Spoiler Free Summary
“The Good Place”, a surprisingly philosophical comedy about Eleanor Shelstrop, her gang of friends, and their misadventures in the afterlife, just wrapped up its fourth and final season. For an American comedy, such a short run would typically signal failure. In this case, the delightful, and hilarious show burned fast and bright with constant reinvention, which kept the show from bogging down in its central premise. That it did not overstay its welcome, or quickly exhaust the limits of its premise, is a minor miracle and a credit to the inventiveness of its creators.
It ended just about when it should have, and though I have both theological and philosophical disagreements with the premise and the shows finale, which I will discuss in detail below the fold, on the whole it was enjoyable, though occasionally crude and vulgar, and entirely worthy of a binge watch now that it’s over.
★★★ (3/3 - Must See)
In-Depth Thoughts
(SPOILER ALERT!)
In addition to being good fun, the show is also quite philosophical. Eleanore’s love interest, Chidi, was a moral philosophy professor on earth, and in the afterlife he becomes the remedial morality tutor for Eleanor and the other dropouts, apparently in the Good Place by accident, who must now figure out how to be truly good. During the course of the show they name drop philosophers, including Aristotle and Kant, and discuss moral philosophies like deontology, virtue ethics, and nihilism, in bitesized form, of course. They even enact a hilarious, if bloody, portrayal of the famous Trolly Problem. Probably the first, and only time, that will ever be played for laughs.
From the outset, I was concerned about two potential disasters: 1) that they would portray a vision of the afterlife offensive to Christians, which is usually how religion and religion-adjacent material is intentionally or unintentionally handled by Hollywood, and 2) that they would pretty much immediately run out of material to sustain their premise over the usual length of a comedy show.
They presented a vision of the afterlife that was too quirky and whimsical, and too unlike any particular religion, to be taken too seriously, and anyway the show is too much fun for it’s theological deficiencies to detract too much from enjoyment.
The latter problem, they solved by modifying the premise at least every season, usually multiple times a season. Season one had the biggest change in its final episode when we discover that Eleanor and Co. are not, in fact, in the Good Place, but in the Bad Place. Michael, played brilliantly by Ted Danson, is not a pseudo-angelic figure, but a demon who devised an innovative form of torture—other people. (I don’t think Satres’ “No Exit” was mentioned, but they clearly had that in mind when conceiving of the show.) Season two threatened to simply repeat the premise since Michael reboots their memories when they figure out where they truly are. But it blows through the rinse and repeat routine in the first few episodes and the show never stops adding new wrinkles, keeping it fresh and exciting.
The gang ends up at various times in the Medium Place, in the Bad Place proper, in the anteroom to the Good Place, in the courtroom of a cosmic Judge who threatens to reset the entire universe, back on earth for a second try, and at long last in the Real Good Place, only to discover that it’s not all its cracked up to be.
After saving humanity from an automatic damnation resulting from a flaw in the points-based eternal rewards system, and then saving the entire universe from the Judge’s reset, they are rewarded with entry into the Good Place, which they must also save. In the Good Place everything is so relentlessly and ceaselessly amazing that everyone there eventually becomes a pleasure zombie, bored and befuddled by never ending delights that eventually cease to be delightful.
This final twist was, in some ways, their most philosophically satisfying. Never-ending pleasure and infinite earthly life, which is essentially what the Good Place is, would never satisfy, because finite goods could never provide infinite happiness. Thus an infinite succession of them would become tedious. This is easily observed in life. Think of how delicious the first bight of a large helping of ice cream is, and how unremarkable is the last.
All finite goods provide only finite pleasure. And yet, we never stop desiring something.
The show, naturally, fails to take this extra step and observe that though finite things cannot satisfy infinitely, we do nevertheless have infinite desire. That we desire infinitely, ultimately points to our desire for Goodness itself, that is, for God—as C. S. Lewis famously argued.
Instead, they fix the Good Place by creating an option for self-annihilation. This brings meaning again to their lives in the Good Place, since they know their lives can end. After many lifetimes worth of experiences and moral growth in the real Good Place, our heroes eventually come to peace with themselves. Having done and become everything they could ever want, they are left merely with a desire to end their unearthly existences. They walk into a lovely forrest and blissfully dissolve into a pleasant sparkly shower of spirit-dust, which rains down on humanity and makes everyone on earth just a little bit better.
There is no God here, and thus no beatific vision. No real heaven, no real Good Place. This show that is ostensibly about the afterlife is ultimately just about life itself, which in the minds of the creators ends in total death and darkness. It would have been better, I think, for them simply to leave the question open. Instead, by conclusively answering that question, the end cannot help but feel ultimately sad and hollow.
For this reason, the show becomes a good apologetic for Christianity, if only by showing that the very best that an atheist can hope for is ultimately not very meaningful. You can, by striving to be a good person, increase slightly the overall goodness of the world. But to what end? For what ultimate purpose? Everyone you ever touch with your goodness, every soul you save from damnation, every saint you help create, will ultimately dissolve into nothingness, as will anyone that they touched.
The same goes for the love of Eleanor and Chidi, another fulcrum around which the show turns. Through their love they help each other become as good and perfect as it is possible for each of them to be. But their love is ultimately not enough to satisfy. Chidi is first to choose annihilation. Eleanor, for her part, must let him go, despite the fact that she doesn’t want to, because she realizes that she is incapable of providing the infinite bliss that would make a person want endless life. The show presents it as being at peace, but I cannot help being reminded of the earlier faulty Good Place that had endless pleasure that ultimately did not satisfy. Not even their love can last, because it, too, is finite.
So much greater is the Christian vision of eternal life, in which our souls are forever radiant because we are in love with Love Himself and in loving him with his own infinite and perfect love, we live forever in unending blessedness.