BoJack Horseman and A Teacher opened up a new chapter of #MeToo stories
TV Features For Our Consideration
Image: Netflix
This year was marked by calls for escapism as much as a push for greater accountability. Lockdown orders may have prompted us to share recommendations for the best comfort watches, but even in the midst of the pandemic, people took to the streets to protest systemic racism and police brutality. Watch parties became a conduit for connecting virtually, while all manner of companies were challenged on their exclusionary hiring practices, and Tarana Burke’s #MeToo movement continued to shine a light on sexual violence and other abuses of power across industries.
Founded in 2006, the #MeToo movement gained new momentum in 2017, as numerous actors and artists, including Gabrielle Union and America Ferrera, spoke up about sexual assault and harassment. Ashley Judd and Rose McGowan were among the dozens of women who brought forth allegations against Harvey Weinstein. As support for survivors and victims grew, so did the hand-wringing over whether the disclosures and discussion about inequitable power dynamics were going “too far.” But many proponents viewed this reckoning as just getting started.
Here, 2020 offered some catharsis—the consequences for abuse went beyond professional ouster as Weinstein was sentenced to 23 years in jail, and Hollywood confronted his predation and the culture that enabled it in The Assistant. But TV creators took a more holistic approach to #MeToo stories this year. Both the final half-season of BoJack Horseman and the limited series A Teacher recounted abuse and even broached the possibility of redemption. Perhaps most strikingly, both shows showed the aftermath of abuse, for both the perpetrators and the survivors. At a time when the desire for comfort drives viewing habits, BoJack Horseman and A Teacher urged audiences to sit with their discomfort over who we’re prepared to forgive and who we see as victims.
BoJack’s morose horse protagonist seemed on track for a redemption arc in the first half of season six. After months in rehab, BoJack (Will Arnett) gained valuable insight into his self-destructive behavior. The not-entirely-washed-up actor began to see what’s been clear to audiences since season one: Being a survivor of abuse doesn’t excuse his own abusive behavior, and his celebrity status, which was his shield for so long, has actually thwarted his development. By midseason, a sober BoJack had rebuilt his life away from the limelight, teaching acting to Wesleyan students. His younger sister, Hollyhock (Aparna Nancherla), was happy to see him when he first visited Connecticut, and his relationships with Diane Nguyen (Alison Brie), Princess Carolyn (Amy Sedaris), and Todd Chavez (Aaron Paul), while somewhat strained, were far from over.
Given BoJack’s offenses—trying to have sex with his former crush’s teen daughter, encouraging a recovering addict to go on a bender with him, being high at work and strangling his co-star—it was as close to a happy ending as he probably deserved. But “A Quick One, While He’s Away” proved BoJack’s comeuppance was still on its way. Series creator Raphael Bob-Waksberg has fielded questions about how the show would end since at least season two, but the first real hint at the conclusion came in the fifth season. When BoJack begged Diane to once again publicize his misdeeds, trading memoir for exposé, she declined, because that would mean he was still putting the burden on others. Bob-Waksberg and the rest of the BoJack team, including Lisa Hanawalt, Kate Purdy, Joanna Calo, and Aaron Long, drew an important distinction there, between being held to account and taking responsibility.
The final leg of the series sees BoJack both assuming responsibility and being held responsible, using its signature trenchant writing, as well as the visual panache Hanawalt cultivated for years. The same type of dry-erase boards that once listed fake Oscar nominees now bear witness to BoJack’s misconduct, though the worst is saved for last. BoJack is challenged to rethink his “fuck-ups,” as is the Hollywoo(d) public—and the audience. The litany of offenses is undeniable, and BoJack is exiled.
