The Good Place finale
Jan. 11th, 2021 01:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sorcyressEzri and I finished watching The Good Place today!
To be more accurate, we had each separately watched the first three seasons of it, and then decided we should watch season four together. So yesterday we watched eight episodes and today we watched five and now we're done!
I cried a lot for the last episode because I really really liked it.
One of the things I liked most about the last episode was that the show actually gave us a real, true, goodbye with the characters. The plot of the show really did finish with the second to last episode --they figured out the way to make the Good Place non-brain-mushy and that was the Happily Ever After the show needed.
And then...they gave us one more episode to say all our goodbyes.
I finished watching another show recently as well (with a big ol' ensemble cast) and while you got little brief flashes of all the side characters, it was during the climactic final battle, so you don't really get to see their happily ever afters1. I remarked to Ezri that I wanted one more episode so I could see what the characters did next.
Good Place...gave me that one more. And it made me sob happy tears most of the way through it, because that is how people should go out, thousands of Bearimys from now. When they're ready. When they've found their peace, and said their goodbyes.
Also, Jason essentially becoming an actual monk for a few thousand Bearimys is dope and I am here for it. Especially just like...Manny Jacinto wandering around in beautiful wooded scenery is a soothe for my soul. (What can I say, I'm a sucker for cheekbones and recognition of non-binary identities)
The first few episodes of season four were hard to get into -- I'm not sure when I watched season three, but it was definitely more than a year ago, and I just felt...it was a little too much "yeah, yeah, we've seen all this wackyness before, Eleanor is insecure, Jason is dumb, whatever". But it hit its stride and it continued its story and it ended things...well. Beautifully. Honestly. Fucking _delightfully_.
Also, how absolutely over-the-moon PUMPED am I about the end of Season Four, in which Jason saves the day by paying attention to Janet and recognizing that Janet is not-a-girl? Like, this is a character who is _so_ empowering to me, and as soon as she skipped that line I felt my heart break a little, because I can't bear my role model to decide she thinks its okay for her friends to call her a girl or whatever. But that wasn't it! It was Bad Janet all along and Jason used that to figure it out and *happy shrieking*.
One last observation, which has no important bearing on anything, but I am entertained to have noticed it: in an earlier episode when Elanor is talking to the judge, she starts listing all the friends from Friends, and winds up concluding that 5/6 would wind up in the bad place. The only one who doesn't? Well, it's the same actress as who winds up helping them save the day in the second-to-last episode when they are actually in the good place! I know nothing about Friends, but I thought it was a cute connection!
I recommend the show, if you like smart, earnest, loving sitcoms. It has some of the best-made twists and turns on television, and it grows in a truly enjoyable way. Also? Every single one of the main six is a legit snack.
Let's all try to make the world a better place, yanno?
~Sor
MOOP!
1: Okay, except [redacted polyam trio] ADOPTED [redacted probably-no-longer-evil] character and it's so cute and I love it so much that was my favourite part of that finale damn!
To be more accurate, we had each separately watched the first three seasons of it, and then decided we should watch season four together. So yesterday we watched eight episodes and today we watched five and now we're done!
I cried a lot for the last episode because I really really liked it.
One of the things I liked most about the last episode was that the show actually gave us a real, true, goodbye with the characters. The plot of the show really did finish with the second to last episode --they figured out the way to make the Good Place non-brain-mushy and that was the Happily Ever After the show needed.
And then...they gave us one more episode to say all our goodbyes.
I finished watching another show recently as well (with a big ol' ensemble cast) and while you got little brief flashes of all the side characters, it was during the climactic final battle, so you don't really get to see their happily ever afters1. I remarked to Ezri that I wanted one more episode so I could see what the characters did next.
Good Place...gave me that one more. And it made me sob happy tears most of the way through it, because that is how people should go out, thousands of Bearimys from now. When they're ready. When they've found their peace, and said their goodbyes.
Also, Jason essentially becoming an actual monk for a few thousand Bearimys is dope and I am here for it. Especially just like...Manny Jacinto wandering around in beautiful wooded scenery is a soothe for my soul. (What can I say, I'm a sucker for cheekbones and recognition of non-binary identities)
The first few episodes of season four were hard to get into -- I'm not sure when I watched season three, but it was definitely more than a year ago, and I just felt...it was a little too much "yeah, yeah, we've seen all this wackyness before, Eleanor is insecure, Jason is dumb, whatever". But it hit its stride and it continued its story and it ended things...well. Beautifully. Honestly. Fucking _delightfully_.
Also, how absolutely over-the-moon PUMPED am I about the end of Season Four, in which Jason saves the day by paying attention to Janet and recognizing that Janet is not-a-girl? Like, this is a character who is _so_ empowering to me, and as soon as she skipped that line I felt my heart break a little, because I can't bear my role model to decide she thinks its okay for her friends to call her a girl or whatever. But that wasn't it! It was Bad Janet all along and Jason used that to figure it out and *happy shrieking*.
One last observation, which has no important bearing on anything, but I am entertained to have noticed it: in an earlier episode when Elanor is talking to the judge, she starts listing all the friends from Friends, and winds up concluding that 5/6 would wind up in the bad place. The only one who doesn't? Well, it's the same actress as who winds up helping them save the day in the second-to-last episode when they are actually in the good place! I know nothing about Friends, but I thought it was a cute connection!
I recommend the show, if you like smart, earnest, loving sitcoms. It has some of the best-made twists and turns on television, and it grows in a truly enjoyable way. Also? Every single one of the main six is a legit snack.
Let's all try to make the world a better place, yanno?
~Sor
MOOP!
1: Okay, except [redacted polyam trio] ADOPTED [redacted probably-no-longer-evil] character and it's so cute and I love it so much that was my favourite part of that finale damn!
no subject
on 2021-01-21 07:46 pm (UTC)(Catching up.)
Yeah, totally agreed -- I pretty much adored The Good Place from start to finish, but the finale sealed the deal and put it on my personal list of The Something Like 20 Best TV Shows of All Time. It was beautiful, and a little sad, but a sort of good sad: a recognition of life and transformation and ending that you almost never see on TV.
(Kate and I watched the final episodes of The Good Place, Watchmen and Good Omens on nearly consecutive evenings, leaving me with the conclusion that that was the best week of television I would ever experience.)