NBC’s ‘The Good Place’ is headed to a bad place– the end of the road. The high-concept heaven/hell sitcom will return for a fourth and final season this fall, revealed the show’s creator and executive producer Michael Schur, at a series panel held at the Television Academy in North Hollywood, on Friday night. ‘The Good Place’ wasn’t canceled. Rather, this will complete the story as Schur and his collaborators designed it.
As he stated at the panel:
“After ‘The Good Place’ was picked up for season two, the writing staff and I began to map out, as best we could, the trajectory of the show. Given the ideas we wanted to explore, and the pace at which we wanted to present those ideas, I began to feel like four seasons – just over 50 episodes – was the right lifespan.
“At the end of the day, we don’t want to tread water just because the water is so warm and pleasant. As such, the upcoming fourth season will be our last.
“I will be forever grateful to NBC and Universal TV for letting us make The Good Place, and for letting us end it on our own schedule. I will also be forever grateful to the creative team, both on-screen and off, for their hard work and dedication to a very weird idea. We ask the question very frequently, on this show, what do we owe to each other? The answer, for me, is: I owe all of you a whole lot… We look forward to a great final season airing this fall.”
‘The Good Place’ premiered in 2016 to solid ratings, but it has really excelled when it comes to streaming. (Entire prior seasons are available on Netflix, while Hulu releases episodes the day after they air on NBC.) Unlike other sitcoms, however, due to its serialized storylines, ‘The Good Place’ is a series that has to be watched in order, meaning that newcomers can’t just check out one random episode and expect to understand it.
Kristen Bell fronted the comedy as Eleanor Shellstrop, a terrible human being who realizes she was sent to heaven– or ‘The Good Place’– by accident. She also soon realizes that she is there at the expense of the soul of another woman named Eleanor Shellstrop who deserved eternal peace and happiness, but was instead sent to The Bad Place in Eleanor I’s place. But in ‘The Good Place’, nothing is as it seems, and the mystery becomes more tangled as Eleanor and her hapless friends, played by William Jackson Harper, Jameela Jamil, and Manny Jacinto, dig deeper. Ted Danson and D’Arcy Carden round out the regular cast.
‘The Good Place’ was nominated for two Golden Globe and two Emmy Awards. In 2018, it was named the American Film Institute’s TV Series of the Year.
Luckily, this isn’t a case of cancelation. Fans will be able to get the entire story the way that Schur envisioned it. And there is one final season to look forward to in the fall.
Were you a fan? Are you sad to see ‘The Good Place’ go?
Source: Deadline