Margo Martindale ain't afraid of nothin': 10 recurring joke characters who make BoJack Horseman special

Back in the 2010s, there was a very famous TV show, one that captured The A.V. Club‘s imagination for six seasons. As BoJack Horseman turns 10 this week, we’ll be looking back at the engrossing animated comedy with a series of essays and interviews. This is BoJack Horseman Week.

For all that BoJack Horseman can never truly escape the orbit of its black hole of a title character, it contains a whole galaxy of amazing, bizarre characters who dot the Hollywoo starscape. And while some of these briefly glimpsed weirdos, sex robots, and co-stars move in and out of the focus of the narrative over time (notably, BoJack’s various love interests), many lurk around the edges for the entire run of the show, adding texture to its efforts to be both a Simpsons-esque rapid-fire Hollywood satire, and a show about depression, addiction, and the ways they can mix and interact in the souls of dangerously damaged people.

And so, this list: An effort to chart the BoJack universe through ten characters who could, for better or worse, be described as “recurring joke characters”—even though BoJack is rarely that simple of a show. While laying out our criteria for inclusion, we settled on a few rules: These characters could not have a direct, important impact on BoJack’s story. (Hence the omission of fast-talking screwball comedy escapee Paige Sinclair, despite our deep affection for Paget Brewster’s ability to zip out snappy putdowns and moxie-laden asides; as the journalistic engine who brings about Bojack’s final meltdown, she’s just too central to the plot.) And they must appear in at least two different seasons of the show. (Alas, Dr. Boing Boing.) Beyond that, we’ve tried to pull from the series’ entire run, and placed the characters themselves in a loose ranking of personal preference/how hard they made us feel…something in their multiple appearances on the series. So, without further ado (but due deference to those list-making masters over at Girl Croosh), we embark by visiting one of the best names ever granted to a character in media:

“I am totally unqualified to cover a news story this important, but as a straight white male, I will plow forward with confidence and assume I’m doing fine!”

One of the most directly mean character parodies to appear on the series, the blissfully vapid A Ryan Seacrest Type (A Ryan to his friends) presides over any number of light media fare in the BoJack universe, most notably regular video tabloid Excess Hollywoo. (Where he stars alongside such luminaries as Some Lady, An Actress Or Something, and A Billy Bush Type.) A creature of teleprompter instincts, ARST is typically employed as a talking head for a little light exposition ’n’ mockery, dropping in to remind viewers just how empty the eyes, and minds, of the Hollywoo elite typically are. It’s a drive-by bit of character assassination, admittedly, but not an inaccurate one.

“I’m not ready! I never got to direct my Backdraft remake, Zach Braff’s Backdraft!”

Possibly the single strangest “recurring” character on this list is also the first (but by no means the last) to involve an actual famous person doing a game impersonation of themselves. Future Alex Inc. star Braff makes his first appearance in season four’s “Underground”—and since he ends said appearance by being burnt to death and then devoured by hungry celebrities, you might have expected it to be his last. But Braff returns two seasons later in the strangest place possible: The interior of BoJack Horseman’s mind, in the series’ horrifying penultimate episode, “The View From Halfway Down.” Braff’s Scrubs-esque familiarity adds to the dream logic of the subsequent surreal dinner party, since he, like all the other attendees, is someone who died in some kind of proximity to BoJack. It’s an unsettling element in a deeply unsettling episode, even if Braff does manage some comedy, and maybe even some pathos (Braff-os?) on his way out the door.

“But has the concept of women having choices… gone too far? We’ve assembled this diverse panel of white men in bow ties to talk about abortion.”

Essentially Keith Olbermann doing a whale-based parody of his old enemy Bill O’Reilly, MSNBSea’s Tom Jumbo-Grumbo is one of the only recurring characters to appear in all six of BoJack Horseman’s season—typically when the show’s spin on news coverage needed to get as loud and opinionated as possible. Bloviating from his blowhole on topics from abortion, to fracking, to stealing muffins from the troops, Jumbo-Grumbo is a whale of no set moral position, but one set volume. He even gets his own off-screen recurring joke character, in the form of newsroom scapegoat Randy—Randy, don’t look at Jessica! This is on you.

“It gets easier. Every day, it gets a little easier. But you gotta do it every day. That’s the hard part. But it does get easier.”

The only completely non-comedic character on our list also just barely qualifies for our “multiple-season” rule, appearing in a flashback in the show’s third season. But he still leaves a major impact on its second, and on the series’ overall themes, as he jogs past BoJack’s opulent mansion in each of those early episodes. (A stalwart presence, acting in contrast to our hero’s ongoing and flailing attempts at feeling better about himself.) It all builds to the character’s only lines of dialogue, rendered above, and delivered with warm gravitas by Chicago P.D.’s Jason Beghe to close the show’s second season. And while BoJack will spend the next four years trying, with wildly varying amounts of effort and success, to apply that simple advice, it remains a good touchstone for the show’s ongoing fascination with self-improvement: It can get better—you can get better—but it never happens if you don’t put in the work.

“You just became prime suspects in the case I like to call ‘Black And White And Dead All Over”: A Whale Of A Crime—An Officer Meow Meow Fuzzyface Mystery’”

The (fuzzy) face of incompetent policing in Los Angeles appears in both BoJack Horseman’s first episode, and its last, although beloved Reno 911!  actor Cedric Yarbrough doesn’t get any lines in either. Once he does start speaking, though, we find out his character, police officer Meow Meow Fuzzyface, is both ridiculously bombastic and cookie-obsessed—and also, in fine TV comedy tradition, an absolutely terrible cop. Speaking in noir patter and narrating his own adventures, Fuzzyface clearly views himself as the main character of reality, which only makes his periodic instructions into BoJack’s own self-centered existence all the funnier.

