A review of BoJack Horseman

I heard about BoJack Horseman by accident. I was sinking in a pit of ALS Bucket Challenge videos and saw Conan O'Brien's entry. At the end of it, instead of clicking on the next in the series of endless videos of random celebrities pouring ice water over their head so that they didn't have to donate $100 to RESEARCH AND CURE LOU GEHRIG'S DISEASE, I clicked on a thumbnail depicting Conan and Will Arnett.

I like Will Arnett. Yes, sometimes I think he's a bit one note, but I like that note, so, I clicked. It was a clip that started with him talking about Teenage Mutant Ninja Childhood Rapists and I was ready to tune out (Will Arnett was looking very orange in this particular interview and it was making me uncomfortable) when Conan mentioned Arnett's new project; an animated thing called BoJack Horseman, a new Netflix Original Series.
Considering how excellent a lot of Netflix's original stuff has been over the past few years and the fact that, since it was animated, I wouldn't have to see Arnett's jaundiced countenance, I decided to check it out.
I popped over to Netflix and saw the trailer: Will Arnett, Aaron Paul, Amy Sedaris and Alison Brie.
I was at least going to watch the first episode; I love all these actors and, although the trailer made it seem a bit low brow and repetitive, what's twenty two minutes taken from my already pointless life?
Exactly.
Nothing.
I watched the first episode and, yeah, it was kind of low brow and repetitive, but, the opening credits were fantastic (as was Grouplove's original, overly-referential song over the closing credits), Patton Oswalt played three characters and Kristen Schaal was in it as well, so, I decided to watch the next episode.
And so on.
Now, I was beginning to enjoy myself; there was more to the show than the trailer indicated and it was fun hearing Paul and Brie not do their normal thing, not to mention Paul F. Tompkins' boundless, grinning exuberance as Mr. Peanutbutter, a character whose name gets funnier every time it's said aloud. Then, around episode seven...things got deep...and real.
And it was weird.
Good weird.
Then, in episode eight, when we get a good look at the heart of this show and at the origin of BoJack's issues, things get even better: they get reflective and somber and the scene at the end between Herb Kazzaz (voiced, masterfully, by Stanley Tucci) and Horseman is so far away from where this show started that you won't believe it's from the same series.
I just finished watching the last episode (finishing the whole season in two sittings) and I'm already bummed that it's going to be at least a year before there are any new episodes to consume, if it gets renewed.
Way to go, Netflix, you've, again, made something ballsy as fuck, another triumph from the people who, only a few years ago, merely delivered DVDs to your house, introducing the concept and practice of binge watching.
Evolution is so exciting, isn't it?