post- 10/11/18

Issue

In This

Rebecca Buxbaum

Anita Sheih

2

Shiru

Strawberry Generation Makes Music 4

Rachel Landau 4

Opening at the Manege Abbie Hui 5

Warm Tastes James Feinberg 6

Heaven is a Place on Earth

postCover by Jonathan Muroya

OCT 12

VOL 22 —

ISSUE 5

FEATURE

Strawberry Generation Makes Music Sweet Tunes with “Millennial Snowflakes”

By Anita Sheih Illustrated by Katya Labowe-Stoll

T

wo years ago, I remember going to the Underground for an event. How the event went and what friend I went with and what things I saw there, I can’t remember. But what I do remember is what I heard, from two people and a ukulele. Little did I know that I was witnessing the beginnings of Strawberry Generation, an indie pop band made up of four students, three EPs, and one strong passion— making good music. *** post-: Let's do intros.

Luk Yean (Luk): I'm Luk Yean. I'm one of the singers and the rhythm guitarist. I'm from Singapore.

My majors are CS-econ and music. And my spirit animal…[sighing] What do you think?

Alejandro Subiotto Marqués (Ale): A fox.

Luk: Fox? Really? Like a lazy fox.

Valerie Zhu (Val): No, no, no, like a sly fox.

Ale: Like a snow fox.

Luk: Oh, that's good, snow fox.

Val: I'm Val. I am one of the vocalists, and I play keys, sax, and tambourine. I used to play ukulele also.

Letter from the Editor

Sometimes melodica. I study biology. My spirit animal is the tomato.

Luk: ‘Cause you're vegetarian—or used to be [laughing].

Ale: I'm Alejandro. I'm the drummer in Strawberry Generation, and I'm from Brussels, Belgium...I'm a development studies major, I'm a senior, and my spirit animal is a lion mixed with a koala.

Max Naftol (Max): Ok [laughing]. I'm Max. I'm a senior and a music concentrator. I play bass in the band. I guess my spirit animal would be an octopus.

Weird State Things 1. Maine’s state beverage—Moxie

When the weather is this nice in mid-October, it’s hard not to think of Brown as The Good Place. After a short break from the campus hustle and bustle, post- is returning this week with a local focus. We hope you enjoy our thoughts on the new ramen place on Thayer and the new face of Shiru Cafe; feel inspired to stop by Strawberry Generation’s EP release show (tonight) or Gigs on the Grass (tomorrow) and enjoy

3. Idaho’s state slogan—“Great Potatoes.

Tasty Destinations.”

4. Missouri’s state nickname—“Show Me State” 5. New Mexico’s state question—“Red or Green?”

some student-produced music; and remember the strange

6. Utah’s state snack—Jell-O

and wonderful connections Brown brings, both at home and

7. Arizona’s state tie—bolo tie

abroad.

8. Maryland’s state exercise—walking Happy fallventures,

Jennifer editor-in-chief of post-

2!post–

2. Nebraska’s state soft drink—Kool-Aid*

9. Delaware’s state macroinvertebrate—stonefly 10. Rhode Island’s state song—“Rhode Island, It’s For Me” *Nebraska also has a state beverage. However, Kool-Aid (though it might deserve a special shout-out) is still not a soft drink.

Luk: Mmm interesting, that’s funky. post-: So how did you all meet?

Val: Origin story? Wait, I don't know how origin we're talking here.

Luk: So I was born in…[laughing].

Val: We met in the Ratty in freshman year, Luk and I. We met through our mutual friend Chris.

Luk: I guess around the same time, I was recording some of my own stuff. And I made a song, called “Satellite,” and I had an idea that I wanted a saxophone solo at the end of the song. So I asked Chris, “Do you know anyone who plays the saxophone? He was like, “Oh yeah, my friend Valerie plays it.” And I was like, “Ok! I'll reach out.”

Val: Then Luk said, “Hey, we should do a show together.” Me, Luk, and Chris. So we did. It was the B-Side Coffee Haus.

