The Bad Place of The Good Place is certainly a location no one wants to visit when they die, although so far, it doesn't seem nearly as bad as most depictions of Hell in popular media. Series creator Michael Schur recently explained why that is, and added in two things that he's refused to be shown in The Bad Place.
No kids, because that's too depressing, and no physical anguish. I think that keeps the show from devolving into some weird manifestation about human pain. It's better to show toxic masculinity or annoying YouTubers, because that sounds like what hell really is.
Seeing a child in The Bad Place or physical pain inflicted on others could be funny on The Good Place, but Michael Schur wants to keep with lighter forms of torture. As funny as it may be to hear about the penis flatteners, two-headed man-eating bears, and demons grabbing someone's butt from the inside and turning them inside out, actually seeing that go down wouldn't be so funny. Okay, two of those three wouldn't be hilarious to see on screen.
Despite that, Michael Schur isn't down for changing his mind on adding violence and torture to The Good Place anytime soon. Instead, he'd rather the show's demons be almost to be represented the same as humans, with the difference being their penchant for finding ways to torture their victims in unique ways. As Schur mentioned at L.A.'s Vulture Festival (via Vulture), this is obviously the much more humorous way to approach Hell's servants. Here's how he put it:
If they were really evil demons who were hedonistically ripping people's eyes off and stuff, that doesn't sound too funny.
The Good Place has instead turned Hell into a corporation of sorts, where demons approach their responsibilities of torture and mayhem as if they were a job. There are board meetings, discussions on how to innovate torture, and competition amongst demons in what seems to be a cut-throat work environment. Of course, there are actual spots where damned humans are tortured, but those locales have yet to be shown on the NBC comedy.
If Michael Schur is adamant on his rules for The Bad Place, there's a good chance we'll never get to see any torture beyond demons getting locked up inside cocoons. Schur is a fan, however, of introducing demons to paint a vivid picture of what won't be shown, such as the guys from the toxic masculinity department. More characters like that should lay things out well enough that viewers don't need to actually see the torture to know it's happening.
The Good Place airs on NBC Thursdays at 8:00 p.m. ET. For a look at what else is happening on television at the moment, be sure to visit our fall premiere guide. For a look ahead at what's coming in 2019, head on over to our handy midseason premiere guide.
