History Recap / TheGoodPlaceS4E08TheFuneralToEndAllFunerals

* DidYouJustFlipOffCthulhu: All the Janets in the world stand up to Gen, who could easily vaporize demons by snapping her fingers. She's thrown off only because there are so many of them.

* CessationOfExistence: The threat of this hangs over ''all of humanity'', living and dead alike, when Gen decides to reboot all of existence because the world and humans in general have become too complex for the points system to judge effectively rather than find some way to fix the system itself.

** Gen plans to use one to wipe out ''all of existence itself'' to start over with a clean new slate... until Janet sends it into her void. It looks like a garage door opener.

* EvilIsPetty: Shawn would rather rub Michael's simultaneous loss and victory in his face and convince Gen to stay the course rather than admit he was wrong, do an EnemyMine, and beg Gen to reconsider wiping out the universe (which would include himself).

* CessationOfExistence: The threat of this hangs over '''''all of humanity''''', living and dead alike, when Gen decides to reboot all of existence because the world and humans in general have become too complex for the points system to judge effectively rather than find some way to fix the system itself.

* DidntThinkThisThrough: When the gang objects to Gen obliterating the universe, she asks them what they thought was going to happen if she decided they were right about the points... and then they realize that they really ''didn't'' think about what the solution to the broken points system would be due to Janet and Michael accidentally making the Soul Squad afterlife fugitives. They were hoping that Gen would reform the points system itself, though; Michael awkwardly says maybe give humans three points for eating apples instead of two.

* SternlyWordedLetter: Faced with the imminent erasure and rebooting of humanity, the Good Place Committee sit down to write one of these. Then they decide "stern" is too confrontational, and the guy writing it stops and resigns on the spot.

* HeelFaceDoorSlam: It's confirmed, sadly, that Brent's literal last-minute change of heart wasn't enough to pull him out of the negative point range of morality. Michael is forced to concede to Shawn that Brent actually got ''worse'' during the experiment.

* BillBillJunkBill: Gen sorting through her purse goes "lip gloss, lip gloss, thing that ends all that wars, ''Series/{{Justified}}'' season 2..."

--> '''Gen''': I don't think any of you are using that right...

* BrickJoke: In the first episode of the season, Michael mentions one incarnation of Janet called Disco Janet. Here, during the climax when the army of Janets show up, one shows up brightly dressed, curly-haired and in rollerskates doing a disco dance.

--> '''Gen''': I don't think any of you is using that right...

* BaitAndSwitchComment: Subverted. Jason says his mother died of "the big c", which was what he called a crocodile outside his house, before admitting he was joking and she ''did'' die of cancer.
* BrickJoke: In the first episode of the season, Michael mentions one incarnation of Janet called Disco Janet. Here, during the climax when the army of Janets show up, one shows up brightly dressed, curly-haired and in rollerskates doing a disco dance.

** When checking the humans' scores, they find that they all did indeed become better than when they started... except Brent, who became 1% worse, though his last-second apology did bring his score back up to that amount when it was much lower before.
** When Gen is unimpressed with the humans' point scores, Michael reveals to her how much those who the gang helped as "The Soul Squad" improved, with Kamilah opening a scholarship under Tahani's name for girls to go to college, Donna continuing to be a good stepmother to Patricia, and Pillboi opening a charity.

** Chidi. Eleanor decides to wake him up, tell him the truth about everything (again) and hope that he can find a solution to save everyone.

* EvilIsPetty: Shawn would rather rub Michael's simultaneous loss and victory in his face and convince Gen to stay the course rather than admit he was wrong, do an EnemyMine, and beg Gen to reconsider wiping out the universe (which would include him).

* TakeThat: When Michael asks Matt to show the progress Kamilah, Donna, and Pillboi had made since Team Cockroach influenced them positively, Shawn states that ''he'' should cite three random living people too to make his case, citing Elizabeth Holmes, Henry Kissinger and LetsPlay/PewDiePie.