Luk: It was the first ever acoustic show that B-Side Magazine organized, and my Meiklejohn happened to be the founder of B-Side. It was really fortuitous because he knew that I made music and asked if we wanted to play a short set. So I asked Chris and Valerie to play at that show. And at the end of the show, there was this really cool-looking fella who came up to us and said, “Hey, that was great! My name is Alejandro.”

I was like, “Oh, cool, Alejandro! Nice to meet ya.” After that, it became the four of us, I guess.

Val: And then Chris was like, “Sorry, man, I got CS.” Luk: Then we got a couple of extra new members, and then they left. And for a while, it was the three of us again, and now Max is joining us. post-: What is the story behind your name?

Luk: Strawberry Generation is a Chinese phrase, and it’s the Chinese equivalent of saying “millennial snowflakes.” Strawberries spoil and become rotten really easily. It's the way that the older generation mocks young people. I guess we kind of wanted to reclaim it and turn it into something that's...not that.

And also, strawberries are a distinctive visual image, so I kinda like it.

Ale: So I think our music is very...sugary and happy and all that stuff, but if you listen for the lyrics, it's not as simple as it may seem when you're just listening for the music. post-: How do you come up with the lyrics?

Val: LIFE. All: [laughing] Val: That's the question! Sometimes, you listen to a specific artist, and you're inspired by the stuff that they do, and you kind of feel like you wanna write.

Sometimes, you're inspired by situations in your life.

I guess like, for me, if I experience something very sad, or if I'm feeling moody, then I'll wanna write. post-: You've mentioned how everyone in the group comes from different places and has different tastes in music. So we wanted to talk about how you're different but what unites you in this group.

Ale: Brockhampton.

All: [laughing] post-: Is that a point of division or unity?

Ale: Unity.

Luk: I feel like there are small intersections of the Venn diagrams of each of us.

Ale: Yeah, they're really interesting intersections.

Luk: Yeah, both Ale and I listen to rap, like Brockhampton and A Tribe Called Quest. Val and I like Carly Rae Jepsen…The bands that unify us are the ones that we identify with, possibly because we sound quite connected to them. We have quite a similar style and lineup as Alvvays, which is an indie pop band from Canada. So I guess we all converge and happen to like the band because that's what we want to see perfected in our own music.

Val: That's Alvvays spelled with two v's instead of a w.

All: [Holding up v’s in the first two fingers of each hand] All-v-vayz!

Strawberries spoil and become rotten really easily.

It's the way that the older generation mocks young people. I guess we kind of wanted to reclaim it and turn it into something that's...not that. post-: What would you call your music?

Val: Haha, sweats nervously, haha.

Ale: Sugar pop. I say sugar pop, yeah.

Val: We're kinda twee.

Max: Pretty, like, saccharine, almost.

Ale: Isn't it jungle something? Something jungly... no, jangly!

All: Yes, jangly! post-: What's it like to be a student musician at Brown? 'Cause you mentioned Chris stopped because of CS, right?

Luk: Yeah, I can go first because I slept at 5 a.m. last night doing CS homework. I feel like, first of all, I have to acknowledge that my parents are really supportive.

They're coming to our release show, which is great.

They're literally only coming to see us play. I think it's gotten a lot tougher, partially because, just personally, I kind of changed majors in my junior year. Although more like I added CS in addition to econ. So that’s been kind of tough. I guess being a student musician, I keep thinking about opportunity cost because I'm an econ major [laughing]. But you know, I don't think I'd be the same, I don't think my Brown experience would be the same if I wasn't part of the music scene and playing music with the people in this band.

Val: I don't think that I ever considered not doing music at Brown. I do a lot of different things that are unrelated to each other, like in bio and with the music stuff. In my bio-related activities, people there don't really know a whole lot about my music life. And people

in my music life don't really know a whole lot about my bio-related activities. It's like Hannah-Montanastyle, [singing] get the beeest of both worlds! But it's good. It keeps you sane…Like Luk said—opportunity cost, gotta figure out what your priorities are. I think that's always the hardest question: What is important to you? And what are you willing to spend time on over the other things?

