#tgp meta

[ranchthoughts]

The Good Place and MSP: Pacing and Narrative Structure [a crossover for a probably tiny audience]

this post will contain spoilers for The Good Place and My School President so be forewarned!

I was watching a couple of videos about The Good Place by the youtube channel Pillar of Garbage (this one and this one) and it sparked some *thoughts* which reminded me of one of my powerpoint presentations on MSP that I made.

Basically, The Good Place (TGP) and My School President (MSP) have an atypical narrative structure and in particular atypical pacing compared to other shows like them or the shows we might expect them to be.

Firstly, both shows have “premature” big reveals:

halfway through the first season of TGP, Eleanor admits that she is in the Good Place by mistake, instead of filling an entire season or more with her hijinks as she tries to hide that fact

MSP establishes that Tinn is not an unmoved cool guy out to get Gun but in fact a soft, pining gay romantic in the first episode, a reveal which in other shows hasn’t happened until the mid-point of the season or even the very end

Secondly, both shows move through plot lines more quickly than other shows would:

TGP introduces several season- or episode-spanning concepts and then move past them with in an episode or two: e.g., season 2 of TGP starts with all the characters being rebooted in a second go-round of the Good Place experiment, and it seems the whole second season will be much like the first with the characters only realizing they are in the Bad Place at the end → in the second episode of the season Eleanor figures out they are in the Bad Place; and episode 3 of the season (Dance Dance Resolution) has them speed run through hundreds of reboots, representing possible seasons of content.

practically every problem introduced in MSP is resolved by the end of the episode: e.g., Sound is introduced and wants to take over the club → by the end of the episode Gun is back in charge and Sound has been welcomed into the fold; or Tinn knows Gun’s mother is sick but she tells him not to tell Gun → in the next scene Gun finds out, a couple of scenes later things are smoothed over with Tinn, and by the end of the episode we know Gun’s mother is going to be ok; a girl gives Tinn sweets and compliments him which makes Gun jealous → in the next scene we learn it was a case of mistaken identity. As a result, there is little protracted drama or angst (especially revolving around miscommunication) in MSP compared to other BL shows

Thirdly, both shows don’t always have us win:

e.g., at the end of season 2 of TGP, when Eleanor is on her quest to be a better person, she isn’t rewarded for it, it makes her life harder, and she falls back into her old ways

e.g., in MSP, Chinzilla doesn’t win Hot Wave

It was really interesting reading through peoples’ speculations on social media while TGP and MSP were airing about where these shows were heading next, as invariably there were people thinking of other shows (sitcoms, BLs, etc.) and expecting these shows to go those routes (e.g., expanding relatively simple premises over full seasons, or extensive plotlines and drama steeped in miscommunication and jealousy). But then the next episode of TGP or MSP would air and blow through a full season’s premise in half an episode or sidestep all the most dramatic possibilities

Because of these three things (“premature” reveals, quick pacing, the protagonists don’t always win), TGP and MSP felt fresh week after week. We didn’t know where TGP was going to go next, and MSP was flipping the conventional BL narrative arcs and plot devices on their heads. The shows felt confident: they didn’t need to stretch things out over multiple episodes or full seasons because they knew they had more than enough compelling narrative material to keep going.

These shows surprised us, but at the same time the progression of the story and the characters felt more realistic than in other shows. The characters in TGP face setbacks but ultimately grow as people over the course of the show, and the characters of MSP communicate with each other like most real-life friends and partners would and don’t get mired down in extended miscommunication plotlines.

Also shoutout to this post by @distant-screaming that reminded me of the narrative/pacing section my MSP ppt

[disregardcanon]

i was thinking about how deeply rwby has changed over time (not in a bad way, just in that way where the status quo is decimated almost on a volume by volume basis) and i think that my best point of comparison for something like that is the good place.

sure, you can recommend one of these shows with just the original premise (and it’s a good premise), but so much of the joy and nuance of the show comes from knowing that the status quo gets destroyed and everything changes.

sure, the premise of “college kids learn how to fight monsters and fight crime while dealing with personal drama and prejudice” is a fun premise just like “bad person gets into heaven due to a clerical error” is a fun premise, but both of these things don’t get to the meat of what’s really impressive about these shows.

also it’s hard to balance the “don’t spoil things” culture with the “actually if you don’t have a spoiler or two you won’t have any idea what you’re actually getting into” reality of the thing being presented here.

