Not surprisingly given the Hollywoo(d) setting, this show is packed full of many references to other works of film and television, especially to the casts and crews involved in their production.
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(Please sort these examples under the appropriate episodes, and then delete this folder.)
- Herb Kazaaz's production company Vanity Plate at the end of Horsin' Around episodes, is done in the style of Al Hirschfeld celebrity caricatures.
- There are a few references to J. D. Salinger's lesser known works:JD Salinger: "Get me a Red Bull and a banana-fish sandwich!"Todd: "On it! It's a perfect day for a Red Bull!"
- A recurring background character wears a shirt referencing The Misfits, except it reads "The Misprints".
- Princess Carolyn's office contains several cat-themed versions of well-known books, such as "Purrsepolis" and "Me Meow Pretty One Day". The latter is a reference to a book by David Sedaris, the brother of Amy Sedaris, who plays Princess Carolyn. There's also a poster for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof featuring a feline actress.
- The name Lenny Turtletaub is a reference to director/producer Jon Turteltaub
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Season 1
BoJack Horseman: The BoJack Horseman Story: Chapter One
- When asked if he carries his Horsin' Around DVDs with him everywhere, BoJack replies, "Linus carried a blanket around with him, and no one gave him shit for it.
BoJack Hates The Troops
- During Tom Jumbo-Grumbo's newscast, one of the headlines on the ticker at the bottom of the screen reads "Government declares war is good for absolutely nothing, say it again" which is a reference to Edwin Starr's hit "War".
Prickly-Muffin
- Andrew Garfield has a number of similarities to Garfield, such has loving lasagna and hating Mondays. Only Todd seems to notice.
- The scene outside of the furniture store features a Visual Pun - The Partridge Family.
Zoes and Zeldas
- From what we see of the video game Decapathon VII, it's a puzzle game apparently identical to Columns.
The Telescope
- BoJack's dressing room mirror has several sticky notes with quotes from Rick and Morty on them.
- Herb being caught trying to sexually solicit an LAPD officer in a public park bathroom in the mid-90s is a possible reference to an incident that happened to George Michael in the same place a few years later in Real Life.
Downer Ending
- Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman and Doctor Who are mentioned by Todd and Bojack. There's even a conversation about Bojack mishearing the name of Sarah Lynn's pharmacist Doctor Hu as "Doctor Who".
- There's a moment during BoJack's drug hallucination, in which BoJack visits Diane (who looks a lot like Lucy van Pelt) for amateur psychiatric advice. Mr. Peanutbutter also resembles Snoopy here.
- BoJack later gets another drug-induced vision of Diane, but this time she falls victim to AKIRA-style Transformation Horror.
Later
- It is revealed that Character Actress Margo Martindale is serving her time in the same prison as the cast of fellow Netflix show, Orange Is the New Black.
Season 2
Still Broken
- There's a subtle nod to Arrested Development, which Will Arnett also starred in, with Herb telling Joelle in a flashback that "family is the most important thing".
Yesterdayland
- Wanda's new friend Alex, who turns out to be a KGB agent that has been in a coma since the 1980s, strongly resembles Philip Jennings from The Americans, which is a show about Soviet spies in the 1980s. Coincidentally, Margo Martindale plays a supporting role on the show.
Let's Find Out
- The Teaser is a clear homage to Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance), with the same "one-shot" style and jazzy drum score.
- The rest of the episode takes the common elements and gently transfers from there, to an episode-long homage to the media-focused works of Aaron Sorkin. Mia McKibben delivers a lengthy resumé of impressive achievements (including "never being sick at sea") to diss Todd, in a direct shout-out to Charlie Wilson's War.
- BoJack being Ordered to Cheat on a game show by Wanda, on a question about a close personal interest of his, is very reminiscent of John Turturro's role as Herb Stempel in Quiz Show.
Escape From L.A.
- Bojack abandoning all of his responsibilities to travel across the country to reenter the life of someone he hasn't seen in a very long time is behavior that is very reminiscent of Don Draper in Mad Men.
