What I’m Watching: The Good Place

The Good Place: Season 2, Episode 11 “Rhonda, Diana, Jake, and Trent” (B+)

The train has officially left the neighborhood and now we’re on to the exciting, nail-biting activities in literal Hell where they have to pretend to be demons just like everyone else around them. It was a lot of fun seeing them try to blend in after Michael went through their disguises and they all responded to what he said. Tahani’s was undoubtedly the most impressive, putting on an American accent and still managing to name-drop as frequently as possible. Jason fit in best, trading balltaps and generally behaving in a dumb way with the torturer played by Dax Shepard, who just happens to be Kristen Bell’s real-life husband, hence his casual encounter with Eleanor which didn’t indicate all that much of a spark. Chidi, naturally, struggled most, and kudos to him for coming through in the end and suggesting something that he knew had worked well on Eleanor, who apparently had done some reading of her own without even being assigned, before delivering an unexpected balltap of his own. The representations of them on stage were pretty spot-on, and it was great to see Michael learn what he did from his human friends and sacrifice himself so that the four of them could make it through the portal to go face the judge. After hearing Nick Offerman’s voice as the giant slug demon Michael briefly met, I can’t wait to find out who is going to play the judge and whether he’ll be sympathetic at all to our reformed friends. They do have their uses, like Jason’s very crucial use of the Molotov cocktail to help them get away.