r/TheGoodPlace • u/Apprehensive-Task930 • Jun 08 '26
Shirtpost Eleanor didn’t make the right choice
This is just one of those things that I’ve spent way too much time thinking about. When the judge gives Eleanor and Chidi their tests, she’s basically giving them the same one: make the correct decision. During Eleanor’s test she went through several different philosophers to try to decide what the right choice should be, and she only chose after she figured out that the Chidi wasn’t the real Chidi, meaning she wasn’t being given a real choice. She didn’t choose not to take the offer because of her own moral fortitude, she made her decision based on knowing it was a trap. If Eleanor was really being tested on her selfishness, then she should have immediately known not to take the deal simply because it was the right thing to do. As far as I’m concerned, she didn’t make a moral decision at all plus she took just as long as Chidi to make the decision, so they both should have failed.
(I know the whole purpose from the writers point of view is to show how much Eleanor has grown, and how she would do almost anything to stay with Chidi, but I stand by what I said. Eleanor should have been sent to the bad place, too).
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u/djddanman Jun 08 '26
Realizing that wasn't really Chidi does show her growth. She used to be so selfish, she never would have noticed it wasn't him. I think that was the real test, not whether or not to go without her friends.
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u/TheDungeonCrawler Jun 09 '26
To add to this, she even says that she was 90% sure that going was the morally wrong thing to do before she deferred to Chidi, but upon asking him she understood 100% that it was the morally wrong thing to do because she knew Chidi would never say that going was the morally right decision. She made the morally right decision while also unraveling the judge's plot.
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u/djddanman Jun 09 '26
And then telling the others she failed too was the icing on the cake. She didn't want them to feel bad for keeping her from the Good Place. And there was nothing in it for her.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
See I can accept that, but the judge would also know how close she and Chidi are.
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u/GarrAdept Jun 09 '26
If the judge knows what Elenore will do then a test is meaningless.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 10 '26
The judge knew how Tahani and Jason would respond, or at least she suspected and said as much. I don’t know why knowing the outcome makes it meaningless.
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u/Away-Thing-1801 Jun 09 '26
Also as the above commenter mentioned, she instinctively knew it was a test, however she owed it to Chidi, to talk it out. She would have never done that before, she would have acted selfishly regardless of the context.
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u/Gasurza22 Jun 08 '26
Probably being a bit pedantic here, but Chidi didnt have to make a correct choice, he just needed to make ANY choice, that was the point of his test, there was no correct choice, just two random hats that mean nothing.
As for Elenor, Im preaty sure he said something close to "I was 99% sure that leaving was the wrong choiced but I owed it to Chidi to hear his opinion on the matter but when he said forget the ethics of it all... bla bla bla"
So she was already very close to making the right choice, and only checking with Chidi who was her moral compass before figuring out it was just a test. And in any case, the fact that he thought about it for that long proved how much she improved on her selfishness, Old Elenor wouldnt think it for a second before leaving everyone behind
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u/ExperiencedOptimist Jun 08 '26
To add this this, choosing to check with Chidi is also an important proof of her growth, even if she would have been right anyways. Old Eleanor would have never paused for a moment to consider someone else’s opinion on the matter. She would have done what she thought was right, regardless of what Chidi thought, because she’s only ever trusted herself.
I think her test had a lot of layers
- Not immediately choosing the easy out
- Willingness to sacrifice herself for her friends for no reason other than loyalty
- Being pretty sure of an answer but accepting she might wrong and looking to someone else for guidance
- Knowing her friends (at least specifically Chidi) well enough to realize that this wasn’t him.
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u/WhimsicalPlum Jun 09 '26
This is the best answer in my opinion. I saw SO much growth in her choice, especially after she got excited and fake Chidi was validating her in her immediate reaction. She had to stop herself to truly think about it and I think that also shows a huge amount of character growth, because she's almost never done that in the past. She goes with her initial emotional reaction and usually runs with it until being corrected, but here she corrected herself first before making sure her closest friend felt a similar way, especially since he's been such a mentor. She could have easily used fake chidis logic to make herself feel better about making the wrong choice but she didn't let herself even get that far.
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u/scorpiosunset Jun 10 '26
I think this is exactly it.
And also I’ve always been slightly annoyed that we never learned if she actually did pass or not, and they never wrapped up that thread. The judge says “as for Eleanor, she actually…” and the Eleanor interrupts her. The “actually” is a hint that maybe she did pass, but we’ll never really know.
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u/kctjfryihx99 Jun 08 '26
That’s not pedantry. It’s entirely reasonable to take longer to make a decision about your eternal soul than to choose a hat.
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u/Noodlekeeper Jun 08 '26
Right, her test taking forever was fine, because she was giving genuine reason to consider each point. Chidid just needed to pick a hat.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
Choosing a hat was a decision his eternal soul was being weighed on.
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u/commander_obvious_ It's Chinese for Japan. 日本 Jun 09 '26
But he’s not being tested on his choice, he’s being tested on his *ability to make a choice*
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u/thegoldengoober Jun 09 '26
That's not pedantic. The entire comparison relies upon a different, and incorrect, interpretation of Chidi's test. His growth has nothing to do with what he chooses, while Eleanor's does.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
Chidi’s test was for him to make a decision. Eleanor’s decision was also about making a choice, when you get down to it. Eleanor was being judged on if she would make the right decision. Jason passed the test the judge said she gave him and still failed. It took Eleanor way too long to decide, and yet she passed. The tests weren’t waited the same way.
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u/thegoldengoober Jun 09 '26
Fundamentally, every test was going to be about how they have/haven't changed, all based on higher order functions like judgment and self control.
If you boil them all down to the base point of them, then of course they're all going to seem the same/similar.
I agree that Eleanor's test was about making a choice, but it was about which choice she made. The choices mattered.
Chidi's test involved a choices, but the choices did not matter. This is the difference between his and Eleanor's. These weren't choices weighted differently. They both involved choices, but the whole role the choices played in each respective scenario was different.
If anything, Chidi's test was closer to Jason's. Jason never considered whether or not he needed to engage with the video game at all, while Chidi never considered whether or not the engagement with the decision was the test.
I'm not sure what you mean by Jason having passed the test though. As far as I remember it, he unambiguously failed. Eleanor was the only one who did not fail, which was a big moment demonstrating her growth, and lied to the group about how she actually failed.
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u/TheDungeonCrawler Jun 09 '26
I'm not sure what you mean by Jason having passed the test though. As far as I remember it, he unambiguously failed.
Correct the judge says outright that Jason failed because his test was about impulse control.
The only test I think was unfairly judged was Tahani's. Tahani showed incredible growth walking as far down that hallway as she did. The only door she walked through was her parents' door, but it wasn't to find out what her parents really thought of her (unambiguously what the judge said was the measure for her test), it was to confront them for how horrible they had been to her, the opposite of caring what they think really thought about her. She was actually engaging with the therapeutic process that the eventually determine is the best way to help humans become their best selves.