The last two installments stray from BoJack storytelling form; the penultimate episode, “The View From Halfway Down,” seems to bring things to a conclusive end with a series of heart-stopping moments. And it’s the series closer, “Nice While It Lasted,” that offers the most devastating moment. The final scene, in which BoJack and Diane stare up at the cobalt blue sky, leaves so much unsaid between the two characters. But BoJack Horseman’s final episodes delivered what few productions have dared to do since we as a society began to reckon with predators and the power dynamics they’ve benefitted from. Along with offering a glimpse of what closure could look like for survivors (the Fireflame billboard is a great background gag and a triumph for Stephanie Beatriz’s Gina Cazador), BoJack Horseman, in the series’ most meta-moment yet, showed what it looks like to hold abusers—including your faves—responsible.
Hannah Fidell’s A Teacher, which premiered November 10 on FX on Hulu, heads toward similar territory, though it takes a very different path to get there. Fidell’s expanded her character study from 2013 into a quietly powerful rumination on who is viewed as a victim and who is deemed a predator. The limited series centers on Claire (Kate Mara), an attractive 30-something teacher painfully aware of the rut she’s in, but too invested in her self-denial to change anything. Her life is full of obligations, not aspirations; it always has been, Claire thinks, as she’s had to put everyone else’s needs before her own. So convinced of her own altruism is she that when she meets Eric (Nick Robinson), a prepossessing high school senior, Claire almost immediately offers to tutor him for the SATs. And because she continues to believe she has very little control over her life, it’s years before she’s able to see that she was already exerting undue influence over a teenager. She tells Eric he’s smarter than his friends; after learning he wants to be pre-med at University of Texas at Austin, she takes him on a campus visit. Claire shares a little too much of her own life during these encounters, sits a little too close, encourages Eric to call her by her first name. In short, she’s grooming him, though she believes their relationship is equitable because the attraction is mutual.
FX on Hulu includes a disclaimer about the abuse and grooming ahead of each episode, but for the first half of the series, Claire and Eric’s relationship is shot dreamily, their exploits set to the kind of swelling music found in romantic films. This manipulation of the audience, a subversion courtesy of Fidell, mirrors the manipulation of Eric, who initially believes he was in a relationship with someone who happened to be older. His feelings about what happened change over the course of A Teacher’s 10 episodes; when he first has sex with Claire, he shouts, “I’m the motherfuckin’ man,” to himself. Years later, when asked about the abuse in college, Eric downplays what happened, even though it’s clearly taken a psychological toll on him, because men can’t be, or aren’t supposed to be, victims. After one last time jump, Eric recognizes he was abused, which, though an important step, is just the first in a long journey toward healing.
Fidell’s narrative is made of up two distinct parts, including the fallout of Claire and Eric’s relationship, because, as the director has said, “The story doesn’t just end when the headline comes out.” In the first several episodes, Fidell creates space, though not exactly empathy, for Claire’s motivations. Like BoJack, Claire also came from an abusive background, but her version of “acting out” was to bottle everything up—her anger, her desire, her fear. She views her behavior with Eric as a kind of latent teen rebellion, which would be pathetic if it weren’t so destructive. Early on, the story plays like a fantasy because it’s Claire’s fantasy, one in which she’s in a gratifying relationship and gets to be a mentor. Even after she’s been arrested, Claire struggles to see herself as an abuser. For Claire, abusers are men like her father, whose own self-destructive behavior robbed her of a childhood. Her mistake, she says, was in allowing herself to be caught up in her own and Eric’s feelings.
In its final episodes, which we won’t give away here in their entirety, A Teacher begins to grapple with the consequences of Claire’s actions, and who is actually bearing the brunt of them. There’s a feint toward a happy ending, and a stirring speech: “I have to live with this forever. And so do you.” But the four hours of storytelling that come before the finale have plenty of narrative heft and groundbreaking twists on their own. Like BoJack Horseman, A Teacher contemplates redemption, but not before reform, and certainly not before acknowledging an offense has been committed. In focusing on the aftermath of abuse and on historically overlooked victims, both series contribute to a new chapter of #MeToo stories.
