S02.E04: Team Cockroach

[Anisky]

2 minutes ago, Dowel Jones said:

Or, it could be just a half hour comedy show instead of a world shaking allegory.

Eh. The show runner has explicitly said that the show is about ethics. I don't think it's a huge reach to think that perhaps the show is about ethics.

[iMonrey]

Quote

Upon reflection I hope that Kamilah Al-Jamil, when she eventually dies goes to the worst Bad Place in existence. Pretending not to recognize Tahani, and then telling her she should strive to be a cocktail waitress, at an event that she was excluded from?! I hope she gets an entire crate of butthole spiders to herself! 

Yeah, Tahani should take comfort in the fact that her sister will wind up in The Bad Place too. She was a real bitch. 

Was that the same actress playing Tahani's sister? I could have sworn we saw her in a flashback last season and it was someone else.

Quote

Well we know a few things.  

We "know" them if we take Michael's word for it. Like Eleanor, I still have my doubts. There might be an even more elaborate scheme within a scheme going on.

[ZoqFotPik]

6 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

Was that the same actress playing Tahani's sister? I could have sworn we saw her in a flashback last season and it was someone else.

According to imdb, it was the same actress, Rebecca Hazlewood.

[Panopticon]

4 hours ago, CooperTV said:

I'm glad the show is continuing with its perfect set-up from last season:

1) If you have severe anxiety issues, you deserve to die in the most idiotic way possible and go to hell to be tortured.

2) If you're victim of emotional abuse and your parents never loved you and you always wanted to prove yourself to them anyway or being noticed (because that's how emotionally or otherwise abused children usually act), you deserve to die in the most idiotic way possible and to to hell to be tortured;

3) If you're mentally challenged and fall for life of crime, you deserve to die in the most idiotic way possible and go to hell to be tortured.

That's show is so cute!

I've never gotten the sense that the show is preaching that anyone deserves to be tortured or die horribly. I just thought that the show was starting from the framework of "these happen to be the rules of the universe." Eleanor, who was the primary protagonist of the first season, explicitly talked about how there ought to be a medium place for people who were neither the best of the best nor horrifically awful, and if anything I got the impression that the audience was supposed to agree with her on that.

Meanwhile, the problem with Michael's torture plan is that the humans continue to grow throughout their torture. For example, constant exposure to Eleanor was supposed to exacerbate Chidi's anxieties and initially it did. But then Eleanor was able to get it through Chidi's head that he could tell her to fork off when she was bothering him, and even able to create a space where he could say he loved her without having a weeklong stomach ache while he debated the pros and cons. And of course Chidi gave Eleanor what she needed to become the kind of person who would say "you don't need to say you love me too, I just want you to know I love you." I loved how hard it rocked Eleanor in this episode when Michael confirmed that Chidi agreed to help her Every. Single. Time. after she spent a life on earth being raised by parents who couldn't be bothered remember her birthday or refrain from blowing her college fund.

I do think the show has very cute moments, actually.

[swimmyfish]

15 hours ago, CaptainTightpants said:

Upon reflection I hope that Kamilah Al-Jamil, when she eventually dies goes to the worst Bad Place in existence. Pretending not to recognize Tahani, and then telling her she should strive to be a cocktail waitress, at an event that she was excluded from?! I hope she gets an entire crate of butthole spiders to herself! Nobody puts down the sexy skyscraper on my watch missy!

I believe that Michael tells Eleanor in the very first episode that most artists end up in the Bad Place. Considering the 800+ reboots of Michael's Good Place set-up, we can assume several years have passed since Tahani's death - it's very possible that Kamilah is already in the Bad Place. I don't know if it's on the writer's agenda, but I would really love to see some afterlife interactions between Tahani and Kamilah - especially if part of Kamila's torture is believing that Tahani did indeed get into Good Place.

[tennisgurl]

"Actually Michael, I would like to sing a few words..." If Eleanor didn't know she was in The Bad Place already, she certainly would have right then! 

