The Good Place recap: Season 4, Episode 4, “Tinker, Tailor, Demon, Spy,” Aired Oct. 17, 2019
The episode opened with a game of magic pictionary to help the humans bond. Every clue had something to do with the humans’ lives, and the drawings came to life.
However, it turned out that game of pictionary was a super misleading beginning to the episode because the show took a turn reeeeeaaaaally quickly. So let’s dig into this The Good Place 4×04 recap of all the twists, lies, and uncertainty.
“Something feels off”
The creepy masked figure was Glenn from the Bad Place?!
He came to the neighborhood without Shawn’s knowledge to warn Eleanor that Michael is actually Vicky in a Michael suit.
But is it Michael or Vicky? It’s unclear for most of the episode, and I’m not entirely convinced on the conclusion, but I’m interested to see if this plot comes back in a future episode.
Demon lie detector
Michael’s recent cycle of lies put him in a strange position as he tried to convince Eleanor, Jason, and Tahani that he really is Michael. First, he lied about getting a call from Shawn about the Michael suit, which caused his freakout from the beginning of the experiment, which he then lied about the reasoning for. You still with me?
Eleanor had Janet create a demon lie detector to get to the bottom of the situation, and when the team tried to use it on Glenn, he blew up – nothing left but blue goo. Luckily for him, demons can’t die, so Glenn will just put himself back together over the course of a few months.
Fire squid
When Eleanor demanded Michael take off his Michael suit to reveal either Vicky or his demon self, which would solve all the confusion over his true identity, he told the team he didn’t want to because he is a 6,000-foot-tall fire squid with teeth everywhere and a smell and “so much juice.” Ohhhhh man. I absolutely need to see this.
This explains a lot
To keep Eleanor from calling the judge to reset the experiment, Michael volunteered to blow himself up like Glenn so that they could keep going as is with all the progress they made with the new humans.
Just as Michael turned the faulty lie detector on himself, it was revealed that the real Bad Place plant in the neighborhood was Bad Janet masquerading as Janet! Jason, of all people, was the one to figure it out, as Bad Janet (as Janet) didn’t correct Jason when he called her a girl. That is super clever.
I cannot believe The Good Place 4×04 gave us such a huge twist! Even further, I am astounded how much sense this twist makes in hindsight – Janet has been rather counterproductive recently, and Good Janet wouldn’t set Team Cockroach up to question Eleanor’s leadership. I know at least some of you saw that coming, but I didn’t.
So while there was all that back-and-forth about whether or not to trust Glenn or Michael, another highlight, besides the magic pictionary, was Cheleanor’s nacho date. There really isn’t much human-created food better than nachos. Also, Chidi is absolutely making an effort to become better, and that’s really great progress.
And now Michael and Jason head to the Bad Place to rescue Janet. At least The Good Place 4×04 ends with Eleanor pretty sure Michael is actually Michael. Vicky wouldn’t offer to sacrifice herself for them, would she?
This show still has a lot of tricks up its sleeve for us. I can’t wait to see what happens next!
What did you think of “Tinker, Tailor, Demon, Spy”? Let us know at @PureFandom on Twitter!
The Good Place airs Thursday nights on NBC at 9:00/8:00c.
(Image: Colleen Hayes/NBC)