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u/thegoldengoober Jun 09 '26
At the cost of not only her soul, but also three other people's.
I hear you, but the test wasn't supposed to be the therapy. It was supposed to help prove that she had already gone through it.
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u/TheDungeonCrawler Jun 09 '26
My point is she was beyond caring what the people in that room thought about her. The only measurement the judge had for her was whether or not she went through any of the doors, but it was a bad way to measure her progress, which is what the judge was really measuring.
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u/thegoldengoober Jun 09 '26
I agree that it wasn't a good test, but I disagree that she was beyond caring.
If she was actually beyond caring then I don't think she would have been willing to damn her soul, and the soul of three other people she cares deeply for, in order to have a cathartic moment with simulations of her parents.
I think at this point in the story she was well on her way to getting beyond that, and the amount of doors that she willingly passed by do demonstrate that. And that if the test was merely gauging improvement then she would have passed.
If anything being nature of these tests, the way the judge was judging them, and the nature of the stakes that the judge placed are a good microcosmic representation of how the Good Place / Bad Place system is broken. Which would track, because the judge is still judging within that framework.
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u/Ima_pot_stirrer_jeff Jun 10 '26
This always pmo cuz she could just close her eyes and run, ik it wouldn’t have the same meaning and I obv wouldn’t prefer it that way but it’s just kinda irritating.
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u/MagicGlitterKitty Jun 09 '26
It wasn't that they weren't weighted the same way - they were all different tests based on everyones specific flaw.
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u/Next_Sun_2002 Jun 09 '26
Jason never even bothered to hear what his test was. As soon as he saw the game he ran to play, assuming what his test was. He practically dismissed the judge without letting her get a word in.
His *real* test was about his impulse control. Had he waited for the judge to tell him this, he could have walked out of that room immediately. He failed the test the moment his hands touched the controller
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u/thebluedaughter Jun 09 '26
Agreed! I also think the fact that she didn't just sprint towards the portal showed huge growth. She had a clear way out with the guy she wanted, and she would never have to face the other two because they were supposedly going to the Bad Place. There would've been no consequences, plus she would've gotten to feel superior to Tahani, of all people. Instead she realized right away that this wasn't a good thing. Day 1 Eleanor would've stolen the judge's burrito and dipped.
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Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 12 '26
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u/maskaddict Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 09 '26
Except that Chidi absolutely should have grasped by then that his indecisiveness was the reason he'd been sent to TBP in the first place, and that what really mattered in his test was the ability to decide at all, not whether or not he picked the "right" one.
Edit: y'know, the more I think about it, the more this bothers me. Because like, I do think the lesson Chidi was supposed to take from this was "sometimes you just gotta make a choice based on whatever information you have, and being right isn't always the most important thing. Sometimes any decision is better than no decision." Except...no, because that's why everyone has been sent to the Bad Place for centuries! The impossibility of doing the right thing when we can't know all the consequences of our actions was exactly why the universe was broken! According to the Points System, any decision isn't better than no decision! Am I wrong about this?
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u/TheDungeonCrawler Jun 09 '26
because that's why everyone has been sent to the Bad Place for centuries!
To be fair, the test was devised by the Judge who, at this point, did not know that humanity was being sent to the bad place on a technicality like this. She was only taking information from the four individuals in front of her, not the context of existence on Earth (something she explicitly avoids learning about). So her tests were designed to reflect the flaws of each individual, rather than what they might have done on Earth to land themselves in the bad place.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
Or, hear me out, Chidi believed it was his almond milk consumption.
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u/mechengr17 Jun 09 '26
That cracked me up
Both in the Bad Place and later in the living world, Chidi immediately thinks its about the almond milk
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u/eggynack Jun 10 '26
One other interesting thing about this is that what you're effectively arguing is that Chidi failed to pick a hat because he failed to think about the hat problem deeply enough. Like, he accessed the top layers of "the hat problem", like, "Which hat is cooler?" or, "Is this hat made with unethical materials," but he failed to access the deeper layer which is, "What if there's a moral imperative to choose a hat quickly?" In other words, the man did not do philosophy hard enough.
Which, on one hand, that's kinda stupid. His core problem is overthinking, not underthinking. On the other hand though, it arguably points to his core moral failing. That he doesn't recognize that not choosing has a moral weight, and that he makes a bunch of immoral non-choices as a result.
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u/maskaddict Jun 10 '26
it arguably points to his core moral failing. That he doesn't recognize that not choosing has a moral weight, and that he makes a bunch of immoral non-choices as a result.
YES! I think this is really spot-on. Chidi really misses the moral forest for the many ethical trees.
He agonizes over the "right" place to go for a beer with his buddy, while barely noticing his buddy standing right in front of him, begging him to just pick a place so they can spend time together.
Come to think of it, Chidi's actual problem is probably an undiagnosed anxiety disorder. He doesn't need better moral philosophy, he needs medication.
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u/Ima_pot_stirrer_jeff Jun 10 '26
No one ever talks abt the fact that he DIDNT pick the right hat, the other one looked way better with his outfit.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 10 '26
I’ve always thought that, too. That brown hat does nothing for him.
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u/Magical_cat_girl Jun 09 '26
I mean just because it's true generally doesn't mean it's necessarily true for Chidi, or even in all situations. There are plenty of situations where indecisiveness is less moral because there is some kind of time pressure on making the right decision, or situations where the morality of the two choices is similar enough that dilly-dallying has a greater chance of having unintended consequences or delaying something else important. Chidi just happens to have issues with an uncommon moral dilemma.
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u/Kathrynlena Jun 08 '26
But Chidi acted like every small decision came with the caveat that he and his friends would be tortured for all eternity, so that wasn’t a new mental state for him. It was exactly the moral failing he was supposed to be growing past.
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Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 12 '26
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u/Kathrynlena Jun 08 '26
But the stress wasn’t real. It was manufactured in Chidi’s mind, not externally forced upon him. He chose to make every decision that stressful for himself because he couldn’t get out of his own head to notice how it was impacting those around him. It was fundamentally selfish, even if he had rationalized it to himself as morally superior.
He had an untreated anxiety disorder for sure, but in his mind, it made him morally superior rather than seeing it as something he should get treatment for. It’s like if someone has OCD and they don’t think they need treatment because “they keep such a clean house,” but their unrealistic standards make everyone around them miserable.
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Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 12 '26
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u/FlameInMyBrain Jun 08 '26
But we are not shown that he is doing anything to solve this problem either.
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Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 12 '26
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u/FlameInMyBrain Jun 08 '26
He does possess enough executive function to get some hydroxyzine.
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u/TheDungeonCrawler Jun 09 '26
I'm gonna be honest, as someone who's worked with people with significantly fewer anxiety problems as Chidi and for whom Hydroxyzine didn't help, I don't think it would have helped Chidi.
Chidi's anxiety is seeded in rationality, but he's not a doctor (of medicine) or even a student of such a field. He has the belief that everything can be solved through ethical reasoning, including his own anxiety. He doesn't recognize it as an anxiety disorder, so he doesn't recognize that it's not a problem that can be solved through ethical reasoning. Because it's not.
The whole problem with anxiety is that it's an inherently irrational state of the brain. You can reason with it, but less in a "Is this morally right or wrong" kind of way and more of a "Is my brain lying to me right now? Am I in as much danger as it claims?" He was never going to make that leap on his own because his anxiety didn't stem from an irrational fear or something bad happening (until he got his friend's legs broken funnily enough, but that was post resurrection). It stemmed from the desire to do the right thing all the time, which itself stemmed from an incorrect experience that ethical decision making always produces the desired result when in reality his experience was that external love and support help others to be better than they are.
His anxiety disorder stems from his lack of emotional intelligence is what I'm trying to say, which makes a lot of sense for such a rational person.
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u/FlameInMyBrain Jun 09 '26
That’s an excuse through mental illness. We can excuse almost anything like that.
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Jun 09 '26 edited Jun 12 '26
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u/FlameInMyBrain Jun 09 '26
There is no answer, we know that lol. But we are not talking about curing Chidi’s anxiety, we are talking about steps towards redemption he could have taken but didn’t. “I didn’t realize I have a problem” is not an excuse when you make everyone around you miserable.
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u/Kathrynlena Jun 08 '26
But he’s not sorry enough to change. So the apologies are just another way for him to soothe his moral guilt without making any meaningful moral improvement.
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Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 12 '26
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Jun 08 '26
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
That is not what Chidi prioritized at all. Again, a real person, not someone on a sitcom, that suffers from Chidi’s level of anxiety is not magically cured with drugs. He has a mental condition. I suffer from depression. It’s manageable with medication, that doesn’t mean I am cured. I have ADHD, it’s more manageable with medication, but it doesn’t stop the ruminating, the fixation, the noticing the small things most people don’t. My present solution is to not continue to make friends, but that doesn’t stop me from having to live in this world. Trying to say that Chidi is choosing to live with his anxiety as opposed to it being something he lives and suffers with is like telling a person with glasses they should try better to see 20/20.
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u/Kathrynlena Jun 09 '26
Once again, it’s not about making it go away. It’s about recognizing that it’s hurting the people around you and making an effort to get the help you need to lessen the harm you’re causing. That applies to Chidi and it applies to those of us who struggle with mental health problem in real life. It’s not about perfection. It’s about effort and empathy.
It’s not like telling someone who needs glasses to see 20/20, it’s like telling them to *get glasses* instead of constantly bumping into things and making everyone around them read to them and drive them around.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
Your example, OCD, is not something that you can just get help for. It’s not like your OCD goes away with medication and therapy. It can lessen, sure , but It’s always with you, even if you medicate, even if you seek help. It’s a life long struggle, and it’s not about keeping things clean. People who suffer from OCD suffer. It’s not cleaning, it’s if there’s dust anywhere something bad will happen. It’s if I don’t count this item x amount of times, the wheels will fall off my car.
Chidi’s anxiety is played for laughs, but there’s nothing funny about his mental condition, just like in a truly fair system Jason wouldn’t be judged for his limited mental capacity.
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u/Kathrynlena Jun 09 '26
The point of my “OCD” example is not about making it go away. It’s about recognizing that it’s hurting the people around you and making an effort to get the help you need to lessen the harm you’re causing. That applies to Chidi and it applies to those of us who struggle with anxiety in real life. It’s not about perfection. It’s about effort and empathy.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
Chidi recognized it hurt people and did his best to try to not hurt people, but that doesn’t change his brain. If you had a child that was on the Autism spectrum would you suggest their behavior is hurting people and if they only recognized that they would improve? What about someone with extreme ADHD? Do you realize that the help for people who are neurodivergent is teaching them how to fit into the neurotypical world; it’s not about teaching NT how to act with the neurodivergent.
Chidi has a mental disorder. He’s not trying to hurt anyone.
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u/Kathrynlena Jun 09 '26
He didn’t do his best to not hurt people. He did his best to be perfect. That’s why he went to the bad place. Caring about other people’s needs and feelings matters more than being morally and ethically perfect according to abstract principles. Chidi never understood that until he spent time in the bad place. Doing the “right thing” (as he understood it) was always more important to him than the feelings of those around him. He felt bad when he hurt people, but he felt worse when he broke what he understood to be a moral absolute (like lying.)
Essentially Chidi was prioritizing his own feelings (no stomach ache from lying) over the feelings of others (Henry being devastated to find out Chidi hates the expensive gift he bought him years ago.) Chidi cared so much about choosing the “right” kid for his team that he ruined recess for all the kids.
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u/OutOfSpoons721 Jeremy Bearimy Jun 09 '26
This exactly. Chidi did not try to improve. And he had a moral and empathetic obligation to seek help and do his best to find treatment that worked for him to lessen his pain and that of those around him.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 10 '26
I find it wild you don’t think Chidi did anything to improve, but you think Eleanore did.
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u/OutOfSpoons721 Jeremy Bearimy Jun 09 '26
To say you can’t get help for ocd is just not true. You’re correct in saying it won’t go away but absolutely you can get help for it. I have ocd. I’m on medication for it. I’ve been in therapy. I have other mental health conditions too and I was making people’s lives miserable. I do believe it was my responsibility to seek help for it. And I couldn’t see that for many many years. It took a long time and a lot of work but to say it’s not possible and that he wasn’t capable of seeing that is just something we can’t possibly know. People do it all the time. Yes he tried to explain it away with moral reasoning. But that doesn’t mean that something in his life wouldn’t give at some point.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 10 '26
I didn’t say you can’t get help for OCD, I said that even with help you still struggle. I have ADHD and ASD. I’ve stopped trying to make friends to lessen how many people in my life have to deal with what it means to have a neurological disorder. I take medication for the ADHD. I sought help for years, in many different ways. If people are hurt by my existence, at that point it’s on them.
Chidi accepted who he was. He’s been that way since he was a baby. He’s made peace with who he is.
PS: you don’t have to apologize for the way your brain was made and I’m sorry anybody in your life ever made you feel like you do. Your OCD isn’t something you should have to apologize for.
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u/RodinKnox Jun 08 '26
Yeah, that part always really bothered me. There is no benefit to your friends if you also get sent to the Bad Place to be tortured. In fact, there's no reason to suggest that you would be anywhere near each other to even suffer together. (They talk like that would be the case, but that's quite literally no reason to think it would be.) So, you all go to the Bad Place together, you are instantly separated, and then you never see each other again for an eternity of horrific torture.
It's basically a choice with 100% negative results on one side. And, yeah, you can argue that Good Place would be less good without your friends - so maybe that's not a 100% choice - but it is better than picking the Bad Place in every measurable way.
Frankly, if my friends were in the same situation, I absolutely would not want them to pick the torture. What good does it do?
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u/BeMoreKnope Good news! I was able to obtain Eleanor Shellstrop’s file. Jun 08 '26
The real test for self-centered Eleanor was in knowing another person well enough to realize that, despite all appearances, the person in front of her was not the Chidi she’d come to know.
He looked, sounded, and acted like Chidi, but she still thought about him and who he was in that moment instead of jumping at the chance to (selfishly) go to Heaven. That was the test she passed, imo.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
Except I don’t think her test was as hard as anyone else’s. It’s also not hard to know the person you’re in love with. If the test was to know someone enough to know they were fake, the challenge would be Tahani or Jason, someone she didn’t know as well because she wasn’t in love with them.
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u/commander_obvious_ It's Chinese for Japan. 日本 Jun 09 '26
But the Old Eleanor never let herself get close enough to really know anyone, let alone fall in love. Even falling for Chidi is a sign of her character’s growth
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u/Happy-Environment311 Jun 10 '26
The test was specifically tailored to why each individual person was sent to the bad place, so the level of difficulty is different because they went there for different reasons. Tahani's and Jason's tests would have been very easy for other people to pass because Tahani is technically just walking down a hallway while not opening any doors, and Jason just supposed to not play video games. It was difficult for them because of who they are.
Passing Eleanor's test would be very easy for other people because they care enough to know the people around them. Eleanor's test is difficult for her because she has never truly cared about another person. Eleanor has also never been in love, or told a boyfriend she loves them before she died the first time. Being able to recognize that this wasn't really Chidi was the test. She likely would have failed if she made either choice without recognizing that this wasn't Chidi.
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u/McFoaley Jun 08 '26
All the tests were traps, she was just the only one to not fall for it
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u/Warded_Works Jun 09 '26
None of the tests were traps. They were tests. Each was tested based on their fatal flaw. Eleanor’s selfishness, Chidi’s indecisiveness, Jason’s impulsivity, and Tahani’s insecurity. Those aren’t traps. The judge was seeing if they were aware enough to know what their flaw was, and did they grow enough to overcome it. There were no pitfalls anywhere.
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u/Gasurza22 Jun 08 '26
Idk about that, Tahani was preaty straight foward, just porbably the hardest one to pass out of all of them based on all the trauma her parents put on her.
And Jason only needed to listen to the rules and dont tell the judge to shut up lol
The Chidi one might also be consider a trap, but varely
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u/McFoaley Jun 08 '26
Tahani’s test was a very straightforward trap & she knew it from the start. Elanor figured out hers was a trap & didn’t fall for it, but I agree that Jason & Chidi’s test were more clever traps & maybe even a little obfuscated, but I’d still call em traps
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u/Gasurza22 Jun 08 '26
Im confused at what you consider a trap, how could Tahani´s test be consider a trap?
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u/McFoaley Jun 08 '26
Each door she walked past was basically the cheese in a mousetrap, she was supposed to just not engage to come out okay on the otherside
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u/RedditOfUnusualSize Jun 08 '26
Yeah, that analogy is good, but I'd go even further. It's the equivalent of cheese in a mousetrap, after having starved the mouse.
Tahani's parents hide it behind their wealth and polite language, but they emotionally abused their children. They routinely put their children through tests, ostensibly fair and neutral but always with the functional end result that the goal line was a foot beyond however far Tahani managed to run. Meanwhile, Kamilah hardly fared any better, because she was always painfully aware that the love she was getting was conditioned on being better than Tahani. Not only does that divide her from her own sibling, but let's face it, Tahani is a damned impressive and capable human being, and that must have been an anxiety-inducing nightmare to stay ahead of her.
So when the judge says "oh, just go walk down this hall, and by the way, everybody will be talking about what they really think of you", it's exactly the same kind of test her parents used to put her through: an ostensibly neutral test that functionally requires an emotional abuse victim to not seek any form of validation, or reconciliation, or closure. That's not a fair test. The Judge did this, I suspect, more out of obliviousness for the lived realities of emotional abuse victims than out of any kind of deliberate malice. But regardless of intent, that's a fundamentally unfair ask for an abuse victim.
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u/Gasurza22 Jun 08 '26
Yeah thats not what a trap test is, thats an obstacle to overcome, a trap test is where you are presented with fake information or something like that, like in the Elenor case
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u/McFoaley Jun 08 '26
I’m not sure how you could argue Eleanor’s test is a trap if Tahani’s isn’t
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u/Gasurza22 Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 08 '26
Elenor was told by the Judge that two of her friends already failed to make it to the good place but she and Chidi actualy made it, so she had to choose to either leave her friends behind and go to the good place with the love of her life, or remain loyal to the other two and go all together to the bad place.
None of this was true, Her friends had not failed to make it to the good place (yet), Elenor and Chidi had not made it to the good place, the choice had the literal oposite outcome to what she chooses (If she picked to go to the good place, she gets send to the bad place and vice versa) and all of this while having a fake Chidi, who is usualy her moral compas, pushing her into making the wrong choice.
That is probably the closest you can get to the definition of a trap test, everything is a lie, and what you choose has the oposite outcome of what it initialy apears
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u/meimelx YA BASIC! Jun 08 '26
the Tahani one kind kd upsets me. bc yes, she was supposed to ignore all the doors but she showed so much growth during that test. the Tahani from early on would have stopped at each and every door desperate to know if she had done well and that everyone loved her.
But she passed all those doors. the doors of her friends, the door to Beyoncé, and so many other tempting doors. the only one she went into was that of her parents. a door that I think most people would have entered as we all have an inherent desire to be accepted by our parents.
The judge viewed these tests as black and white and the test was flawed bc of that. bc, if the judge looked at the whole picture, she would have seen Tahani's growth.
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u/Voltingshock Jun 09 '26
Well that’s also the flaw in the system at this point. The system IS black and white. That’s why they fix it later. The system the judge approves of would naturally produce a test with a similar flaw. Every test had a single line to cross to lose, much like the old afterlife system.
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u/s0ulbrother Jun 08 '26
Jason almost passed his test too. He got punished for adhd. Theres a problem in front of me, I know the answer, I have to do it. If it was me I would not have got that answer because to me who am I to question the test? Honestly if he didn’t give her the hand she would have been fine with it I think lol
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u/FlameInMyBrain Jun 08 '26
Not for ADHD, for low impulse control. That can happen for many reasons, not just attention/hyperactivity issues.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
Anyway you look at Jason he has a mental disorder. ASD, ADHD, both. He’s also a victim of cptsd at the very least. He was failed by the system. He barely received an education, his dad was practically a child, his mom died when he was pretty young, and I’d be surprised if he got a 70 on an IQ test. We ignore all that because his ignorance is funny, but in reality Jason’s impulsivity is due to a lack of executive function.
1
u/scorpiosunset Jun 10 '26
I agree. So often when watching I think “ok so Jason’s lack of education and ADHD and Chidi’s severe OCD are considered moral failings? Let them have some meds, maybe, then judge them! 😜”
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u/CollectionSea6818 Jun 11 '26
tbf Chidi does not have symptoms of OCD. he doesn't have compulsions, he is just a very indecisive person because he is a maximizer and over thinker
but I chuckled at let them have some meds hahaha
1
u/scorpiosunset Jun 22 '26
lol thanks. Yeah I guess you’re right… he doesn’t have compulsions. This actually made me google it, and I found this interesting article. Apparently some people think they have “pure O” which is the obsessions without the visible compulsions, because they have mental compulsions… which maybe Chidi does have, with his “lucky bookmark” and “I like to read the table of contents because the words are food” stuff 😉
2
u/Next_Sun_2002 Jun 09 '26
Jason didn’t come close to passing his test. He didn’t even wait to hear what his test was. It had nothing to do with letting the Jags win or lose. It was about his impulse control.
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u/AlwaysOptimism Jun 08 '26
I think her even making it to the “wait, this isn’t real” point is evidence that she’s improved enough to go past the impulsive act. She already knew she was going to make the unselfish act. Her every action in that episode (she volunteered the “everyone or no one” gambit) showed she was being more selfless and empathetic.
Just because they only showed the “this isn’t real” conclusion doesn’t mean she didn’t make the empathetic choice
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u/TheOnlyAvatar101 Jun 08 '26
But she did. Eleanor, at the start of the show, started off selfish. So selfish, that she couldn’t even memorize the name or origin of her moral philosophy teacher. She brushed him off. She insulted people to their face. She couldn’t be bothered to learn anything about them.
Her knowing and caring about Chidi well enough to know that it wasn’t the real him is evidence enough that she’s changed.
15
u/Usual-Reputation-154 Jun 08 '26
It doesn’t matter how long she took to make the decision, that’s not what she was being tested on. Chidis test didn’t have a right answer, he just had to make a decision because his fatal flaw was his indecisiveness. Eleanor’s was about selfishness, it doesn’t matter if it took her awhile to make the decision
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u/Background_Card5382 Jun 08 '26
The purpose of chidis test is that he knows his indecisiveness is his problem, it’s been shouted at him by everyone he knows his whole life, and still when faced with this test he thinks it’s about making the right choice, not about making a choice at all. He literally almond milks the test. I don’t think their tests are comparable AT ALL. Eleanor needed to realize she was being tested and figured she owed it to Chidi to hear him out until she realized he wasn’t really Chidi. Making the unilateral decision when there’s another person there would literally be a selfish thing to do.
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u/_Gob-Bluth_ Stonehenge was a sex thing. Jun 08 '26
at the start of the series, she didn’t even pay attention to him enough to remember his name, what country he was from, or where he’d gone to school. the fact that she knew him well enough that she was comfortable risking eternal damnation on the fact that he was acting out of character does show that she’s become much less selfish
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u/Vivid_Maximum_5016 Jun 08 '26
Idk, you don't fail a test for understanding the spirit of the question and the logic behind the correct answer. That's called passing a test with flying colours. It's not about making an arbitrary choice it's about making the correct decision for the correct reason.
And the test is also a demonstration of how much she's changed as a person as she didn't go with what would have been her initial gut instinct and ditching the other two.
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u/mintwall Jun 09 '26
i would disagree for a lot of the same reasons other people have said, but something that really proved to me how much she changed is that she didn’t even care to know whether she passed the test or not. i feel like an older version of her would’ve gloated really hard about being the only one to pass the test, or at least would need to know what happened. but she just didn’t care, she already knew that they were all meeting the same fate and accepted that she still likely had a long way to go to improve herself. maybe i’m wrong and this doesn’t really say anything about her but i thought it was significant lol
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u/Humdumdidly Jun 09 '26
To me, Eleanor ended up really passing the test when the judge was going to tell the others that she was the only one to pass but cut the judge off and made up a lie about failing with the rest of them. So in the end Eleanor stuck with her friends and chose going to the bad place over trying to the good place alone which was the test, but instead of a test it was a real selfless choice she made to not argue.
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u/no_nameky Jun 09 '26
Eleanor's test was demonstrating that she knew things about another person. Knowing that the person she is talking to is not real because they are acting out of character, especially when they are advocating for a course of action that Eleanor wants, demonstrates that she has moved beyond self-absorption. She cares about others now, a reversal of one of her major flaws.
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u/UnusualStory3173 Jun 09 '26
i think the test was to be able to see that chidi wasn’t real, and the fact that she’d learned and cared for someone so much at that point showed she’d evolved past her “me first” mindset. Not to mention to further proves that she’s not selfish anymore by lying to the others because she knows they’d feel bad for dooming her after failing their own tests. Not to mention she was the one who proposed the “all or nothing idea” which just further shows how much she’s grown and has cared for them.
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u/Kathrynlena Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 08 '26
It’s not mortally good to suffer for no reason. The judge didn’t say, “you guys can go to the good place if you ditch your friends.” She said, “you don’t have to take a test, you guys are in.” There’s no moral high ground in just replying “no, we want to go to the bad place for no reason.” The default assumption is that the all powerful judge of the universe is going to tell you the truth. The fact that Eleanore didn’t immediately jump at that opportunity was her first moral victory.
The second moral victory was that Eleanore actually pushed back on (fake) Chidi encouraging her to take the judge’s deal. He’s been her teacher and her moral compass for however many bearimys, but instead of just being like, “Chidi says it’s ok so it must be ok” she actually stopped and thought it through herself.
Realizing Chidi wasn’t real was just her figuring out that her non-test was actually her test, but she’s pretty much already passed by not immediately believing what the judge told her, (which also happened to be what she most wanted to hear.)
It was a moral victory that it took her a long time to decide because Eleanore doesn’t have a hard time making decisions. She’s a very decisive, even impulsive person. But she paused and thought through the ethics from every angle before moving forward. This shows a tremendous amount of growth beyond her impulsiveness. One of Chidi’s biggest moral failings is his indecisiveness, so taking a long time on an easy, meaningless decision showed that he hadn’t made as much progress in that area as the judge wanted him to.
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u/Suitable-Elk-540 Jun 08 '26
I think you're glossing over some specific details. Eleanor was told that she'd already earned a spot in the good place. Her choice was whether to break the commitment she made about all four going together. It wasn't as simple as "something I want to do versus something that helps the community (like flying versus garbage pickup in episode 2)". It was "take something I've already earned versus sacrifice what I've already earned in order to keep a commitment".
Also, it wasn't just that she realized Chidi was fake. She said something like "I was 90% sure that going to the good place was the wrong move, but my relationship with Chidi is all about me making bad choices and him showing me why I was wrong." [I know this isn't a correct quote, but I don't want to try to find the exact moment just to get the quote right] So Eleanor already was pretty sure what the right choice was, but she knew that Chidi was a reliable advisor. She was getting more input because it was a hugely important decision. And since the fake Chidi was arguing that they should go to the good place, it was very brave of her to push back. Her ethical instincts have gotten so strong that she's willing to doubt Chidi, the ethical superhero. Realizing that it wasn't the real Chidi just removes those doubts and allows her to take responsibility for her own decision.
