Remember that show that made you relapse, the one that sent you into an existential depression for weeks? The one that was just so good, true, and powerful that you couldn’t stop watching despite it slowly corroding your very potential for joy? You know the one, BoJack Horseman. Yeah, the show about the talking horse famous for his ’90s sitcom, that’s the one. Well, the horse isn’t back, but it seems like the vibe is, so you better begin finding fortitude now and strengthening your constitution, because a brilliant bit of television is coming, and it’s going to blow your house down.
Yes, Netflix is getting the old gang together again and bringing back the artists and studios responsible for their very first adult animated series, BoJack Horseman.They’re unleashing another painful comedy into the world, titled Long Story Short, reuniting some excellent people from BoJack Horseman in the process. As Tudum reports, Lisa Hanawalt (Tuca & Bertie) is supervising producer and will design the art. Noel Bright and Steven A. Cohen (Tuca & Bertie, Undone) will executive produce for Tornante Television. ShadowMachine (Tuca & Bertie, Pinocchio) is producing. Corey Campodonico & Alex Bulkley will executive produce.
What Is Long Story Short & Will Raphael Bob-Waksberg Hurt Us Again?
Oh God, we’re not sure if we’ve even properly recovered from the last time we watched BoJack (it was the second time… after a break-up…). Maybe this new series is happier? Let’s see; the short synopsis reads as follows:
Long Story Short
is an animated comedy about a family over time. It’s about the shared history, the inside jokes, the old wounds. If you’ve ever had a mother, father, sibling, partner, or child, this is the show for you — and by the way, would it kill you to call them?
On the surface, this seems exceedingly normal. But we’re aware of the creator of BoJack, the melancholic man behind it all, the brilliant bummer of a Bob who can make an animated family comedy seem like a Henrik Ibsen play. Raphael Bob-Waksberg is the philosophically yearning spirit that created, produced, and wrote BoJack Horseman, along with the scattered but otherwise phenomenal and mesmerizing rotoscoped series, Undone.
BoJack Horseman is his masterpiece so far, though. The series was an emotionally devastating look at addiction, narcissism, nostalgia, and mental illness through the vibrantly colorful lens of an imaginative cartoon world where anthromorphized animals blend with humans in society. It takes place in ‘Hollywoo’ and follows the titular alcoholic has-been star of a ’90s family sitcom called Horsin’ Around. With the voices of Will Arnett, Alison Brie, Aaron Paul, Paul F. Tompkins, and many others, BoJack Horseman dives painfully deep into its title character and those in his orbit, breaking our hearts episode by episode as the series asks whether he can ever find redemption.
Long Story Short Will Debut in a Very Different 2025
Just like us binge-watching BoJack Horseman with bottles of whiskey and boxes of tissues, Bob-Waksberg just can’t help himself and stay away from Netflix animation. He released this statement about the show, which is now set to debut in 2025:
It is legitimately a thrill and an honor to be back doing what I love most: drafting enthusiastic pull quotes for press releases to Hollywood trade publications. Who says you can’t go home again?!
It’s only a year or so away, but Long Story Short will be released in a very different cultural moment, with a newly elected President of the United States (and perhaps a global war, with Netanyahu dragging the U.S. military into it). BoJack Horseman debuted in 2014 during the last stage of the Obama administration, and fittingly ended just after the inauguration of Joe Biden in January 2020. It felt like commiseration during the Trump years, a reminder that you aren’t alone in your suffering and depression, and that humanity really is pretty awful, so it’s not just your imagination. And yet it found slivers of hope.
Now Long Story Short is debuting just after the end of Biden’s presidency. Depending on who wins the 2024 election, a Raphael Bob-Waksberg may be the perfect balm to soothe our troubled times. Or it may be just too much, a misery overload. Time will tell. In the meantime, you can watch BoJack Horseman on Netflix through the link below: