- ❝ You know the thing is, the problem really, with being a do-gooder? No one cares ❞
- —Eleanor
Chapter 26: Somewhere Else is the 13th and final episode of Season 2 of The Good Place.
Plot[]
Michael makes a plea and Eleanor looks to take the high road in the season two finale - Michael tries to pull a rabbit out of a hat.
Summary[]
While the humans plus Janet make their last confessions to one another, including Chidi kissing Eleanor, Michael tries to argue with the Judge that the current system of judging people into the Good and Bad places is unfair — his experiment proved that humans can change, even after death. Gen is seemingly unconvinced, believing that the humans' improvement was spurred purely for their desire for a reward at the end (in this case, getting into the Good Place), and she and Michael attempt to hammer out a solution, eventually posing two options: either the humans go to the Bad Place, or spend an unknown amount of time in personal Medium Places apart from each other as Michael works their case. Eleanor protests that neither idea sounds appealing, and Michael has a third idea — what if the humans were just given the "right push"? Gen is intrigued, and snaps her fingers before Eleanor can ask what is going on.
Eleanor is alive again, back on Earth, and has been saved from her death by a mysterious figure. Shaken to the core, she realizes that she's been wasting her life being a terrible person and strives to be a better one. She proceeds to quit her shady job and gets a new one at an environmental organization, and generally acts kinder to her coworkers and the people around her, including coming clean to her roommate about the "Dress Bitch" fiasco. However, this newfound resolve to improve herself eventually crumbles, and after six months, she's reverted back to her trashy ways.
Distraught, Michael subtly intervenes by posing as a friendly bartender. He listens to Eleanor's stories and points out that she's expecting a reward for being a good person. He asks her to consider "what we owe to each other". This question spurs her to read about philosophy, eventually stumbling upon a three-hour online lecture by Chidi on the topic of why people do good things. Eleanor then flies to Sydney and asks to speak with him.
After Michael and Judge Gen confer about what they will do to solve the case, their proposal is refused by Eleanor. The other possible solution was to send all four back to Earth, and if they could be accepted into the Good Place by the end of their lives, the case would be solved though Michael and Gen speak vaguely about it, eventually they decide on this course of action.
The four friends are sent back to Earth, where it shows Eleanor almost getting killed, but right before it would have happened, a mysterious person pulls her away from the danger. She then realizes she almost died, and she makes a superb effort to be a good person for six months, even joining the environmental group whose employee she often tortures, but after things start going downhill again, Eleanor gives up. Six months later Michael appears as a bartender on Earth and talks to her about "what we owe to each other."
It just turns out that Chidi gave a speech on that topic, and Eleanor watches it on her laptop. She then packs up and sets off to St. John's University in Sydney, Australia, where Chidi is a professor. She enters his room, sits down, and the episode cuts to Michael returning to Janet ready to watch their lives play out.
Cast[]
Main Cast
- Kristen Bell as Eleanor Shellstrop
- William Jackson Harper as Chidi Anagonye
- Jameela Jamil as Tahani Al-Jamil
- D'Arcy Carden as Janet
- Manny Jacinto as Jason Mendoza
- Ted Danson as Michael
Guest Starring
- Maya Rudolph as Judge
- Angela Trimbur as Madison
- Seth Morris as Wallace
- Allyn Rachel as Betsy
Co-Starring Cast
- Meryl Hathaway as Brittany
- John Hartman as Joe
- David Piggott as Frim
- Ben Harris as Waiter Stenn
Trivia[]
- This is the highest rated episode of Season 2 with a rating of 8.9 on IMDb.
- Ted Danson used to be a bartender. He throws a towel over his shoulder and leans against the bar to talk to her, then it was similar to his character Sam Malone on Cheers.
- Features the song "Maybe" by The Submarines.
Gallery[]