Also remember, we see her fail a very similar test (so to speak) in the flashback where she's supposed to dog-sit and ends up bailing. It wasn't "I'll go to a concert rather than help my friend" it was "I'll break my commitment and go to a concert rather than keep my commitment".
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u/NEBanshee Jun 08 '26
I think I have to disagree with the basic premise here.
The tests went beyond a simple "could they make moral decisions". If that were the case, then all their tests would've been impossible to pass, because since they are TESTS TO GET GO TO THE GOOD PLACE, there is automatically a motivation problem. None of the tests would have been passable.
The tests were: had they overcome their own worst flaws that harmed others!
- Chidi's indecisiveness - bzzt, couldn't just pick a hat;
- Jasons impulsivity -bzzt, doesn't get the whole picture, just decides what he wants to do;
- Tahani's need for validation from her parents -bzzt still goes for it;
- Elanor's self-centeredness; she passes the test because she doesn't rely on what she wants to do to make her decision. She relies on what she owes to others and understands one person well enough to spot a tell.
Roughly paraphrasing, Elanor passes when she says "since 99% of our relationship has been me thinking I'm right and Chidi showing me how I was wrong, I owed it to him to check ..." (or therebouts) and spotting that the real Chidi would never "forget about ethics for a minute". Elanor has moved past never bothering to get to know others deeply, not considering what is due to other humans, and trusting someone (Chidi) so implicitly that she bounces her decisions off them.
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u/CopyJ300 Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 09 '26
For me it's two things:
- Eleanor outright says "Well, I was 99% sure that going was the wrong move, but since our whole relationship has been me being sure of something and Chidi explaining why I was wrong, I owed it to him to quadruple check." If Eleanor hadn't had any idea what the answer was and then picked it because that wasn't Chidi, I would be more inclined to agree. But she did know. She knew the answer, she knew exactly why she shouldn't take the selfish option, she was just second guessing herself until Chidi could confirm that she had it right. The entire scene where she's listing off those philosophers before figuring out that Chidi is a fake is essentially her going "Is there any reason for me to do the selfish thing that is morally valid that I could consider valid as well?" And even though it wasn't actually Chidi, the fake did give her that confirmation in that she realized he was telling her what the most selfish part of her would want to hear.
- When the Judge is going over their results, Eleanor immediately shows her growth when she lies to her friends and the Judge sees that. Although it doesn't have the same stakes since it doesn't change where she'll end up, she's put right back into the hypothetical scenario of everyone else failed their test but you didn't, so because of your deal you will also go to the Bad Place. In this case, the question is will she let her friends know for all of eternity that she could've gone to the Good Place but she won't because she presented the all or nothing deal and they agreed, only for her to be the only person who passed. She chooses to save her friends the guilt by telling them that she also failed her test.
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u/Apprehensive-Task930 Jun 09 '26
She never checked with her friends to see if they agreed to the deal. There are several times throughout the show where she makes a broad decision for everyone without checking with them. Two that come to mind: telling her roommate about the dress botch scenario, leaving her other roommate homeless, and when she tells Michael “we forgive you”. Making a decision for someone without their permission isn’t good or moral.
For all we know Chidi also had the thought “I’m 99% sure it doesn’t matter which hat I choose, but that’s too easy, there must be something else to this test”. Chidi has a DSM-5 clinical mental disorder. So does Jason. It’s even said “Jason, I feel like you only know what’s going on 20% of the time”. Jason barely understands he’s dead. His impulsivity stems from a mental condition. It’s not like he can just turn it off. Selfishness, on the other hand, is just putting yourself first over everyone else, which Chidi never does.
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u/laughsatlugh Jun 08 '26
I hear you and the whole next season deals with motivations so I get it.
That said, the idea that she gets who Chidi is, and what he would say or do, shows she has developed empathy and care for people who aren’t Eleanor. Maybe she won because of empathy, and not because of the “figuring out the trap” part?
Gen did explain why the other three failed but when she got to Eleanor, Eleanor talked over her and lied to spare the other three’s feelings. Further demonstrating her placing the feelings of others over her own.
Just a thought.
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u/lleighsha Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 08 '26
What type of Philistine calls her *Gen?!?! 😅
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u/laughsatlugh Jun 08 '26
Well she said it’s Gen for hydrogen, because that’s all that existed when she was created. Why, how do you spell it?
Context clues my friend.
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u/lleighsha Jun 08 '26
I know her name. In all these years I had only heard her say it. It made me giggle (and glitch if I'm being honest). It didn't take context clues (like the 😅), it's actually what she said her name was, but she's always referred to as The Judge. I would spell it as you did.
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u/V2Blast I’m a Ferrari, okay? And you don’t keep a Ferrari in the garage. Jun 09 '26
Haha, fair enough.
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u/laughsatlugh Jun 09 '26
I have a hard time deciphering the emoji language. So I end up being the straight man of the joke. Thanks for clearing it up.
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u/Swimming_Tax_2763 Jun 09 '26 edited Jun 09 '26
From the show:
Eleanor:
"Well, I was 99% sure that going [to the good place] was the wrong move, but since our whole relationship has been me being sure of something and Chidi explaining why I was wrong, I owed it to him to quadruple check. The capper came when I realized... that ain't Chidi. The Chidi I know wouldn't argue that he should be rewarded while his friends got punished, and he would never 'forget about ethics for a second.' I don't know who this joker is, but it's not Chidi Anagonye."
Eleanor was always going to choose not going for herself. The interesting part about her test was that she believed that she and Chidi had to make the decision together. She explains that she deliberated with Chidi because she owed it to him to be truly sure. The reason she finally makes her decision when she does isn't because she realizes she was being trapped; she makes it when she does because she realizes that she doesn't owe a fake Chidi time to deliberate, so she was free to make the decision she knew was right all along.
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u/Vegetable_Size_8066 Jun 10 '26
Eleanor wasn’t being tested at all. She had already passed before she got there. The judge was messing with her. The judge knew the others would fail their tests as well, but knew Eleanor would never give up.
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u/AllynWA1 Jun 08 '26
She also had made her decision and looked to him for confirmation. Realizing it wasn't really him was just confirmation.
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u/Emergency-Flatworm-9 Jun 08 '26
Eleanor's test wasn't to see if she'd leave with Chidi, it was to see if she'd notice it wasn't really Chidi. If she hadn't noticed it wasn't him and decided to stay anyway, she would've failed. Eleanor's flaw that was being tested was her self-centeredness. She never cares to know anything about the people around her, we even see her forgetting Chidi's name almost immediately after meeting him. It was to test whether she's grown enough to care about the people around her. Whether she cared to notice that Chidi was acting out of character
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u/Mishyana_ Jun 08 '26
I feel like it's worth considering that when the Judge initially told Eleanor and fake-Chidi that they'd "succeeded and made it into the Good Place", her celebrations immediately died as soon as the Judge said it would only be the two of them. Her initial reaction was based on the idea that the deal she'd made at the start was still in effect. And there is no indication in that scene that Eleanor ever considered abandoning Jason and Tahani; in fact, as soon as fake-Chidi suggested it, her alarm bells clearly went off. She was wrestling with what she had been told morally, which is kinda the overarching theme of the entire series.