Season 3
Start Spreading The News
- The posters in the cafe where Bojack and Jill Pill meet after her play advertise pig-starring musicals including Hamilton and Fun Ham.
The BoJack Horseman Show
- When Todd sneaks into Emily's house, he learns that her father works as a TV show editor, and he's holding onto a film roll for the Grand Finale episode of The Sopranos. It's revealed that Todd is responsible for causing the show's infamous Smash to Black ending, by accidentally tearing off the last strip of its film while running out of the house in a hurry; Todd looks at the last few frames and finds out that... Tony marries Dr. Melfi!
Fish Out Of Water
- Much of the episode pays tribute to Lost in Translation. Pacific Ocean City is a stand in for Tokyo where Bojack feels isolated and struck with culture shock while promoting his film and the end where he tries to give Kelsey Jannings a note when she is about to leave the city is deeply inspired by the end of Lost in Translation. Except here we see Bojack's message to Kelsey but the words become blurred before she can read it which is the opposite of Lost in Translation where Bob successfully whispers his message in Charlotte's ear and she's deeply touched by it but we as the audience can't make out the words.
- There's a homage to Modern Times when BoJack and the baby seahorse go to the factory where the baby's father works at.
Love And/Or Marriage
- Ralph Stilton's name is a reference to the children's book series Geronimo Stilton. At the end of his "non-date" with Princess Carolyn, he references another with this line when she realizes she won't have time for another date with him.Ralph: "What? Did I say something? Is it because I asked for the glass of milk? Because if you give me a cookie—"
- And in both cases, the name refers to Stilton cheese.
- When Mr. Peanutbutter is chasing down his phone in the sewers, the maintenance workers he passes by are four turtles wearing blue, orange, red, and purple shirts and bandannas.
That's Too Much, Man!
- Sarah-Lynn calls Diane an "Asian Daria".
- When they visit the planetarium theater, Sarah-Lynn and BoJack appear as black silhouettes against the screen.
That Went Well
- In the scene where Mr. Peanutbutter and the Cabracadabra girls drive to the beach to deal with the giant wad of spaghetti about to destroy Pacific Ocean City, the shot of the cars driving full-speed down the beach is a direct riff of one of the most famous shots from Mad Max: Fury Road.
Season 4
See Mr. Peanutbutter Run
- A montage of Katrina getting legislation passed so that Woodchuck Couldchuck-Berkowitz could legally challenge Mr. Peanutbutter to a ski race is shown in the style of Schoolhouse Rock!, particularly the "I'm Just a Bill" episode, which, apparently, is the only song pop culture can remember.
Commence Fracking
- Bojack visiting his former lovers in order to find out which one is the mother of his alleged illegitimate child, is a scenario inspired by the movie Broken Flowers.
- Mr. Peanutbutter gives a speech stating that "California is not the greatest state in the nation, but it can be", with Katrina holding up cue cards off to the side.
Thoughts and Prayers
- The character that Courtney Portnoy plays in her action movie is the niece of Taken's protagonist ("Ms. Taken").
- Todd states among his ideas about gun control that if people had the right Pumped Up Kicks, they could outrun bullets.
Stupid Piece of Sh*t
- When Judah tries to tell Princess Carolyn and Rutabaga about Meryl Streep retiring, Rutabaga calls him "Mr. McGregor". In The Tale of Peter Rabbit, Farmer McGregor was the farmer whose garden Peter kept sneaking into, despite the fact doing so got his father killed (meaning Rutabaga is essentially calling Judah an asshole).
Underground
- A group of spoiled, vain, hypocritical rich people are at a dinner party which they find themselves unable to leave, and as food and water begins to dwindle they succumb to their worst impulses. This is all inspired by the movie The Exterminating Angel.
- Pinky mentions to have gotten the rights for a show about a mom who becomes a zombie called Mombie. note
The Judge
- A background character can be seen wearing a T-shirt of a horse-ified Aladdin Sane.
- We find out that mice have a holiday called "The Feast of St. Squeaky", about a heroic mouse who killed an evil cat king.
