comparison, at least at first. This episode, in which she and BoJack must visit Boston after her dad dies, sees her emotional vulnerable for the first time, after her remaining family members stand her up at the funeral. Diane is unsentimental about her father and unapologetic about her feelings, as she should be, and this little glimpse into her family background helps establish what she’s trying to define herself against. Among other highlights are BoJack’s letter to Diane (the first of many) and a demented detour involving a barrel of chum.

56. “Yesterdayland,” Season 2, Episode 2

On the set of Secretariat, Diane is warned against the perils of stagnation, often found in celebrities or married people, something literalized here in the form of Wanda, an owl who spent the last 30 years in a coma. She and BoJack hit it off before some predictably absurd complications (here, it’s the presence of a Russian K.G.B. agent who also spent the last 30 years in a coma); meanwhile, Todd embarks on a business venture that tests the limits of his friendship with Mister Peanutbutter. BoJack’s efforts at self-improvement culminate in a blazing finale, and if this list were about the best final shots overall, this would easily be in the Top 10.

55. “Ancient History,” Season 5, Episode 9

The introduction of Henry Fondle (Aaron Paul)—a talking sex robot made by Todd—was a pleasant reminder that BoJack Horseman still had surprises up its sleeve, even nearing the end of its fifth season. This episode chiefly concerns BoJack’s medication, which is starting to blur reality from fantasy in his mind. Hollyhock’s visit to L.A. goes south when she mistakenly disposes of BoJack’s painkillers in a moment of panic, leaving him unable to medicate in debilitating pain. Meanwhile, Ralph Stilton (Raúl Esparza), Princess Carolyn’s ex (and a mouse) compounds Princess Carolyn’s efforts to adopt a child as a single mom. Like the Monet hanging in Diane’s apartment, these characters are all broken, but trying despite their obvious flaws, and beautifully so.

54. “Commence Fracking,” Season 4, Episode 4

When BoJack meets Hollyhock, he doesn’t front: “Let me be the first to tell you that I’m bad news.” It’s brutally honest, later matched by Hollyhock with one of my favorite line readings in the series: “I’m sorry it’s so unpleasant for you to have to interact with women you were shitty to.” Hollyhock and BoJack’s efforts in trying to find her mother opens up a deep well of potential candidates, resulting in a hookup between BoJack and the president of his fan club. Something must be in the air in Hollywoo, because, while trying to get pregnant, Princess Carolyn and Ralph get it on in the back of a police cruiser in an act of sexy resistance, and Diane and Mister Peanutbutter’s sex-capped fight is intense enough that I can only assume it’s already on PornHub.

53. “Surprise!,” Season 6, Episode 4

A surprise party for Mister Peanutbutter and Pickles (voiced by Hong Chau in season five and Julia Chan in season six) goes off the rails when the former tells the latter about his infidelity, leading to expertly deployed shenanigans as the partygoers struggle to avoid detection by the fighting couple. On the serious side of things, Diane asks BoJack if he’s going to be okay if she moves to live with her boyfriend in Chicago; he tells her to go, so that she can be a friend instead of his hostage. This episode’s gags are typically sharp: Ewe Haul is among my favorite punny brand names used on the show, and Julia Chan’s line reading of the improbable phrase “LMAO sorry for your loss” is spit-take worthy.

52. “One Trick Pony,” Season 1, Episode 10

This episode finds BoJack being tormented from multiple directions. He’s initially coerced by Princess Carolyn into playing Mister Peanutbutter in a movie, and eventually has to acknowledge deeply unpleasant truths about himself when Diane turns in her manuscript on his life story. This episode amusingly plays with time courtesy an extended bit where Lenny Turtletaub looks for a bagel in, as befits a turtle, drawn-out fashion, and the movie-set environment is well leveraged against the tensions brewing between BoJack and Todd, among others. Naomi Watts (as herself) co-stars with BoJack, playing Diane, and the resulting sexual relationship between the two further scrambles his brains. What lingers most is the image of BoJack hoisted and helpless in front of a green screen, which feels like a manifesto of sorts for the show’s thoughts on the movie industry.

51. “A Little Uneven, Is All,” Season 6, Episode 5

Diane didn’t expect Princess Carolyn to pounce on her idea about a book of essays, sell it to a publisher, and suddenly force her into a six-month time frame (“Enjoy the process!”) to finish something she’s having a hard time even starting. Life’s like that. When I pitched this article, I didn’t realize the fullness of the endeavor. It’s been worth it. Hard work is. And this episode does a lot of hard work for the rest of the season: the writer’s strike begins, BoJack accidentally gets Doctor Champ (Sam Richardson) drunk on contraband vodka, and Joey Pogo (Hilary Swank) arrives, initiating the closest moment that BoJack Horseman comes to having an Aaron Sorkin plotline. It also sheds further light on another painful memory from BoJack’s past, and how it takes a community to both raise and fail a child, generation after generation.