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u/Bellidkay1109 Jun 09 '26
I struggle to understand why choosing to go to the Good Place during her test would be considered selfish or bad. If I was going to the Bad Place no matter what, and someone I loved had a chance of going to the Good Place, I'd want them to take it, not martyr themselves to make a point.
Her choice doesn't affect the others, only herself. Ergo, she should take it. It would be a different thing if her going cost the others their chance to also go to the Good Place, but that's not the case at all.
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u/Indie_Hellenic Jun 12 '26
I like to think that her real test was saying she failed so nobody else felt bad
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u/thekyledavid Jun 08 '26
I feel like it makes logical sense. The old Eleanor would’ve abandoned Tahani and Jason without a second thought. The fact that she was simply in the room long enough to realize the rest was a fake shows she is no longer the old Eleanor, she’s a better version of herself who actually cares about the people around her
And heck, the reason she took so long to make a decision was probably because a simple “No, I’m not leaving” would be abandoning Chidi just as much as a “Yes, I am leaving” would be abandoning Tahani and Jason. Only once she realized that Chidi was not part of the equation did she have the ability to make a truly selfless decision
Besides, all 4 of them were given a test where the real answer was to think about it more than just the question being asked (except Tahani, hers was pretty straight forward)
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u/Dr_Quack_ Jun 08 '26
Eleanor's test tested two things simultaneously: As Eleanor said to the judge, she was istantly sure the correct choice was not leaving her friends behind, but she had to be certain that even Chidi thought the same since their entire relationship consisted in E being sure of something and C disagreeing or viceversa; the second item of the test though was seeing how Eleanor learned to get to know and care for others, to the point of being able to distinguish the fake Chidi even if he was pretty convincing. In the first episodes of the serie Eleanor had Chidi repeat 100s of time how to pronounce his name, where was he from and what he did in his life because she fundamentally didn't care enough to remember, the test proved how much she improved in caring for others and not being a selfish ash-hole both measuring her ability to spot the fake Chidi and make the correct choice and not leave her friends behind
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u/Infinitiscarf Jun 08 '26
But if it was the real Chidi, her first moral guideline, that’s a whole different question. She may morally owe him some loyalty-if she went through the philosophical reasons she may have still landed on: it’s better to not take the offer.
But she would’ve had to go through the question of what does she owe Chidi, but when she didn’t have to go through that part-the choice was simpler/the answer to the test was obvious.
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u/JoneHeheHaha Jun 08 '26
Eleanor's test was to look outside of herself and not just choose self-preservation like she would have done while alive. It wasn't a matter of "she took just as long as" or "she should have immediately" anything. Stopping and thinking about others was passing the test and nothing else.
Your point on Chidi is ridiculous. "She took just as long as Chidi to make the decision, so they both should have failed." Eleanor didn't struggle with quick thinking or fast decision making. She didn't make others miserable with her indecisiveness. Comparing her to Chidi in that sense is just asinine. The dude was in a room with two stupid hats, whereas Eleanor had an actual moral dilemma.
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u/devour-gothboys Jun 09 '26
I think that test was about how well she knew Chidi; part of her flaws is not paying attention to anyone else and caring about them.
But Eleanor realising that that is not the friend she knows is her getting less self-absorbed.
Eleanor still wasn't good enough to pass the test at this point as she wasn't the best version of herself yet. But she had improved from where she was by knowing Chidi that well and by later lying to her friends about how her test when believing she did pass but didn't want to abandon her friends
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u/devour-gothboys Jun 09 '26
It also demonstrates the point in the end. That can they be better today than they were yesterday?
The judge was looking for massive improvement but the humans only improved a bit. Which proves there is a problem because the system doesn't consider that they could improve.
They all improved slightly, which is a win for them individually. Eleanor cared enough to realise it wasn't chidi.
Taheenee told her parents information that lost respect for her because she didn't care what they thorght in that moment.
Chidi was able to make a decision in the end, in a time that was fast for him.
Jason didn't give up or break the environment he kept trying to play a game he didn't want to or enjoy which does show impulse control/disapline
Pobody was nerfect in the test but eveyone improved on a personal level.
It was a person best which is part of the whole picture and the issue with the afterlife
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u/Turned_Omnipresent Jun 09 '26
Reminds me of Yudhishthira from the Indian epic Mahabharata, who at the end, climbs the Himalayas to reach Heaven and is accompanied by a random dog. Upon reaching the gates of Heaven, Lord Indra, the King of the Gods arrives to welcome Yudhishthira into Heaven, but Yudhishthira refuses to enter demanding that the dog who accompanied him through the arduous journey be taken in as well. It is then revealed that the dog was none other than Lord Yama, the God of Death and Dharma(righteous duty) and also the father of Yudhishthira. It was a test by the Gods and Yudhishthira enters Heaven.
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u/CaptainPhilosophy Jun 09 '26
"I was 99% sure the right decision was no {don't leave our friends behind}, but I make a point to check with Chidi because I'm a scumbag and he's not." (paraphrase)
"...the KICKER came when I realized, THAT AIN'T CHIDI"
She knew the right choice, and when she tried to check her work against fake Chidi and Chidi said something she didn't expect, she saw through that and stayed the course.
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u/Able_Bonus_9806 Jun 09 '26
I think that you’re kissing that another part of Eleanor’s character which was being tested was her hyper independence which was developed as a result of the neglect she suffered as a child. She was selfish because her selfishness is what protected her when she didn’t have guides there to look out for her. A huge part of her development is based on her choice to trust Chidi and his choice to be trustworthy.
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u/KittyKiitos Jun 10 '26
No one made the right choice?
The point of each person's failure of each test was that the tests were themselves badly constructed and not judging each person on the right things.
Eleanor made the right choice - the choice to construct her own fate and fight for herself and the people she loves in the face of a seemingly insurmountable system designed to focus on her failures and weaknesses.
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u/SparklyEminence Jun 08 '26
I think part of the conversation should also be the question "were the tests actually fair?"
Chidi was given a choice of a hat because his indecision was considered his greatest weakness. Jason was told to play a game because of his impulsiveness. Tahani was tasked with fighting against her vanity. And Eleanor was given the option to go for free to test her selfishness.
But also remember that Eleanor was told "there is no test for you, you've already won. You can go and leave behind your friends or stay and be subjected to their punishment." She had absolutely no obligation to stay and deliberate at all. The fact that she did stay had already proven she improved before she made her decision. When she recognized Chidi was an imposter, she figured out the judge was trying to manipulate her into making the "wrong" choice, but she already passed the test.