100 Comments
I’d love to see Danette discuss a show where a male teacher fucks his female student. I’m sure she’d be a bit less understanding.
I’ve never seen Bojack Horseman. Many people with excellent taste say it’s a good show. Certainly I think highly of Danette’s opinion.But everything I’ve ever heard about that show makes it sound *unbearable.* No one ever talks about it being funny*. It’s always “The horse cartoon takes another harrowing look at the wounds of trauma.”Is it really that bleak constantly?
(*Except that they have gag signs sometimes. That’s always the one. “No, no, it is funny! Look at this joke sign!”)
Sounds like it’s not a show for you, and that’s fine.The closest thing I can think of offhand is “The Comeback” though Bojack goes to even darker places, partly just because there are a lot more episodes. But that kind of thing isn’t for everyone.
Ah, the comparison to The Comeback makes a ton of sense. I didn’t care for that either! Thanks!
I happen to thing it’s much funnier than the Comeback and I liked the Comeback. Look at some clips on youtube or wherever.
It’s actually pretty hilarious most of the time. Even the bleak episodes have some great jokes.
I think the issue is that media portrayals of the show tend to focus on its dramatic aspects, because that’s what sets it apart from other adult animated shows.
I’ve never watched Bojack, but it always seemed to me to be an example of one of those shows that critics rave about, garnering high “audience praise,” but when you ask people if they’ve watch it, the response is always “No, but its on my list.”If forced, I’d point to something like Mad Men, with its universal praise and pop-culture presence and yet really low actual viewership. I suppose if you want to put in the time, more power to you.
I mean, it managed to last six seasons and get a proper ending on Netflix, a service known for killing shows in their infancy unless they’re instant massive hits. So someone was definitely watching.
Perhaps it’s just my aesthetic but I’ve watched both of these series all the way through multiple times. In fact, each time a new season came out I would rewatch all the previous episodes. They are beautiful, funny looks at actual human life (even if one has a horse as a protagonist).
Mad Men is brilliant and not without humor.
No, sometimes Character Actress Margo Martindale murders several people and then is excused because she’s going to be in a really good movie, so it’s not all bad.
I personally think the show is hilarious, sometimes even while it’s also bleak (and it does get very bleak indeed). I suppose the bleak part is just more interesting to write about. And before everybody started talking about how devastating it all was, it was actually frequently quite surprising how serious the story could get.But it’s a big part of what makes the show great. From start to finish, it has many moments that are gloriously silly, heartwarming or just plain fun. I say check it out!
I found it to be pretty funny. And while yes very bleak and dark at times, it’s never just bleak and dark for the sake of being bleak and dark. It’s telling genuine stories of the characters so it doesn’t feel like the writers are saying “So you’re feeling good? Well how bout THIS darkness to bring you down! HAHAHAHAHA!” What saves it is that it really develops the characters the context of these things happening to these well developed characters makes it so much more palatable. It’s also moving in other ways too. Sometimes uplifting.But always for me, lots of laughs.To what you noted, it’s just those instances or episodes that were brilliantly dramatic are the ones that made people sit up and take notice.
The first few seasons are legit hilarious. It goes downhill when it gets more depressing and Todd’s story arcs focus more on him being asexual than being funny imho.The underwater episode is a legit piece of high art.
It’s like Mad Men, except funny and with compelling characters.That said…I fell off in S3 – a bit too emotionally grueling for me, haha
I’m going to call you Carlos the fool, cause Mad Men is exceptionally funny in parts and also has super compelling characters.Come at me bro!
After three or four episodes, I realized that the only characters I had any reaction to were the ones I fucking despised, like that whiney, selfish, pathetic piece of shit Don Draper.(Pete was annoying too, but my distaste was nowhere near as visceral).Genuinely a sorry excuse for a man.So, I dipped. No regrets.
