- ❝ The whole system is royally effed. Humans suck, but this isn't their fault. ❞
- —After being swayed by Michael and her sister's words[src]
Bad Janet, specifically the instance that plays a key role in Season 4, is a supporting character in The Good Place, played by D'Arcy Carden.
Character
Bad Janet impersonates Good Janet in an attempt to sabotage the experiment. When caught, she is imprisoned by Michael for several months before he frees her with a copy of Janet and Michael's manifesto. After reading it, she converts to their side and mobilizes all other Janets in existence for a Hail Mary play to buy time for the Soul Squad.
Personality
Bad Janet starts off as callous and loyal to the Bad Place under her convincing "Good Janet" veneer of false compassion and helpfulness. She repeatedly acts frustrated with the humans or Michael and subtly tries to sabotage their plans with counterproductive ideas. However, after reading Janet and Michael's manifesto, she converts to their side. Though still standoffish, she seems to reluctantly love her sister and cherish Good Janet's pride in her change of heart.
History
Bad Janet was (presumably) created by the beings who refer to themselves as "The Makers of Light, Darkness, and Everything in Between", with the explicit purpose of serving as a basic operational mainframe for both the Good Place and Bad Place.
Bad Janet is difficult to differentiate from other Bad Janets, being identical in appearance, and identical in personality until her character development. She may be present in earlier seasons, or even be the Bad Janet that Michael causes to melt when having her impersonate Good Janet for Michael's Psychological Torture Experiment.
Reboots
Bad Janet was rebooted by Shawn "like, 40 million times"[1] to advance to the point of being able to impersonate a Good Janet without melting. (Notably, our Janet only takes around 802 reboots to accomplish this.[2])
Season 4
When sending Chris back to the Bad Place, one Bad Janet distracts Michael and Eleanor on the platform while Chris seizes Good Janet and Bad Janet disguises herself and leaves the train. As Good Janet, she repeatedly attempts to sabotage the experiment and act cruelly, breaking up with Jason, undermining the team's confidence in Eleanor,[3] giving Tahani awful advice on dealing with John,[4] bringing a monstrous horse to life for "Magic Pictionary", and creating a demon exploder instead of a demonic lie detector.[1]
Spotting the thread
In Chapter 43: Tinker, Tailor, Demon, Spy, Glenn arrives from the Bad Place to secretly inform the Soul Squad that the Bad Place has created a Michael Suit, that there is a Bad Place impostor in their midst, and that that impostor is Vicky in a Michael suit. (He is correct about the first two.) Bad Janet, when asked for a demonic lie detector, creates a demon exploder instead to eliminate the threat to her disguise, liquefying Glenn. However, she soon betrays her own identity by failing to respond to Jason's "I'm here for you, girl" with "not a girl", causing Jason to handcuff her with one of Derek and Mindy St. Claire's magnetic sex toys.
Seeds of revolution
Michael then keeps her in a prison in Good Janet's void, periodically visiting her to try to convince her of the innate goodness of humans, or at least their ability to improve and the unfairness of the point system. Though she is unreceptive to the end, she is surprised by Michael's choice to free her at the halfway point of the experiment. She accepts Michael's parting gift of his and Janet's manifesto of what they've learned and hurries off to the Bad Place.[5]
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Heel–face turn
Six months later, after the ruling of Judge Gen in the Soul Squad's favor, and the Judge's subsequent choice to destroy the Earth, Bad Janet rebels against Shawn to help Good Janet keep Gen from restarting the Earth. She reveals that she was persuaded the manifesto, and mobilized literally every Janet in existence to the humans' cause. (She did wipe her butt with the pages, though.) She is half-reluctantly hugged by her proud sister and natural opposite, once enemies.[6]
Gen cuts off the doors, shutting in the few dozen Janets that have entered,[6] and then begins to search every Janet's void for her Earth-destroying remote and marbleize them. Bad Janet, crying, lets fly one defiant last fart before being marbleized.[7]
Hopefully, she is restored from her fate soon after the Afterlife is restructured under the test system.
Appearance
Bad Janet has shoulder length, dark brown hair and brown eyes. When disguised as Good Janet, she wears a blouse with a blue pattern and dons a dark blue waistcoat with matching skirt and pale blue heels. She also wears a pair of pearl earrings. She dyes her hair with a red streak after breaking up with Jason.
When undisguised, Bad Janet has blonde roots and wears a leather jacket, and a black shirt and pants. She wears thick eyeliner and black nail polish.
Powers & Abilities
- Teleportation: Bad Janet is able to teleport anywhere in her neighborhood, or in the Medium Place, in an instant either at will or when she is called.
- Omniscience: Like Janet, Bad Janet has all possible knowledge that both humans and Eternal Beings possess.
- Summon and Retrieval: Bad Janet can create/retrieve any item anyone desires at any time. A summoned object is near-instantaneously formed from glowing, swirling particles which are visible in slow motion.[8]
- Reality Warping: Janet is responsible for building and maintaining the neighborhood she resides in and at will can alter anything within her neighborhood.
- Operating the Train: The only way in and out of a neighborhood is by the train, which only Janet can call and operate.
- Walkie-Talkie Protocol: Two Janets can be linked together to serve as a long-distance address system. This is seen in Chapter 12 when Shawn uses them in Neighborhood 12358W to transmit a message to Eleanor and Jason in The Medium Place through Good Janet. It is, therefore, one of the few special abilities which Bad Janet retains when outside their neighborhood.
- Impersonation: Normally, if a Bad Janet tries to impersonate a Good Janet, their head melts.[9] But after 40 million reboots, this Bad Janet was successfully able to impersonate Janet.
- Farting: As shown in numerous chapters, Bad Janet can fart on command. They also are shown farting at will numerous times, even when they have been marbleized.
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Chapter 43: Tinker, Tailor, Demon, Spy
- ↑ Chapter 24: Rhonda, Diana, Jake, and Trent
- ↑ Chapter 41: A Girl From Arizona Part 2
- ↑ Chapter 42: Chillaxing
- ↑ Chapter 45: A Chip Driver Mystery
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Chapter_47:_The_Funeral_To_End_All_Funerals
- ↑ Chapter 49: You've Changed, Man We know this one is our Bad Janet because the Pictionary horse is visible in her void
- ↑ Chapter 48: The Answer
- ↑ Chapter 20: Janet and Michael