50. “Brrap Brrap Pew Pew,” Season 3, Episode 6

Being a feminist can be hard, and it seems particularly so for Diane even on a good day. Here, spread thin at work, she accidentally launches a national conversation about women’s choices when she inadvertently tweets about her intention of getting on abortion on the account of pop Sextina Aquafina (Aisha Tyler). Her screw-up turns into a positive when social media responses start flooding in, and Sextina decides to have her fake abortion live on television, prompting Princess Carolyn to cash in a favor from John Carpenter to produce a fake live-for-TV abortion I’m grateful we never see. Diane’s overthinking ways are eased by Princess Carolyn, but also an unnamed girl she meets at the abortion clinic, whose more down-to-earth, if perhaps cynical, perspective cuts through Diane’s moral hand-wringing like a well-sharpened machete through the jungle brush.

49. “Underground,” Season 4, Episode 7

During a fundraiser for the California governor’s race, Diane and Mister Peanutbutter’s home falls into the earth, after an earthquake caused by the fracking Mister Peanutbutter allowed to take place in their yard despite Diane’s protests. Trapped underground, the gathering quickly devolves into the BoJack Horseman equivalent of The Exterminating Angel: a character aroused by changes in power dynamics experiences multiple orgasms, Mister Peanutbutter proves his total lack of leadership ability, and a maniacal Jessica Biel (voiced by Biel) burns Zach Braff (voiced by Braff) for food, all while Diane and BoJack do the only sensible thing available to them: getting drunk in the bedroom. Todd and Princess Carolyn, also underground, are cut off from the rest of the house, eventually striking a deal with an ant colony (RuPaul plays their queen) to return to the surface and rescue the partygoers. “Underground” is a great, literal chamber piece.

48. “The Judge,” Season 4, Episode 8

Hollyhock is being drawn into BoJack’s darkness before our eyes, and by this episode, it’s beyond any doubt that she’s on drugs. BoJack is trying to look out for her, but he’s oblivious to much of what’s going on under his own roof. Lack of communication is a trend here. As an apology for inadvertently dumping trash on her neighboring lawn for years, BoJack’s taken a role on a show with Felicity Huffman (playing herself), which does not turn out to be what he thought it was. Meanwhile, Princess Carolyn and Ralph visit his family together for the first time, trying to hide her pregnancy in the process. Amusing bits abound—a frog crossing the road, Frogger-style, and a character with inter-species hand transplants—but many storms are gathering, and the tone is appropriately troubling.

47. “Old Acquaintance,” Season 3, Episode 8

“Old Acquaintance” is bookended with a framing device that posits the secondary, sometimes antagonistic characters Rutabaga Rabbitowitz (Ben Schwarz) and Vanessa Gekko (Kristin Chenoweth) as “the good guys,” a reversal that benefits from the show’s usual empathy. It’s New Year’s Eve and agents all over town are trying to get deals done before midnight, but the detail work is just as significant as the anticlimactic outcome: the way Mister Peanutbutter walks in circles before getting into bed, or the jubilant aura of the Labrador Peninsula. “Weird Al” Yankovic is gold as Mister Peanutbutter’s brother, Captain Peanubutter, who’s hiding a medical problem but lays the existential doom on heavy only when Diane is around. This episode effectively encapsulates the show’s own twin modes of light and dark, ending on an endearing vision of new life but not before reminding us of Sarah Lynn’s troubles.

46. “Horse Majeure,” Season 1, Episode 9

This episode could arguably be placed higher just for the introduction of Vincent Adultman, a “person” who’s clearly three boys stacked on top of each other, wearing a trench coat, and to whom Princess Carolyn takes an immediate fancy—oblivious to his true nature, and to BoJack’s pronounced dismay. Todd finally connects the dots and realizes what BoJack did to his rock opera, and Mister Peanutbutter and Diane tie the knot. Both also express deep apprehension; not before spiraling out some, again, BoJack finally voices acceptance (“Not everything’s about me,” he admits, and the relief is palpable). I feel a joke was missed when Todd mentions Mister Peanutbutter’s opinion about sticks (as per the subtitles) as opposed to Styx, but that’s my own fault for not checking these past years. The grace note falls last here, as BoJack finally opens up to Vincent, barside at the wedding reception. Just watch it. You’ll see.

45. “Intermediate Scene Study w/ BoJack Horseman,” Season 6, Episode 9

“Acting is about leaving everything behind and becoming something completely new.” BoJack would love to do just that, but the past is unforgiving and approaching quickly in the rear view. Starting a new job as a college professor, BoJack is making true gains, attending AA regularly, and trying to do right by his students. In a critical subplot, BoJack tries to stop one of his students from leaving school early for a role in a TV show, knowing too well how his own youthful success turned out. BoJack realizes that he and Hollyhock are in a fight, but the larger scale of the problem eludes him until the final moments, when a phone call from Charlotte rocks his world like lightning from an unseen storm.

44. “A Horse Walks into a Rehab,” Season 6, Episode 1

Season six begins where Sarah Lynn’s life ends, showing BoJack lying to a predictably lazy Officer Meow Meow Fuzzyface (Cedric Yarbrough) about the circumstances surrounding her overdose, before returning to the present, where BoJack is finally checking into rehab. He keeps a bottle of vodka nearby to remind him of the past, which continues to bear down: flashbacks continue, showing his reliance on alcohol while acting on Horsin’ Around, his penchant for bullying as a teenager, and childhood trauma, in a heartrending scene where he drinks some of his parent’s vodka before cuddling up to his mother, who’s passed out after a party. The requisite silliness quotient is pristine, and the gag involving a Flintstones vehicle particular inspired.

