How The Good Place Avoided Turning Into The Bad Place

You'll stand by my side no matter what, right? Of course I will. Good. Because those aren't my memories. I wasn't a lawyer. I'm not supposed to be here. This is The Good Place, a show that marries deeper concepts of ethics and philosophy with some ridiculous and at times absurd comedy. The pilot episode is about Eleanor Shellstrop, played by Kristen Bell, exploring a heaven-like good place after her death, eventually realizing she's there by mistake. She then has to figure out how to keep this mistake a secret and stay in the afterlife by becoming a better person, or else be banished to a hell-like bad place. Different episodes of The Good Place might feel perfect for different reasons, but the season one finale takes the cake because it encapsulates how The Good Place masterfully subverts expectations. Holy mother-forking shirt balls. The Good Place had a four-season run on NBC from 2016 to 2020. It won a Peabody Award, four Hugo Awards, and was nominated for 14 Emmy Awards. Creator Mike Schur was no stranger to NBC. He was a writer on Saturday Night Live from 1997 to 2004, then moved on to write The Office, and eventually went on to co-create Parks and Recreation and Brooklyn Nine-Nine, which, yes, originally aired on Fox, but whose final few seasons aired on NBC. Schur was able to land a 13-episode deal for The Good Place based on just a concept pitch alone. The season one finale was notably praised for its twist ending that left audiences and cast members alike with their jaws on the floor. They're never going to call a train to take us to the bad place because we're already here. This is the bad place. The ending actually wasn't revealed to the cast until it was time to film the episode. Schur was always writing at least one season ahead. He had the whole first season mapped out before they began filming. Then while filming season one, they mapped out the entire second season. This planning is essential when establishing expectations and then subverting them. He always knew exactly where they were going while still leaving the room for the actors to play and improvise jokes. As they were writing, he would constantly be asking, how long does this show merit being on television? And as they started mapping out the fourth season, he knew it would be the last. I hate to see you walk through the final door at the edge of existence, but I love to watch you leave. Here we go. Comedy functions off of expectations and subversion. Doing or seeing something unexpected results in funny situations. A clash of contexts or an inappropriate response is subverting our expectations and making us laugh. Think about a bull working behind the counter in a china shop, for example. Mike Schur said that the best ending to a story is at once inevitable and surprising. That was the only way it could have happened, and yet the audience didn't see it coming. No, this doesn't make any sense. His goal for every episode and every season of every show he writes is to end that way, standing precariously at a fork in the road. One major influence, David Foster Wallace's book Infinite Jest, inspired Schur's work. Schur has said, nothing terrifies comedy writers more than heartfelt emotion. Wallace's entire body of work was an attempt to reconcile jokes, postmodern games, and coolness, which he admittedly loved and reveled in with what he saw was the most basic job of writing, to make the reader feel something, to make them feel like they are not alone in the world. These emotional elements, as well as the major twist in Infinite Jest, are clear influences of The Good Place. Each character is confronted by the consequences of a lifetime of choices in this episode. Our characters are faced with the dilemma of choosing someone to go to the bad place with a 30-minute timer set. Under the pressure of making this tough decision, Jason, played by Manny Jacinto, displays surprising intelligence and character growth by introducing this episode's philosophical concept. It's basic consequentialism. The morality of an action is solely judged on its consequences. Throughout the season, both the characters and audience alike believe that Tahani, played by Jamila Jamil, and Chidi, played by William Jackson Harper, belong in The Good Place. When it is revealed that they are just as bad as Jason and Eleanor, it subverts our expectations and ends up being pretty satisfying. You hurt everyone in your life with your rigidity and your indecisiveness. Oh, fork. The season 1 finale opens with a flashback to Michael, played by Ted Danson, being promoted to architect, written to maintain the audience's belief that he is good. I'm going to work so hard. My design is going to be absolutely perfect. Creator Mike Schur always admired Ted Danson for his comedy and cheers, but we get to see some of his more nuanced acting chops and subtleties shine in this episode. Michael's face is unfamiliar and icy, our first hint that he might not be who we thought. The writers used intentional dialogue throughout the episode to build up to the twist. Every line in the flashbacks to Michael is vague, but it's so subtle that the audience is never suspicious of him. The writers hinting, but never showing their cards until the time is right. Oh, man. I can't believe you figured it out. Humans are constantly growing, changing, and are surprising Michael. The moment Eleanor confesses, the moment she realizes it's the bad place, when Jason and Janet fall in love. These are all moments showing that humans are constantly unpredictable, both to Michael's chagrin and to his delight. Humans are so challenging that by the end of the series, Michael loves them so much he wants to be human. I'm going to be. A real boy, Pinocchio. Michael, throughout the series, is always wanting to make things better, whether he creates the best bad place or creates the perfect good place, like he does in the season 4 finale. He is written so consistently in his personality while still growing as a character and becoming the best Michael he can be. You're basic. That's devastating. You're devastated right now. The writers are perfectly setting up Michael's transformation in this season 1 finale so that his character growth from antagonist to protagonist is extra rewarding. Each flashback, whether to the architect planning sessions or to moments we knew from earlier in the season, set us up beautifully for the rest of the series. Getting to know the bad place architects, getting to add more context to familiar moments, allow the audience over and over again to say, this all makes sense now. Whether foreshadowing or deja vu, much of the season 1 finale is beautifully mirrored with the season 4 finale. Jason and Janet are in love. Chidi and Eleanor's feelings are growing for one another. And Jason is the first to say goodbye before moving on to the next chapter of the afterlife. More mirroring is seen in the interruptions from the real Eleanor in season 1 and our Eleanor in season 4 with the same goal in mind. Chidi can never leave. I proposed a rule. The Chidis shouldn't be allowed to leave because it would make Eleanor sad. And I could do this forever. And I'd still never find the justification for getting you to stay. The season 1 finale ends as the series began. A close up of Eleanor's eyes being back in that waiting room. Seeing everything is great. But now we know that it isn't. We can see Michael's smug face and dark eyes. We don't trust him anymore. And we're worried for Eleanor and anxious to start the next season. The writers fit in so much detail in such a succinct, consumable way, setting us up for the entirety of the show. The twist of realizing Michael is the antagonist is such a gut punch that makes the payoff of his inevitable and surprising goodness by the end of the series so rewarding. Mike Schur has said that his favorite themes to write are, people need each other to be happy. Communities are important. And nobody achieves anything alone. You can see these themes in all of the shows he's written on and created. But The Good Place especially embraces these concepts. Frequently showcasing deep, poignant emotion tied to thought-provoking philosophies. Beautifully written human relationships. And all balanced by surprising, expectation-subverting humor. And well, that's all we have this week. Is there anything we missed? Let us know in the comments below. And as always, please subscribe in order to stay up to date with everything Nerdstalgic.