The Good Place: Will the Judge change the entire point system?
The third season of The Good Place has been all about finding the problem with the point system. Now that Michael knows, will the Judge help him fix it?
Now that The Good Place has given us exactly what’s wrong with the point system, we have more of a problem than we thought.
It’s not that the Bad Place has done any tampering with it. No—it’s just that our world has gotten so much bigger and more involved that unintended consequences happen. Even if you do a good deed, the ways and means behind it might still give you negative points.
So at the end of this week’s episode, when Michael realized the Good Place committee will be zero help, he did the next best thing: He called the Judge. You know, the one he’s been avoiding for well over a year because their little experiment went very sideways.
But… will Judge Gen be able to help? Will she want to help after everything they’ve done? Michael is coming with the four humans in tow, so there’s nothing left to lose, nowhere else to go. He and Janet can present their manifesto, but will it add much to their cause? They wrote it before they discovered the wildness that has become the point system.
Those unintended consequences are the bane of all good things. Sure, you can surprise your grandma with flowers, but if pesticides were used and they weren’t grown naturally, if you take a photo of her surprise using your phone that was built in a sweatshop in a third-world country, you’ll end up losing points.
But none of those things are your fault! There has to be a way to do something about it so that your good points don’t get dinged by someone else’s wrongdoings. And that means The Good Place is getting ready to throw it all out the window again.
We have two episodes left until season 3 ends. We already know it will end on a bonkers cliffhanger and leave us waiting until September.
Michael will be going to the Interdimensional Hole of Pancakes and most likely asking the Judge to radically change the point system. As one of the only neutral parties in the universe, Gen may be the only person who can fix it at all.
But will she?
Michael’s pulled a lot of stunts over the past year. He started out as a demon architect in the Bad Place, and now he’s fighting for humanity. He’s not an impartial person, but he has a big heart.
Maybe it will depend on how bored Judge Gen is and what other shows she has to binge-watch on her plate. And if she does agree to take another look and make some adjustments, will everything get reset once more?
Will Team Cockroach still have a chance to make it into the Good Place, even if it’s not by what they did with their time on Earth, but what they’ve done since dying (again)? They might just find themselves with tickets into eternal happiness.