[roseofithaca]

Hellstrop/Cheleanor parallel I can’t believe it took me this long to notice...Chidi and Eleanor’s first kind of ‘moment’ happens at the end of episode one where Chidi is begrudgingly helping a drunken Eleanor go to bed and she has this vulnerable moment where she realises she’s dead and asks if he thinks anyone cared that she died, and as annoyed as Chidi has been with her, you see that sliver of sympathy and understanding start to show from him that grows as the show goes on...

Kinda similar to a certain demon’s existential crisis which ended in him burning out after a drunken party binge and needing to be comforted by a certain human who has been distrustful and annoyed with him until that point and starts to slowly understand him and feel sorry for him...

And now I’m headcanoning that Eleanor helped take his shoes off and get him comfy on the couch to sleep when she realised he didn’t have a bed to crash on. And maybe she even tucked him in and told Janet to make sure Vicky and the others didn’t disturb him....

Then she woke him up banging pots and pans together because that little bench tortured her for 300 years and she still wants payback.

[cecret-with-a-c]

Scalding hot take, but maybe the events of TGP would've been even more emotionally impactful if memories, once erased, couldn't be recovered.

Take into account what this would mean for Chidi's confidence, Michael's remorse and guilt, the bonds of the gang and everyone's growth.

Don't get me wrong, I don't particularly like this idea. And tbh I would feel like something lacked solving. But I'm just saying maybe we would've cried even harder and some things would end up being more meaningful.

Okay, now you can stone me, I won't fight it.

[elsaclack]

SPOILERS FOR THE GOOD PLACE!!!I just watched the new the good place ep and am just wrecked. I hope you did too, because I would love to hear your thoughts on this ep! Like I already love chidi/Eleanor and that ep just proves how amazing they are. And the NOTE! SO PERFECT! I had felt chidi was sidelined this season, but damn, they made it up . Also what a performance by WJH. So many perfect elements, would love to hear your thoughts on this!

listen i just……….like the tension…….the romance……..the fact that chidi is back in that end of s3 mentality…………..the fact that jason spilled his freaky cocktail for a full 20 minutes……….the DRAMA

no but for real i’m gonna try to put this into words because i’ve been thinking about it a lot and i’m still struggling to articulate exactly how i feel

in previous seasons when we’ve had flashbacks to the characters’ lives on earth, it was always about how their negative behavior impacted the people around them, but in that episode we got to see how chidi’s negative behavior impacted himself - how what started as something good and noble quickly snowballed into a legitimately paralyzing obsession that stole any semblance of joy from his life AND afterlife. case and point, when he was legitimately falling in love with eleanor in the midst of a system designed to torture both of them and he ended up clinging to his strict moral code and denied both eleanor and himself the pleasure of being together. the moral code he developed to be a safe haven was a direct source of his unhappiness. how On Brand

chidi spent his entire life AND AFTERLIFE looking for the answer to one major moral problem: how do i be the most morally perfect person in the universe? and it all came down to him realizing that no matter how much he deliberates and belly aches and agonizes over the moral impact of every micro-decision he’ll ever make, there will NEVER be an answer - the world is made of philosophical grey areas and there are always exceptions to every rule, meaning that the world is chaos, and there is no solution to chaos on a mass global scale. might as well throw some peeps in that chili pot. who cares.

and then, MUCH LIKE THE FRAMEWORK OF THE EPISODE ITSELF his mindset shifted from global to individual. how do i be a good person to and for the people i love? and once that shift occurred, it all became really easy: the answer to all of his moral problems in his universe is eleanor. eleanor makes him decisive, eleanor makes him brave, eleanor makes him leave the safety of his cozy library apartment and experience life, eleanor, eleanor, eleanor. eleanor is the answer. eleanor has always been the answer. it’s the yin and the yang of a healthy relationship played out over the course of an eternal afterlife. chidi has become a braver and more decisive person, and eleanor has become a kinder and more empathetic person, and those changes are a direct effect of each other’s influence. other people’s too, of course - but from their very first day in the afterlife, it’s been chidi and eleanor. and through every twist and turn and valley and mountain since then, it’s been chidi and eleanor.

there may not be such a thing as soulmates in that traditional fanfic trope kind of way, but what chidi and eleanor have is about as close as anyone could hope to get.