Ruthie
- Princess Carolyn is told that Portnoy is unhappy with things, and asks "Who knew that Portnoy had so many complaints?"
- The meowing song Ruthie presents her ancestors singing is very much in the tune of the Les Misérables song "Look Down."
Time's Arrow
- The way that Beatrice's dementia-warped memories are represented is inspired by Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; with objects randomly disappearing, people lacking faces, auditory distortions and places that should be normal becoming bizarre locations.
- The scene where Joseph burns Beatrice's beloved baby doll as a result of scarlet fever later causing her to not abort BoJack is very similar to The Velveteen Rabbit.
Season 5
The Lightbulb Scene
- At one point, Mr. Peanutbutter plays Julius Caesar in a TV commercial for the Little Caesar's pizza chain. He later describes Caesar being the King of Apes.
Bojack The Feminist
- As Diane explains media normalization to Bojack, she mentions Ellen DeGeneres as a positive example of normalization (for gay people), and Jack Bauer as a negative example (for torture).
- Diane calls Bojack's feminist shtick "playing Joss Whedon".
Free Churro
- BoJack admits he stole his jacket anecdote from the Maude episode "Maude Bares Her Soul". Structurally, this episode is also quite similar to that one, in that it is effectively an episode-long monologue delivered by the main character.
- BoJack compares his mom and dad to Becker, summing them up as having all the potential to be a good family / TV show, but letting it all go to waste.
Mr Peanutbutter Boos
- Among the extras' costumes:
- There's a beetle dressed as Beetlejuice.
- One woman dressed as a sexy version of the women from The Handmaid's Tale .
- A couple is dressed as Velma and Scooby.
- One fox woman is dressed as a character from GLOW (2017).
- A woman dressed as Elastigirl and a man dressed as Shrek are both talking with Mr. Peanutbutter at one point.
- A woman can be seen holding a volleyball fashioned after Wilson as part of her costume.
- A guy is wearing bunny ears and a shirt called Space Jelly.
- Mr. Peanutbutter and his wives' costumes:
- Katrina wears a dress and a silly hat and says she's dressed as Blossom.
- He and Jessica Biel try to make a couple's costume to The Notebook, but Mr. Peanutbutter dresses as an actual notebook.
- He and Diane make a complicated costume reference to The Hangover.
- During the parties, when Mr. Peanutbutter talks with several people about some TV shows:
- In the one he goes with Katrina, he can be seen briefly talking with The X-Files lead actors about the existence of files A through W.
- In the party he goes to with Jessica Biel, he talks with some lead actors of Glee about the show.
- He believes that Lost is basically Gilligan's Island.
- Jessica Biel has a big fear of mummies, due to failing to get a role for The Mummy (1999).
Ancient History
- Todd names the Sex Bot he created "Henry Fondle", after Henry Fonda.
Ancient History
- A nun says that to an amnesiac Margo Martindale that she could be anyone, a judge, a Russian Spy or a proud southern matriarch.
The Showstopper
- In the beginning of the episode, a bird flying over an apocalyptic landscape during a scene from Philbert can be seen wearing a blue and yellow jumpsuit.
The Stopped Show
- One of the protesters against Henry Fondle is a dead ringer for Gert Yorkes.
- Bojack losing track of reality thanks to trauma and addiction to pills, and having to make the choice to go to rehab, with his best friend having to take him, is the same beats as what happens near the end of House season five.
Season 6
Intermediate Scene Study w/ BoJack Horseman
- Terry, one of BoJack's students, attempts to prove his skill to BoJack by crashing his AA meeting in-character as an old man with a monologue lamenting losing everything to addiction, which ends with him shouting "I've abandoned my boy!"
- The wall of celebrities in the Laugh Shack features Ali Wong and Kristen Schaal, who are depicted as a cobra and a horse, respectively, in reference to their real-world comedy routines.
- Diane is shown with a book called "Gal Pals: Eleanor and Hick", which references Eleanor Roosevelt's allegedly lesbian relationship with Lorena Hickok.