You must really hate a LOT of shows, cause man…Sopranos – Tony is a pretty sorry excuse for a man whining to his psychiatrist about his problems as a monsterBreaking Bad – See above but remove the psychiatristThe Wire – McNulty and pretty much every guy on there is a whiny, selfish and pretty patheticI can go on…
Breaking Bad had Jesse…and Walt was never as self-evidently selfish, pathetic, and cowardly as Don (the first big flip on Walt is when he turns down the Schwartz’s money…by which point you’re already hooked).McNulty’s an ass, but Simon cleverly introduces him through the familiar lens of “The one cop brave enough to buck the corrupt system,” before he shows us what he really is…and The Wire also had Kima and D and Wallace and Bodie and Bunk and String and Lester and Daniels.I’ve never actually watched The Sopranos through…but what I’ve seen of it is very upfront about who and what Tony is, rather than valorizing him the way Mad Men tries to do.
“Walt was never as self-evidently selfish, pathetic, and cowardly as Don” The same Walt who would rather put his family under repeated threats of death than be honest, because being a drug dealer makes him feel like a man? That’s not selfish or pathetic? Walt who forces his wife to stay in their dangerous relationship against her will? Walt who kidnaps his infant daughter to hold as a hostage after his son calls the cops on him shortly after his Nazi buddies kill his brother-in-law and he nearly stabs his wife?You may want to re-watch Breaking Bad if the takeaway was anything other than Walter White is the worst kind of selfish coward. They weren’t hiding it with Don Draper, and they REALLY weren’t hiding with Walter White.
As I’ve said, repeatedly, Walter White is the fucking devil – far worse than Don’s truly banal shittiness.That said:A) The mask doesn’t truly slip until well into the series (the first moment, as I mentioned, is telling Elliot and Gretchen to fuck themselves).B) The depths of Walt’s evil are far more fascinating than Don’s aforementioned banal shittiness.C) Walt at least pretends to care about other people, even as satisfying his pride is always his first priority.
More to the point…not a single one of those characters, despite all being truly terrible fathers, would *ever* pull the shit Don did in Marriage of Figaro.In order to build your shoe around the deconstruction of an archetype of a “Man’s Man,” you have to have a lead character who at least superficially resembles one.
But that’s the point my Dwarf friend: in context of the times and era he DOES resemble that. And the truth is that he’s not: he’s really a messed up, hurt person who has built this incredibly fake personal around him. And in regards to being bad fathers, McNulty (who I fucking love) uses his kids to stake out a fucking drug dealer. Walt who does everything for his family (he claims) is not that person: as he admits at the end he did it because he loves and wants power. Lastly, again…Mad Men makes sure to point out by the end of episode 1 that DD is clearly a cheat and a man lacking moral character. Which, considering his job is selling crap to the public, helps build your view of him.
Oh, McNulty is a truly, terrifyingly awful parent – and Walt is a sociopathic monster.But the mask doesn’t slip until we’ve had enough time to become invested in them, the plot, and the other characters.Draper is clearly a whiney, selfish punk from jump, and none of the other characters make much of an impression.(Despite my enjoyment of Conor!)
You’re a monster 🙂
I have no doubt that Peggy eventually became a great character!(I’ve heard similar things about Joan and Sally!)But Don’s being good at a job I don’t give a fuck about wasn’t enough of a hook for me to get past his being the type of guy who blows off his daughter’s birthday and comes back with a freaking dog, and make it to the point where Peggy became more than his demure secretary.
Don’t even get him started on Seinfeld. Look at all of those whiny characters. And not once does anyone come right out and say “none of you deserve the audience’s respect.” Plus the show isn’t even about anything! Why would I want to watch a show about nothing where none of the characters are wonderful people?
Not the biggest Seinfeld fan…but at least it isn’t full of navel-gazing awe at its own profound analysis of the human spirit and the meaning of “America.”
Please, you didn’t even make it past season 3 you hack! 🙂 In all seriousness, the entire series as a whole and the overall arc more than shows why you should have stuck it out.
