It’s been a while since I’ve truly felt the gnawing helplessness of a cliffhanger hit as soon as the credits roll in a season finale. That’s when you know that the show has hit the sweet spot between satisfying your curiosity about the premise and leaving you just as curious as it goes. In the case of Pluribus, this feeling is made all the more interesting by the fact that Vince Gilligan has a thing for the most unprecedented turns a story can take. You can’t be predictable when your next big idea is a secret from you. And while predictability is the last thing a show like Pluribus should have to worry about, that doesn’t really free it from its responsibility to build a cohesive narrative. “La chica o el mundo” is an impressively unambiguous answer to the central debate of the story. To accept the infection or to fight for humanity. A pretty meta metaphor for Carol’s own decision between the two lanes, which essentially is the show’s way of telling you that whatever has happened to the world in Pluribus isn’t something you can merely dip your toe into. You either dive right in or you stay the hell away until you can figure out how to fix it. But the clock’s ticking for Carol, because while it might’ve been deliberately confusing for the most part, the alien RNA is bad news. In the final episode of the first season of Pluribus, there’s no hiding from the truth that an infection is just that. A disease with the fundamental purpose of conquering and consuming everything healthy in its wake. Let’s just hope that Carol can get a handle on Manousos’ “radical” spirit before the hive-mind figures out how to take her in. Because as far as the finale goes, scarily enough, they’ve found a way.
Spoiler Alert
Carol meets Manousos
I can’t believe Carol isn’t totally bothered by the hive-mind’s surveillance of Manousos’ ambulance. She isn’t masking anything, for sure. So I guess Carol being totally cool with it has a lot to do with the fact that she personally feels safe being watched by them. Not like they’ve given her any reason to feel threatened by them. But I’d still be a little spooked if I was Carol. And I can totally see how in the 60 days since the big joining, Carol’s kind of gotten slightly comfortable with the idea of the world being the way it is. Her increasing closeness with Zosia has only lulled her even further into this worrisome sense of ease with the alien takeover. When Manousos is only two hours away from her, I don’t think Carol’s got anything explosive on her mind. The only reason she even wants to meet him is because he’s made such a long trip. She’s gonna have to do it alone, though. Manousos hardly shares the same fondness for “the others.” So I doubt that he’ll be all that accepting of Carol’s relationship with Zosia. Or even Zosia’s presence, for that matter. Like I said last week, there isn’t a whole lot of common ground between Carol and Manousos’ other than the fact that they’re still very much themselves. Ironic, no? It isn’t super reassuring when Zosia tells Carol that Manousos would never hurt HER. Especially considering the man shows up with a goddamn machete on his belt. Surprise, surprise! Manousos won’t even go into Carol’s house because he’s certain that they’re listening in on them. Hell, he jumps back like it’s a weapon or something when Carol whips out her phone to use the translator app. But even without the hive-mind and everything, can you really say that Manousos is overthinking? I’m not saying he isn’t nutty, because he totally is. He won’t trust Carol and the hive-mind enough to even go into her casa for a chat, but he expects a woman to get into a car with a strange man? Talk about being obtuse! When they finally do get to interact, and they’re under the umbrella because Manousos doesn’t wanna take chances with the hive-mind’s lip-reading skills, Carol gets to know what he really thinks about them. Manousos has never even stopped to speak to the people he deems soulless and evil. And he’s the kind of guy who’d sooner obliterate the whole lot of them than reflect on why he feels the way that he does. Carol didn’t expect such blatant genocidal instinct from the guy. And what does Manousos have to say for himself? The fact that he thinks that human life is far more important than any other form of life on Earth. He’s not waiting for the hive-mind to put his worries to rest. I’m pretty sure he believes Carol when she says that they won’t hurt him. The only thing that Manousos is after is the destruction of the hive-mind. You can see why Carol, or anyone with the slightest bit of empathy and sanity would think that Manousos’ is totally cuckoo for not even seeing these people as people anymore. But even then, the way Carol fights for the hive-mind is alarming. It’s not like Manousos hasn’t given her enough reason for her to want to steer clear of him. But that’s got nothing to do with how Carol has practically accepted her coexistence with the hive-mind.
The girl or the world?