“I had a ball at Diane’s 25th birthday and underline ball I don’t know why this is so hard.”

The never-seen character is a staple of great TV comedy, and Paul F. Tompkins’ cheerful labrador Mr. Peanutbutter actually has a couple in his entourage. (“Erica!”) But few “characters” get more laughs with less screentime, to our minds, than the never-glimpsed, highly literal sign printers who PB returns to, time and again, for all his banner-printing needs. Maybe it’s just that the sign gags—of which BoJack has hundreds, but rarely this deftly executed—put Mr. Peanutbutter in the rare position of playing exasperated straight man to an even dumber character, each new sign capturing his increased irritation and attempts at getting out ahead of of the problem. But it’s the rare running joke where every single iteration across six seasons of television manages to land the laugh, inviting you to imagine the highly frustrating phone conversation that produced each obvious disaster. (Including the final reveal, in the show’s finale, that Mr. Peanutbutter hired them to replace the D stolen from the Hollywood sign back in the first season, with predictable results: Hooray for Hollywoob, indeed.)

“The rule of man is over. Now begins the rule of fire!”

As the story goes, former Seventh Heaven star Jessica Biel—revealed as one of Mr. Peanutbutter’s ex-wives during the show’s third season—actually requested the BoJack writers go harder on her than any of the jokes they’d initially written. And harder they went. (Including such lines as referring to her as an “attempted movie star,” “less famous Michelle Monaghan,” and, maybe most brutally, “Future hard Jeopardy! question.”) Biel is clearly having a blast poking fun at herself and her B-List/Bielist reputation—never moreso than in season four’s “Underground,” when she seizes control of the party of earthquake survivors buried beneath Mr. PB’s mansion, leading them into cannibalistic fire worship before bemoaning their eventual rescue and return to the surface world. (Having gotten a taste for serving the people, she later gets into politics.) BoJack’s celebrity satire material is only ever part of its DNA, but it’s always great when the show’s writers and producers find a partner really willing to play.

“I found it to be an above-average experience. Please forgive me for getting emotional.”

We’re admittedly cheating a bit with the inclusion of Princess Carolyn’s stalwart, man-bunned assistant, who, after years of serving in the joke mines, eventually got a prominent part in the show’s later seasons as her final love interest. But the road to that unexpected, surprisingly sweet conclusion is so funny that we can’t really imagine a list of BoJack’s best recurring characters without Judah’s quiet ultra-competence. Arriving as a sort of gift from the management gods after P.C. suffered through hapless assistants like Stuart and Charley Witherspoon (also both fine candidates for this list), Judah is a very basic character archetype, raised to perfection by a fantastic voice performance: the super-competent, emotion-free assistant. Embodied by the great Diedrich Bader, he’s capable of getting laughs with the driest of line deliveries, revealing that, in all of Hollywoo, there is one person who’s capable of getting things done with a minimum of fuss (or feeling).

“I went to stock market today. I did a business.”

Vincent Adultman is BoJack Horseman’s comedy in its most sublime execution: a classic joke, played to the hilt, expanded upon, given depth, and then brought to a surprisingly poignant conclusion. The basic gag is simple, playing into the show’s first-season tendency to make BoJack the only sane man in the room: Obviously, Princess Carolyn’s new beau is actually three kids stacked on top of each other in a trenchcoat, using a broom and a mannequin arm for hands. The fact that no one else can see it—and that “Vincent Adultman” has few interests in life beyond business, stock market, and going on the tall-person rides at Disneyland—is one of the best running jokes of the show’s first two seasons, even as he eventually gets shuffled away after the show stops treating P.C.’s quest for love and fulfillment as quite such an obvious farce. But while we have him, what a treat Vincent Adultman is: a mature, emotionally intelligent character who’s big enough to admit when he needs to have a timeout to think about what he did. (Or a soda.)

“When you get to heaven, look up Margo Martindale. I won’t be there… but my movies will!”

It starts so simply: BoJack, doing that season one thing where he applies sitcom logic to messy interpersonal situations, attempts to sabotage his roommate Todd; needing an accomplice, he hires Character Actress Margo Martindale (Justified, Will Arnett’s sitcom The Millers, a million other things) to play a tiny role. (The joke, essentially, being for big Margo Martindale fans realizing that the bit part character she played in an earlier scene was actually the actress herself). And from there, it snowballs: For the rest of the series, any time BoJack (or, eventually, anyone) needs to hire a wild card for their various schemes or crimes, for some reason, the August: Osage County actress is their go-to call. Meanwhile, Martindale begins to embrace her new role as an agent of chaos with increasingly manic glee, cackling about her delight in biting off fingers and pushing the boundaries of live entertainment, all of it informed by her incredible talents and versatility as a performer. (Also, it’s obviously very funny that she is always referred to as Character Actress Margo Martindale.) A lot of famous people had a lot of fun playing against type when they popped up on BoJack over the years, but none as perfectly as Martindale, who had nothing but good things to say about the show, or creator Raphael Bob-Waksberg, and whose low, down-to-earth voice is clearly projecting the time of her life as she belts out lines like “Those limp dicks are about to find out what savvy film and television viewers have known for years. Character Actress Margo Martindale ain’t afraid of NOTHIN’!”