"You say you wanna get better, and you don't know how. Well, here's me, your friend, telling you how: get therapy."
— Diane
Diane's therapist encourages her to set boundaries with BoJack. A missing string cheese ignites a dispute between Todd and Princess Carolyn.
Tropes:
- All Take and No Give:
- BoJack's relationship with Diane, to the point that she's a Living Emotional Crutch.
- Princess Carolyn lampshades this relationship with Todd, who lives in her apartment despite giving no rent and takes qualms with her seemingly taking a string cheese from him.
- Angrish: When BoJack gives a "Not So Different" Remark to Diane, she is so livid that she rushes into Flip's writing room to write an episode script based on the vague details she heard about on the tape recorder. While she's typing all this out on the typewriter, she is visibly seething with rage the more she writes.
- Big "NO!": Mary-Beth lets out one when Todd demands that he and Princess Carolyn go into arbitration, even after they seemed to be patching up.
- Bittersweet Ending: Indira's story ends in disaster for everyone involved. Thanks to Bojack seeing Indira as a "lunch buddy" and not as a friend, he quits as her client, and Indira for legal reasons has to terminate her relationship with Diane when the latter says she doesn't feel safe in Dr. indira's office. Mary-Beth, in contrast, proves that Princess Carolyn has an alibi about the string cheese, causing Todd to have a Jerkass Realization about how he's freeloading off her couch and acting entitled. He not only gives her the office but also says he'll pay rent to her since he has a paying job now.
- Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Mary-Beth has shades of this, given that while Indira is just doing minor name changes, Mary-Beth changes all of her characters to surreal and confusing things. Mary-Beth even manages to do this to Indira's story; Diane was simply changed to Diana, but Mary-Beth insists she is explicitly imagining the character to be Diana, Princess of Wales.
- Couch Gag: To hide his identity, Indira changes BoJack's name to "Bobo the Angsty Zebra" as she tells the story about him. The opening credits are swapped to reflect this, with BoJack becoming a zebra and the title of the show changed. Even the poster for "Horsin' Around" was replaced with a poster for "Bobo's" hit-show in the 90's, "Stripin' Around".
- "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: Indira patiently tells Diane that she has a choice to make: either set boundaries with BoJack or confront him about the tape. If BoJack knows that Diane knows about Penny, at least they can talk about it and work through it, plus she can find out the full context. It's still bad but not left as an elephant in the room. In the climax, Indira all but orders Diane to talk about the tape when she finds BoJack taking a lunch hour in the latter's office. Instead, Diane says she doesn't feel safe in this, and Indira's expression changes as she has to terminate her relationship with Diane for this reason. She's visibly frustrated and guilty about it when relating the story to Mary-Beth.
- Dog Got Sent to a Farm: It never occurred to Mr. Peanutbutter that his parents were dead because his brother only said they "moved to a farm".
- Face–Heel Turn: Diane goes from gentle and understanding to cold, unforgiving, and brutal by the time this episode ends. Justified because of all the crap BoJack puts her through and knowledge of how he nearly molested Penny.
- Feud Episode: Between Todd and PC.
- Framing Device: This episode's framing device is Indira and Mary-Beth recounting their respective weeks at work — Indira is wrangling BoJack, Diane, and Mr. Peanutbutter (by association), while Mary-Beth is handling a feud between Princess Carolyn and Todd. They even lampshade that alternating stories and pausing to comment during the most interesting parts is obviously a natural way to have a conversation.
- Glad I Thought of It: Flip praises his own genius for the new script even as he stands back watching Diane type it herself.
- Grey-and-Grey Morality: BoJack did a terrible thing with Penny, but in making him act out his own confession (on television, where Penny can see), Diane is thinking of her own anger and not how this could potentially retraumatise the girl.
- Intelligible Unintelligible: In Indira's story, Flip is now a dolphin named Flippy, who only communicates in dolphin noises. However, Diane can understand him just fine, and subtitles are also provided for the audience.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall:
- During their conversation, Indira and her wife acknowledge the importance of a b-plot that will give levity to the darker main plotline.
- Indira also channels the audience's reaction to Mary-Beth's overly surreal descriptions of her clients to protect their confidentiality.Indira: I feel like I'm having a hard time following the story because of how weird you made the characters.