43. “Feel-Good Story,” Season 6, Episode 3

Diane carries the world on her shoulders, or at least tries to, and her cutthroat idealism is tested further when her employer asks her to do “feel-good” stories about the most depressing topics in our society. Her cameraman and soon-to-be-boyfriend, Guy (Lakeith Stanfield), offers a necessary counterbalance, though, and when White Whale Corporation buys the website they’re working for, they agree to do one last story in an effort to take down “the man,” until they realize that even bad press can be good for evildoers (turns out Congress has legalized murder for the rich here too). The trio of letters BoJack writes to Diane, read in voiceover, elevate this episode further.

42. “lovin that cali lifestyle!!,” Season 4, Episode 10

The title of this episode is a lie, coming from Hollyhock’s text message to one of her dads—sent just as she’s overdosing from the drugs BoJack’s mother, Beatrice (Wendie Malick), is slipping into her coffee. The fallout sees Hollyhock understandably isolated by her fathers, and BoJack, upon discovering the source of Hollyhock’s near-demise, isolating his mother in the worst nursing home room he can find, only to find that she recognizes him once more. BoJack Horseman has dealt with death frankly since the beginning, but it rarely has so precisely intuited the ways life continues to surprise even after hope seems lost.

41. “The Kidney Stays in the Picture,” Season 6, Episode 6

Princess Carolyn has long prided herself on her ability to separate her personal life from her public profile, but that ability to compartmentalize means she’s sometimes oblivious to what a monster she can be. Here, as the assistant strike gets underway in Hollywoo, she’s in lockstep with the elites who want to be able to continue treating their assistants like trash—until a flashback, edited in like quicksilver, reminds her of her roots. Judah (Diedrich Bader) returns, and so does Todd’s stepfather, Jorge (Jaime Camil), with news about his mother, suggesting new beginnings to come. How appropriate that the episode ends with someone opening a door.

40. “Planned Obsolescence,” Season 5, Episode 3

The centerpiece of this episode—a Russ Meyers-esque sequence involving fighting sisters and an out-of-control, very large barrel of lube, scored to “In the Hall of the Mountain King”—is among the longest and funniest set pieces in the show’s run. This episode digs pretty deeply into the insecurities of the show’s characters, never more achingly than the slow zoom on Gina when she auditions with a favorite childhood song—the unfortunate result of BoJack trying to do a good deed but taking something away instead. The closing scenes, as the International Space Station is destroyed in glorious fashion, are a high note, but the aforementioned fight comes close when one salamander rips the arms off another, only for them to instantaneously sprout back.

39. “Let’s Find Out,” Season 2, Episode 8

Presenting the recording of the first episode of J.D. Salinger’s new reality show, Hollywoo Stars and Celebrities: What Do They Know? Do They Know Things? Let’s Find Out, and all the on-sage and backstage hubbub, “Let’s Find Out” is in some ways the most real-feeling episode of the series. The show-within-the-show angle helps, as does the running gag of Wanda working her way through decades of technology with mixed success (“I faxed it to you. Oh, I guess I shredded it to you”), as well as Danielle Radcliffe’s ace vocal work, as himself, but it’s mostly a crucial moment in BoJack and Wanda’s relationship that makes it all feel very true. Mr. Radcliffe and BoJack square off as contestants, while Todd vies for attention with a mouse named Mia (Tatiana Maslany) who has refreshingly little patience for his shenanigans. The final shot’s an all-timer.

38. “Mr. Peanutbutter’s Boos,” Season 5, Episode 8

“Mr. Peanutbutter’s Boos” collapses time, showing the events of BoJack’s annual Halloween party over four disparate years, with Mister Peanutbutter in attendance with a different one of his partners (Katrina, Jessica Biel, Diane, and Pickles) in tow. Among other moments of historic significance, we see BoJack inviting Todd to stay at his house and Diane’s first time meeting BoJack, years before they met to work on his memoir. These yearly slices feel like emotional records of time’s cruel march that spawn great empathy, especially in the present, where Diane tends to an upset Pickles in the bathroom after the party goes as disastrously as is expected.

37. “Sunk Cost and All That,” Season 6, Episode 11

Finally, BoJack’s past comes out in the open: Having fainted following Charlotte’s (Olivia Wilde) phone call about unwanted reporters, BoJack talks with Princess Carolyn, Todd, and Diane in his office about the bad things he’s done, the listing of which eventually takes up two whiteboards (among other heretofore unknown facts, BoJack lied about “getting” Radiohead, and also keyed Kenan Thompson’s Kia). In the B plot, Mister Peanutbutter learns to let go as he condones Pickles’s acceptance of a perfect job opportunity. BoJack asks Princess Carolyn, “Is it possible that you letting me go is the happy ending?” Maybe BoJack learns to let go of himself too. The long shot of him speaking to his students (“Please, cherish this”) while Princess Carolyn and Diane listen speaks beautifully to someone who’s found peace and purpose just as they begin to slip away.

