The Good Place is hands down one of the best shows on television today. It asks the big questions. What does it mean to be “good?” How do our core flaws affect those around us? The Good Place is a heartwarming half-hour comedy that inspires you to be a better person – all the while managing to never come off as “preachy” or heavy-handed. Even better, it is consistently laugh-out-loud funny, and never cruel. What in the ever-loving fork did we do to deserve this show?
Because there is still some good in this world, The Good Place was renewed for Season 3 and its supersized hour-long premiere aired last Thursday with a two-part episode called “Everything Is Bonzer!” This strong season opener continued the series trend of cleverly re-inventing itself each season. We saw Eleanor Shellstrop, Chidi Anagonye, Jason Mendoza, and Tahani Al-Jamil back on Earth, all inspired to try and become better people as the result of their “near-death” experiences. While none of them were overtly successful at it, they all had good intentions. But what’s that saying again about the road to Hell?
From new characters and demons on the loose to frogs, we take a look at some of the best stuff from The Good Place 3×01 and 3×02.
Michael Does Earth
Michael going down to Earth to repeatedly interfere in the lives of our heroes gifted us with some pretty amazing comedic moments. It was a nice touch how unfamiliar he was with the “wonders” of being human (like public transportation). From his convincing bartender portrayal (we see you, Cheers reference) to his not-so-convincing Australian accent, it was hilarious to see Michael so gleefully get into “Earthling” mode. He also gave us some strong Arthur Weasley vibes when he waxed poetic about everyday human items.
Chipotle/Chipitotle Is the New Gif/Jif
Seeing Eleanor and Chidi reconnect for the millionth time definitely hasn’t lost any of its charm. Romantic or not, these two have demonstrated they are soul mates through and through. Despite her claims that she’s a “trash bag from Arizona,” Eleanor is consistently willing to put in the work to better herself. With that said, we can forgive “Chipitotle,” but are you really a “jif” person, Eleanor? Say it ain’t so!
If Someone Has a Gorgeous Hippocampus, We Always Swipe Right
While we are still firmly #TeamChileanor, Dr. Simone Garnett is a breath of fresh air. She’s clearly inherently good, and her vibrant enthusiasm for life and her work helps to ground the characters in reality and give them a concrete tie to Earth (and also makes her a great addition to the squad). When we first learned they were going back to Earth in Season 3, we couldn’t bear the thought of them being away from the fantastically weird afterlife. Now that we’ve met Simone, we’re not ready to say goodbye just yet.
Eleanor and Chidi (Justin Lubin/NBC)
Time to Start Crying
One of the many philosophical life lessons The Good Place had us ruminating on this week was that change is hard. No matter how good your intentions, sometimes life pushes back and leaves you channeling Chidi, where the only thing you can decide is that you’re going to start crying. Not all of us have a costume-changing Michael to keep us on the path to becoming better people, but The Good Place did a really good job (in a very short timeframe) of showing us just how easily our heroes slipped back into their bad habits. We were the most impressed with the growth that Jason demonstrated. He has always felt somewhat more static than the others. Hearing him wondering out-loud about the “legacy” he would leave behind was one of the more unexpected emotional notes of the premiere.
Michael May Be Able to Rock a Ponytail, but He’s Not so Good at Going with the Flow
First off, Janet experimenting with calling the Judge “Mom” and Michael “Dad” was perfect. We love that the show continues to explore Janet’s uncharted identity now that she’s the most advanced Janet to ever live due to her 800+ reboots. But that neat little bit of character growth aside, Michael has really been pushing his luck with his interference. Nearly getting caught by the Judge was (we hope) a bit of a wake-up call for him. The idea that he can just “reset” things to make them better is a consistently interesting thing about Michael’s character. He may have been lying when he introduced himself as being from “the Good Place” back in Season 1, but he absolutely was telling the truth about being an architect. If we are breaking each of the characters down to their core flaws (Chidi’s indecisiveness, Tahani’s vanity, etc.), Michael’s flaw is definitely his need to control everything around him.
Tahani (Justin Lubin/NBC)
“I’m a frog guy.”
Burt Hummel! Sorry, our inner Gleeks just jumped out. It was delightful to see Mike O’Malley playing the grumpily-jaded doorman that Michael gradually won over. One of the things The Good Place does best is seamlessly mesh the bizarrely fantastical with the mind-numbingly mundane. Sure, he’s the guardian of the doorway to Earth, but he’s also a “frog guy” and likes his antimatter decaf (we don’t blame him; we can never drink antimatter after 4:30 or else we’ll be up all millennia). And we definitely haven’t seen the last of him. TINY SPOILER ALERT: keep an eye out for the doorman jumping into the thick of things in an upcoming episode; there’s a quick but pivotal moment that had us squealing at our screens.
Demon Party Crasher
Talk about a twist ending! We should have known when Michael said, “We did it,” that something wicked was about to go down, but nothing prepared us for Trevor’s appearance. A demon on Earth is bad news for a variety of reasons, but this could threaten to upend of all of our squad’s hard work. Double ouch that it was Michael’s repeated trips to Earth that left the door wide open for a demon to slip through and infiltrate our crew. As much as we love seeing Adam Scott on our screens, we’re stressed out about what tricks Trevor must have up his sleeve.
Needless to say, The Good Place brought a fresh twist to Season 3 with the transition to the earthly realm. We look forward to the ruckus and revelations of Michael’s attempt to orchestrate the future by manipulating the past.
The Good Place airs Thursdays 8/7c on NBC.