Ale: That's why you gotta do the humanities, and not do the readings [laughing]. post-: How often do you guys try to meet or practice?

Max: Scheduling all that stuff in and around classwork is quite difficult. It’s easier with Strawberry Generation though, because Luk is very militaristic in his planning and thinking, with organizational skills that I've never seen in an informal band before.

Everything's on a Google Drive, everything's run through Slack, there's notifications, there's even, you know— Val: A shared Google Calendar.

Max: A shared Google Calendar, everything is on military time...

Luk: Sorry, I wish to clarify by saying it's 'cause I actually was from the military.

Max: Yeah, it's just funny to see that applied to a musical setting because I've never experienced that before. It's efficient but also intimidating.

Ale: I'm really grateful for how much effort Luk puts into all of it. Because it always feels like he's always helping further us in some way.

Luk: The major thing that I'm kind of trying to enforce onto myself is that we want to finish an album by the time we all graduate next year. Which is tough because we have maybe, at most, 2.3 songs complete.

And we probably need a few more to make an album.

Val: We'll have more.

Luk: Ale has always been like, “Hey, let's go to become a Brooklyn band and live in a small apartment…”

Ale: Well, I said LA first...

Luk: LA is tough...unless you're Brockhampton.

All: [laughter] Luk: Well, 'cause Ale and I are international students, the future is fuzzy...We'll see about that.

The fact that this is our last year and that we're international students is definitely fueling this urge for me to get things done, because...it reminds you that things are ephemeral. Part of me's always like, “Oh, you know, I'm a senior. I have to do senior-y things, and I still wanna make this album. This is crazy.”

Ale: I feel like senior-y things is making music. *** Strawberry Generation’s new EP, Losing Our Way, comes out today—if you’ve never heard their music before, a perfect way to get a first taste would be to stop by their release show tonight, Friday, October 12, starting at 8 p.m. at North House (111 Brown St.). If you can’t make it, you can also find them online! After all, this is a band of, by, and for the millennial generation.

This interview was edited for length and clarity.

“I’m a Ratty agnostic.”

“Okay, everyone, plug your sex batteries in!”

“What if I raised my kids on diet food?”

“Bros don’t know how to hook up. They’re completely incompetent.”

October 12, 2018!3

NARRATIVE

Shiru

Preview at the Manege

Meditations on Modernity

By Rebecca Buxbaum illustrated by molly young I have been here fifty-three times since springtime I remember when the naïve baristas offered plastic cups for iced drinks only to watch them float beyond the caffeinated gates in the hands of summer swindlers when I signed up proudly declaring my career aspirations to be wine tasting animal husbandry do I know any languages?

I laugh smugly but alas my multilingual education has not prepared me for the new vernacular java C++ python I am confronted by my illiteracy when I threw caution to the wind surrendered my email with the assurance that I am only useful in an aggregate O the anonymity of the crowd Behold! a long-STEM rose of anthropological contemplation a barrage of students searching for seats asking strangers is anyone sitting across from you? meet-cutes in the making will there ever be corporate sponsors? are we the conqueror or the conquered? have we submitted our will to the pull of the corporation or are we at last demanding compensation? it’s discourse, b*tch.

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An artist alum in Saint Petersburg

C

By Rachel Landau Illustrated by Lauren Marin

ool rains had been falling in Saint Petersburg all afternoon. They had been falling when a friend and I ate an early dinner of falafel and bottled water on Vasilievsky Island; they had been falling when we walked across the Blagoveshchensky Bridge, the Neva River underneath us still and gray. That morning, I chose to wear the only dress I brought to Russia: a conservatively cut cotton smock, turquoise and too casual, now thoroughly soaked.

I had left Boston for Russia a week earlier. Within hours of my arrival, the World Cup began its summer reign on television screens around the country. Fans from every imaginable place paraded up and down Nevsky Prospekt in spirited ensembles, chanting and singing and speaking in languages unfamiliar to my ear, filling restaurants and hotels with their families and friends. Under an almost always present sun, Saint Petersburg refused to rest, and I found myself never sleeping, unable to block light from entering through my window.

The empty streets and raindrops invited introspection otherwise difficult to attain. Walking across Saint Petersburg, my friend and I made our way to the Manege for an invitation-only preview of a major exhibition, “SPB 2103,” which was to open to the public the next morning. I had been offered the chance to attend through my writing residency at a different museum in the city, and it seemed like too cool an opportunity to refuse.

A small crowd of young people in raincoats stood outside the enormous neoclassical building, smoking their long cigarettes. My friend and I entered the massive central hall. Pastel lights flashed on the ceiling and the wispy white curtains, and a table covered in champagne flutes, croissants, and cups of local beer hugged the left side of the room. Historic pictures and videos of Saint Petersburg cycled through in an elaborate PowerPoint projected over a stage.

Everywhere, fashionably dressed artists mingled.

I recognized another artist from the museum where I was doing my residency and greeted him, asking how his day had been. In a previous conversation, we had established ourselves as fellow Brunonians— indeed, he had attended Brown for a while, albeit 40 years before me. At the Manege, we made small talk for a few minutes before returning to our three major points of shared interest: art, Saint Petersburg, and Providence.

Over champagne, we talked about how Providence is such an exciting place to be young—a daring and intellectual and creative world. The artist told stories about the music scene from his time as a student. He described old friends from the community who spent their lives making music and having a good time. As these stories went on, I found myself growing homesick for concerts I had attended at AS220 and cups of hot drinks over which I had written poems at the Coffee Exchange. It was impossible not to remember all the rainy days I had experienced at Brown—the endless sound of precipitation pelting my Grad Center window.

At one point, the artist called Providence “the New Orleans of the north,” a name I’m not so sure resonates with my own experience of the city but nonetheless sparked a certain curiosity. Given the diverse opportunities afforded by the Open Curriculum, Brown students likely end up seeing everything so

differently, so uniquely—whether it be the entire city or just Brown’s way of operating within it.

After a certain amount of schmoozing, the artist, my friend, and I entered the actual exhibition to see what we had come to celebrate. The premise of “SPB 2103” was thrilling, to say the least: The city of Saint Petersburg celebrates its 315th birthday in 2018, but how do we even begin to imagine how different it will be by its 400th birthday in 2103?

But there we were, thousands of miles from Rhode Island, thinking and dreaming of Providence, trying to switch out Russia’s cultural capital for the city surrounding our university campus.

The first part of the exhibition featured a long timeline tracing various periods in the city’s construction. We walked through this part especially slowly, stopping often to read the details about architects and city politics. Next, a central room interpreted the city’s current ways of looking and operating. Finally, an upstairs section imagined how Saint Petersburg might look in just under a century, at its aforementioned milestone 85 years from now.

Looking back, what was strangest is that we were a timeline of our own: My new artist friend proudly represented Brown’s past whereas my student friend and I eagerly represented Brown as it is now. Among ourselves, we could speculate about what lies ahead at Brown and what could come to be in the city around it, but all of it felt far away, making it difficult to construct any fantasy of Rhode Island even half a century from now. Already, so much on campus has surprised me— what can change in a summer never fails to astound me, and what each class brings to campus is lovely in its uncertainty, even if it is just a bizarre new name for the Ratty. But there we were, thousands of miles from Rhode Island, thinking and dreaming of Providence, trying to switch out Russia’s cultural capital for the city surrounding our university campus.

After the exhibition, I walked around all night. The rain finally stopped, and all the sidewalks were glowing.

Later, Russia won its soccer game in Saint Petersburg against Egypt, and fans left the stadium in hoards— people dancing and singing on Nevsky for hours and hours. The next day, it rained again.

