page_title: Michael's Gambit
section_title: Production
hierarchical_section_title: Michael's Gambit / Production
caption_attribution_description: PHOTO CREDIT: ANDERS KRUSBERG / PEABODY AWARDS 71st Annual Peabody Awards Luncheon Waldorf=Astoria Hotel
context_page_description: "Michael's Gambit" is the season finale of the first season of the American fantasy-comedy television series The Good Place. It is the thirteenth episode overall and originally aired in the United States on NBC on January 19, 2017, immediately following the previous episode, "Mindy St. Claire". The episode was both written and directed by series creator Michael Schur.
  In the episode, Eleanor, Chidi, Tahani, and Jason must decide which two of them will go to the Bad Place to make up for Eleanor and Jason's absence there. They struggle to find a pairing on which they can all agree, and Eleanor realizes why their time in the Good Place has been unusual. In flashbacks, Michael wonders if there is a better way to design neighborhoods in the afterlife.
  The episode is known for its plot twist, in which the neighborhood is revealed to be the Bad Place in disguise. Schur created the ending when developing the show but kept it secret outside of a few crew members, with the exception of Kristen Bell and Ted Danson, who were told when they signed on as cast members.
context_section_description: The episode was written and directed by Michael Schur, the show's creator. It is his second writing credit (after the season premiere) and first directing credit for the series.
  When developing The Good Place, Schur turned to dramas such as Lost and Breaking Bad, which contained many cliffhangers and, in his words, left viewers "so absorbed in something and so intrigued by something that you have to know how it ends." During the development process, he worked with Lost co-creator Damon Lindelof to gather advice and input on the series; Lindelof urged Schur to "take the time to think about what you're going to do before you do it." As a result, the entirety of the first season, as well as the start to the second season, was planned out in advance, and Schur and the writing staff would deviate little from this plan during production of the first season. Schur also took some inspiration for the flashbacks from Lost. He noted that the scenes were "usually [a] two- or three-beat mini-story, told in distinct beats throughout the episode [and] reflective of the larger question of the episode."
  Schur told Kristen Bell and Ted Danson about the season's twist ending when they were originally brought on board. He felt it was important for their characters to know what would happen, mainly since Michael orchestrates the scheme and Eleanor is the one to figure it out. He explained, "I wanted them to know the whole picture. I thought it would be sort of uncool to Ted Danson to say, 'I want you to play an angel,' and then four months later go, 'Just kidding. You're a devil.'" Schur also told the writers about the twist at the beginning in order to ensure the writing would be consistent and set up the finale, but he did not tell the other actors on the show until they were near the end of filming for the season. He later remarked, "They gave the most honest and real performance they could give, simply because they didn’t know."
  The episode was written and filmed before the show premiered. Originally, the writers had several other ideas for how to have Eleanor tell herself about Michael's scheme, including writing a message on herself in a manner similar to Memento, before deciding on giving Janet the note. To write the note, Eleanor tears a page out of T.M. Scanlon’s book What We Owe To Each Other. The sinister laugh from Michael after Eleanor figured out his plan was improvised by Danson after several takes and spliced together with other footage. In the rebooted neighborhood, many details, such as the furnishings in Michael's office and the clown paintings in Eleanor's house, were slightly tweaked or rearranged; Schur later explained that this shows how extensive Michael's plan is.
  While NBC had made previous episodes available to the press early, the network did not release the finale ahead of time, likely to preserve the twist. The network would also renew the series for a 13-episode second season in the wake of the finale.
caption: Michael Schur, series creator and writer/director for the episode
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