Pluribus: Season 1

14

There is so much about this show that had Mr. Hipster written all over it. It’s not The Leftovers, but there are definitely elements that feel like The Leftovers. But I guess instead of two percent of the world up and vanishing, like 99.99% of the people kind-of, sort-of vanish. Or, more so, become a giant hive mind. So, their bodies are all separate, but their mind is all one. Leaving only thirteen people globally outside of the group-think, essentially isolating them from the rest of society. Among them is our protagonist, Carol Sturka (Rhea Seehorn), who is your kind of prototypical crank. An alcoholic, but relatively successful author of cheesy romantasy novels that she clearly resents. The only positive thing in her life is her wife, Helen (Miriam Shor), who ends up a casualty of the initial alien hive mind takeover. Along with millions of others who mostly die by calamity when the original takeover makes everyone seize for a short time. Some fell from the sky as pilots lost control. Some drove into poles or died in multi-car pile-ups. Or, like Helen, just froze, fell straight backward and smashed her head on the pavement.

And therein lies the story of Pluribus. A really simple concept that becomes a deeper contemplation of loneliness, group think, individuality and all sorts of other themes that I’m not smart enough to get on my first watch. I honestly thought that this thing was a giant commentary on AI. The fact that the hive mind seemingly exists to serve Carol and the other unjoined. The unjoined can ask for anything and it’ll be delivered. They can ask any question and it’ll be answered. In that self-affirming way that ChatGPT always serves it up: “That’s a wonderful question, Mr. Hipster! You’re really smart for asking it this way and here’s our answer: That [fill-in-the-blank] is the greatest example of [fill-in-the-blank] in human history. You’re lucky to have it and are an amazing person for acquiring it. Thank you so much for sharing your special [fill-in-the-blank] with us!” The obsequiousness with which the hive mind treats Carol is one of the more infuriating aspects of her interactions with them. Are they just telling her what she wants to hear, or giving her honest-to-goodness answers to her questions? Just like AI. But, it seems, Vince Gilligan came up with this concept way prior to the rise of AI. So, that’s not it. Swing and a miss on me thinking I was smart.

But, really, what are we looking at here? Seehorn spends the majority of the series alone. Not only physically, but with everyone else on the planet sharing thoughts, motivations and feelings, she’s also alone inside her own head. With her unique thoughts and unique feelings. And in that we see human motivation. Since the hive mind is now all about efficiency and utilitarianism. Since no single human has motivation for comfort or desire or power. There is no joy. No tradition. No anything other than sustaining and maintaining. Which, of course, means that there is very little suffering. Very little sadness. No war. No bigotry or fighting. You know, since everyone shares a brain. In some ways we look at this opportunity as utopian. Sounds nice, right, never having to worry about money or personal loss? But at the same time we see soullessness of their existence. The way the women become play things for one of our thirteen uninitiated, Koumba. The fact that all personal ownership and relationships have been eliminated, so the hive minders gather in school gyms to all sleep crowded together on a gym floor rather than sleep in their individual houses with their individual partners. To presumably save energy and be efficient with human capital.

Now, if you’ve ever seen a Vince Gilligan show — most specifically Better Call Saul — there is something you will have to prepare yourself for. And you will either love it or hear the siren call of your phone during his most Gilligan-ish tics. The dude looooves process. And kind of hates editing when it comes to process. There are episodes in Better Call Saul where Bob Odenkirk spends the entire runtime basically writing stuff on Post-it notes on the back of a bus. Or an entire episode going through his days over and over again at the dreary cell phone store, which mainly consists of him bouncing a ball off a wall bored out of his mind. If you’re not prepped to deal with this thing he loves so much, there are periods of time in Pluribus that will feel like a slog. Or scenes that will feel like the intentional cringe of a Family Guy where the joke goes on for seventeen beats too long. It’s part of the Gilligan aesthetic. At one point Carol pisses off the hive mind so badly that they decide they need a break, leave town and can only be reached via a voicemail box that Carol has to dial into to leave her requests. There’s a scene in Vegas where she calls that number like maybe five times in a row to yell at them and each time she calls we’re forced to listen to the ringing and then the voicemail response in toto. No edits, no nothing. And poor Rhea Seehorn has to sit there and do face and voice acting to a cell phone in a different way each time. She is an amazing pro. Likewise, there’s a scene where her character has asked the hive mind to restock a grocery store that’s been emptied so she can have a normal shopping experience. We get to watch each and every truck arrive. Each thing get loaded off the truck. Each thing get put in its place. Until the whole store is restocked. There is some editing, but it is a very long scene of picking up and putting down boxes and clearly something that Gilligan thought we should see. Why? Because process matters. Your boredom and/or tolerance for pacing may vary.

I realize at this point I’ve barely talked about the actual television show. And that’s because the whole thing is more of a vibe and an intellectual experiment than it is a plot-driven piece of media. Carol goes on her journey of sadness, isolation and awakening. She fights her natural instincts to give into the hive out of sheer stubbornness or perceived loyalty to her dead wife. Mostly in the form of the “sexy pirate,” Zosia (Karolina Wydra). A woman the hive has cast to be Carol’s guide because they know she’s her physical ideal and a dead-ringer for the male protagonist in her most popular romance book series (though gender-switched, obviously). The hive uploaded her wife’s memories to the shared brain of all of humanity before she died, so they also know Carol’s history, her likes and dislikes and therefore Zosia has all of the shared memories of the two women to draw from. Carol maintains a whiteboard of a list of characteristics of the hive mind in order to presumably defeat them, among which is the fact they can’t lie. So, their interactions are honest, but manipulative. Ultimately, the hive mind’s plan is to co-opt the remaining uninitiated into their fold and hook them up to the mothership so that when whatever alien force reaches Earth, it will have 100% cooperation and unity. It’s your choice, as a viewer, if this force is actually a positive, loving one or something more nefarious. We struggle, along with Carol, to make that determination. As she agonizes and eventually wavers, there is one person on his way to her in New Mexico via Paraguay, Manousos (Carlos-Manuel Vesga), who has already decided that he’s going to save the world from this evil, alien force. The question is, can Carol hold out long enough for him to get there, join forces and figure out a way to reverse the curse.

I’m admittedly simplifying. But that’s kind of the narrative in a nutshell. And most of it is done through one-sided convos with Carol. Seehorn face acting and acting acting. She’s on screen for almost the entirety of the series. She was definitely the breakout star as Kim Wexler on Better Call Saul, and has continued her streak here as the strong, but also weak but also fiery Carol. She’s funny and angry and confused and sad. She gets to do some physical stuff and be a cranky asshole and drama queen all in one character. I imagine when she read the part, she had her Emmy speech all written up the next day. It’s a really juicy part and is clearly the focus in this tale. There are really only three people in the main cast, and one of them doesn’t even show up until the third episode (of nine) and basically speaks Spanish for its entirety. I’m curious to see where Gilligan goes from here, having left it on a bit of a cliffhanger at the end of season one. I imagine he might not fulfill the fan service-y stuff that I’m sure some folks are hoping for. The dude seems to live to subvert expectation and fan theories. Anyhow, I don’t think this show is going to be for everyone. If you bore easily, or want way more laser battles and shit in your sci-fi or monsters in your post-apocalypse, the pacing and lack of big set pieces may not be your thing. But if you want something with that creeping sense of unease, some seriously heady psychological thinkage and an acting tour de force in a package that looks and sounds cool, you’re definitely going to want to check it out.