36. “Xerox of a Xerox,” Season 6, Episode 12

Attempting something like damage control before the story about Sarah Lynn’s overdose is released, BoJack performs very well on his first interview before letting the confidence go to his head and spiraling out in a crass follow-up. Here, we learn of the extent of BoJack’s role in Sarah’s death, after BoJack states in an interview that he waited to call the paramedics (in private, he says that he covered his tracks). The way Princess Carolyn’s eyes follow BoJack, unflinching, speaks to her own sense of responsibility. BoJack’s reminded of the good he’s done by a fellow comic reminiscing about his departed brother (“Drugs took a lot from him, but he still had that laugh”), and it’s a small step forward when Diane turns on BoJack’s follow-up interview just in time to see him admit responsibility.

35. “The Horny Unicorn,” Season 6, Episode 13

Almost everyone hates BoJack now, and the usually cheerful Mister Peanutbutter, a.k.a. Sad Dog, feels like Pagliacci the clown. Good thing for old friends, as BoJack suddenly finds himself homeless after being sued by the Xerox corporation for referring to him disparagingly by their product’s name. There’s something poetic about how BoJack loses his house just as Todd moves into his first apartment. In no position to refuse work, BoJack finds himself developing a Deadpool-esque movie idea—the eponymous horny unicorn—with controversial Hollywoo actor Vance Wagoner. But the hits keep coming, particularly in the closing sequence, where the letter BoJack can’t bear to open suddenly becomes the last words he’ll ever get from his sister. Anyone who’s ever been cut out of another’s life, or lost a sibling, will feel the moment especially deeply.

34. “A Quick One, While He’s Away,” Season 6, Episode 8

Paige Sinclaire (Paget Brewster) only shows up in a handful of BoJack episodes, first here, yet she’s one of the greatest creations to be found in the show. Modeled after His Girl Friday’s Hildy Johnson, she’s a pig with a nose for news, and her detection of a good story quickly begins to tear at the threads holding BoJack’s life together, simultaneously turning the screws on the anxiety-prone viewer in expert fashion. Scouting out potential details about BoJack and Sarah Lynn at an AA meeting, Paige and her cohort Max find the red dippy drinking bird BoJack took the mic from on his bender in season three, and whose memory of the incident sends the journalists on to New Mexico. Hollyhock learns something of BoJack, too, the dawning realization leaving the unmistakable feeling that things will never be the same.

33. “The Old Sugarman Place,” Season 4, Episode 2

“The Old Sugarman Place” finds BoJack having fled the set of Ethan Around (to his former co-star’s financial ruin, one imagines) and ignoring Diane’s phone calls and revisiting his family home in Michigan, now in disrepair. The show’s flashbacks to his mother’s childhood there begin spilling over into BoJack’s present, and we learn that young Beatrice’s older brother died in battle and her mother ultimately lobotomized for her resulting depression. Back in the present, Eddie (Colman Domingo), a widower dragonfly, is a brief but welcome addition to the cast of characters (ditto BoJack’s grandfather, played by Matthew Broderick), reminiscent of the wells of pain everyone carries.

32. “Yes And,” Season 2, Episode 10

Todd finds purpose when he joins an improv group in this episode, which features, among other treasures, an excellent performance from Rian Johnson. BoJack accidentally offends the new director on his movie (Garry Marshall) into doing unnecessary retakes, upsetting his schedule and ruining his mood, distancing Wanda in the process. A purposefully roundabout critique of Scientology slays, but this episode lingers in the mind most for its one-two emotional punch of BoJack and Wanda’s breakup, featuring one of the truest lines written for the series (“When you look at someone through rose-colored glasses, all the red flags just look like flags”), and Diane’s monologue about her emotionally stunted marriage, sadness, and regret.

31. “It’s You,” Season 3, Episode 10

BoJack’s dreams and fears are both fulfilled in this episode when he’s mistakenly nominated for an Oscar, finding out about the mix-up only after partying so hard that he flirts with death. The series finally cashes in on its opening credits motif when a drunk BoJack drives his new car into the pool hanging impossibly on the side of his house. Diane shows up to congratulate him, but instead finds BoJack covering up his true feelings, ending in a fight about how clearly miserable he is (“There’s gonna be plenty of people around when I kill myself”). Princess Carolyn is reassessing her life after a string of bad business decisions, and Diane’s learned to better prioritize her own happiness. The titular line comes in the form of Todd’s attempt to talk some sense into BoJack after a devastating relation, his tirade including a perfect deployment of the F bomb.

30. “Hank After Dark,” Season 2, Episode 7

BoJack Horseman has always been just a little ahead of the curve of the national conversation, predating the Me Too era with this episode’s look at an accused sexual offender, Hank Hippopopolous (Philip Baker Hall), who weathers the storm of media scrutiny with ease after Diane inadvertently causes a dust-up while promoting her book with BoJack. No surprise that Diane takes the heat simply for reminding people of the existence of the accusations lobbed against Hank. The importance of perspective hits home hard here, as Todd contends with international geopolitics after being mistaken for a major world leader while Diane and BoJack deal with their important but decidedly less critical drama.

29. “Stupid Piece of Sh*t,” Season 4, Episode 6

In its later seasons, BoJack Horseman got exceptionally good at getting inside its character’s heads, literally. This episode takes a deep dive into BoJack’s self-destructive mindset, using voiceover and an alternate animation style to suggest his ongoing, mostly negative conversation with himself as he navigates the “nightmare non-sexy version of Three’s Company” that his life has become. With his senile mother now living with him and Hollyhock, he’s more easily set off. He becomes particularly jealous of a horse doll his mother starts to care for quite kindly (in start contrast to how she and her husband treated BoJack as a child), and in acting on that jealousy, pushes Hollyhock further away, speaking to how even justified cruelty numbs us and perpetuates itself.

