What's Next, Joseph Campbell?

  

*Spoiler alert for The Good Place*

    For most, the hero’s journey is fulfilled only by reaching the last step in the cycle, the Freedom to Live. In this final stage, the hero achieves a balance in life when they are no longer afraid of death and are “neither anticipating the future nor regretting the past” (“Hero’s Journey''). Pessimistically, however, I feel eventually this state would begin to lose its significance. I predict that after a while, the balance that had once accompanied the final stage will begin to tip back to a state of normal and gone is the glory of life in the cycle’s finale. Similar to when a dog finally catches its tail, but then realizes that it’s now stuck. So that I don’t sound completely radical (or rad…), one of my favorite TV shows, The Good Place, aligns with this thought: the idea that, perhaps, completing the hero’s journey does not govern the fulfillment of the quest.

The Good Place features protagonist Eleanor Shellstrop in the afterlife. Eleanor was a particularly rancid human on Earth, but she somehow winds up in the “Good Place,” a.k.a. heaven, run by the immortal being Michael. In a spiral of a plot twist, Michael turns out to be a demon disguised in a human “skinsuit,” who had created a fake Good Place to cover up the fact that Eleanor, along with three others, are actually in hell; he uses the idiosyncrasies of human life to create a different kind of torture. Eleanor and Co. end up figuring out that they are actually in the Bad Place, and, thus, their journey begins--to escape to the real Good Place. Three seasons later, they finally arrive in the true Good Place, yet its perfection is not as blissful as it seems. They find out that living in an idyllic heaven for eternity has turned people into mindless zombies because their every desire is met in the blink of an eye. Without the time limit of the real world, this never-ending oasis becomes pointless.

They realize they cannot live in this endless perfection forever. It is only when they create a portal for those who are ready to leave the Good Place that the afterlife in heaven is truly cherishable. The idea that the final stage of the hero’s cycle fulfills the journey is contradicted in the Good Place, for there is the question of “what happens next?” Is this stage endless, or does the narrative continue? According to The Good Place’s interpretation, people cannot be satisfied unless they know that there is more to their journey. It seems we can only appreciate the present when we know there is a possibility of a future, for humans are inquisitive creatures. Where the portal leads to is unknown, but both the knowledge that the journey can continue as well as the uncertainty of what the future entails are the aspects of the hero’s journey that make it worthwhile.

In the very last episode, Eleanor is ready to leave the real Good Place, and we see her finally entering the portal. The others have left before her, yet this is the only time we get to see what is on the other side. The portal leads the people’s souls back to Earth where they embrace another human’s life; thus, the journey does indeed continue. This ending is one of my favorites because it concludes the narrative with the promise of another. It gives the journey another purpose and also, perhaps, the anticipation of a second chance. Throughout the show, Eleanor experiences moral growth that would not have been possible in the span of a human lifetime on Earth, and by the final season, she is a better person. When she enters the portal and into life on Earth, we see her soul influencing a person’s actions for the better. There is not only a sense of fulfillment from the continuation of her journey, but there is also satisfaction knowing her journey has been given a new purpose. 

    The hero’s journey explores a deeper narrative than I thought, and it also gave me a reason to rewatch clips from The Good Place. All in all, I suppose we can say, “Good job, Joseph Campbell.”