ARTS&CULTURE

Warm Tastes

Introducing Ganko Ittetsu Ramen

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by Abbie Hui Illustrated By Rémy Poisson

raving something more substantial and filling than instant ramen that you can find in a grocery store and whip up with a pot of hot water?

My roommate and I were hungry for comfort food when we finished unpacking on move-in day. We did not have to venture far before we stumbled upon the newly opened restaurant next to Pokéworks on Thayer Street: Ganko Ittetsu Ramen.

I was not prepared for the sensory overload when I walked in. Colors flashed before my eyes: black, white, grey, and a splash of red. The staff greeted us in Japanese, and we were quickly directed to a table. From there, I made more sense of the quaint surroundings. The spacious, clean, dark-grey details and repurposed wood tables sprinkle this modern ramen house with decor focused on traditional, intuitive, Japanese simplicity. A beautiful wall mural shows enthusiastic ramen lovers gulping down their ramen and savoring every drop of the broth—the restaurant is probably hoping for the same reactions from customers. Tables are arranged in twos and fours. Though tables sit close to one another, the proximity doesn’t feel too awkward— the ambiance is lively, full of conversation. You can even observe the chefs’ magic live if you grab a seat at the counter. Once seated, the staff hands you a menu featuring six ramen flavors. Since that first visit with my roommate, I have become a regular, shamelessly sampling every flavor, and on a recent visit, I had the opportunity to chat with head chef, Ken Iwaoka. By the restaurant’s bustling kitchen, he explained the intricate planning behind the ingredients and combinations that make up each Sapporo-style ramen dish.

What makes Sapporo ramen special? The ramen’s base broth and sauce are mixed in the wok to create a richer flavor.

The basic components of each dish are broth and noodles, with varying sauces that distinguish the six ramen options. Ganko Ittetsu’s broth is locally sourced and never frozen, made up of 70 percent chicken and 30 percent pork stocks. The

restaurant’s custom-made ramen—a bouncy, thick noodle—is found in four menu items while thinner noodles complement the lighter Shoyu and Shio ramens. Ganko Ittetsu’s uniquely thick soy sauce comes from a Japanese factory. The unpasteurized sauce is not fermented during transport, giving it a short shelf life, but it’s worth it. A variety of toppings help balance the flavors of each dish: For instance, onions and scallions neutralize the Gantetsu Shoyu’s oiliness. From corn to wakame (edible seaweed), every element is flavorful. And if you’re hungry for something extra, you can choose to add an extra serving of noodles or another protein: chashu (melting soft, mildly flavored sliced pork) or seasoned ground pork.

Let’s untangle the mysteries of each ramen dish!

Tan Tan, the restaurant’s signature sesame option, is slightly nutty and mildly spiced. The added spicy garlic oil enhances the depth of the buttery, silky, rich broth. This is a great rendition of China’s original soupless noodle dish, tantan!

When you want some spiciness in your life, Gankara Miso is your go-to. Packed full of flavor, this dish is spicy but not overwhelming, with perfectly crunchy bites of corn and tender tan-tan pork. If you’re wary of spice, you can ask for the spicy paste on the side. This miso-based ramen is a house favorite!

You cannot go wrong with Ganko Ittetsu’s “Signature Shoyu Ramen.” Shoyu is one of the most traditional kinds of ramen: basic and well-known.

The soup’s dried fish stock and diced onions add character.

Shio (translates to salt) is the “Hokkaidostyle shio ramen.” This clear broth tastes like a combination of chicken and pork. Ingredients like sea salt, fish stock, dried scallop, and kelp sauce complement each other to create a light but hearty broth. I drank all of it! Shio might sound simple, but like Shoyu, this ramen is difficult to perfect.

Ganko Ittetsu’s heaviest, most filling dish is Gantetsu Shoyu. This ramen includes more oil and toppings—including bean sprouts, scallions, sliced and diced chashu—to balance out the dish. Dry fish powder and fried garlic bring out the ramen’s flavor, leaving me satisfied.