28. “Later,” Season 1, Episode 12

Mirroring the opening of the first episode of the series, this first season finale also begins tellingly with a talk show. This time it’s in flashback, on The Dick Cavett Show, where Secretariat is defending himself against gambling accusations, and also reading a fan letter from young BoJack. Soon after, he commits suicide by jumping from a bridge. Back in the present, adult BoJack has won the Golden Globe for Best Comedy or Musical for his memoir, and is coming to terms with this new chapter in his life. Diane, struggling to find purpose in life, is tempted by an opportunity abroad to help people in need, but she’s utterly unsupported by her spouse. BoJack lands the Secretariat gig he’s always wanted, and Todd and Mister Peanutbutter start a business venture of questionable merit (and the results of which help bring home an Andrew Garfield joke that’s been brewing for nine episodes). Season one ends strongly, with an effusive Tegan and Sara needle drop confirming the promise of even greater things to come.

27. “What Time Is It Right Now,” Season 4, Episode 12

Season four’s final episode ends with equal parts heartbreak and promise. BoJack finally tracks down Hollyhock’s mother and delivers the information to her, despite the efforts of her fathers, while Diane and Mister Peanutbutter’s spontaneous getaway ends badly with a poorly received gesture. The writers really run rampant with the alliteration here, and the series stretches itself further than ever before in its emotional dynamism. After seeing all the weight that BoJack has to bear, his dawning realization that someone wants him to be in their life is a well-earned gift to the audience.

26. “The Amelia Earhart Story,” Season 5, Episode 5

In it’s opening flashback, a young Princess Carolyn watches a black-and-white film about the eponymous pilot on a warped VHS tape. Such are the ways this show uses detail and memory to effect us. This episode tells the parallel stories of Princess Carolyn’s first of five eventual miscarriages, in flashback, and her return to her hometown to interview as a potential candidate for adoption, in the present. The expecting mother she meets, Sadie (Jaime Pressly), is skeptical, and Carolyn finds herself torn between her wish to be a mother and the responsibilities she’s already heaped upon herself. The final scene, in which a young Carolyn prioritizes her own wishes against those of her mother’s, feels like a much-needed bucket of cold water to the face.

25. “INT. SUB,” Season 5, Episode 7

This episode starts off as silly as they come, but it hides a dark core. An exposition dump disguised as a conversation between two therapists making a minimal effort to hide the names of their clients, BoJack Horseman temporarily becomes Bobo the Angsty Zebra, with all manner of extenuating jokes and off-the-wall ideas (Princess Carolyn is a “tangled fog of pulsating yearning,” showrunner Flip McVicker is a dolphin with writer’s block, and Mister Peanutbutter has been rebranded Mister Chocolate Hazelnut Spread). By episode’s end, however, reality is again in full swing, and Diane has reached a breaking point with BoJack’s behavior, playing the Hamlet to BoJack’s Claudius with a script for BoJack’s show, unknowingly sending him further down the Lynchian rabbit hole his life’s becoming.

24. “Good Damage,” Season 6, Episode 10

Diane’s struggle with writing her memoir reaches its zenith in “Good Damage,” which depicts her tangential thought process as a series of rough sketches in which the people in her life act as mouthpieces for her imposter syndrome. Her ability to deal with the stresses of modern living is sharper now, thanks to her supportive boyfriend, Guy, and her decision to go on meds for her depression (the song at the beginning of the episode, in which Diane rocks her medicine bottle like a Mentos stick, is one of the show’s catchiest), but new Diane relapses after feeling the pressure from Princess Carolyn to finish her book. The book she ends up actually writing, Ivy Tran: Food Court Detective, happens almost by accident, with the title character erupting in Diane’s consciousness like a big bang of spontaneous creativity.

23. “Head in the Clouds,” Season 5, Episode 10

“Head in the Clouds” reintroduces Esteemed Character Actress Margot Martindale after her ambiguous fate two seasons prior; thought to be lost at sea, she’s been living in silence at a convent, shocked into speaking again by one of the episode’s more surreal developments. A giant BoJack balloon has been accidentally set loose, wreaking havoc on the horizon and BoJack’s sanity. Before all that, the successful premiere of Philbert sees Diane upset with herself for having had a hand in something that might legitimize or contribute to shitty behavior of the toxic male variety. The resulting verbal fisticuffs are some of the most bruising of the entire series.

22. “Angela,” Season 6, Episode 14

“Angela” adds more context to a key moment from BoJack’s past—Herb getting fired from Horsin’ Around—and the revelation that he had more power over the situation than he’d realized sends him spiraling even further. Having been shunned by the one family member he’d felt close to, BoJack was already slipping back into substance abuse and self-hatred. Says Angela (Anjelica Huston), “The truth is none of it matters and the truth is it all matters tremendously. It’s a wonder any of us get out of bed at all.” Diane’s book, the young adult concept she first resisted, is seen to have a real impact on her fans, and a conversation she has with Mister Peanutbutter after an unlikely discovery, the morning sun hitting the Chicago river in the background, is lovely even by the show’s usual standards. “Angela” takes us down some dark roads in the end, but as has been said before here, the only way out, is through.