Well, he’s inside. Now what? I can’t just say that there’s any reasonable reason behind Manousos’ general behavior around Carol. Because I don’t really think that Manousos needs to literally snap his fingers at Carol to ask her for the phone as he looks around for a bug like a maniac. No bug. Just some stray Cheetos under the couch. But the point is, this guy is less and less likeable the more you get to know him. He’s rude just for the heck of it. Although if you really must find a way to justify his insanely offputting behavior, you could still be a little patient with him and hope that he’s only acting this way because he knows Carol’s all friendly with the hive-mind. It does give Carol a pretty big scare when Manousos finds a weird device in her booze cabinet. But again, no bug. Only trauma. When Carol calls Zosia to make sure that they didn’t plant a bug in her liquor cabinet, what she finds out is bound to make her wish that she didn’t make this call in the first place. The device is a movement sensor that Helen had placed there to keep track of Carol’s drinking. You can see how defensive Carol is about her alcoholism when this revelation catches her off guard. Helen’s hardly the villain for having been worried about her spouse. There have been plenty of signs, including the whole situation with the motion sensor, that suggest that Helen has had to tiptoe around Carol’s issues because she doesn’t want to accept that she has issues. Alcoholism is just one of them. Coming back to Manousos and his persistent distrust of the hive-mind, nothing really changes when he finds out that they didn’t plant any listening device in Carol’s mind. If anything, he’s now all the more motivated to destroy them because he knows that he can talk to them. That’s the first thing he does after Carol drops him off at the Wilsons’. Manousos gets the hive-mind on the line and gets Zosia to come over. What a terrifying prospect! Also, did you see the poster of Thurston the Great Magician on the wall at the Wilson house? I wonder if his famous line, “I wouldn’t deceive you for the world,” is somehow an indication of Manousos’ reliability. He may be scary as hell. But he’s somehow the only person in the world right now who can see the truth. The alien RNA has pulled the wool over the world’s eyes and convinced them of the possibility of a magical utopia. Manousos is beyond problematic as a person. But he is the only one who’s still unaffected by the hive-mind’s inadvertent manipulation. Why do I say inadvertent? That’s because the hive-mind is really only doing what they can’t even help. They’ve lost the ability of individual critical thinking, they’ve lost the need or the desire to make decisions for themselves, and they’ve definitely lost most of their survival instincts. Why else would Zosia come right over to meet Manousos and answer all his questions? Yes, to Carol’s utter horror, Zosia has told him everything. She couldn’t help it. Carol was right to freak the hell out when she saw Zosia’s car and ran right over to rescue her from the crazy guy she’d just met. Thankfully, Zosia wasn’t hurt. Well, not yet anyway. But this particularly complicated situation does bring up a lot of latent emotions for Carol. It’s not as simple as Carol loves Zosia and Zosia loves her back. Carol’s strictly monogamous, kinda possessive, and super freaking protective of the woman she’s fallen for. So it obviously breaks her heart a little bit when Zosia reminds her that she, by which she means “they,” love Carol and Manousos just the same. No “you’re mine” with these people, Carol. Yet you can’t help but be delighted by Carol’s strange, and might I say, very selective ability to be super vulnerable. In the process of falling for Zosia, she’s forgotten that they can’t truly be monogamous. I mean, they’ll perform it to please Carol. But they’ll never truly love Carol more just because Zosia and Carol are basically in a relationship. A very difficult truth for Carol to absorb. But she doesn’t get much time to process it because Manousos didn’t stop with Zosia. He’s gone ahead with his crazy plan to “fix the world.” Too bad for Carol, she finds out what Manousos has been up to when the repercussions show up on Zosia. The hive-mind is having a seizure again. Who’s yelled at them this time? Manousos. And I mean he’s actually screaming in the face of the person formerly known as Rick in a desperate bid to “pull him out.” Remember Manousos’ little ham radio and the notes he took of the frequencies? I guess all the fan theories about how that’s all Manousos needs to fix what’s broken actually got to his head. He’s a complete madman as he basically tries to exorcize Rick when the radio transmission hits a specific frequency. I think Manousos is trying to figure out if there’s a pause between the transmissions when the hive-mind gets to be human for a very short amount of time. He believes that the radio transmission from space is how the hive-mind is being kept under the thrall. It can’t be as simple as that. So he obviously fails and causes a genocide in the process, much like Carol. Well, not exactly like Carol. Because Carol didn’t know that she’d be hurting anyone. But that isn’t the case with Manousos. Considering Zosia just told him “everything,” he knew the consequences of what he was doing when he did what he did to Rick. Manousos was okay with killing off millions of people in a desperate attempt to bring them out of their terrible state. How you feel about that is up to you, I guess. I know how Carol feels about it. She can’t fathom the extent of the apathy Manousos is capable of. Since he’s a threat to the hive-mind, they’ve emptied out Albuquerque again. There goes Carol’s happiness. And Manousos isn’t the least bit remorseful about it. On the contrary, he seems much more emphatic about his plan now. He thinks he’s found the way. Though I can’t say that he has. Not yet, at least. Manousos is not backing down from this fight now. But Carol, on the other hand, would much rather go after the woman she loves than stay and help the mass-murdering weirdo who now has a smile on his face. The girl over the world. Carol’s choosing happiness, for a change.
