Review Fix Exclusive: Margaret France Talks ‘The Genius of Bob’s Burgers’ And More

Review Fix chats with “The Genius of Bob’s Burgers” author Margaret France, who discusses the origin of the book and so much more.

About the Author:

Margaret France is an instructor of English at Yakima Valley College in Yakima, Washington. She has also taught at Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey, Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois, and at UC Davis. She has published scholarly articles on Daniel Defoe and 18th-century personal advertisements.

About the Book:

Given the limitless freedom of animation, why would anyone use it to make a sitcom about a struggling family-owned burger place? And why would audiences embrace this greasy fantasy, not just by tuning in but by permanently decorating their legs and arms with images from the show and writing detailed backstories for its minor characters? This book-length critical study of Bob’s Burgers examines the moments in which the animated sitcom exposes the chasms between generations, explores gender and sexual identity, and allows fans to imagine a better world. Essays cover how the show can be read as a series of critiques of Steven Spielberg’s early blockbusters, a rejection of Freudian psychology, or an examination of the artificiality of gendered behaviors through the cross-casting of characters like Tina and Linda. By tracing the ways that the popular reception of Bob’s Burgers reflects changing cultural attitudes, the essays provoke broader questions about the responsibility of popular entertainment to help audiences conceive of fantasies closer to home: fantasies of loving and accepting parents, of creative, self-assured children, and of menus filled with artisanal puns.

Review Fix: How did this project begin?

Margaret France: I wanted to get grant money to hang out with my friends! I have a PhD in English and my field is Eighteenth-Century British Lit, but my friends did twentieth and twenty-first century stuff and loved going to the PCA/ACA (Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association). The first few years I managed to find topics in my field that overlapped, but then, in 2015 I delivered my first paper at PCA on Bob’s Burgers, called “The Revolution will Wear Pink Bunny Ears.” That was the first of five papers I delivered on the show between 2015 and 2020. By 2016, I knew I would write a book.

Review Fix: What made this a captivating subject for you?

France: Bob’s Burgers makes me laugh. There’s never a bad time to watch it. I’m never in a mood where it won’t make me feel better. Part of it comes from the humor, of course, but for me I think it’s even more about the presentation of family and community. Without being saccharine, the show presents an environment in which a diverse body of people, many of them deeply flawed, are worthy of love. That’s a balm. The election of Donald Trump in 2016 was the start of a period where I felt a lot less belonging and community in my life, which has been exacerbated by the pandemic, so the particular escapism offered by Bob’s Burgers has been especially welcome.

Review Fix: Why do you think the show has thrived for so long?

France: They are very true to their voice: if you liked season 3, season 9 will delight you as well. Also, for an animated sitcom, they have a great willingness to show growth in characters. That’s rewarding for longtime viewers, who can, for example, get a special thrill from seeing Louise act out of compassion once in a while.

Review Fix: What was the research process like?

France: I worked over six years. Every chapter was its own challenge, both because the topics would shift but also because the best way for me to complete this while working full-time was to break the project into modular bits that, with the help of my editor, I massaged into something more cohesive. So sometimes it was incredibly fun! Reading the birth order theory materials was delightful. I think a lot of popular psychology is bullshit, so I loved seeing how persuasive the evidence could really be, even if the scholar behind it was completely discredited. Something doesn’t have to be true to live in our minds as a way of making sense of who we are, so birth order theory turned out to be kind of like astrology or tarot; it can give you the language to explain people, if not the actual source of their character. The worst chapter to research was, surprisingly, Spielberg. Rewatching The Goonies and ET ruined my dearly held impressions of them from childhood. Jaws, however, is a great movie about fatherhood, and I would love it if they did another homage, because Bob is the great Roy Schieder role that got away

Review Fix: What did you learn that you weren’t expecting?

France: I ruminated on the implications of having White actors voice Black characters, particularly Marshmallow. It took me down a path that made me think very critically about the kind of representation that the show has behind the scenes. Some of the warmth of  the show comes from the comfort level of the cast, some of whom have been working with creator Loren Bouchard for decades. But hiring friends and known quantities shut out the voices of people who would have said, “hey, if we are going to have BIPOC and LGBTQ+ characters on this show, we need those voices in our writing room and our cast.”

Review Fix: How did the book change during the writing process?

France: I conceived the book as being “timeless knowledge” in the way of much academic writing, but it seemed dishonest, as I completed it in 2020, not to refer to current events. I think the book is better for acknowledging what Bob’s Burgers means in general, but also what it meant as we went through this historic reckoning with how some people in our culture are literally disposable, through the BLM movement and the pandemic.

Review Fix: Who’s your favorite character and why?

France: I think Mr. Fischoeder might be the most compelling and consistent condemnation of capitalism ever embodied in a cartoon. He’s part of the legacy of Mr. Burns and Scrooge McDuck, but he’s somehow even more churlish and odd. Kevin Kline’s voice makes every denial of basic human empathy go down as smoothly as a Manhattan on a Friday afternoon. Linda delights me, and I always welcome a visit from style icon, Aunt Gayle. But honestly, that’s the charm of the show: it’s so warm that every character might be my favorite, depending on the day.*

Review Fix: What are your goals for this book?

France: I want fans to feel justified in their enjoyment of the series and have their ideas about the show reinforced and challenged equally. I want to be part of the conversation that people have when they are trying to articulate why a piece of art moves them, even if the way that conversation is sparked is through disagreeing with me.

Review Fix: Who do you think will enjoy this book the most?

France: Pop culture nerds of all ages!

Review Fix: What’s next?

France: I haven’t really gotten going on another book project yet, but some of the ideas that I’ve been playing with include a poetry collection recapping reality TV shows (mostly House Hunters and Below Deck so far), and coming up with a project to justify my growing collection of Playgirl magazine from the 1970s and 80s.

Review Fix: Anything else you’d like to add?

France: A lot of people see themselves in Bob’s Burgers who have never seen themselves represented in mainstream media before. While I go to town on how revolutionary or regressive Tina is, or whether or not Gene is really challenging conventional ideas of masculinity, nothing that I have to say is as important as that feeling of your truth, reflected on the screen. Love Bob’s Burgers for your own reasons, and don’t allow me or anyone else to argue you out of your own delight and joy.

*Except for Jimmy Pesto. Seriously, fuck that guy.