The Good Place: 5 Times Jason Was An Overrated Character (& 5 He Was Underrated)

Michael Schur’s The Good Place is, it seems, one of the best comedies to have emerged from the 2010s. It’s not hard to see why many would think this, since it manages to combine deep philosophical ruminations about the nature of morality with characters that the viewer can earnestly care about and wish to succeed. Of all of those characters, Jason is one of the most fascinating, especially since he is, without question, the dimmest bulb in the group.

However, beneath his foolishness, there is a heart of gold and, strange as it may seem, he even seems to possess his own form of wisdom.

10 Overrated: His Loyalty To His Idiot Of A Father

Time and again, it’s made clear that, for better or worse (and often worse), one of the most formative influences on Jason has been his deadbeat of a father. When he finally appears, it’s clear that the man is even more of an idiot than Jason, though he lacks a lot of Jason’s charm. While Jason certainly deserves some props for being loyal to a man who clearly didn’t feel the same thing for him, it also defies logic and good sense for him to continue.

9 Underrated: Even He Figured Out It Was The Bad Place Once

It’s probably not a surprise that it was Eleanor that was the first to discover that what everyone had thought was the Good Place was in fact the Bad Place. After all, as bad as she can be, Eleanor has a sharp intellect. However, it’s important to remember that there was even a time when Jason-poor, dim-bulb Jason-who actually figured it out first. As the old saying goes, even a broken clock is right twice a day, and the same goes for Jason.

8 Overrated: Love Of Janet May Not Be About Open-Mindedness

The romance between Jason and Janet is one of the most touching aspects of the entire show. After all, it’s not every human being who would try to make it work with a being that knows everything and can summon objects on command. He even seems not to care about the fact that she isn’t human. However, given that Jason is, to put it mildly, not very bright at the best of times, it might just be that he doesn’t recognize that there is a difference between humans and Janets.

7 Underrated: He Managed To Play Jianyu Convincingly For A While

When the viewer first meets Jason, their perspective on him is filtered through Eleanor (since she’s the focal point of the narrative to start with). At that time she, along with the other humans, is under the impression that Jason isn’t a dunce from Florida but is, instead, a monk named Jianyu. The brilliance of the whole thing is that somehow, despite everything, Jason manages to play this part convincingly for quite a while (it helps that he also keeps his mouth shut the whole time).

6 Overrated: Bortles And A Molotov Aren’t Always The Answer

Jason, like any good sitcom character, has a few characteristics that carry on throughout the entire series. Most notably, he seems to have an absolute obsession with both Blake Bortles and molotov cocktails. Of course, his frequent mentioning of these two things can be very funny indeed, but there are also a few times when the viewer just wants to shake him and remind him that these two things aren’t the answer to every issue or question that arises in life.

5 Underrated: He Seems Less Incompetent Than His Friends Somehow

Jason, for all of his dim-wittedness, seems to have a charm that allows him to make friends with almost no effort. During his life, for example, he seems to have had several people that were his consistent collaborators. Most strangely, however, it would appear (based on what the viewer sees) that Jason was, in all likelihood, the smartest one of the bunch.

It’s truly frightening to think of anyone being dimmer than Jason, but somehow they manage to pull it off.

4 Overrated: He’s Only So Upbeat Because He’s Kind Of Dim

Of all of the characters, Jason is the one that seems to have an irrepressible sense of optimism about everything. Even when things are at their bleakest, they seemingly can count on Jason to give them a sense that things might turn out after all. At the same time, a cynical viewer might be inclined to point out that this optimism probably stems more from Jason’s lack of intellectual sophistication than it does from any sophisticated philosophical position.

3 Underrated: He Doesn’t Get Enough Credit For Not Accidentally Killing Himself Before The Safe Incident

Like the other three human characters, Jason’s death was brought about by his own carelessness and stupidity (in this case locking himself in a safe without adequate ventilation).

What’s most surprising about this revelation is the fact that Jason managed to somehow get this far in his life without accidentally killing himself beforehand (or at the very least causing himself grievous bodily harm), especially since he seems to have an almost pathological fondness for molotov cocktails.

2 Overrated: Everyone Being Impressed When He Gets Something Right

Every time that Jason manages to get something right during the course of the show, everyone seems impressed with what he’s accomplished. This is particularly true of Eleanor, who heaps praise on him whenever he proves that there are a few functioning brain cells still going. However, it’s worth noting that often he just stumbles into the right answer and, of course, the old adage about the broken clock holds true in this instance as well.

1 Underrated: He’s Probably One Of The Better Characters, Morally, In The Beginning

There’s something to be said for Jason’s particular form of almost childlike simplicity. In the beginning of the show, and to an extent throughout its run, it’s pretty clear that Jason is one of the better characters, in terms of his personal morality, than many of the others. Perhaps this is because he’s too dim-witted to really be malicious. On the other hand, it’s also true that his carelessness means that he often causes harm, even when he doesn’t necessarily mean to do so.

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