The Good Place on NBC

I mean, on Star Trek. He should show up in The Good Place too, though

i mean, i liked pushing daisies (or maybe i liked anna friel), it just was a little suffocating and cloying

i finished s1

it's weird that this is such an LA show and the only Latino is a criminal with the moral and mental capacity of a 12-y.-o. whose innocent stupidity is played for laughs

i know it's churlish, as is noting there appear to be no gay people despite kb's luggy side

happy_shruggie.gif

I don't think anyone in the show is from anywhere near LA (Eleanor: Arizona; Chidi: Nigeria/Senegal; Tahani: UK; Jason: Florida)? Does "LA show" mean something more general? Also, I think Jason is Filipino-American; idk if that makes it better or not.

I thought Antonio and Gunner played a gay couple on the first season, too. Don't know if that counts.

*in

If anything makes me uncomfortable, I think it's that Jason's character might come close to being actually intellectually disabled at times but it is always played for laughs. I don't have a clear opinion about it yet, just a potential red flag.

the neighborhood is like a parody of LA suburbs i.e. all the frozen yogurt, sunshine etc, but it's true it's neither here nor there as far as my discomfort around that character goes.

i like the show! i just wish it could be a little braver about race (and gender and sexual identity)

There are four main human characters on the show, only one of whom (and arguably the least moral of them) is white. Two of the others are an African philosophy professor and a British Asian millionaire philanthropist, neither of which seem like stereotypical or insulting portrayals. I don't think it's statistically unrealistic that all four would be predominantly heterosexual. What am I missing?

the fact that the only latino is a borderline-retarded criminal

but yes i take your point

He's not Latino!

ha okay well i guess i am dumm sorry everyone

i think its cool that they went with unknowns for jason, tahani, and chidi. i looked them up and chidi and jason have done almost nothing! and tahani would only be known by people who watch british music chart shows on t.v. completely unknown here.

yeah, he's filipino on the show. and filipino/chinese in real life.

and even jason thinks that heaven is racist. he says so on the show.

i know jameela! we used to work together. here's a picture i took of her once. v proud of how it came out

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/640x360/p01pqps9.jpg

I think it's that Jason's character might come close to being actually intellectually disabled at times but it is always played for laughs

That's a bit heavy! I thought the character was a parody of a lamebro Youtuber / Viner type

Tracer: whoa!

The Jason character seems more culturally dumb to me than mentally challenged? I’ve known people who were actually book smart who come off more naive. I think he’s just... from Florida.

jameela and kristin bell are two of the most beautiful people on television, but I kind of like that the show doesn't really play up their beauty

Chidi is a well known NY stage actor

as soon as I read that, my first thought was "so what L&O episode was he on?"

one way back in 2010, looks like

lol

"Chidi is a well known NY stage actor"

which kinda means unknown. in t.v. terms.

i just think it's cool that they are not people who have been in 10 different awful people sitcoms.

I get a little bit of cognitive dissonance watching this show and realizing that Eleanor and Chidi, or at least the actors playing them, are my age. At least I'm not in hell.... I think.

xp he was also in High Maintenance!

I have to agree that people who regularly do (or have done) stage work are better at actual acting. Or at least I hold to that bias.

I liked him in Paterson too.

one more slightly dim filipino-american bro on a lighthearted-look-at-existential-dilemmas-focused primetime show and we'll officially have a trend (see also josh chan on CRAZY EX-GIRLFRIEND)

I like The Good Place a lot more as a show but tbf, at least in Crazy Ex-Gf, you also saw Josh's family (incl e.g. a doctor father iirc) and friends (incl a Filipino-American priest). But yeah, I was wondering if this is a Filipino-American stereotype I didn't really know about.

jason's friends from the old days show up briefly in flashbacks. crazy ex girlfriend does have a season and double the episode length on the good place...

I remember Jason's friends being similarly dumb but I could be forgetting. Second point is totally fair and I do think Good Place is mostly really good on race.

no one is arguing for unjust slandering of floridians I see

Yeah, it might be more of a Florida stereotype than anything.

It is 100% a Florida stereotype

you know you're in the bad place if your soulmate doesn't even know who blake bortles is

anti-Florida, anti-dj bigotry is acceptable

that's not music...that's EDM!

jetskis, dance crew, djs, drugs, jetskis... imo Jason's life had it all

also his friend Pillboy, who is DOPE

I lol every time he talks about Pillboy

also: wings

I want to order wings now.

wings are dope

It was a good call.

i don't know about chidi, making him senegalese (?) but coming up with an in-world excuse for playing him as a culturally unmarked american (or i guess, culturally highbrow = cosmopolitan, conventional social identity left behind) plays exactly on the nose for his portrayal of a philosophy professor (seriously, pitch-perfect), but it also sets them up to not have any need to address black identity.

everyone is equal in death

- thomas hobbes

Chidi should speak French in the flashbacks. Where was he supposed to live? It's hard to tell because you get his grown friend, the Australian professor, the English-speaking girlfriend in bed...

we binged the first season in like 2 days - i like it a lot

i think he moved around a lot doing post-docs and shit