[captain-harpo]

I feel like the obvious solution on the good place, and the one they’re moving towards story-wise, is to replace the bad place with a “get better place”. It would be consistent with how often they push the point that people can improve if they’re given the proper tools. If they go down that route it would also be a direct parallel to the prison system on earth and its ramifications, which is probably something Mike Schur is interested in doing.

[thetolkiengeek]

what she says: im fine

what she means: chidi is the lynchpin of team cockroach and without his inherent goodness and his desire to help, none of the events of tgp could have happened and the fact that eleanor went to him for help each time is a sign that she wanted to change and the fact that chidi helped each time is a sign that he believes in the inherent goodness of people, and eleanor going to chidi and choosing to be vulnerable with him doesn’t just mean that she wants to be a good person but that she’s finally believes in her own goodness, and her finding peace with erasing all of chidi’s memories shows just how much she has grown as a person and how selfless she’s willing to be, and chidi’s own confidence in the correctness of his decision, the fact that he actually made a decision, shows how much he has also grown as a person

[katoska]

I need to unpack some Michael&Eleanor stuff in the episode Chillaxing. This is, as always, not a very nice read of Michael’s motivations in this episode. You have been warned.

Tl;dr: Torturing Chidi hadn’t been for his benefit, but for Eleanor’s (and Michael’s own)

So, it starts with Chidi being super-relaxed and having a lot of free time because Brent quit his lessons.

Eleanor and Michael are both shocked how happy Chidi can be when he’s not busy. 

Eleanor says bitterly: ”Well, I guess once you have the burden of saving humanity removed from your brain, life is dandy.” referencing both a) Chidi’s mind-wipe AND b) her own stress from having to be Saviour Of The Universe. 

Those are two different angers with two different sources. Only one of them is Chidi’s fault. The other one is Michael’s. And isn’t it funny how her words  pretty much echo what Michael said last week? He said Eleanor arguably made the bigger sacrifice (anger b)) and “Chidi gets to live blissfully unaware of what he gave up” (anger a)). Crazy foreshadowing, Eleanor getting angry exactly about what Michael said she should be angry about.

So Michael, *for some reason*, thinks the problem here is that Chidi is way too happy, rather than him not having anything to do. Somehow, him being miserable will lead to him helping other people. Even though the only reason Chidi is so “chillaxed” is because Brent had quit so there’s no one around to help. (Just give him someone to help! Chidi isn’t Brent; he doesn’t need misery to realize his flaws. He NEEDS SOMEONE TO HELP! And vice versa.)

Anyway, Michael suggest they torture Chidi. They get him to help Jason (excellent! that’s what he needed! a Person To Help!) and it makes Chidi rather miserable, which so far is just a necessary evil. Eleanor counts the misery as a success because to her, misery=growth or something, plus she is fucking angry at a) Chidi for abandoning her and she is ALSO angry that b) she has to save the whole universe. So she tortures Chidi way harder than necessary for both those issues. 

What I think is, Michael hadn’t really suggested the torture for Chidi’s sake, but for Eleanor’s. She had a lot of supressed rage to work through, so Michael pointed that Blamehose squarely at Chidi before she could unleash it on himself. He set this up in the previous episode when he said the thing about Chidi getting to be blissfully unaware while Eleanor has to live with her sacrifices. Eleanor is not happy but Chidi is, so Chidi gets the blame even though half of Eleanor’s unhappiness is due to Michael’s panick attack.

Anyway, eventually Eleanor gets disgusted at her own vindictiveness and abuse of her power and breaks down. The tears flow, Michael subtly lets Chidi know that he has the power to make him explode if he keeps bothering them and marches Chidi out of the office. Then he tells Eleanor it’s ok to let herself feel her anger (at Chidi) even if it’s slightly irrational and unfair (to Chidi).

Chidi finds the solution to his problems himself once he stops getting tortured and offers to make Jason better - as had been the plan with “Jianyu” all along before the torture started.