21. “Ruthie,” Season 4, Episode 9

Imagining a future world where Princess Carolyn’s great great great granddaughter Ruthie (Kristen Bell) is giving a report on her great great great grandmother in 2017 (and where time is now measured in beans), “Ruthie” brilliantly embodies the ways in which drama and storytelling are used to manage life’s woes. This framing device is eventually revealed to be Princess Carolyn’s fantasy—something she thinks about when she has a particularly bad day. On this day, her pregnancy is found to no longer be viable, and a broken necklace reveals a lie about a family heirloom (the live action-infused animation that conveys this bit of the story is, quite simply, awesome). Meanwhile, BoJack is doing the considerable grunt work required to track down Hollyhock’s birth mother. The story about a story reveals itself to be a lie, but sometimes that’s where the truth lies.

20. “Best Thing That Ever Happened,” Season 3, Episode 9

“Don’t you break my heart, BoJack Horseman,” says Princess Carolyn, sharing BoJack’s bed one morning in 2007. “You smell nice,” he offers. After the failure of BoJack’s Horsin’ Around follow-up, Princess Carolyn was there to comfort BoJack, a fact that sticks in the throat when we return to 2016 and BoJack is firing his agent of nearly a quarter century before the two break out into a very public fight at BoJack’s restaurant. The heaviest episodes of the series often have the silliest B story, but the subplot here involving the restaurant management falling apart proves key in the season’s deliberately drawn-out surprise. Regarding BoJack and Princess Carolyn, it’s beyond clear these two people love each other, which makes its bitter conclusion both painful and necessary, like the severance of a limb lost to gangrene.

19. “The Showstopper,” Season 5, Episode 11

BoJack Horseman is enough of a Mobius strip that it’s unsurprising in hindsight that one of its showstopping episodes would eventually put that descriptor into the title itself, simultaneously rendering its meaning literal. As BoJack’s increasingly drug-addled real life and paranoid time on set continue to blur together, reality devolves like the climax of a David Lynch movie, including a perfectly bizarre commercial presented intact, featuring Todd begging for advertisers, and a fantasy turning violently real. This episode gets nearly as dark and complex as the series ever has, showing, among other things, how dangerous it can be to simply be a woman, and how wanting to help someone is sometimes the surest way of hurting them.

18. “Out to Sea,” Season 2, Episode 12

Following the devastating conclusion to BoJack’s time in New Mexico, season two’s finale catches us up in rapid fashion on Diane and Mister Peanutbutter, using a De Palma-esque split screen, before getting down to business. Todd moves out to continue working with the improv group he hasn’t yet realized is exploiting him, but before long, BoJack realizes that he has to save his best friend, noting in a touching monologue that letting Todd stay with him was the best thing he ever did. Opening a new orphanage with his Horsin’ Around residuals is his latest good deed, but even these larger gestures end up ruining his sense of self, BoJack succumbing to a small nervous breakdown at the opening ceremony. The finale sees him trying his best, and Jason Beghe’s brief but moving turn as a running baboon meant the world to me, also trying to run more, when the episode dropped in 2015. It somehow means more now.

17. “The Telescope,” Season 1, Episode 8

“The Telescope” feels like the first time BoJack Horseman proved it could go anywhere, featuring as it does a dying cancer patient’s (Stanley Tucci) refusal to offer forgiveness to a friend who wronged him decades ago, every note of this blistering exchange ringing true. The B plot involving a pair of thieves who attempt to kidnap Todd acts as a necessary counterweight; the self-proclaimed Celebrity Stealing Club can be seen lifting goods from other parties throughout the series on at least two occasions. The memory that maybe haunts BoJack the most is seen here: Buckling to homophobic protesters, the network wants to fire Herb, and BoJack is unable to stop it. Before this episode’s finished, he’ll have made another mistake that’ll haunt him for some time.

16. “The New Client,” Season 6, Episode 2

Princess Carolyn’s having a hard time as a new mom, and “The New Client” shows her doing it all, quite literally, with a brilliant animated device of overlapping action that will speak to anyone who’s every lost sleep caring for another human being for a length of time. She’s so worn out that when she shows up to visit BoJack at his rehab clinic, she’s accidentally checked in herself, but it’s only after finally being allowed to crash as she does that she finally decides on a name for her daughter, the resulting moment being one both of the smallest and the heaviest of the entire show, like an emotional vortex around which everything else is pulled.

15. “Still Broken,” Season 2, Episode 3

BoJack Horseman has given many gifts, and one of my favorites is the way Henry Winkler (playing himself) reads the line, spoken at a funeral, “Let us now read his final tweets.” Even better is a bit of wisdom offered later about there being no shame in dying for nothing. BoJack runs into Charlotte for the first time in 30 years at Herb Kazzaz’s funeral, setting into motion events that will drive the rest of the series, while the inscription on a commemorative bench, which reads “All That Kazzaz,” effectively foreshadows the show’s penultimate episode. Presently, one of Herb’s final wishes sends the former cast of Horsin’ Around on a treasure hunt with dubious merit. The last shot is one of the best—final or otherwise—of the series, effortlessly evoking a lifetime’s worth of hope: truth in artifice, writ large.

