Foto

The Good Place Referenced the Bad Place at the Beginning

W hile Eleanor, Michael, and the rest of The Good Place crew is handling a whole new set of problems in Season Three, the Michael Schur creation is one of those shows that's always worth a rewatch. And if there's one group of people dedicated to the cause, it's the good people of Reddit. This week, a user with the handle Kidlike101 hit the r/TheGoodPlace boards with his or her own perfectly Good Place Season One theory :

I decided to rewatch the series again today. It might be reaching but there are quite a few 9 rings/circles throughout the episode. Nine plates decorating the yougrat [sic] place, nice [sic] gears over Eleanor's bed, nine shrimps (Reaching but I thought it was fun) and I think there might be more.

For those who haven't brushed up recently on their 14th century Italian poetry, the user is referencing Dante's Inferno —more specifically, the nine circles that comprise hell. It's definitely an interesting theory, and it's not too far off the course from Schur's style. He has admitted that he's placed more than a few easter eggs in for eagle-eyed viewers that know what they're looking for.

The only con to the theory is that Schur has stated that the writer's room purposefully tries to avoid iconography that might allude to any specific religion, and the Divine Comedy , comprised of Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso, relies pretty heavily on Catholicism, but all those circular nines? Once it's pointed out, it's pretty hard to deny.

Big hat tip to those Good Place fans who bring their deep cut literature knowledge to a rewatch. Now: head back to season two and see if we can find any connections to Purgatory.

Esquire.com .

ADVERTISEMENT - CONTINUE READING BELOW