The Meaning of Death: BoJack Horseman vs. The Good Place

hey everyone this video was done in collaboration with our good friends over at the tape stick around until the end of the video to hear more about their deep dive into Princess Carolyne what's up wisecrack Jared again in case you missed it two of our favorite shows in recent memory wrap this year a good place and Bojack horseman now on paper these shows might seem very different ones a feel-good show about a ragtag team of dead people trying to save everyone from member flattening hell maybe if you score negative points on earth sorry you blew it enjoy having your penis flattened while the other one is about well this prick maybe some of the troops are heroes but not automatically I'm sure a lot of the troops are jerks but what if I told you that if you dig a little deeper these shows actually approach the same philosophical topic from opposite perspectives oh as it turns out both the good place and Bojack are preoccupied not just with death but with how the big slumber gives meaning to our lives so in the words of everyone's favorite Florida man let's hook them all top cocktail the thing and see what happens welcome those wisecrack edition on two ways to die the good place and Bojack horseman and as always spoilers ahead now for the uninitiated the good place has a lot of twists and turns over its four seasons the show started as a story about humans mistakenly ending up in heaven only to surprise us with the revelation that their good place was in fact an intricate plot to torture them but after getting a surprisingly good-looking demon on their side hello Silver Fox the show follows the gang as they try to change the rules that govern the afterlife that's because the current system is seriously broken this is the problem with the current system live anything less than the most exemplary life and you are brutally tortured forever with no recourse the cruelty of the punishment does not match the cruelty of the life that one has lived to fix the problem the judge kind of like a pseudo God with a daddy complex last time I checked I didn't have a dad that's why I'm attracted to all the father figures on the TV shows i watch wants to erase humanity and start from scratch but the gang manages to convince her and the folks down in the bad place to adopt a new system you die go to the afterlife and then go through a series of tests before you move on to heaven at the end you're given a sort of evaluation and the architects explain what you did badly what you did well and then you get rebooted and do it again and again and again until you ace it all's well that ends well right not so much well the gang may have stopped all humanity from going to hell that doesn't mean that heaven is all that great in the words of Hypatia of Alexandria paper this is paradise all your desires and needs are met but it's infinite and when perfection goes on forever you become this glassy-eyed mush person living forever is kind of its own hell so Eleanor has a solution a way to restore meaning to the people in the good place is to let them leave in other words for your afterlife to have meaning you too must die or in this case cease to exist the show wraps up with our heroes all doing what they need to feel at peace before shuffling off this immortal coil now if you think it's strange that a show about the afterlife ends with everyone essentially dying that's probably because you're not familiar with this guy mortality offers meaning to our lives and morality helps navigate that meaning wait what I think it says is that mortality offers meaning to the events of our lives that dude right there is Todd Mei who's not only a professor of philosophy but also a philosophical adviser to the show with Pamela harana me it's Mays book death that actually provides the philosophical framework for the series ending in it may makes the bold claim that the fact that we die is the most important fact about us formai death provides a unique structure to our lives with death subsuming all other facts about our lives without death he argues we would all lose a sense of meaning and maybe even virtue to prove the point may asks us to consider jorge luis borges his short story the immortal which follows a man named joseph kartoffel as' in search of a river that grants immortal but when kartoffel is finally drinks from the river and discovers his society of immortals he's shocked to find that they're just a pathetic husks of former humans they barely talk show strikingly little interest in others and wander about in the literal ruins of their own civilization if this sounds familiar to you maybe that's because it reminds you of this delightful character in the good place multi-ball I mean it's perfect we're all having orgasms literally all the time I died a virgin so that's real crazy because there's nothing that the residents the good place haven't done or will not eventually do during that eternity nothing provides them meaning or joy even the literal constant cosmic orgasmic bliss or go-karting with monkeys monkeys are the ideal go-kart opponents they're funny enough to give the finger but not smart enough to win perhaps worse this unending life seems to also strip people of their identities Hypatia of alexandria for example becomes the exact opposite of an erudite ancient philosopher she swapped her toga for an NFL jersey goes by the name Patti and has totally