I don’t doubt it, haha – Mad Men’s not being my thing doesn’t mean other people are wrong for loving it.Not every show can be as top-to-bottom perfect as Cobra Kai!
You’ve hit the nail on the head. The difference between Bojack and Don is that BH doesn’t set us up to pity or excuse Bojack despite everything bad that happened to him. In MM, Don might be a train wreck in his personal life, but this is explained away by his tortured childhood, plus he’s brilliant at his job and cast as sexually desirable.
Yeah, I think they expect me to care a LOT more about Don being “good at his job” than they ever provide any reason to, haha.
I will say the first season of Mad Men was by far its bleakest with only Sterling providing any real relief, but it gets better and better (and the first season was still great – the pilot alone was probably the strongest pilot of any show I have ever seen – A+ definitely)
I think the biggest issue with Mad Men is that they didn’t realize how *quickly* they’d established Don as a pathetic clown, entirely undeserving of respect.With Bojack, that’s the upfront premise of the show, rather than a “reveal.”
They literally show him to be a wife cheating jerk in the first episode…
Well, Don’s a terrible person, but at least before his alcoholism got the better of him, he was shown to be excellent at his job. Bojack was never implied to be anything more than a barely competent actor who just got lucky in being cast in an successful sitcom in the 1990s.
Yeah…but I don’t care about his being good at selling cigarettes, haha.Being the best ad exec in the world isn’t actually any more interesting or impressive than being a middling actor.
Okay, I guess (although much in the vein of how they’ve been hundreds of novels about being professors of English or Creative Writing in universities written by professors of English or Creative Writing), stories about actors and other Hollywoo(d) types are pretty common in movies and TV (although I still liked Bojack) Horseman). Msd Men presented a profession I never thought about before, so it was interesting from that perspective.
Yeah – a fairly big factor in appreciating Mad Men really does boil down to how interesting you find Don’s job, haha!For me, it’s the sort of job where I’d have to really like the character to give a shit about how well they do it.
I get hating don, but kinda sucks that you gave up on the show altogether because of it. It’s been a while since I’ve watched it, but I assume you’re talking about how he drives by but doesn’t bring the cake back?
He spends his daughter’s birthday party ignoring her, then he disappears for several hours and comes back with a fucking dog.Complete piece of shit move – worse than driving his little brother to suicide in order to protect his “new life” as Seymour Skinner.
That’s only YOUR opinion though. Clearly enough viewers and critics did find it interesting.
I’m honestly not sure if it would break through to the same extent in the era of Peak TV, or if it would be closer to the ranks of the legion of “workplace dramas where white collar men whine and behave badly” that have followed.
The fact that you’re blatantly ignoring Peggy and all the other women (who are a huge part of the show) to say nothing of how history is played out says to me you’re not ready for Pop Pop yet.
None of the women had been established as anything more than ciphers meant to represent certain archetypes “Of that time” before I got sick of the show, haha.If I could swap Mad Men’s and Terriers’ fates, I wouldn’t hesitate.
I find you sad and alarming. Terriers is SO over-rated…a much shittier Hap and Leonard.
I’ve always meant to check out Hap and Leonard – “Better than Terriers” is a strong recommendation!I just need characters who at least pretend to care about something other than themselves.“Sure he’s whiney, selfish, and doesn’t even pretend to care about his kids, but look how good he is at a boring white collar job!” just isn’t enough of a hook for me; especially because I don’t care about the set design or costumes.
Those are valid points, curse you. However as a typical white guy who was in my 30’s when it premiered it obviously spoke to me. I definitely love Hap and Leonard, but I should preface that with two things: 1) I only saw Terriers after the AV Club lavished so much adoration on it that short of it being the best show ever made, it was going to be a let down2) I’m a HUGE fan of writer Joe Lansdale who made the original book series, same way I love Elmore Leonard. So any competent work based on the source would appeal to me. By the way you should give Mad Men more of a chance: the women characters end up being pretty great and Don absolutely gets his comeuppance.