So this will be our new plot it seems like. Team Cockroach takes morality classes while trying to hide what they know and get to the real Good Place. Sounds like it will be a lot of fun, and it means more time spent with Eleanor and Michael, and maybe more information about how this world works. I also think its a good idea to go back to the first seasons set up, makes things less complicated. 

I think this show might end up being a deconstruction of the very IDEA of a Good Place and a Bad Place, and how putting people into either a place of eternal happiness or eternal torment based on what they did in life is a really messed up thing to do in the first place. Especially in this universe, where even arbitrary things can get you sent to the Bad Place, and even the best people in history dont make the cut. The Fab Four all made mistakes in life and had issues, but they all had reasons why they were the way they were, and are all clearly capable of change. People are so complicated and so capable of bad behavior as well as good behavior and are so shaped by their pasts and issues and mental states and time and culture, that the idea of judging people so harshly, especially people like the Fab Four who are clearly capable of changing for the better, is basically pointless. 

Mindi was so close to her cocaine! 

[Chaos Theory]

Personally I am willing to take what Michael is saying at face value until given reason not to.   Tahani's death seams appropriate for her.  The setup seams for now to be workable.  I  am not saying Micheal isn't lying or won't try and betray them but assuming he is does nothing for me at this point so I am going to assume he has no choice but to go with the truth.

Edited October 6, 2017 by Chaos Theory

[Affogato]

16 hours ago, Linny said:

 

How long will it take for Vicky and the others to figure out that Team Cockroach wasn't rebooted? I still think Vicky may actually be working for Shawn and is aware of Michael's machinations and is actively subverting him. There are so many levels of manipulation possible that I'm really curious how everything will play out.

Jason's face when Janet handed him the sparkler was the best. He may be the dumbest person ever, but he's also pretty damn adorable.

Vicki reminds me enough of Tahani so I wonder if their isn't going to be something going on there, perhaps she can be a vehicle of Tahani's self awareness and redemption.

Jason wouldn't have survived as long as he did if he wasn't adorable.

[Charlesman]

After so much action last week, that kind of felt like a "filler" episode. 

[CinAZ]

It seemed to me that this whole episode could have been 3-4 minutes tops and would have had the same message.

what if this whole bad place is an experiment of the good place.... maybe Michael is a terrible demon, so he might qualify for the good place or maybe the medium place with a little coaching. And the Fab Four are just the humans to out his good side....  HA! 

[Wandering Snark]

I love that of course Vicky gave herself the role of highest scorer and co-opted the sash they had for Eleanor in V.1.

[Affogato]

I thought everyone showed promise in this episode. Chidi made a decision to join with Michael and argued the case decisively. Eleanor's first impulse was to take care of herself (the cocaine would be to buy a place for herself in the medium place) but she paused and reconsidered. Jason realized his ideas weren't helping and went off to play with his sparkler. Michael asked for help. Tahani was able to take the first step in understanding why she was in the bad place.

At this point they have an interesting crew. Michael is an architect, Janet is a ... well .... Janet, Tahani is a fundraiser, Jason is a the one they can test their ideas on,Eleanor is rapidly becoming the leader of the group. They can make their own good place, for all of that. They are a moral startup. Janet being the most advanced Janet is interesting.

[Anisky]

58 minutes ago, Wandering Snark said:

I love that of course Vicky gave herself the role of highest scorer and co-opted the sash they had for Eleanor in V.1.

I know, right? Especially because the "Best Person" sash was created as part of Eleanor's torture. We've seen in Eleanor's flashbacks that she has very little shame, but even she fully felt how awkward and, frankly, humiliating it was to have to wear that sash. Vicky, missing all of that, is like, "Ohh, MINE!"

Also, I found it hilarious that what was ostensibly supposed to be everyone's first day in the afterlife, Vicky not only thought that karaoke was an appropriate way for her to introduce herself as "mayor", but she also chose a song called "I Will Survive" with lyrics such as
"I know I'll stay alive"
"Did you think I'd lay down and die? Oh no not I!"

Yes Vicky, what a perfectly appropriate song to sing when you're supposed to have just been told a few hours ago that you're dead!