14. “That Went Well,” Season 3, Episode 12

Season three’s finale confirms what we already knew about Sarah Lynn’s life ending, but not before a flashback to an unfortunate encounter between her and BoJack years before. BoJack is wracked with guilt, but it’ll be years until the full ramifications of her overdose (and the full details of BoJack’s actions that night) will come to pass. The culmination of this season’s strange spaghetti strainer subplot offers some of Margot Martindale’s best material in the entire series (and a Mad Max—or rather, Really Quite Upset Max—reference to boot), but it’s mostly a somber affair here. Trying to do good, BoJack agrees to a new TV show, only to panic and flee when a child actor tells him they want to be like him when they grow up. Many great storytellers have used Nina Simone’s voice for its magical effect, and this season’s rhapsodic conclusion is no exception.

13. “The Stopped Show,” Season 5, Episode 12

The pendulum swings far in this end to the fifth season. BoJack’s assault of Gina in the previous episode (an action he can’t recall from his painkiller-fueled drug trip) emerges as a non-controversy when Gina insists it instead be played off as “just acting,” lest her career be held back, but their show still ends up being canceled when a far less likely event upends their parent company. Princess Carolyn becomes a mother, a pair of long-lost twins find each other, and BoJack seeks the help he needs by finally going to rehab. Even the most broken of us can still get the help needed, BoJack seems to say, and when Diane drives into a tunnel to the tune of The War on Drugs, just as the sun comes out, it feels like it believes it too.

12. “The Face of Depression,” Season 6, Episode 7

This episode begins by looking backward, delivering a montage of painful memories as BoJack cleans his house and makes his way to AA. Resistance to change is a common theme, as Diane dismissed Guy’s wishes that she try going on meds to handle her depression, only for BoJack, of all people, to show up and help to spell out the obvious. There are many instances of BoJack’s goodness coming out over the course of the series, but his cleaning up Diane’s apartment for her is one of the most touching. Just as powerful is Mister Peanutbutter finally having a long-held wish fulfilled, but it’s a tear-jerking airport reunion that will stay most in my mind.

11. “Chickens,” Season 2, Episode 5

If I had to pick one episode to use to introduce BoJack Horseman to someone, this would likely be it. In fleshing out the disturbing details of how the food chain works in this world, at least when it comes to “food chickens” versus “friend chickens,” this episode further complicates the already complex ways in which species intersect with and relate to each other here. Todd meets, names, and grows fond of a lost, genetically altered food chicken, Becca (Lisa Hanawalt), whose baks and squawks make way for some of the finest wordplay in the show’s entire run. The final scene juxtaposes Diane and Todd’s optimism against the crushing weight of corporate greed, and it’s a sliver of cautious hope I’ll be holding onto for a very long time.

10. “Downer Ending,” Season 1, Episode 11

Establishing the 11th episode as the perennial showstopper, “Downer Ending” sees an enraged BoJack refusing to permit Diane’s book about him to go to press, insisting that he’ll be able to write a better one in the five days left before printing commences. Enlisting Todd and Sarah Lynn as writing assistants and securing some choice drugs from a humorously named Dr. Hu (Ken Jeong), BoJack, Todd, and Sarah go on an epic bad trip that remains one of the greatest visual achievements in the series, recalling, among other influences, the dynamic invention of Chuck Jones’s Duck Amuck. BoJack’s visions of the life he didn’t choose lead to an unanswered plea for absolution, the left hook of an ending a harsh reminder that fame is in many ways the greatest impediment to being known.

9. “Escape from L.A.,” Season 2, Episode 11

“Escape from L.A.” feels like riding an exhilarating rollercoaster that flies off the rails at its highest point, somehow landing safely, leaving its occupants terrified and grateful to be alive. BoJack forgets about a lot of the decisions he’s made, and his Don Draper-esque choice to ditch his job on the Secretariat movie in order to see an old friend in New Mexico is one that will haunt him possibly forever. Going to a high school prom as a family friend’s “date,” BoJack provides alcohol to minors, and then does the wrong thing again before doing the right thing, following it up with some more wrong things. The emotional payload, delivered by Olivia Wilde, lands like a small nuclear weapon. Fucking up has rarely felt so good to watch.

8. “That’s Too Much, Man!,” Season 3, Episode 11

Sarah Lynn is celebrating nine months’ sobriety, but the variation on John Everett Millais’s “Ophelia” above her bed, featuring Sarah in place of Shakespeare’s noblewoman, says otherwise about her chances. BoJack Horseman has never been shy about the type of child star it saw in this tragic case of celebrity gone awry, and here it arrives at its fateful conclusion in appropriately devastating fashion. The editing suggests, terrifyingly, how blackouts must feel, as BoJack and Sarah Lynn indulge each other’s addictions and go on a months-long bender, making a fateful trip to AA somewhere along the way, and attempting to make amends, which backfires. The somber conclusion feels inevitable, but the real pain of the matter comes from the fact that it didn’t have to be.