forgotten the name of her former profession but it's not just our passions that eternity would numb May sights fellow philosopher Martha Nussbaum and speculating that eternity could even chip away at our moral concerns going so far as to speculate that even justice would be imperiled the needs of others would not urge themselves on us in the same way since their existence would not be threatened by our neglect this is certainly the case in Bohr has his story where car topless relates how a man was left at the bottom of a ravine for almost a century because no one could be bothered to get him out after all why rush when you have until the end of time and while the good place didn't quite bear this thesis out it's interesting to note that after an eternity Chiti who made moral philosophy his whole life on earth and the afterlife was no longer interested in studying the subject once he got to the good place after thousands of reading the most difficult writings in the world I've acquired a new passion garbage books do you think it would have been a good symbologist if there were a real job but the good placement odd may both agree that eternity is a less than great everything needs in it may for his part asks his readers to consider a novel a book concluding isn't important in and of itself literally every book in existence has a final page but this ending itself lets you reflect on what came before and gives you a chance to order that experience or we can consider your typical TV sitcom the fact that there's a final scene to each episode isn't surprising but building to that end allows the episode to have a narrative drive and a sense of closure for the good place the knowledge of finality allows the show and its characters to create meaning the chance to walk through a door of non-existence allows Jason to feel complete when he played the perfect game of madden after over 400,000 tries and it allows Chiti to feel at peace when he and Elinor sit down for their last dinner together as Michael paraphrase Elinor you said that every human is a little bit sad all the time because you know you're gonna die but that knowledge is what gives life meaning but if all this seems a bit overly well optimistic then maybe Bojack horseman z' perspective would speak to you more afterall Bojack has spent six seasons deconstructing the idea that anything in life can be neatly wrapped up let alone in the face of death funny isn't it things that matter matters and the truth is it all matters tremendously it's a wonder any of us ever get out of bed at all and yet we get out of that and the final half of season six is no different while Bojack seems to have turned a new sober leaf as a drama teacher at Wesleyan everything goes south for him when two intrepid 1930s style reporters start poking around his past what begins as a story about bojack's involvement and saralyn's death quickly spirals into a PR nightmare with Bojack getting grilled for all his horrible behavior on national TV when she was intoxicated you had sex with her and when she was sober you gave her the heroin that killed her then in an effort to cover for yourself you waited to call the paramedics that might have saved her life one relapse later complete with a near-death experience and one of the best dream sequences on television and Bojack has been sentenced to 14 months in jail the series ends with Bojack being released for a night to attend Princess Carolyn's wedding where he must accept the fact that life doesn't have any rhyme or reason he just simply has to get by yeah what are you gonna do life's a [ __ ] and then you die right sometimes sometimes life's a [ __ ] and then you keep living it's that last sentence that really encapsulates the philosophical essence of the show life's a [ __ ] and then you die or sometimes you just keep on living unlike the good place there are no clear-cut endings in Bojack horseman no real moments to get a greater sense of closure sure Bojack might make a big gesture of change at the end of one season whether it's saving Todd from an improv cult or showing kindness to his mother on her deathbed but he always slides right back this place was supposed to be a fresh start for me rehab was supposed to be a fresh start but no matter how many starts I get there's always the same ending everything falls apart and I end up alone simply put endings in Bojack offer little to no meaning so it's not too surprising then that death the end of all ends is likewise treated as a frightening meaningless unknown this all harkens back to the early French variety of existentialism to paraphrase the original bad boy of French philosophy jean-paul Sartre humans are created without any specific purpose unlike toilet paper which is obviously made to be bought and hoarded like precious gold we enter this world without any rhyme or reason and only define ourselves afterwards but whatever one finds in their quest for meaning it's all for naught as the cosmic curtain comes to a close some existential nihilists even go a step further and say why bother searching at all and the words of philosopher Donald Crosby stretch fret and delude ourselves as we may our lives are of no significance and it is futile to seek or to affirm meaning where none can be found while existential nihilism is as far away as possible from todd may's argument that death gives life meaning it's been a constant staple for Bojack in fact death punctuates