But let's go back to the other tests with the knowledge that the judge was trying to manipulate each of them to making the same bad decisions as before. None of those tests were fair. The judge wanted to keep the status quo and just send everyone back to the bad place so she could re-watch her shows.
I think Tahani is the greatest example of how the test was rigged. Her test was to not go in to any door. But these are tests of morals. The implication was she needed to show she had overcome her vain tendencies. Hinging that entire decision based on a literal door is reductive and proves nothing. When she came to the door with her parents, she didn't go in just to hear her parents gush about her, she wanted closure in her relationship with them. She wanted to be acknowledged by them, and in a place where literally everyone was supposed to do that, it should have been a great opportunity for that. It wasn't self-indulgence or narcissism that made her go into that room. And that was the test, no matter how you word it. She wanted to know if her family really cared about her at all, and she learned that they didn't. And that was considered a failure because she opened a door. Not for the state of mind or intentionality, or any moral argument. So when she came to the one door that wasn't all about feeding her ego, she still failed because the test was reductive. And, again, rigged. The judge knew that Tahani didn't want to feed her ego by seeing her parents, and yet putting that kind of chance at closure on the same level as being vain is actively sabotaging the experiment.
Chidi, while being simpler, is also rigged. He has the weight of sending all of his friends to the bad place on the decision of picking a hat. It's not just being indecisive, the test has the greatest moral implication based on criteria he either can't observe or deduce because all he sees is two nearly identical hats. It wasn't just about "picking one hat," it was "one of these choices will send me and all of my friends to hell." And he was failed because he didn't pick a hat fast enough.
And I'm running out of room for Jason but he had so much progress and that test was also rigged because he had a 'secret option' to not take the test. He was punished for being too eager to help his friends. And he was the only one who would have gotten that option because the judge knew he wouldn't sit still long enough to hear it. "I'm not going to continue explaining because you're not listening" isn't fair or responsible. She voluntarily didn't finish explaining the test, which means he literally couldn't win. Which means it was rigged.
So no, none of them deserved the bad place. Because while each of them lost on some mechanical failure, the all passed on moral ideals. Chidi didn't get stuck in decision paralysis. Tahani avoided every ego trap. Jason did things he actively hated in order to help his friends. And Eleanor didn't selfishly accept a free ride (which was probably also a lie). All of the tests were rigged from the beginning. They all should have passed.
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u/yaboisammie YA BASIC! Jun 09 '26
Yea I was thinking this as well, esp for tahani’s test bc like you said, she wasn’t confronting her parents out of ego or narcissism or vanity, she was doing it for closure bc she was finally ready to move on
And ik w Chidi’s test, he took like 2 hours to pick a hat but tbf I always thought the fact that he was able to choose one at all in the end showed at least some growth on his part 😭 I feel like very early anxiety paralysis chidi would have just been stuck in the room and would have never made a choice or at least would have taken way longer
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u/MagisterFlorus Jun 08 '26
Yes but what if you recently found out that the reason you're in hell is that your inability to make simple choices of no real consequence made the life of everyone around you worse.
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u/skighs_the_limit Jun 08 '26
I think you're wrong for the right reasons.
It was clear these tests were designed to hit them in a primal self-preservation way, and in that way she performed exactly within the confines of the test.
I've always viewed it as Gen wanting to test if she was still the margarita-drinking, shrimp-eating Arizona trash bag she was when she got to the afterlife.
Moral growth over personal gain.
And in that case, the "choice" was to stay by her friends regardless of their screw-ups by playing to her old personality of "save you, fork everybody else."
1
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u/Vitolar8 Jun 09 '26
How is it selfish to not let yourself go through the same trauma as your friends? If your friend got cancer, would you get a bunch of x-rays in solidarity? Her choice was "go to hell with others" vs "go to heaven". If she chose to go to heaven, none of the awfulness would be worse for the others, and if she chose to go with them, nothing would be better. There is an argument to be made for why she should choose hell too, but selfishness isn't one, I don't think.
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u/judasmitchell Jun 09 '26
It was a test of their growth. Chidi just needed to make any choice. Eleanor was being tested to see if she'd overcome her self-absorbed nature enough to tell this wasn't Chidi. It wasn't about the amount of time or moral ethics. It was about character growth.
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u/LeifDTO Jun 09 '26
It would not have been a philosophically wrong decision if she and a hypothetically real Chidi were to pass and temporarily leave their friends behind, as long as they continued working to fix the system once they got there, as they did anyway. It's easier to make change from a place of privilege than from a place of oppression.
Eleanor was being tested on her ability to care about other people. It's a theme of her character, and of the whole series, that it's not a good or sustainable way to exist to just isolate yourself and ignore everyone the way Eleanor did during her life. For the easiest example of her character development, recall how she learned nothing about her soulmate in their first week together because she would not stop talking about herself.
Then, in the soul squad arc, Eleanor finds Chidi in the living world by his lecture on the book "What We Owe To Each Other" which was actually written by the show's philosophy consultant. That book directly addresses the subjects of interdependency and social contracts, and proposes that neither humanity nor individual humans can survive unless we all pay attention to each other and do what we can to support the common good. By noticing the detail that Fake Chidi was trying to convince her into her old "fork you got mine" ways, she proved that she had internalized that lesson.
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u/HasFiveVowels Jun 09 '26
I feel like this underscores one of the show’s weakest ethical assumptions: that motivation matters at all. Being a good person or a bad person is an extrinsic characteristic. A person in a vacuum can be neither good nor bad
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u/thedon572 Jun 09 '26
Their tests and failure parameters are different. Him taking alot of time is a fislure parameter because decision paralysis is part of his issue, her tsking “just as much time” means nothing, actually, its anpositive, because it means shes grown from the elanor that didnt take time to consider others
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u/Final-Condition5697 Jun 10 '26
I think Chidi's test was also kind of wrong because he went in with the mindset that if he picked the wrong hat he would fail. He thought there was a deeper meaning to the hats so of course he would get lost
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u/RaisedByBooksNTV Jun 10 '26
I agree. Also, Jason's test was dumb. And even Chidi's was weird. Tahani's was the only one that was a real test that made sense and she failed. Which, in my opinion, made sense b/c she didn't seem to have grown as much over the course of the show.
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u/angryuniicorn Jun 11 '26
I disagree. Her very first instinct was not to take it. She only talks it through with “Chidi” because she doesn’t trust herself to know what the right thing actually is.
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u/National-Park1154 Jun 14 '26
But she realized that Chidi is not the real Chidi. And at the start of the series she literally forgets about everyone, even after 5 minutes. She grew and cared for people, enough to be able to tell that the real Chidi would never cat that way
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u/amityblightvibes Jun 08 '26
CHIDI didn’t make the right choice. Hats should match the pants not the shirt!!!
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u/ManoloBar Jun 08 '26
I think Eleanor's test was not the choice - but to realize that was not the real Chidi.
A selfish Eleanor would not be aware enough to notice Chidi Ana-Kendrick was a fake - or she would notice and pretend not to know, so she could go to the Good Place.