Miso is “the origin of Sapporo style.” Sapporo is the largest city on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido. According to the history section of

Ganko Ittetsu’s website, the famous miso ramen was invented in 1954 when a customer asked for a miso and pork soup with noodles. As miso was invented in Sapporo, this dish adapts the signature Sapporo recipe, with miso sauce giving the dish a mild flavor and a twist of chicken lightening the pork broth.

Once seated, the staff hands you a menu featuring six ramen flavors. Since that first visit with my roommate, I have become a regular, shamelessly sampling every flavor...

Ganko Ittetsu’s ramen is authentic, delicious, and full of flavor. You can taste the love that goes into each and every bowl of heaven. Every noodle tastes fresh and bouncy, creating the perfect bite.

Along with flavorful sauces, rich broth coats the noodles perfectly. Every ingredient in the bowl is expertly combined and prepared—down to each perfectly-cooked egg. Don’t hesitate to try the condiments found at each table: ground white pepper and shichimi (a spicy powdered seasoning).

Though Ganko Ittetsu’s only protein is pork, vegetarian or seafood options may be available in the future. Moving forward, Ganko Ittetsu wants to stay focused on ramen—their speciality—but according to the head chef, they are open to adding appetizers, additional toppings, different ramen flavors, and more.

This niche restaurant is a welcome addition to the Providence food scene, perfect for college students craving an authentic taste of Japanese ramen and good enough to rival Ken’s Ramen downtown. Not only does Ganko Ittetsu Ramen feature high-quality, flavorful ramen and generous portions sizes, but I also look forward to the ambiance every time I visit: the friendly, attentive staff, artwork, and decor. I am excited to return for more, especially as the weather gets colder and days get shorter this fall: Some days just call for a warm bowl of ramen.

October 12, 2018!5

ARTS&CULTURE

Heaven is a Place on Earth

show’s strong suit has always been its clearly delineated rules for fantastic landscapes; the Good and Bad Places were almost characters in themselves in their wild, magical-realist cruelty. I sense the writers miss it too. One of their favorite pastimes was giving the restaurants in Michael’s fake “Good Place” neighborhood outrageouslypunned names, and this carries over to the realworld setting of season three: for instance, Chidi visits a muffin stand in Sydney called “We Crumb

Watching The Good Place on NBC

By James Feinberg illustrated by Cricket McNally

W

hen is The Good Place going to run out of room? Thus far (up to and including the current third season, which began September 27), Michael Schur’s afterlife-set opus has been a constantly funny Parks and Rec-like sitcom, sure.

But it has also been, in season one, an existentialist, philosophical text about the nature of goodness, and, in season two, a sci-fi bliss-out. Now, in season three, the show has become slightly more conventional, a (literally) earthbound friendsin-a-bind situation comedy. But it remains as inventive as always. How long can it possibly last?

For those who haven’t seen the show—and that demographic seems to be increasingly shrinking (like John Mulaney, The Good Place is rapidly becoming a mechanism of comedy hipness-signaling)—it follows Eleanor Shellstrop (Kristen Bell), a trashy Arizona sales rep who’s hit by a truck and wakes up in the titular Good Place, apparently Heaven. A dizzying series of twists follows: Eleanor thinks she’s been placed in the Good Place by mistake; Eleanor is actually in the Bad Place (you-know-where) being tortured by a demon, Michael (Ted Danson), who is attempting a social experiment; Michael warms to Eleanor and convinces his fellow demons he’s continuing the experiment but actually isn’t; Michael helps Eleanor and the other three victims of the experiment escape from the Bad Place; Michael resurrects all four of them in an attempt to prove they can become good without otherworldly interference. If this seems like a lot of ground for a half-hour comedy to cover, consider that most of season two concerned Michael restarting the experiment over and over again in a sort of Groundhog Day/Heaven Can Wait crossover scenario. Yet, the show never became repetitive— actually, it just got better and better.