almost every season with the deaths of herb cos as Sarah Lynn and bojack's mother all causing Bojack to hit new emotional lows and subsequently scramble to make sense of his life I don't know how to be Diane doesn't get better and it doesn't get easier but it's season 6 where the show really drives the existentialist message home particularly in the episode the view from halfway down after Bojack relapses he breaks into his old home takes a bunch of pills drinks a bunch of vodka and then has a near-death experience while drowning yeah I kept having this dream where I was having dinner with all the people who were gone and I thought I should do that in the dream Bojack has dinner with all the people he knew who died also zach braff is the waiter water Thank You Zach Braff what starts as a dinner game about the best and worst parts of the characters lives quickly devolves into a conversation about the value of these lives saralyn insists that all the joy she brought her fans must mean something while corduroy Jackson Jackson you know the guy who hanged himself while jerking off and sucking on a lemon says it can't equal bojack's uncle's sacrifice you you singing songs on stage it's the same thing as this guy who died liberated because their Apple to Auschwitz is notably this isn't the structured kind of philosophical conversation we would see play out in the good place or an answer or resolution is always found at the end of 22 minutes instead there's no agreement no answers here bojack's father represented by Secretariat says it best what they did with their lives didn't matter all the time those people spent trying to do good or help people will be something I did none of that and yet here I am same as them regardless of what they did on earth or who they were they all died and he attempts to create meaning or to find peace or just desperation peace that's someone trying to convince himself of something of what the life has meaning or purpose that but if you check the right boxes and do the dance and you get a little parting gift at the end a frame certificate that says congratulations you've got peace of course Bojack is anything but at peace when he realizes he won't be waking up from this dream you're not coming oh this is always the part where I wake up you all go to the show Zach Braff says part of my reach even though he can clearly get my plate from another angle then I wake up okay instead Bojack joins the others for a literal show one by one the characters perform an artistic rendition of their deaths saralyn sings a song about how you shouldn't stop performing until you're dead corduroy hangs himself and Secretariat /bo Jack's father reads a haunting poem about jumping off the bridge thrash to break from gravity what now could slow the drop halt I'd give four toes to touch the safety back atop at the end of all these performances the characters exit through a door of non-existence but this door isn't the serene wooded variety we see in the good place it's an abyss it's a stark contrast where the good play strives to tell us that death will be peaceful and that you'll go willingly what will happen when we go through it well we don't really know exactly all we know is it will be peaceful and your journey will be over Bojack implies that it's terrifying and you're going whether you want to or not now while it might be tempting to chalk this all up to bojack's traders being a bit more artistic in their visions of death these choices are actually integral to existentialism most existentialists argue that if meaning exists in the world it is an entirely human construct according to Sartre when we perceive the world around us what we're actually doing is trying to impose order upon it he writes it's our presence in the world which multiplies relations it is we who set up this relationship between this tree and a bit of sky thanks to us that star which has been dead for millennia at that quarter moon and that dark River are disclosed in the unity of a landscape more importantly existentialist argue that this mental process is what allows humans to be free sure there's no grand purpose to our existence but that doesn't mean we can't attempt to create one for ourselves and the artists who distills their vision of the world onto a canvas or a stage is perhaps the most free of all it explains why so many existentialists like Sartre Camus and de Beauvoir were also playwrights and it explains why herb tells Bojack this during his dream has anyone ever come back from this place PJ there is no place it's just your brain going through what it feels like it has to go through all you can do right now is sit back and enjoy the show none of this was real it simply Bojack creating art from his life trying to impose order in the end Bojack has to come to the sobering realization that this is it see you on the other side there is no other side this is it of course Bojack doesn't actually die and maybe that's the point think back to maze point the idea that death gives structure and meaning to a life if a person never died if the book never ended if the show just went on then at what point will we be able to sit back and ask ourselves what does it all mean ultimately the good place chose a sitcom ending one where the characters all completed their journeys and found peace even if that meant their existence is coming to an end I just suddenly had this calm feeling like the air inside my lungs