Edited October 6, 2017 by Anisky

[Anisky]

Also, interestingly, Michael's explanations so far match up with what Michael Schur has said about the show: That Mindy and the Medium Place are real, that Janet isn't in on it, and the average length of each reboot. Unless Schur is lying in his interviews in order to mess with us, so far Michael has been more truthful than I'd have expected. What he tells them about the number of attempts matches what we saw last episode, too.

I am pretty leery of his claim that there's a way to get to the Good Place, but I found his initial explanation of his plan for all of them to go there, and how he would try to get the Good Place to accept him too, very interesting. 

Prediction: The Good Place isn't willingly keeping people out; they're somehow limited so that they're only allowed to take in the "very best", but they are against the idea of the Bad Place and don't actually want anyone to be there. They would take "Bad Place refugees" in a heartbeat.

My bet is that when Michael says he thinks might be able to stay in the Good Place by saying he rescued four people from damnation and say he's changed, and Chidi asked if the Good Place would even let them stay, Michael realized that he revealed more than he should have about the Good Place and backtracked to say he had no idea. 

I think there's a decent chance Michael was lying about there being a way to get to The Good Place (though I'm not sure). If he was lying, then I think he let his knowledge of the Good Place inform the fake plan. (He and Eleanor had just finished explaining why it's easier to lie when you're basing it on the truth.)

EDIT: I also noticed that Michael said that if their plan fails, ECTJ will have to go to the "real Bad Place." Obviously he has every reason in the universe to tell them that they're better off in his neighborhood than in any other Bad Place neighborhood, since without their help he'll be eternally tortured too, but I found that phrasing interesting. 

Edited October 6, 2017 by Anisky

[Affogato]

Love "Team Cockroach". 

[Bruinsfan]

18 hours ago, CaptainTightpants said:

Upon reflection I hope that Kamilah Al-Jamil, when she eventually dies goes to the worst Bad Place in existence. Pretending not to recognize Tahani, and then telling her she should strive to be a cocktail waitress, at an event that she was excluded from?! I hope she gets an entire crate of butthole spiders to herself! Nobody puts down the sexy skyscraper on my watch missy!

My worry is that with hundreds of years in the Bad Place, she might be running it by now.

[CherithCutestory]

Quote

so far Michael has been more truthful than I'd have expected.

Oh, wow.  Just because he is a tool of evil who delights in tormenting humans you assume he must be a liar?! You are exhibiting some serious anti-demon prejudice.

Quote

Prediction: The Good Place isn't willingly keeping people out; they're somehow limited so that they're only allowed to take in the "very best", but they are against the idea of the Bad Place and don't actually want anyone to be there. They would take "Bad Place refugees" in a heartbeat.

I think you are right. That fits with the video given to Mindy St. Clair. The Good Place wanted her. They fought for her. Sure she was a special case. But it's still interesting.

It makes sense why the Bad Place wanted her. They love torturing people. But the Good Place probably wants everyone they can get their hands on too. But the shuffling of souls to the good and bad place is usually automatic according to very specific rules.

If some souls were to cross the line then they likely would fight for them just like Michael pretended to.

[wilnil]

44 minutes ago, Anisky said:

EDIT: I also noticed that Michael said that if their plan fails, ECTJ will have to go to the "real Bad Place." Obviously he has every reason in the universe to tell them that they're better off in his neighborhood than in any other Bad Place neighborhood, since without their help he'll be eternally tortured too, but I found that phrasing interesting. 

I'd love to see how that was written in the script. It could also be "the Real Bad Place" as in "Very Bad" -- maybe there are supposed to be levels of badness, or at least Michael now wants them to think there is.

[Fukui San]

I didn't quite like Tahani's death story. It was a little too broad and long. One writing tweak I might have suggested were I in the writer's room. Have Kamilah continuing to argue with Tahani while she topples the statue. And then be injured or killed while Tahani is crushed. In that way Tahani's death gets overshadowed by her sister one last time.

I'm rewatching this episode now. I just realized that Eleanor says "Son of a bench" when the hidden stairs are revealed.

