The Good Place – Snowplow

By: Ariba Bhuvad

The meddling continues in this week’s episode of The Good Place and it leads to less than ideal circumstances for Michael (Ted Danson) and Janet (D’Arcy Carden). Managing to escape the grip of the Judge (Maya Rudolph), the two of them find themselves on Earth again trying to keep the group together. They won’t return to the afterlife until they are certain Chidi (William Jackson Harper), Eleanor (Kristen Bell), Jason (Manny Jacinto), and Tahani (Jameela Jamil) have all been saved. This is proving to be more difficult than they anticipated but they refuse to give up.

They keep a close watch over the group with the use of cameras and microphones as the months go by and the study continues to develop according to plan. But about three months in Eleanor realizes that she didn’t anticipate staying in Australia for so long and may have to go back home as a result. Enter meddling Michael. He conveniently leaves a lottery ticket for her to find which gives her $18,000 in prize money.

Another three months go by and Tahani starts to feel her lonely hormones kicking in and looks to Jason to do something about them. Concerned it will be another thing that could ruin the group dynamic, Michael intervenes by bringing in one of Tahani’s exes into the picture. They instantly hit it off and somehow his insecure, self-deprecating personality suits Tahani’s overconfident one. But Michael’s meddling took an unexpected turn here when Tahani and Larry (Ben Lawson) end up engaged some months later and plan to move back to London.

Chidi and Simone (Kirby Howell-Baptiste) decide that given Tahani is leaving anyway, this is a good stopping point for the study and will allow them time to analyze the data and look ahead to redoing it with new subjects. This upsets Eleanor greatly and though she suggests that the group stay together, everyone seems pretty set on leaving. She lashes out and storms out of Tahani’s engagement party, distressed over losing the first real group of friends she’s ever had.

Later, Simone finds Eleanor outside Tahani’s HeirBnB (yes, that’s a thing on The Good Place) and she has calmed down considerably and asks Simone why she reacted the way she did to everyone leaving. Simone’s diagnosis? Eleanor is afraid to be alone and the thought of going back to that frightens her.

After apologizing to the group for her irrational behavior, Eleanor and the group collectively decide to have an annual reunion to ensure that they keep in touch and stay in each other’s lives. Naturally, Michael is furious at the group falling apart and once again pulls out the metaphorical snowplow to meddle. Despite Janet trying to convince him not to, he bends her words and decides that he has to sneak into the Judge’s room and reset the timeline on Earth.

But there’s just one teensy problem. As Michael summons the magical golden door to go back to the afterlife, he and Janet turn around to find Eleanor, Chidi, Tahani, and Jason standing there wondering–what the hell is going on?