…and I was in my late teens/early twenties during its cultural heyday, which definitely played a role in its not appealing to me, haha (and I say this as someone who thinks of Michael Huisman as “Sonny from Treme”).I actually hadn’t realized that H&L was based on a book until I googled it just now – I just love MKW, haha! I do love gonzo pulp, so I’ll have to check that series out as well.
Even in the height of peak era television, Mad Men is clearly the best written show hands down.
That’s always been why I love the show so much: the writing is just SO fucking good. Even a mediocre episode tends to be outstanding. And the acting by and large is incredible. Also I could watch John Slattery play Roger Sterling forever.
“Couldn’t sleep. I stayed up, watched the sunrise.”“How was it?”“Average.”
For me the biggest issue with Mad Men is it’s about the bad guys . But I rooted for the counter culture not the dream of a house in the suburbs with two cars and 2.6 children middle class culture that Madison Ave sold so well.These are the guys who sold the stuff that caused climate control.
He’s not a clown. He’s a complicated man. Like Walter White, only not as much of a dick.
Walter White is the fucking devil.Draper is a selfish crybaby.Plus, selling meth is far more inherently interesting than “Armin Tamzarian sells ads.”
And in their ways, both Don Draper and Lane Pryce are kind of Bojack-esque in that we feel for them even though their problems are mostly of their own creation.
It is a hilarious show!! The best part about Bojack is that it is simultaneously a masterclass in character-focused dramatic storytelling AND the goofiest shit on TV. And both of these things work!
It’s an extremely funny show. It’s full of absurd hijinx, sight gags, show biz satire, and goofy characters. It plays well to anyone with a Simpsons-tinged humor palette. It just also happens to be emotionally devastating.
I found it funny for at least the first 4 seasons. I think it just is a victim of being described awfully, like I think I never would’ve watched it either if I hadn’t started in about season 2, before all the reviews started emphasizing the depression.
Give it a go, it’s much more than bleak. Its depiction of trauma is exceptionally nuanced, that’s why people talk so much about it. It’s also really funny and the world it’s set in is richly developed.
I know it’s not for me. I watched one episode and was just viscerally repulsed by the animal heads.
I get that feel. I watched a good chunk of the first season, and I remember not liking the first episode, but the rest of it I enjoyed. It isn’t exactly a LOLfest, but the writing felt refreshing from your other animated shows at the time (more grounded in real emotion and not just zany shenanigans, though that has its place). Not sure how it holds up to that nowadays. I also enjoy Will Arnett, so that might’ve played into it.
It is very funny. Like probably 70% of it is silly, goofy cartoon jokes. It’s just that serious, harrowing emotional stories in that kind of cartoon are rare and they’re really well done, so people focus more on that element.
The series, throughout its entire run, a comedy first and very amusing. The emotional resonance people feel is woven into the stories fairly seamlessly and only really gets driven home for 30 seconds at the end of an episode. There really is no dark or hard exploration of tragedy, with the exception of perhaps the 6th season but by that time you’re into the characters enough, and its still funny enough, that you don’t mind.
The show is actually pretty hilarious most of the time. The dark episodes are indeed pretty dark, but there’s usually only one or two a season. The show is capable of being one of the funniest shows that I’ve ever seen, and it often is. Although the first half of season one is weak on that front.
It is very funny, but can also be very dark and is not afraid to end an entertainingly funny episode on a super down note.
It’s incredibly funny when it’s not being bleak, and it’s always engaging. Critics like to write about the bleak part because it’s a lot easier to write several paragraphs analyzing the dramatic core of a work than writing about why it’s funny.I had kind of the same view you do before I watched it: every time I saw a reference, it was 10% “it’s hilarious” and 90% “BoJack gazes into the abyss again.” So it sounded weird. But then I actually watched it, and it’s fucking amazing.