* AdultFear:
** Jason reveals that his mother died of cancer.
** It's revealed that Kamilah had to bury her sister. Pillboi grieved Jason alone while Donkey Doug was in jail.

* HeroicSacrifice: The Janets are all willing to have Gen marbelize them one by one while searching for the DoomsdayDevice to buy the gang time to come up with a better solution to the outdated points system.

* DoomsdayDevice: Gen plans to use one to wipe out ''all of existence itself'' to start over with a clean new slate... until Janet sends it into her void. It looks like a garage door opener.

* AttendingYourOwnFuneral: The Soul Squad with an unconscious Chidi in tow hold their own funerals, since they obviously died and never got to mourn their premature deaths.
* BaitAndSwitchComment: Subverted. Jason says his mother died of "The big c"..what he called a crocodile outside his house....then admits he was joking and she ''did'' die of cancer.

** When checking the humans' scores, they find that they all did indeed become better than when they started...except Brent, who became 1% worse, though his last-second apology did bring his score back up to that amount when it was much lower before.
** When the judge is unimpressed with the humans' point scores, Michael reveals to her how much those who the gang helped as "The Soul Squad" improved, with Kamilah opening a scholarship for many women to go to college under Tahani's name, Donna helping her stepdaughter out more with her homework, and Pillboi opening a charity.

* DidntThinkThisThrough: When the gang objects to Gen obliterating the universe, she asks them what they thought was going to happen if she decided they were right about the points...and then they realize that they really ''didn't'' think about what the solution to the broken points system would be due to Janet and Michael accidentally making the Soul Squad afterlife fugitives. They were hoping that Gen would reform the points system itself, though; Michael awkwardly says maybe give humans three points for eating apples instead of two.

* DoomsdayDevice: Gen plans to use one to wipe out humanity...until Janet sends it into her void. It looks like a garage door opener.
** There's also an inversion. While looking for the DoomsdayDevice in her purse, Gen takes out one that apparently ends all wars.
* DueToTheDead: Janet reveals that the Soul Squad's families and friends had their ways of grieving

** Pillboi graffitied a Red Lobster in honor of Jason's memory.

* GondorCallsForAid: Bad Janet circulated Michael's Manifesto to every other Janet in the universe, a militia's worth showing up at Gen's courtroom to help hide her DoomsdayDevice.
* HeelFaceDoorSlam: It's confirmed, sadly, that Brent's literal last-minute change of heart wasn't enough to pull him out of the negative point range of morality. Michael is forced to concede to Shawn that Brent actually got worse during the experiment.
* HeelFaceTurn: It turns out, Bad Janet was moved by the manifesto Michael gave to her before releasing her, and is now convinced that humans do deserve better, and gathers all of the other Janets to help her stall Gen.

* HonorBeforeReason:
** Shawn would rather rub Michael's simultaneous loss and victory in his face and convince Gen to stay the course rather than admit he was wrong, do an EnemyMine, and beg Gen to reconsider wiping out the universe.
** The Good Place committee once again falls victim to this, taking the time to stress over the most ethical way to write a letter pleading to Gen ''not to wipe out the entire universe''.
* HopeSpot: The gang ends up convincing Gen that the point system is indeed flawed, and her solution to the problem is...to wipe all of humanity out and start from scratch.
* IgnoredEpiphany: The whole point of redoing the experiment was to see if humans could improve after death. It succeeded on that front with everyone except Brent, and even he improved at the last minute. Instead of changing the points system, Gen took it to mean that humans in their current form should be wiped out because Earth is too complicated to be accurately judged by the system.

* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Gen initially acts this way during the proceeding. She rightfully points out that three humans making only marginal progress isn't really a valid reason to revamp how things are done, but also acknowledges that Michael's counterargument is legit, namely that the original four humans also got better during the original experiment, as did their families and friends during their time as "the soul squad", and that although Brent generally got worse throughout the experiment he did improve right at the end. She also allows the humans to attend the announcement of the verdict in their favor...well...at least what she ''thinks'' is in their favor.