was the same as the air outside my body it was peaceful in Bojack the show ends but the journey continues even Bojack doesn't really know what he's going to do or how it's going to be but it's easy now in jail I don't have to make any choices for myself I worry about what's gonna happen when I get out we keep coming back to that line from the final scene sometimes life's a [ __ ] and then you keep living in the last scene Bojack confronts the reality that he'll never totally make things right with Diane but even so life will go on as if proving the point the last moments of the show are an uncomfortably long shot of the two sitting awkwardly next to each other in silence so here's the million-dollar question wisecrack and asking how death affects life why did the good place end on simple answers and why did Bojack end with open questions strangely I think the answer lies not necessarily in the show's themselves but in their creators and more importantly their mediums after all the good place is the baby of Michael Schur one of the most influential figures in American television sure cut his teeth on the American office before creating Parks and Rec Brooklyn nine-nine and the good place in other words he's an honest-to-god sitcom genius but sitcoms as a form have their own narrative demands Dan Harmon's said it best when he wrote that TV isn't selling revolution it's selling a hygienic relatable substitution for your own filthy unmarketable humanity the trick that television plays is that it swaps out any meaningful and therefore potentially television subverting truth with the basic eternal truth that change unnecessary ultimately the traditional TV model is focused on placating audiences TV wants to make you feel good even safe about your life's that you'll watch more TV the last thing it wants to do is create an existential crisis but this is exactly what Bojack horseman does and it's precisely because the man behind the show Raphael bob-waksberg is not from Hollywood in fact like many existentialist bob-waksberg is a playwright by training and as a result Bojack uses theatricality the episode times arrow for example freely draws on theater inspirations like Harold Pinter and Carol Churchill by depicting Beatrice's dementia as her mixing and mashing various moments of her life another episode free churro is essentially a one-man show a 20-minute monologue in which Bojack delivers a eulogy about his mother Beatrice and it's also one of the top TV episodes of all time on IMDB even bob-waksberg penchant for theater and all its existential baggage it's not surprising that Bojack shoes the easy answers and happy endings of network TV closure is a made-up thing by Steven Spielberg to sell movie tickets it's like true love and the Munich Olympics doesn't exist in the real world the only thing to do now is just to keep living forward in the end we get a very interesting dichotomy the good place attempts to be a show about philosophy even the starting premise for people stuck in hell torturing each other is inspired by jean-paul Sartre's famous play no exit yet because of the show's sitcom roots it's bound to answers that can easily fit the sitcom mold of clean endings it wants to soothe us with the traditional sitcom logic that it's all going to be okay as long as we have our friends or as Chiti puts it [Music] but maybe we should just be excited that any show network television or otherwise is willing to talk about Conte what are you reading the metaphysics of morals by Immanuel Kant it's a treatise on the aesthetic preconditions of the minds receptivity to duty on the other hand Bojack horseman is the exact opposite of the good place it's a show set in Hollywood that because of its theater roots ends up being about philosophy and to be sure we never get the answer to a lot of questions is there meaning to the damage we experience are we doomed to always be the people we are now and but in all seriousness just as the show leaves us uncertain about how bojack's journey will go it leaves us uncertain about the meaning of life death and any other deeper philosophical questions and in that there's a certain genuineness and authenticity that the good place lacks still itching to learn about every nook and cranny of Bojack horseman is genius be sure to check out the takes video on the only person who somehow stayed friends with bow Jack Princess Carolyne it explores the working woman trope she embodies and her unique relationship to storytelling the take has a ton of cool videos exploring the tropes that are everywhere in your favorite movies and shows they've got a whole bunch of videos on the good place Bojack and my absolute favorite the matrix click here to check them out be sure to subscribe and tell them wisecrack sent you thanks for watching everybody peace

Channel: Wisecrack

Views: 530,538

Keywords: bojack horseman, mr. peanutbutter, bojack horseman ending explained, alison brie, diane nguyen, will arnett, princess carolyn, the good place ending, good place janet, good place trolley problem, kristen bell, ted danson, michael schur, nbc comedy, nbc, netflix, raphael waksberg, raphael bob-waksberg free churro, darcy carden, jameela jamil, elaenor shellstrop, william jackson harper, amy sedaris, wisecrack, the take, philosophy, show me the meaning, video essay, aaron paul

Id: YK6Rg2NEnVM

Length: 20min 44sec (1244 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 21 2020