#time knife

the thing about the time knife is, I don't think it's all that common for people in the good place world to have seen it. like, if someone from abroad comes to your country and sees something super common, like a bird or animal in the park, and expresses absolute bafflement and surprise, you take the time to explain to them, oh yeah! a grey squirrel is this thing that lives in trees and eats nuts, they're super common but pretty neat! and then they go away happy to have learned about this New Cultural Thing? but the TIME KNIFE?? Michael dismisses it right out of hand. this suggests the time knife is more akin to a very overhyped tourist attraction that locals see once on a rainy day but then realise how shit it actually is. ask a seattelite what they think of the space needle and their tone is almost invariably the same as Michael's dismissive response. he's speaking to chidi as an equal here, rather than an educator of the afterlife. they are two people that didn't grow up around the time knife, but have both seen it, and Michael has been dying to express his disappointment at the overhyped and overpriced Time Knife for Eons. so Michael isn't the unhelpful and flippant local, he's a tourist who Wants His Goddamn Money Back