Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Post
  • Reply
Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

Vietnamwees posted:

If it were Vicki, then the Michael suit would have a limp.

My mind immediately jumped to Vicki simply because of the 'boo yah' thing.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007
I think Michael's definitely been replaced but Vicki or whoever just biding her time.

The show starts off with a recap of the skin suit and the gang even talk about how they don't get why the Bad Place would try something so obvious.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007
I think that's just good acting from Kristen Bell and it's not the first time we've seen Michael give a pep talk. It's not like the writers knew that she was going to pour her heart out into the scene.

We get told that Eleanor was loving things up by being in charge so Michael uncharacteristically reinforces her will to stay instead of opting for the greater good and letting somebody else take over. We also know that he's lying about faking the breakdown and putting Eleanor in charge which goes against Michael normally being completely honest with Eleanor.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

LORD OF BOOTY posted:

I do feel like the idea of two Michaels is still plausible.

I love how every crazy theory could be plausible simply because the show is that well written.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

Xelkelvos posted:

There's literally zero telegraphing of a fake Janet

Not saying Janet is fake but Janet breaking up with Jason and telling him about Bortles is pretty uncharacteristic of her. Even the thing this episode when Tahani asks about her hair and you would have expected her to say, 'it's not hair'.

Stabbey_the_Clown posted:

Exactly my point. You cannot have a real Janet and a Fake Michael because they went onto the train together. Therefore if Janet is real, Michael must also be real.

It's worth noting that Janet gets off the train first not to mention the bad place could have turned her off or paused her or did whatever the plot needed to do. Michael could be easily seen as someone offering help while subtly egging the other person on.

It's pretty clear that something is off from the gang back to torturing each other or making each other miserable to the hooded figure we see at the end.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007
The thing about Michael being an imposter basically boils down to the Michael suit.

It was a key item in the last finale, it was raised again in the Bad Place mini episodes and they raised it up here in the first and second episode.

Michael might very well be real but it'd be weird, especially for such a tight show, to keep talking about how the Bad Place has this item and then not doing anything with it.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

Arist posted:

What is this, the local?

Writes a two thousand word essay about the ethics of a racist train.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

Sloth Life posted:

I wonder if playing Good Janet for bad reasons will become a habit and eventually Bad Janet will be Neutral Janet. The experiment itself fails miserably but team cockroach win because Glenn and BJ are no longer actually evil.

I really liked this theory.

The experiment fails but bad people doing good deeds (even for the wrong reasons) inspires other people to keep trying and be better.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007
As somebody who's lost friends and family to suicide, the ending was complete garbage.

Having the majority of the cast basically commit suicide one after the other was a terrible way for things to go especially when there was a non door alternative like Tahani.

You might feel that you've accomplished all you've set out to do in life but I can tell you for a fact that the hole you leave in your absence will never, ever be filled. Eleanor should have looked at that calender and then broken down forever because hey, that's what happens in real life.

It is incredibly selfish to just up and go and not think about the people you leave behind.

The last two episodes basically ruined the whole show.

Why bother trying to do good and helping other people because of what you owe to them if the ultimate outcome is that you say gently caress you to all your loved ones and just leave.

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007
There's a good discussion to be had about what eternity means or the non Buddhist equivalent of escaping the cycle of rebirth but the door isn't it. It is 100% suicide.

The comparison to end of life euthanasia is grotseque to say the least. None of the cast were suffering, they weren't sick or unwell, they weren't physically or cognitively impaired or near the end of their lives. If they wanted to make a point about euthansia or assisted suicide then they should have aged the characters or shown that they weren't the same people they were before.

Instead you have the same people who now have all their needs met, are clearly still healthy and happy, who still have meaningful relationships with people but got bored and decided to end it all.

As one of the other posters pointed out, Tahani was the only person who understood the point of the show. Nobody should be forced to suffer for eternity but we have a responsibility to help and be good to the people around us.

The fact that they're all dead doesn't matter because the door is clealy suppose to represent death. You're taken away out of existence from everybody and anybody who's ever known you. Janet even makes the point that even she doesn't know what happens to you after you go through the door in the same way that we don't know what the afterlife is going to be like.

For a show where the main message was that we should keep trying to do good and help others because of what we owe to them, the ending is such a huge disconnect.

What was the point of it all? That all you needed was to do a certain number of good acts or to act good for a certain amount of time and that's it?

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

Concurred posted:

However, if you look at it in the context of the show, with people dying on Earth and moving on to the next phase of their existence, it becomes clearer for what it really is: a door that returns you back to the universe. Can our human perspectives even begin to contemplate what perfect contentment would be compared to all reality? I'm sure we think we could. The show throws around the term 'eternal being' quite a lot, but nobody watching can even begin to perceive of eternity.

What if you didn't want eternity? What if you were at a point where eternity had nothing more to offer? Shouldn't you be able to make that choice?

In the context of experiencing eternity then death or non existence would be a valid option but in the context of the show, it goes against everything they've worked towards.

Isn't the main thesis of the show that we should do good because we owe it to those around us?

It's not something that has an expiry date or a point where you're suppose to go 'well that's my debt paid up'.

If your presence helps people, if there are people around you that still depend on you then the ethical thing to do would be to stay. Being in heaven shouldn't somehow cancel that obligation you have to the people around you. We try, we might succeed or fail but we try again.

On top of that, it's not like the feeling to go was an overwhelming compulsion. Jason was ready until something happened and he still had more to do. Tahani redirected it to doing more to help people. etc

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Kegslayer
Jul 23, 2007

Azhais posted:

People really seen to be taking "What we owe to each other" to be "What you owe to me"

Nobody is obligated to stick around on the off chance you need them for something

No but under contractualism, the obligation that we have to each other isn't limited by time or the amount of good deeds we've already done.

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • Post
  • Reply