In its second season, it started to feel likeThe Good Placecould do anything.
Years could pass in a blink.
The main setting Michaels cheerfully corrupt phony Heaven faded into oblivion.
Credit: Colleen Hayes/NBC
And the season 2 finale set the stage for another series-defining reset.
The show is timeless enough to be a parable and too funny to ever be preachy.
More importantly, Eleanor spoiled the end ofKangaroo Jack, youre welcome.
In his neighborhood, four dead bad people became better.
Thats not supposed to be possible, Michael noted.
Could people improve themselves in the afterlife?
And doesnt that lead to a provocative idea?
But then the Judge and Michael decided on a stopgap solution.
What fun to see the sub-Maggie Smith celebrities that would surround Tahani (Jameela Jamil)!
Again, that might still happen.
But this was the point where the finale laser-focused on Eleanor.
But the Judge was unsatisfied with their progress.
So there was another reboot, but this time even more reboot-ier.
Eleanor never died, was rescued from the shopping carts by a mystery man with perfect silver hair.
She became a Clean Energy Crusader.
She left her awful job.
Michael and Janet monitored her progress, ecstatic.
And then life got in the way.
It was harder to wake up in the morning with that same brush-with-death energy.
She ditched her job to catch a Taylor Swift reggae cover band.
A year after she escaped death, she found herself all alone at a bar.
(Her friend left her there, because her boyfriends wife was out of town.)
This was a light, kinetic take on heavy material.
Whole seasons of great dramas have focused on the difficulty of self-improvement in the face of daily human drudgery.
Im talkingSopranosseason 6, which began with a comatose Tony experiencing his own life-altering purgatory-verse.
When he woke up, he tried to be a better person Every day is a gift!
but time passed, and he stopped trying.
At the bar, Eleanor met her own personal Jacob.
After a long, boozy night, she asked him what she owed on her tab.
The real question, Eleanor, is what do we owe to each other?
This codephrase, a reference to T.M.
Scanlons famous philosophical text, activated something in Eleanor.
She looked it up on Google and found a video of Chidi.
But she watched in rapture.
Why choose to be good, if there is no guaranteed reward we can count on?
Eleanor flew to Sydney (SCREECHLOSTSCREECH) and knocked on Professor Chidis door.
she asked, meeting him again for the first time.
Eleanor, Chidi, Jason, and Tahani became better people in Hell.
This finale was less horrifying than last yearsBad Place revelation.
The Good Placeis about people who change, or want to.
Slightly-less-vain Tahani reached out to Eleanor in friendship.
Janet (DArcy Carden) has fallen in love, built a Derek, downloaded untold yottabytes of information.
Im not a girl, Janet reminded us.
Im also not a Janet anymore.
I dont know what I am!
Like the characters,The Good Placekeeps changing.
I dont know what it will be when it returns.
You suspect Eleanor and Co. wont spend the whole season in their Sideways-verse.
So knowingThe Good Place, well get there by, what, episode 5?
Ill be waiting patiently for next season.
In the meantime, I promise to eat my vegetables.