- Living Emotional Crutch: When Diane realizes her friendship with BoJack is basically this, with him wanting to dump all his negative feelings on her in lieu of seeking therapy, she does not take it well.
- Master of the Mixed Message: BoJack keeps telling people his mom died, only to say he doesn't want them to treat him any differently because his mom died. By the way, did you know his mom died? Okay, thank you for walking away! Your emotional support is deeply appreciated in this trying time!
- Mood Whiplash: The episode is mostly light-hearted and made even sillier than usual thanks to the alternate character designs. This all changes in the final minutes when Diane psychologically confronts BoJack by forcing him to act through a Philbert script based on his own confession about what happened in New Mexico. BoJack is clearly very disturbed by it.
- "Not So Different" Remark: When BoJack claims Diane is just as bad as him and they're basically the same, Diane, who by this point knows at least a little of what happened in New Mexico, is furious.
- Overly Preprepared Gag: Todd and Princess Carolyn's B-story teases its resolution so blatantly that no one should be surprised to discover Todd's been inches from finding his string cheese the whole time. The resolution still lands as both heartwarming and funny.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: While the other characters are given bizarre new aliases from the third person narrative, "Gino" is merely Gina but with a moustache and short haircut.
- Poor Man's Substitute: Invoked. Indira first says "Jessica Chastain takes the gigs Amy Adams says no to"; Mary-Beth follows it up with "Bryce Dallas Howard takes the gigs Jessica Chastain says no to".
- Plot Parallel: Both the A-plot (Diane trying to distance herself from BoJack) and the B-plot (Todd and Princess Carolyn figuring out what is and isn't fair game in the apartment they share) have to do with setting boundaries.
- Real Life Writes the Plot: Possibly due to Rami Malek not being present on set due to being busy with other projects, they made Flip's dolphin persona talk like an actual dolphin. He came back to voice his character near the end.
- Roman à Clef: As both sides really shouldn't be talking about their clients, Indira and Mary-Beth agree to maintain client confidentiality by substituting the names (and in some cases, their species). In regards to the main characters, BoJack becomes "Bobo the Angsty Zebra", Diane becomes Princess Diana, Mr. Peanutbutter becomes "Mr. Chocolate Hazelnut Spread", Todd becomes "Emperor Finger-Face", and Princess Carolyn becomes "a Tangled Fog of Pulsating Yearning in the Shape of a Woman".
- "Shaggy Dog" Story: After Todd and PC reconcile, Todd reaches into his jacket for a pen only to discover the missing string cheese that started the entire conflict in the first place. For added irony, he started the argument just as he was reaching for a pen the first time.
- Shoo Out the Clowns: Naturally, Princess Carolyn and Todd's lighthearted b-plot wraps up just as BoJack and Diane's darker main storyline reaches critical mass.
- Small Name, Big Ego: Flip believes that everybody sees him as a genius. Diane tries to tell him that it isn't like that, but he brushes her allegation off.
- Something Only They Would Say: When Diane talks to BoJack about getting help, he tells her that she is "not responsible for the dysfunction of others." This rings a bell in Diane's head, remembering that was a phrase that Dr. Indira told her, and believes that BoJack is seeing her behind her back as a client. Sure enough, she barges in while he's with Dr. Indira, and finds out she's completely right, much to her fury.
- This Is My Side: Todd and PC's argument ends up with them labeling items as theirs and using tape to divide areas that they mark as theirs.
- Title Drop: INT. SUB is the single sentence that Flip had written. It was meant to be a subway, but the submarine scenario was created before he could finish typing due to him having a breakdown.
- True Art Is Incomprehensible: Defied In-Universe. Diane shows Flip that his over-reliance on complex and incomprehensible plotlines and symbolism doesn't automatically result in good writing and it has made the writer as confused as the audience. "Philbert" only starts getting good once Diane takes the wheel and starts undoing the mess that Flip made.
- Two Lines, No Waiting: Lampshaded in the conversation between Dr. Indira and Mary-Beth.
- Very Loosely Based on a True Story: Diane writes the Philbert scene "based on a story [she] heard", having Philbert/Bojack kiss a young girl on a submarine and describe the events using the exact words he said about Penny.