Jason, hell is rooting for a team with Blake Bortles as your QB.

2 hours ago, Affogato said:

At this point they have an interesting crew. Michael is an architect, Janet is a ... well .... Janet, Tahani is a fundraiser, Jason is a the one they can test their ideas on,Eleanor is rapidly becoming the leader of the group. They can make their own good place, for all of that. They are a moral startup. Janet being the most advanced Janet is interesting.

OK, now I want to map them against the crew on Gilligan's Island. Let's see, add Mindy along with Michael and Janet, and we have seven.

Professor=Chidi
Skipper=Michael
Gilligan=Eleanor
Mr. Howell=Tahani

Ah, that's where it breaks down. Don't see a good match for Ginger, Maryanne, or Mrs. Howell. Tahani could be Mr. and Mrs. Howell for that matter.

Chidi, in one of your lectures I need you to go over Pascal's Wager, i.e. betting on the existence of God since the reward of being right would be so great. I think that would be pertinent to your situation.

[Impromptu]

While we know that due to the reboots have taken place over a couple hundred years, that doesn't mean that that same amount of time has passed for those still alive on Earth, because time could run differently in the "/not Good Place."  Even 300 years of "/not Good Place" time could be the equivalent of five minutes of alive time.  Of course it could also be equal time... but it doesn't have to be. (Which gives the show's writer's all kinds of options for later seasons).

[Affogato]

1 minute ago, Fukui San said:

I didn't quite like Tahani's death story. It was a little too broad and long. One writing tweak I might have suggested were I in the writer's room. Have Kamilah continuing to argue with Tahani while she topples the statue. And then be injured or killed while Tahani is crushed. In that way Tahani's death gets overshadowed by her sister one last time.

I'm rewatching this episode now. I just realized that Eleanor says "Son of a bench" when the hidden stairs are revealed.

Jason, hell is rooting for a team with Blake Bortles as your QB.

OK, now I want to map them against the crew on Gilligan's Island. Let's see, add Mindy along with Michael and Janet, and we have seven.

Professor=Chidi
Skipper=Michael
Gilligan=Eleanor
Mr. Howell=Tahani

Ah, that's where it breaks down. Don't see a good match for Ginger, Maryanne, or Mrs. Howell. Tahani could be Mr. and Mrs. Howell for that matter.

Chidi, in one of your lectures I need you to go over Pascal's Wager, i.e. betting on the existence of God since the reward of being right would be so great. I think that would be pertinent to your situation.

 Jason may be a Ginger and Janet may be a Maryann. I like the idea of Maryann having near infinite power. They need an analog for coconuts, though. Coconuts that can be alcoholic beverages, radios, mri machines, flying drones, etc. What is the basic material of the universe? In Gilligan's island, definitely the coconut. 

I didn't like Tahani's story, but it did establish that the sister was a jerk and that, even so, Tahani caused her own death with her jealous anger and resentment. 

Is there a god in this show and is there a reward? We haven't heard a particle of evidence that faith gets you anywhere. Anyway, I prefer James. If knowing that god exists wouldn't change your behavior, it isn't important. 

[Anisky]

1 hour ago, CherithCutestory said:

Oh, wow.  Just because he is a tool of evil who delights in tormenting humans you assume he must be a liar?! You are exhibiting some serious anti-demon prejudice.

I can't decide whether I should

A) Hang my head in shame and resolve not to be so speciesist in the future, or

B) Point out that Michael created an entire fake reality for the purpose of deceiving the main characters about the very nature of their existence, flat-out lied to them about that existence nearly 800 times* and has lied to them daily for several hundred years about all manner of things in order to (1) torture them and (2) keep up the charade, so really I'm assuming he's a liar because I've observed him lie a lot.

I know that prejudiced people usually have some kind of rationalization why their assumptions aren't REALLY prejudice, though, so probably option A is the more appropriate one. I apologize and will look into getting some demon sensitivity training. 

;) 

 

*"Nearly" because of the butt reset, Eleanor walking in on his voice diary, the time Michael got drunk and ranted to Eleanor, and possibly a few others we don't know about.