Bojack suffers from the fact that it takes a while to really kick in and even then, it isn’t until the end of S3 that the show really hits the strides of presenting itself as a tragedy-drama with the disguised as a black comedic moments. In that sense, it’s like if the Shield omitted the character of Terry and his assassination at Vic’s hands in the pilot. Bojack doesn’t start with the bang that is a transgressive act that makes you wait with baited breathe for his house of cards to collapse, instead forcing you to go along for the ride until the show drops that makes you want Bojack to get his comeuppance.
The #Metoo metaphor in Bojack’s ending also works because it acknowledges a difficult reality of the phenomenon: how quick Hollywood is to forgive these people. By the end of the series, Bojack has been convinced to film a new movie where he intentionally acts as offensive as possible as a way to “fight back” against PC culture; basically the sort of crap that scumbags like Louis CK have pulled in real life. And it seems to be working, as Princess Caroline mentions the possibility of a comeback for his acting career (though she also gently refuses to be his agent anymore.)You get the sense by the end that Bojack’s professional life will be just fine after he gets out of prison. The media will move on from his scandals and the anti-woke crowd will embrace Bojack’s mediocrity. But his personal relationships with the important women in his life – Hollyhock, who cuts all ties with him, Princess Caroline, who’s keeping him at arm’s length, Diane, who moves away and expects they’ll never speak again – those relationships are ruined. The public consequences are fleeting, but the personal ones are permanent and devastating.
I thought the most crushing aspect of his personal relationships was that Princess Caroline, Todd, Diane, and Mr Peanutbutter were all clearly better off without Bojack in their lives. The final episode didn’t hit you over the head with it, but made it subtle enough to be emotionally impactful.
That’s a really good point, especially because during the previous few episodes, Bojack seems convinced that if he dies, everyone will be miserable without him and regret not appreciating him more (which is how Horsin’ Around ended.) Not only does he not die, he has to live to see that everyone is HAPPIER without him.
I believe PC was going clearly going to remain his friend. Just not his agent.
It’s left ambigious, but their conversation at the wedding has a real feeling of finality to it. It’s up to the viewer’s interpretation, but I got the impression that she’s essentially saying goodbye to him without literally saying goodbye. There’s other clues as well, like the fact that she didn’t invite him to the real wedding held for her loved ones, but she did invite him to the showy wedding held for her professional contacts.
Maybe I just have rose colored glasses, but I just got the impression, neither one would ever abandon the other.
That’s a valid interpretation. It’s just not the impression I got.
I have been watching A Teacher but I haven’t finished it yet because I can see the painful reality of arrest and legal proceedings coming and I am not looking forward to that. I remember being 16 and 17 and having a crush on a couple of female teachers and awkwardly flirting with them to the best of my ability. Thankfully, nothing ever came of it. But the confusion and guilt around sex and sexual attraction was an issue for a long time. Sometimes it still is. I like the show because it is unafraid to look at a hard issue and address the consequences of our actions.
I feel like productions involving the abuse of teenagers (and portraying it as abuse, as opposed to some kind of “love story”) would be more effective if the “teens” in the production actually looked like the kids they are. Pubescent, yes. Close to adulthood, yes. But still adolescent.
“A Teacher” isn’t so bad in that regard and it is supposed to be senior year going into college with the time frame. I see what you mean though. However I think the teen stuff is written terribly. In particular the writers don’t seem to have an ear for how boys communicate with each other at all. Just about everything involving Claire is good or even almost great but when Eric is with his “bros” it’s just completely tone deaf. The only way I can describe it is how my adult female friends make fun of teen guys talking, all over-exaggerated “dude! bro! did you get some?” Not that teen guys don’t do that but it’s hardly all they talk or think about and the one-dimensional view of the teen experience almost ruins the show. It’s still watchable (especially now with so little new TV to watch) and it’s a good angle on the topic, just wish it didn’t feel so out of touch.
