"Bojack Horseman": Hetero-Romantic Aces, but No Gay Men

Bojack Horseman, the animated tv biz parody about the washed-up star of a 1980s TGIF sitcom, is back for Season 5, and heterosexist as ever.  Bojack is now starring in a bad detective series, Philbert, which surprisingly gets good ratings.  After he complains that a scene involving female nudity is too "male-gazey," his director, Flip (voiced by Rami Malik, left), orders a scene with male nudity "for the ladies."

You can't really blame him for forgetting that gay men exist.  The series itself does, frequently.  We're told frequently that all men desire women, and as proof, we're surrounded by heterosexual couplings.  Bojack is dating/having booty calls with Gina.  Mr. Peanutbutter and Diane get a divorce and start seeing other people.

This looks like two men, but in fact it's Mr. Peanutbutter and his new girlfriend, Pickles.

There are no gay men in Bojack's world.

Remember Todd (Aaron Paul), Bojack's not-gay slacker/housemate whose crazy antics provide the comic relief of the series?  Last season he came out as asexual, not sexually attracted to anyone.

But he's hetero-romantic, attracted to women as romantic partners.  So he  starts dating Yolanda (Natalie Morales), a female hetero-romantic axolotl.

Axolotls are Mexican salamanders.  Apparently "asexual axolotl" is a meme.

So they're a hetero-couple in everything but what they do in bed.

Nothing special about that.  Many of the hetero couples you see on the street are not sexually active.  They are waiting for marriage, or they have incompatible sexual interests, or one or both have low libidos.

Or one or both is gay.  There are plenty of reasons why a gay person would engage in a hetero marriage.

Or one or both is a hetero-romantic ace.

Except in those states where a marriage must be "consummated" to be legal, who's going to ask? Who's going to care?  Hetero-coupling is a social relationship, not a sexual relationship.

Turns out that Yolanda's family will.They are highly sex-positive.  Her father (John Leguizamo) writes erotic novels; her mother (Eva Longoria) is a former porn star; and her twin sister Mindy runs a sex advice column. Her grandmother has left them a family heirloom, a barrel of antique lube worth $100,000.

Yolanda hasn't come out to them as asexual -- would you?  So she asks Todd to pretend that they are sexually active, when the family asks.

They do ask.  They are thrilled that Yolanda has finally found someone to have sex with, and interrogate him on how often he puts his penis inside her.

 He draws some suspicion by his lack of familiarity with heterosexual sex -- he can't even get the phrase "hubba-hubba" right.

Then the family insists that Yolanda "honor them" by spending the night and having sex with Todd in her old room.

They can pretend to do that, right?

But then Yolanda's mother tries to seduce Todd, and when he fails to respond adequately to her naked body ("any normal man would have been aroused," she says, forgetting that gay men exist), she concludes that he is asexual.  That doesn't dissuade her -- she wants to Todd to show her what asexual sex is like.

Yolanda' sister tries to seduce him, too.

Her father doesn't, but when the antique barrel of lube bursts, he asks Todd to plug the hole with his erect penis, which he would have if he was a "normal man," having sex with Yolanda.

For people making their living through sex, they show a surprising lack of awareness of the existence of gay men.

In a later episode, Diane tells Bojack about media normalization, which is sometimes good, as in the case of LGBT people, and sometimes bad.

So no one on the show is homophobic.  They just omit the G from LGBT.

A later episode shows Bojack's therapist, Dr. Endira (Issa Rae) having dinner with her wife, Mary-Beth (Wanda Sykes).

I've forgotten how many lesbian couples there are on the show.  Lots.

But no gay men.

See also: Bojack Horseman: Anthropomorphic Angst.