 

1 hour ago, CherithCutestory said:

I think you are right. That fits with the video given to Mindy St. Clair. The Good Place wanted her. They fought for her. Sure she was a special case. But it's still interesting.

It makes sense why the Bad Place wanted her. They love torturing people. But the Good Place probably wants everyone they can get their hands on too. But the shuffling of souls to the good and bad place is usually automatic according to very specific rules.

If some souls were to cross the line then they likely would fight for them just like Michael pretended to.

 

I was also thinking about the video, actually, and how the Good Place representative seemed much more like "We want you but didn't manage to win that fight and had to compromise" and not at all like "Ehhh, we're not sure whether you're good enough for us to take you."  I ended up scrapping that post because it just felt like a vague vibe rather than evidence, but I'm glad that you brought it up, because I was definitely thinking the same thing! 

 

56 minutes ago, wilnil said:

I'd love to see how that was written in the script. It could also be "the Real Bad Place" as in "Very Bad" -- maybe there are supposed to be levels of badness, or at least Michael now wants them to think there is.

I doubt this is what he meant, just because if Michael's ever made a grammatical mistake, I haven't noticed it. If he meant to imply levels of badness, he'd have said "the really Bad Place". 

Edited October 6, 2017 by Anisky

[possibilities]

This "Bad Place" doesn't seem as bad as actual life on earth was, really. Except for the promise of it going on forever and the fear of a worse place hanging over them, they are dealing with some annoying stuff, but they are simultaneously freed from things like paying bills, illness, and other problems that existed in life. It's actually been a very safe and sometimes enjoyable situation for them. I think the show is not at all saying that people like them deserve eternal torment. It's making fun of how sometimes people say things like "I wanted to kill him because..." or how we delude ourselves when others can see plainly how messed up we are. I think it's actually a pretty kind show in that it shows that even when people are behaving in terrible ways, they are still people you can sympathize with once you see what's underneath it.

How do we know that you can't just take a train to the Good Place? You can take a train the the Medium Place without any difficulty, so for all we know, the only reason people don't escape is that they don't think of trying it.

[Fukui San]

14 minutes ago, possibilities said:

This "Bad Place" doesn't seem as bad as actual life on earth was, really.

Oh my God! THIS is the Bad Place!

[Terrafamilia]

I was left wondering if Kamilah or her parents had made a deal with the devil for such an astonishingly ridiculous level of success. People like that generally get drug to hell the Bad Place as soon as their time is up.

[zibnchy]

22 hours ago, Chris24601 said:

Also, while 11 months was the record, I saw that a whole lot of them lasted 6+ months. It doesn't mean much measured against eternity and may not even line up with Earthly time at all, but I feel safe now in saying that its been easily hundreds of years already for them (and poor Mindy with jer cocaine cravings) now.

I have a super large amount of knowledge about hell from being very in to Buffy back in the day and so I can definitely say it does not (line up with earthly time). Angel came back from being tortured for millions of years in hell and only a brief time had passed in Sunnydale.

[KaleyFirefly]

13 hours ago, morgan said:

I always go back to Defending Your Life, one of the funniest movies ever.  It wasn't that Albert Brooks' character was a bad guy, he just was a fearful anxious one who didn't grow/find his bravery while on earth.  Of course he didn't go to the bad place, just couldn't go to the good place.  

I love that movie! It was funny. I think of that movie from time to time, I don't know why. And I've recommended to people.

[KaleyFirefly]

8 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

I think this show might end up being a deconstruction of the very IDEA of a Good Place and a Bad Place, and how putting people into either a place of eternal happiness or eternal torment based on what they did in life is a really messed up thing to do in the first place. Especially in this universe, where even arbitrary things can get you sent to the Bad Place, and even the best people in history dont make the cut. The Fab Four all made mistakes in life and had issues, but they all had reasons why they were the way they were, and are all clearly capable of change. People are so complicated and so capable of bad behavior as well as good behavior and are so shaped by their pasts and issues and mental states and time and culture, that the idea of judging people so harshly, especially people like the Fab Four who are clearly capable of changing for the better, is basically pointless. 