Most of that is thanks to the writing, probably the second-best for a television comedy behind Veep. Certainly The Good Place is the reigning TV champion of making complexity seem breezily easy. (Attention, belabored writers of Westworld:

I’d suggest calling up Schur in the near future.)

But the cast, perfect from the beginning, has relaxed into a comic familiarity that rivals the best of this century’s comedy ensembles. Eleanor and her fellow Great Beyond misfits, Jason (Manny Jacinto), Tahani (Jameela Jamil), and Chidi (William Jackson Harper), are re-introduced at the beginning of season three, back on Earth for a second chance—this time as the subjects of Chidi’s thesis study on victims of near-death experiences.

They’re not meant to remember each other, yet they bounce off one another right away, full of chemistry. Danson, robbed of an Emmy this year, is the best thing about the show by far in his halfdeluded, half-naïve, newly-found enthusiasm for humanity. D’Arcy Carden is wonderful as Janet, his angelic assistant, and Jacinto, who is to stupid what Meryl Streep is to commanding, somehow manages to steal the episode every time. His somewhat reduced role this season is one of the only slightly sour notes in the show’s development.

Our four human heroes have one foot in the Bad Place now; a cosmic psychopomp called the Judge (Maya Rudolph) has decreed that any screwups in this new life will condemn them to the down-below forever—really, we mean it this time.

This lends the show a moral immediacy previously concealed by antic comedy, and Michael and Janet’s desperate (technically illegal) interference on their wards’ behalf in the human world has an earned urgency. Still, I miss the afterlife. The

“Rubbery, plastic-wrapped American cheese squares actually earn their shade of orange from nature.”

Pia Mileaf-Patel, Unpacking Orange 10.12.17

The Good Place is a show about people trying to reinvent themselves, and the show itself is not to be outdone. It’s impossible to say how many times the team behind The Good Place can start over. But watching them try is exciting as hell.

From the Land Down Under.”

The real brilliance of the show lies in its very slow reveal of the fact that the whole posthumous procedure is basically unfair. Chidi, for example, is a strictly ethical thinker and pretty nice guy whose one crime was that he found it difficult to make decisions; if that’s a prescription for the Bad Place, most of the people ahead of me at Starbucks on an average day should start preparing for pitchforks.

But this realization only comes with time. We start off thinking Eleanor’s the real criminal, a deviant who somehow slipped under the wire into a perfect eternity reserved for all of us decent people. Not so, it turns out, as the road to the Bad Place is paved with most folks’ good intentions. As Michael explains in season one, its denizens even include “every President except Lincoln.” In other words, Schur and his writing team revel in setting up their pins and then knocking them down, over and over again. The Good Place is a show about people trying to reinvent themselves, and the show itself is not to be outdone. It’s impossible to say how many times the team behind The Good Place can start over. But watching them try is exciting as hell.

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

NARRATIVE

HEAD ILLUSTRATOR

Jennifer Osborne

Managing Editors

Remy Poisson

a

Celina Sun

FEATURE

Section Editors

CO-LAYOUT CHIEFS

Managing Editor

Divya Santhanam

Jacob Lee

Anita Sheih

Jasmine Ngai

Nina Yuchi

Section Editors

“To be clear, these pink-horse-loving friends of mine were not elementary-school girls, but teenagers, and at least half were male.”

Lily Rockefeller, Kids’ Movies for Adults 10.13.16

Layout Designers

Kathy Luo

COPY CHIEF

Amy Choi

Sydney Lo

Amanda Ngo

Jiyeon Park

Assistant Copy

Steve Ju

ARTS & CULTURE

Editors

Managing Editor

Mohima Sattar

WEB MASTER

Josh Wartel

Sonya Bui

Jeff Demanche

Julian Towers

HEAD OF MEDIA

BUSINESS LIAISON

Liza Edwards-Levin

Samantha Haigood

Saanya Jain

Section Editors

Want to be involved? Email: post@browndailyherald.com!

6!post–