““A Teacher” isn’t so bad in that regard and it is supposed to be senior year going into college with the time frame. I see what you mean though.”
See that’s the thing. If an attractive teacher “groomed” me for sex in high school, I would have been overboard, and I don’t understand how it could possibly be something I would ever regret. Obviously things like being a homewrecker and such if she were married may come to haunt me at some point, but I can’t imagine at any point having any issues because of the affair itself. And I think many if not most guys would not. And I am sure there are a number of well adjusted adult men out there who have had similar experiences who are quite happy in their lives.
And I think many if not most guys would not. Um, ok.
The point is that it’s the adult’s responsibility to shut it down
People still complain about this? When has there ever been teenage teenagers on TV?
Buffy, Faith and Dawn were all played by teens. Gellar turned 20 before the show was broadcast.
Yes? When it’s directly relevant to the show’s subject matter like this I’m pretty sure people are still going to talk about it.
I think it’s less about the general critique of actors in the 20s and 30s playing teens than it is about the fact that a 17 year old boy does not actually look like a man. He is gawky and young. It’s harder to romanatize the relationship between an adult woman and an actual teen boy when you see them together.
I’m only specifying for this type of relationship. If you want it to have an effect, strive for this type of look.
I don’t think they can actually use underage actors for this (and shouldn’t!) but the show that comes pretty close is Dawson’s Creek. They completely mismanage the story and play it like a very straightforward forbidden romance, but the age difference between the actors is much closer to what’s in the script and it looks absolutely revolting. A Teacher doesn’t really have that effect because the actors are much closer in age.
I was in 7th grade when Dawson’s Creek came on the air (I loathed all those teen dramas, unlike most of my female classmates) and when I heard about that storyline I was horrified. Then when Family Guy directly mocked them a year or so later I was thrilled. FG has aged poorly for the most part but at the time it was the only prime-time program really going for the jugular as far as pop culture was concerned.
One could argue that contemporary TV criticism was born out of dunking on Dawson’s Creek (with Television Without Pity and internet recaps and the like).
Really? This is something I know next to nothing about, in terms of its history
TWOP was originally called “Dawson’s Wrap” and they did longform recaps making fun of the show. They eventually expanded to other shows, and a whole bunch of the current crop of TV critics either came from there or frequented it.
I’ll have to look into that, it sounds interesting. Fascinating in that the timeline of DC and TWOP coincides with the rise of blogging as a mainstream form of information dissemination, and of the rise of the internet as a mainstream home presence overall.
If you hate Dawson’s Creek do yourself a favor and go to TWOP archives. Fuck, I miss them.
I know there has to have been some 18-20 year old actors who are still in their gawky boy-child physical phase casting could have waded through. Hell, even a recently aged-out child actor would have landed a good blow.
It’s not mentioned in any of the reviews I’ve seen, but Bojack is a classic Greek tragedy. Bojack’s fatal flaw(s) and hubris (getting cocky and doing a disastrous second interview with Biscuits Braxby) cause his tragic fall.
Hm, I think you’re right that we’ve never directly referenced that. But the show is pretty direct about it, what with the Myth Of Narcissus painting.
Narcissus? I thought the painting was about me.
There are a few times throughout the show where Bojack references drowning (including a soliloquy in which he basically imagines the end of The Awakening for himself). Then, of course, there’s the events of The View From Halfway Down. It’s definitely a motif of the show. A big question is “what if Bojack hadn’t gotten cocky and decided to do another self-agrandizing interview,” but the answer is that he always would have wound up doing some other arrogant thing and suffering for it, until there’s no one left in his life to hurt. I don’t know there’s ever been a bleaker comedy.
The end of Bojack Horseman was THIS year?!
How about just no sympathetic portrayals of pedos? That would be a good start.