I think this is the best description of this show.

[whiporee]

I said this last year, but I think the whole thing turns out to be Elenor in a coma with Michael acting as her guardian angel if sone sort, guiding her through understanding her life and foibles. 

Because Michael had it wrong. Eleanor's flaw isn't selfishness; it's that she actively avoids connecting with people. She calls it selfishness and Michael parrots it, but she's not selfish. She'd self-contained She doesn't trust other people at all. So this construct of her needing other people is helping her discover that.

The other thing that could be going on is that all four of them really know they weren't the good people they should have been, down deep in their souls. They're in the bad place because they believe, at their core, they belong in the bad place And this whole process is to to get them to either overcome or forgive themselves for those flaws, and get to be happy in eternity. Or back to Earth for the next go round. 

[wilnil]

1 hour ago, whiporee said:

Because Michael had it wrong. Eleanor's flaw isn't selfishness; it's that she actively avoids connecting with people. She calls it selfishness and Michael parrots it, but she's not selfish. She'd self-contained She doesn't trust other people at all. So this construct of her needing other people is helping her discover that.

 She was often self-contained, but on some occasions she accepted favors & other considerations from other people when she wasn't willing to reciprocate -- one big example we got was the designated-driver rotation in her circle of drinking buddies. She would accept rides but would never be the DD herself, until her friends got sick of that, which is probably one reason she was out buying Lonely Gal Margarita Mix for One the day she died.

[Anela]

18 hours ago, CooperTV said:

I'm glad the show is continuing with its perfect set-up from last season:

1) If you have severe anxiety issues, you deserve to die in the most idiotic way possible and go to hell to be tortured.

2) If you're victim of emotional abuse and your parents never loved you and you always wanted to prove yourself to them anyway or being noticed (because that's how emotionally or otherwise abused children usually act), you deserve to die in the most idiotic way possible and to to hell to be tortured;

3) If you're mentally challenged and fall for life of crime, you deserve to die in the most idiotic way possible and go to hell to be tortured.

That's show is so cute!

I have anxiety issues, and I find the show funny. I think it's cute.

funniest line for me, was Tahani's, "I died in Cleveland?!" Oh, the horror. 

[clack]

Show still hasn't addressed why Michael chose Jason to psychologically torture. He's too stupid to subtly torment, as this episode again makes explicit.

Is there an in-world explanation, or did the writers add Jason for comedic effect, even though his presence doesn't make sense?

[arc]

2 hours ago, clack said:

Show still hasn't addressed why Michael chose Jason to psychologically torture. He's too stupid to subtly torment, as this episode again makes explicit.

Is there an in-world explanation, or did the writers add Jason for comedic effect, even though his presence doesn't make sense?

The s1 finale had Michael explaining that Jason having to be Jianyu would make him miserable. His obvious stupidity would make Eleanor miserable since she’d be sure he would get them both caught. And Tahani would be miserable that she would never feel a connection with her soulmate.

[Milburn Stone]

3 hours ago, clack said:

Show still hasn't addressed why Michael chose Jason to psychologically torture. He's too stupid to subtly torment, as this episode again makes explicit.

Is there an in-world explanation, or did the writers add Jason for comedic effect, even though his presence doesn't make sense?

I think his presence does make sense. Those who qualify for The Bad Place seem to be people who, one way or the other, failed to live up to the potential that human beings have as a species. (Not failed to live up to their own potential, failed to live up to the potential of being human.) Jason, in his abject stupidity, failed by a long shot.

[clack]

11 minutes ago, Milburn Stone said:

I think his presence does make sense. Those who qualify for The Bad Place seem to be people who, one way or the other, failed to live up to the potential that human beings have as a species. (Not failed to live up to their own potential, failed to live up to the potential of being human.) Jason, in his abject stupidity, failed by a long shot.

Jason maybe belongs in the real Bad Place, but why would he make a good candidate for the fake Good Place? It's not that he's uniquely qualified to make Tahini miserable -- you can just get one of the demons to pose as Tahini's soulmate, as Hot Fireman did with Eleanor.

