The Good Place is an easy show to binge, with only 13 half-hour episodes each season. That being said this article CONTAINS SPOILERS, small ones in the first part and a big one later on. I will put another warning before it. Go watch Season One and come back when you’re done.
What happens after someone dies? It’s something humans have wondered about forever. Everyone was, as it turns out, about 5% correct. Everyone except 1970s stoner teen Doug Forcett. He was 92% right. A person’s actions in life earn them points. Good deeds earn positive points and bad deeds earn negative points. The more positive points, the more likely the person will make it to the Good Place.
Into this afterlife four newly deceased souls arrive:
Eleanor Shellstrop, a telemarketer from Arizona. She became emancipated from her “crummy” parents at 14 and put herself through high school and college.
Chidi Anagonye, a professor of ethics and moral philosophy from Senegal. He spent his life “searching for the fundamental truths of the universe.”
Tahani Al-Jamil, an English socialite. She raised 60 billion dollars for charity, don’t you know.
Jianyu Li, a silent Taiwanese monk. Soon revealed to really be Jason Mendoza, an aspiring amateur EDM DJ and small-time criminal from Jacksonville, Florida.
They all arrive in Neighborhood 12358W, a sunny hamlet built by Michael. 12348W is full of frozen yogurt shops and stores like “Small Adorable Animal Depot” and “Everything Fits.” Michael is an avuncular gentleman eager for everything to go smoothly. It’s his first neighborhood and, unlike most architects, he’ll be living there with the residents. The new arrivals are paired off as soulmates, Eleanor and Chidi, Tahani and Jianyu/Jason.
Assisting everyone is Janet, the “foundational mainframe” of the Good Place, in a cheerful human form. She contains all the knowledge in the universe and is programmed to help the residents with whatever they may need. She might even engage her “Ride or Die Protocol” if you ask her nicely. Janet is always eager to tell you what she’s not “not a robot”, “not a girl.” What she is is awesome. I will be adding her purple vest and skirt combo to my cosplay list very soon.
Eleanor knows something is off right from the start. The memories that Michael shows her aren’t hers as she never did humanitarian missions in the Ukraine. Eleanor was more the scamming the elderly and skipping out on being the designated driver type. Knowing that if Michael finds out, she’ll be sent to The Bad Place, Eleanor enlists Chidi to help make her a better person. He agrees to teach her ethics.
Jason confesses to Eleanor about who he really is. He’s gotten by so far by remembering his parole officer’s advice “Keep your mouth shut or they’ll throw a book at you.” He joins Chidi’s class. Eleanor and Jason are far from the most studious pupils which makes Chidi squirm and gives him stomachaches. It’s hard for Chidi to reconcile telling the truth and hurting people. It once took him three years to tell a friend that he disliked the man’s boots.
Tahani spends her time ingratiating herself with all the residents, bringing gifts and planning parties. She loves the attention that it brings her, having spent her life in the shadow of talented sister and disapproving parents. Tahani is distressed that her soulmate, who she still thinks is a monk, won’t connect with her. Then, her events start going haywire. Michael tells her it’s probably his fault. He made a mistake somewhere and it is going to ruin everything. He may be forcibly retired because of it, and that’s not a good thing.
Eleanor, knowing it is really her fault, and not wanting Michael to be punished convinces Chidi to help her shut down Janet. No one can come or go from the neighborhood without Janet. The guilt of which drives Chidi crazy, Eleanor confesses to Michael after seeing Chidi in such a state. Bad Place demons show up to collect her.
Eleanor, Jason, and a newly rebooted Janet flee to The Medium Place, population 1. That lone resident is Mindy St. Clair, a hotshot corporate lawyer from the 1980s. Mindy had a drug-fueled epiphany that led her to start a global foundation, and promptly died. This earned her an afterlife where everything is meh. After learning that Chidi and Tahani will be sent to the bad place instead of Eleanor and Jason, they rush back to stop it, despite Mindy’s advice to Eleanor to look out for herself.
Second Spoiler Alert: This is the big one!
The four souls aren’t in the Good Place. It has been the Bad Place the whole time. Michael is really a demon who planned the whole neighborhood as torture for them. Everyone with the exception of these four and Janet are in on the scheme. Each of them (“a selfish ass,” “a tortured academic,” “an idiot DJ,” and “a hot, rich fraud,”) was meant to drive the others crazy for all eternity.
But, as Eleanor put it, “We took care of each other. We improved each other. We became a team.”
Their humanity is what makes them strong, and that’s the great thing about The Good Place.
Here are a few things that I especially liked:
The swearwords are modified to fork, shirt, ash, and bench. I find myself using these in my regular life.
Eleanor and Tahani deciding “Not to be those women who fight over a guy and find any excuse to rip each other apart,” but instead spend the day having fun together.
Eleanor, despite leading a mostly selfish life, would take her cousin’s daughter to the mall to get churro dogs. She was fully capable of empathy, just keeping it hidden most of the time.
No matter how difficult his students, Chidi kept teaching. He was exceedingly patient and his lessons detailed. There should be course credits given just for watching.
Tahani’s Horace Slughorn love for luxury goods and name dropping. And her old-fashioned habits, like wearing evening gloves.
Jason consulting a Magic 8 Ball for profound things to say as a monk. Or when he realizes that he’s in the Bad Place because he “has the perfect bud-hole and no dudes to share it with”.
Jason and Janet get married. It’s so sweet and goofy.
Comments are closed.