The Good Place – A Fractured Inheritance

By: Ariba Bhuvad

In this week’s episode of The Good Place, “A Fractured Inheritance” Eleanor (Kristen Bell) tracks down her mom, Donna, (Leslie Grossman) Feeling angered and betrayed, Eleanor is anything but enthusiastic about finding her mom, despite Michael’s (Ted Danson) constant reminders of the end goal–to ensure Donna is on the track to get into The Good Place.

Of course, Eleanor lasts all of five seconds before she starts screaming at Donna about abandoning her and starting a new life with a new name–Diana Tremaine. Given how hectic things have been lately, Michael tries to explain to Eleanor that he chose not to tell her about her mother, but maybe if he had, things might have gone differently.

After yelling at her mother, Michael and Eleanor go inside her mother’s new home and it’s actually quite impressive and we don’t just mean the house. Donna, er Diana, not only has a new house but she lives with her boyfriend Dave (Andy Daly) and his daughter Patricia (Stella Edwards), who seem to love her very, very much. None of this is fooling Eleanor who truly believes her mom is just scamming this family and when the opportunity is right, she’ll flee just like she always does.

But nothing seems to prove Eleanor right–no matter how hard she tries. She asks Dave about how he first met her mom and he says it was while he was visiting a bar he was supposed to be tearing down (he’s an architect) and Donna/Diana was inside drinking. She aggressively confronted him after learning about his intentions to tear down the bar and their encounter led to some sexcapades in the bathroom–and, well, the rest is history.  

It seems like Donna/Diana is actually doing okay and may not need any form of intervention like they previously thought. But Eleanor truly believes she knows her mother and is dead set on finding any proof she can of lies and deceit.

Later that day, Eleanor and Michael join Donna/Diana and Dave at a PTA meeting where Donna/Diana is running for PTA President. She gives a heartfelt speech and tells everyone she went from pub crawling to this and she wants to do this all for a special girl as she points out Patricia. As her first kid, it’s hard to watch Eleanor in this moment because she’s crushed by her mother’s ability to love another kid the way she never loved her.

Assuming that Dave has no idea about Diana/Donna’s past, Eleanor tries to snitch on her mother only to learn that she has already told Dave everything–and we mean everything. Eleanor takes this to mean that her mother is using honesty as a tool to scam Dave and Patricia and remains stuck on the notion her mother is lying. When Michael asks Eleanor why she can’t just accept that her mother could have changed, she realizes it’s because she was never there for Eleanor in this way. And, perhaps, Eleanor wasn’t enough for her mother to want to change as she has now.

Eleanor goes to apologize to Diana/Donna later on and accidentally finds a secret stash of money, the very same stash she was hoping to find earlier. Her mother comes clean about saving up money just in case, but it’s at that moment that Eleanor does something selfless. She tells Donna/Diana that she doesn’t need to do this anymore and she should accept the happiness she has found and tells her to use the money she has saved up towards Patricia.

While Eleanor deals with her mother, Tahani (Jameela Jamil), Chidi (William Jackson Harper), Jason (Manny Jacinto) and Janet (D’Arcy Carden) are all in Budapest for Kamilah’s (Rebecca Hazlewood) art exhibit. The hope here is that Tahani can help guide Kamilah to be a better person to ensure she gets into The Good Place. However, this proves to be rather difficult as suppressed feelings of anger and resentment surface all too quickly when the sisters come face to face.

Tahani attempts to apologize, but Kamilah shuts her down and rejects the apology immediately. And this all happens right after Tahani refuses to take the omelette that Kamilah is making for all the guests, which dramatically leads her to shut down everything. By not accepting her apology, Tahani is infuriated and starts throwing eggs at a painting of eggs, which guests of the exhibit take note of and think it’s part of Kamilah’s artistry.

When Chidi tries to speak with Kamilah he fails horribly because she gets to him given her way with words and the fact that she “took away all his fears.” Left with no other choice, Tahani threatens Kamilah and says she has to accept the apology otherwise she will destroy the entire exhibit. Kamilah thinks Tahani is simply bluffing and refuses her again. Tahani attempts to use the ax by hitting the table, but is then escorted away by the security guards before she can cause further damage. While sitting around handcuffed, Tahani suddenly realizes the rift in her and Kamilah’s relationship is all because of their parents. They always pit them against one another and created an environment of competition so the two could never really bond as siblings. In fact, Tahani has a flashback to when they were young girls and their parents created a competition where each of them had an allotted amount of time to create a painting and the best one would win.

Realizing this is the motivation and inspiration for Kamiah’s art, she gives her sister a huge hug and apologizes for everything that has happened. They mutually agree their parents are wankers and really screwed them up with their contests. Later on, Tahani learns that Kamilah has named the exhibition “A Fractured Inheritance” and even gives her sister a shout-out in an article.

As the episode closes out, Michael reveals a huge, huge secret to Eleanor. And while this isn’t exactly shocking (because we already know), it is for this Eleanor who has no idea of everything that has taken place during her time in The Good Place. The reveal comes after Eleanor shares how happy she is for her mother, but she’s still damaged from the past and it makes it hard to forget everything so quickly. She believes this is why she can’t tell anyone she loves them–but we know this isn’t true. Michael tells Eleanor that in one of The Good Place repeated simulations, she and Chidi said “I love you” to one another. Uh, what now?