* SkewedPriorities: In addition to the matter of reworking the points system, Gen tries to sneak in a petition to reboot Series/AllyMcBeal.

* TakeThat: When Michael asks Matt to show the progress Kamilah Al Jamil, Donna Shellstrop, Patricia and Pillboi had made since Team Cockroach influenced them positively, Shawn states that ''he'' should cite four random living people too to make his case, citing Elizabeth Holmes, Henry Kissinger and LetsPlay/PewDiePie.

** AntiVillain example: While Gen's logic is cold, she says that if there is something fundamentally wrong with the system then it may be best to start from scratch and learn from past mistakes.

* WonTheWarLostThePeace: After a close call, Michael wins the case and prove definitively that a [[StaticCharacter static]] point-system is unfit for [[DynamicCharacter dynamic]] humanity. What does the Judge decide to do about it? RestartTheWorld, wipe out all of humanity - both on Earth and in the afterlife - and start over from scratch.

** When the judge is unimpressed with the humans point scores, Michael reveals to her how much those who the gang helped as "The Soul Squad" improved, with Kamilah opening a scholarship for many women to go to college under Tahani's name, Donna helping her stepdaughter out more with her homework, and Pillboi opening a charity.
** Bad Janet apparently did some soul-searching, after reading Michael's manifesto. She realized that humans can be bad but life is not black and white and wiping ''everyone'' out is too extreme a solution.

* DidntThinkThisThrough: When the gang objects to Gen obliterating the universe, she asks them what they thought was going to happen if she decided they were right about the points...and then they realize that they really ''didn't'' think about what the solution to the broken points system would be due to Janet and Michael accidentally making the Soul Squad afterlife fugitives. They were hoping that Gen reform the points system itself, though; Michael awkwardly says maybe give humans three points for eating apples instead of two.

* EvenEvilHasStandards: Bad Janet doesn't want the apocalypse to happen, because she thinks it's unfair to wipe ''everyone'' out, including the demons that she likes.

* FaceDeathWithDignity:
** Even though he's going to be wiped out of existence, along with the rest of the universe, Shawn can't help but smugly point out to Michael how weird it is that he both succeeded ''and'' failed.
** Gen has an incredibly eager look on her face as she prepares to hit the button on her DoomsdayDevice, this apparently being too exciting of a moment for her to care that she's also going to be eliminated.

* IgnoredEpiphany: The whole point of redoing the experiment was to see if humans could improve after death. It succeeded on that front with everyone except Brent, and even he improved at the last minute. Gen instead took it to mean that humans, demons and architects alike should be wiped out.

* OrphanedPunchline: Michael instinctively shouts "bounces off me a sticks to you" at Shawn when he merely says his name, thinking that Shawn was about to insult him. This becomes something of a RunningGag throughout the episode, both Michael and Shawn using it as a SubvertedPunchline.

* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Gen initially acts this way during the proceeding. She rightfully points out that three humans making only marginal progress isn't really a valid reason to revamp how things are done, but also acknowledges that Michael's counterargument is legit, namely that the original four humans also got better during the original experiment, as did their families and friends during their time as "the soul squad". She also allows the humans to attend the announcement of the verdict in their favor...well...at least what she ''thinks'' is in their favor.

* SkewedPriorities:
** In addition to HonorBeforeReason, Shawn would rather show up Michael, his one rebellious demon, rather than save his own skin.
** In addition to the matter of reworking the points system, Gen tries to sneak in a petition to reboot Series/AllyMcBeal.

** AntiVillain example: while Gen's logic is cold, she says that if there is something fundamentally wrong with the system then it may be best to start from scratch and learn from past mistakes.

* SkewedPriorities: In addition to HonorBeforeReason, Shawn would rather show up Michael, his one rebellious demon, rather than save his own skin.