Michael's grand plan supposedly relies on Jason being tormented by having to pose, silently, as a monk for thousands of years. Michael ("look, a sparkler!") knows that Jason is not capable of that.

And again, why choose Jason, who has the mental capacities of (at best) a 12-year old, out of all the millions of dead people as a subject for subtle psychological torture?  Wouldn't it be mostly wasted on him?

[possibilities]

We did see that Jason was involved in criminal activities. So by the "impact on others" points system, he's not an innocent moron, he's actively hurt people.

I figure Michael could have chosen other people for his experiment but he only got 4 so he chose 4 and tried to make it work. Michael is at best a middle management sort of demon, not an overlord with unlimited options.

Edited October 7, 2017 by possibilities

[Amarsir]

On 10/6/2017 at 3:50 PM, Anisky said:

Also, interestingly, Michael's explanations so far match up with what Michael Schur has said about the show: That Mindy and the Medium Place are real, that Janet isn't in on it, and the average length of each reboot. Unless Schur is lying in his interviews in order to mess with us, so far Michael has been more truthful than I'd have expected. What he tells them about the number of attempts matches what we saw last episode, too.

I don't think Michael had an incentive to lie, other than when he offered the real "Good Place" when he needed to convince them. His description of humans as cockroaches is completely consistent with how he has acted toward them. And you don't need to lie to cockroaches. 

In fact, we haven't really seen him or any of the fake-good-place demons acting like they actively hate humans. There's a rant here or there about elbows or such, but then I also believe he genuinely enjoyed paperclips and other things. His job is torturing humans, and his experiment was to make it more fun for himself. But if that isn't working he doesn't really have a motivation beyond self-preservation at this point.

[Fukui San]

Based on their deaths, I think Michael may have landed the "Young people with wacky deaths" account.  

[Affogato]

10 minutes ago, Amarsir said:

I don't think Michael had an incentive to lie, other than when he offered the real "Good Place" when he needed to convince them. His description of humans as cockroaches is completely consistent with how he has acted toward them. And you don't need to lie to cockroaches. 

In fact, we haven't really seen him or any of the fake-good-place demons acting like they actively hate humans. There's a rant here or there about elbows or such, but then I also believe he genuinely enjoyed paperclips and other things. His job is torturing humans, and his experiment was to make it more fun for himself. But if that isn't working he doesn't really have a motivation beyond self-preservation at this point.

I think 'cockroach' isn't actually a perjorative, I think it is a 'cockroaches surviving a nuclear blast' kind of thing.

It also is an interesting ethical question. A lot of them, however much they like paperclips, also really miss biting and nibbling and twisting and so on. They know the humans don't like this behavior, even if it is an enjoyable paid job for the demons. At what point does it become hate, or something close enough? If you are human, does it matter?

4 hours ago, clack said:

Jason maybe belongs in the real Bad Place, but why would he make a good candidate for the fake Good Place? It's not that he's uniquely qualified to make Tahini miserable -- you can just get one of the demons to pose as Tahini's soulmate, as Hot Fireman did with Eleanor.

Michael's grand plan supposedly relies on Jason being tormented by having to pose, silently, as a monk for thousands of years. Michael ("look, a sparkler!") knows that Jason is not capable of that.

And again, why choose Jason, who has the mental capacities of (at best) a 12-year old, out of all the millions of dead people as a subject for subtle psychological torture?  Wouldn't it be mostly wasted on him?

Jason isn't developmentally disabled, though. He is like a holy innocent, or something like one. I don't know if it will come into play but I don't think he's just a stupid criminal with a pretty face, I think he's something else.

[Affogato]

18 hours ago, wilnil said:

 She was often self-contained, but on some occasions she accepted favors & other considerations from other people when she wasn't willing to reciprocate -- one big example we got was the designated-driver rotation in her circle of drinking buddies. She would accept rides but would never be the DD herself, until her friends got sick of that, which is probably one reason she was out buying Lonely Gal Margarita Mix for One the day she died.