7. “Free Churro,” Season 5, Episode 6

“Free Churro” sees BoJack speaking at length at his mother’s funeral—for just over 21 minutes, to be exact. Her face locked into a grimace that prevented the open casket she would have preferred, Beatrice’s now-absent voice is something her son takes hilarious advantage of in his galling but honest banter. Will Arnett deserves awards merely for all the ways he finds to pronounce the word “fine.” Also noteworthy is the punishing pre-credits flashback to a young BoJack, being driven home by his verbally abusive father (also voiced, tellingly, by Arnett). Each glimpse of BoJack’s childhood makes one wonder how he didn’t turn out even more messed up.

6. “Say Anything,” Season 1, Episode 7

The first of the Princess Carolyn-centric episodes remains my favorite. Creator Raphael Bob-Waksburg makes his first appearance as Charlie, son of Vigor President and Princess Carolyn’s boss, Mr. Witherspoon (a pitch-perfect Stephen Colbert), and whose immediate ascension through the ranks despite his obvious ineptitude stands in sharp contrast to Princess Carolyn’s Sisyphus-like endurance. Jumping through hoops while performing miracles on a regular basis, she’s now working overtime as BoJack reels from Diane and Mister Peanutbutter’s engagement. At the end of the episode, when she’s achieved the impossible yet again and received practically no thanks, we learn it’s her birthday, and not a typical one at that. Lyla Foy’s “Impossible” closes the episode, heartbreaking while barely raising its voice.

5. “The Dog Days Are Over,” Season 5, Episode 2

This episode represents the peak of Alison Brie’s powerhouse performance as Diane Nguyen. The whitewashing of her character being tantamount to the show’s original sin, in the words of its creator, this episode contends with the roots of Diane’s Vietnamese heritage and distinctly American anxieties. Framed as a reading of one of Diane’s online listicles about reasons to travel, the episode capitalizes on the show’s ability to move back and forth through time with ease, bookended as it is by Diane’s emotional fallout following a party at her old, pre-divorce house, after which she leaves L.A. in a hurry, opting for Hanoi. Pickles Aplenty makes her first appearance in this episode (voiced here by Hong Chau), and an understated visual gag involving a woodpecker playing Jenga is priceless, but it’s the fulfillment of years’ worth of potential in Diane’s story that makes this one of BoJack Horseman’s most perfect accomplishments.

4. “Fish Out of Water,” Season 3, Episode 4

As indebted to Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation as it is to silent movies, season three’s “Fish Out of Water” was the best episode of the series at that point, and one of the great achievements of recent animation. Attending an underwater film festival for his movie, BoJack can’t figure out how to communicate through his helmet, loses his nerve when he sees Kelsey Jannings (Maria Bamford) also there promoting her movie, and quite rapidly finds himself stranded and the self-appointed guardian of an also-lost baby seahorse with a knack for mischief and adventure. BoJack’s better qualities are not unlike gold holding together the pieces of a broken bowl, and this episode is teeming with the empathy that comes from knowing goodness is important even if it can’t be credited, or even remembered.

3. “Time’s Arrow,” Season 4, Episode 11

Season four’s big 11th episode manages to outdo the previous three by leaps and bounds, wasting no time in collapsing our sense of time and space as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind meets the climax of Akira in the disintegrating mind of Beatrice Horseman. Haunted by the memory of her lobotomized mother and callous, emotionally feckless father, her mental state wafts back and forth between the past and present. The reinforced parallels between her and her son’s torrid upbringings make painfully clear the ways the sins of our fathers, and mothers, repeat themselves; as it turns out, BoJack is more like his mother than he’d want to admit. Reminiscent of BoJack’s cruel deed in “Stupid Piece of Sh*t,” Beatrice’s love for a lost childhood doll syncs up with the memories of her real baby. BoJack and Hollyhock’s births unfold simultaneously in hallucinatory emotional vortex, and the series crests yet another summit.

2. “Nice While It Lasted,” Season 6, Episode 16

BoJack Horseman ends about the only way it could have: as a series of exquisitely rendered conversations between the primary characters. The fullness of these words and scenes reminds me of the moment Jafar Panahi cries for cinema in This Is Not a Film: Why describe these images and sounds when you could show them? It’s 10 months after BoJack nearly died. He’s sober and out of jail for the weekend to attend Princess Carolyn and Judah’s wedding. BoJack and Todd watch the fireworks at Princess Carolyn’s oceanside ceremony, the encroaching waves washing away their footprints as they talk about the impermanence of things. Princess Carolyn shows her love for BoJack while also setting boundaries necessary for her happiness. Diane does something similar, as the episode begins and ends with her and BoJack, likely sharing their last moments together, doing that most human of things together: looking to the heavens in wonder.

1. “The View from Halfway Down,” Season 6, Episode 15

Like a cross between the climactic musical number of All That Jazz and the final segment of The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, and worthy of comparison to both, this penultimate episode contends with the immensity of a life lived, and of lives lived, with irreconcilable contradictions and pain and beauty in comparable proportions. Also with death, and what it means, or doesn’t, to the dying, and to those who keep on living. Inside BoJack’s lucid dream/death rattle are gathered all who’ve already passed, from his mother to Herb to Sarah Lynn to Zach Braff, to Crackerjack (Lin-Manuel Miranda), an uncle he never met. The approaching immensity of the conclusion (to the series, to life) is brought to bear with intimacy and aplomb to spare—and, when BoJack decides, at the end of all things, to ask Diane how her day was, tears aplenty.