It was a super dreary and rainy morning in New England yesterday, so I was more than happy to watch some morning TV programming with a cup of coffee a little longer than I might usually. And I'm so glad I did. Kristen Bell was on the Today Show to talk about the new season of "The Good Place." I've watched the show since it began a couple of years ago and I've enjoyed the entertainment value of it and the messages it tries to get across. If you haven't seen it, look it up, it's a little hard to explain but the basic gist is that Kristen character as well as some others have died and gone to "The Good Place" - some might call it heaven, but these characters that had died and were sent there were all flawed humans, and The Good Place is a place where everything is perfect. And it drives her a little nuts because she can't do any of the things she likes to do. I'm not doing the show any justice at all by the description... Ted Danson plays a character who is kind of the guy in charge of the good place, and I swear that someone affiliated with the show must have met or have known of Brian Weiss (the past-life regressionist I took a workshop from this summer) as the resemblance and some of the mannerisms are uncanny.
So Kristen was talking about the upcoming season, and she mentioned that she and the other characters get "sent back to earth." I'm not quite sure how they make that work (with them being dead and all), but my first thought was they are hitting on the whole past-life thing (kind of) and perhaps that's another nod to Brian Weiss? That in itself is intriguing, and as she started talking about why they were sent back to earth, Kristen said this (and while I will use quotes, it may not be an exact transcript of her words)... "It’s about we’re all separated on earth and no ones getting better so the whole idea is that we need each other in order to improve and that idea that you need your friends to push you to be better or whether it's your soulmate or your group of friends the idea we need each other to progress and evolve that's what the whole season is about."
As if I needed another reason to love Kristen Bell* and this show. I'll definitely be watching. I believe it is so true what she said, and I've learned that our animals are helping us to grow and evolve (and love unconditionally) as well. I'm excited that a mainstream show is exploring these concepts that so many of us fully believe to be true, and I look forward to where the show takes it.
*I first saw Kristen Bell when she starred in "Forgetting Sarah Marshall." I loved the whole movie, but one of my favorite parts is a little segment after the credits that show Sarah Marshall as a pet psychic in a new show called Animal Instincts. It's a total spoof on the concept of using a pet psychic to solve crimes, complete with Sarah Marshall poised with a gun pointed at a suspect, then she looks at the dog, and both her and the dogs' eyes glow brightly, and suddenly she knows who committed the crime. My husband still teases me about it, saying that I too have animal instincts. It's probably the only way I'd ever be compared to Sarah Marshall/Kristen Bell, so I'll take it!