I tend to agree, her selfishness isolated her.

[MDKNIGHT]

Do people think Michael was telling the truth about HOW good somebody has to be toget to the Good Place and also do you think he was telling the truth when he said Florence Nightingale and all the philosophers didn't make it?  Michael has lied so much I don't know what to believe.

Tahani helped people but for the wrong reasons, Chidi basically talked a lot but didn't actually do anything (except for driving people crazy) but had good intentions.  Both extremes seem to have been enough to get them to the bad place.

I think Janet is going to be very interesting to watch since over 800 reboots must have made a lot of changes.  The first reboot made her able to fight for her love of Jason.  I only wish we could have seen some of her reboot results because the first time with the cactus was hysterical.

[Chaos Theory]

If you think to much about it you will just give yourself a stomachache.

 

I think it was the pilot where a whole bunch of arbitrary scores were shown that often contradicted each other.  You got a bunch of points for eating vegan but then lost points each time you talked about eating vegan unprompted.  Things like that.

 

Ths is a breezy comedy so none of the Fab Four can be evil evils who evil.  They are essentially what most of us would consider middle people otherwise a show like this wouldnt really work.  We just couldn't root for Eleanor if she was a true dirtbag so instead the show has made her incredibly redeemable and by having her played by Kristen Bell insanely likeable.

Edited October 8, 2017 by Chaos Theory

[AnnieBeez]

I hope the next episode finally gets the show rolling. I'm losing patience.

 

Re: Tahani  She should've been my clue to the twist last season. I kept wondering how she could be considered a "good" person.  I think Chidi came closest. He didn't intend to torture those around him with his indecision. And I don't remember his indecision as only being related to ethics--wasn't it pretty much any decision? 

[ZoqFotPik]

23 minutes ago, PuhLeeze said:

And I don't remember his indecision as only being related to ethics--wasn't it pretty much any decision? 

Yes it was everything. He couldn't tell a colleague he didn't like his boots. He wasted an entire recess deciding who to pick on his team. He couldn't plan his friends bachelor party, He couldn't decide what bar to go to or what to order at restaurants. 

[Moozer]

3 hours ago, MDKNIGHT said:

I think Janet is going to be very interesting to watch since over 800 reboots must have made a lot of changes.  The first reboot made her able to fight for her love of Jason.  I only wish we could have seen some of her reboot results because the first time with the cactus was hysterical.

I was really hoping to see Michael's office filled with more and more cactus during the reboot montage last week!

[Amarsir]

Michael taking ethics lessons from Chidi makes sense from Eleanor's standpoint as a thing for her to demand. But I don't know if it actually makes sense. Chidi can only teach theories of ethics, most of which contradict each other. Micheal has first-hand knowledge of the big picture that no human philosopher ever did.

Of course this could lead to comedy. "Jeremy Bentham taught ..." "Well he's in The Bad Place wearing pants made of scorpions right now, so are you sure you want to take advice from him?"

[Big Mother]

how can jason keep his mouth shut? he'll surely blab to vicky at some point and Michael's jig will be up.

[Fukui San]

Vicky and everyone else knows Jason is Jason. I'd think eventually in many attempts he gets found out, and there's some sort of new storyline for him. 

He wont blow it until he reveals info that he knows what's really up to a demon. 

Edited October 8, 2017 by Fukui San

[CletusMusashi]

Jason = Gilligan

Michael= Skipper

Chidi = Professor

Tahani = Ginger

Janet = Maryann

Eleanor/ Mindy = The Howells

[callie lee 29]

Yay, after finally getting my power back on since Hurricane Irma (3 weeks+) I can finally catch up!!

Every time Tahani starts getting to be a little too much, they show her parent and/or her  sister and I'm right back to TeamTahani.  Her parents were horrible, but her sister is/was an insufferable little twat. Jason is still fantastic. And I'm with him #JagsfortheSuperBowl!! (After the Bucs of course)  Janet 302.0 is going to have a major impact towards getting to the Good Place. She has to. After this many reboots she could probably defeat Sean all on her own.