What Will Carol Do With The Atom Bomb?
A lot happened in the beginning of the final episode of Pluribus that we haven’t talked about yet. It made sense to wait until it was time to address Carol’s decision to go all out with Zosia. You see, when we take a trip to Kusimayu’s home, we’re on day 71 of the big joining. So this is happening after the events of Carol and Manousos’ explosive meeting and detachment. Kusimayu meant to join the hive-mind from the very start. Her idea of her identity can’t be separated from her community and her family, all of whom are infected and happy. So it’s a complicated thing to figure out for Kusimayu. Because unlike everyone else, being immune has only made her feel more detached from her real identity as a member of her family and her tribe. Kusimayu must’ve consented to have her stem cells extracted so that they could tailor the RNA to her biological specifications. But though she doesn’t communicate it outright, there’s certainly a whole lot of doubt on her face on the day of her joining. A man with a vessel of the infection that’s now airborne doesn’t really scream happiness and heavenly existence, no matter how much her family reassures her. But she goes through with it because the only way she knows how to exist is to be a part of her family. Seizure, blackout, and out comes the individual who will no longer feel the need for a name. Kusimayu is gone. And the only evidence of just how much was lost in the process will live in her little goat. Kusimayu and that goat seemed inseparable when she was still herself. Her only real source of comfort before the scary process was petting that goat. But after the joining, she’s lost all her attachments. Everything that made her Kusimayu is now meaningless. The love she had for her little goat is gone too.
How can something this heartbreaking lead to anything good? Because you already know that the alien RNA is a weapon against humanity, and not a gift, you know that Carol’s happiness will be very short-lived. Which is awful, really. She’s only just started to make the most of life like a human being is supposed to. Carol and Zosia are practically on their honeymoon in the final act of the 9th episode of Pluribus. The most tragic thing about this whole situation is that, while Carol’s always been a grump and a cynic who’s forever expecting happiness to be fleeting, if it even comes to her, that is, this time around, she actually believes that this will last. She feels so safe being loved by Zosia that she’s forgotten the hive-mind will never stop trying to take her in. But then again, there’s a lot she’s forgotten. She forgot that she had had her eggs frozen back in 2011. It only came up because Helen had installed that motion sensor in the liquor cabinet around that time. Carol must’ve been really going through something back then. Because if freezing her eggs was about the possibility of her wanting a baby someday and not about a midlife panic, I guess she would’ve remembered it, no? Those darn eggs come back to ruin her perfect heaven in the ending of Pluribus when Carol asks Zosia questions about the hive-mind’s progress. Zosia slipped and told Carol that her current happiness was just the tip of the iceberg. She had to have meant that the hive-mind has found a way to infect Carol. It only takes a little push from Carol for Zosia to come out and say it. The hive-mind has got their hands on Carol’s frozen eggs. They’ve been trying to cook up stem cells that are identical to Carol’s from her eggs. Again. What a terrifying prospect! Time and again, Carol’s feelings for Zosia and her idea of a perfect relationship has blinded her to one basic truth. The hive-mind must fulfill their biological imperative, however cruel or unethical their actions may be. They don’t run on emotions and attachments. Carol had a book in her hand by the pool–“The Left Hand of Darkness” by Ursula K. le Guin. The story in that book is a pretty perfect metaphor for all the challenging aspects of Carol and Zosia’s relationship. With her struggles to wrap her head around Zosia’s way of life, Carol is like Ai in “The Left Hand of Darkness.” And Zosia is very close to Estraven, especially considering the whole metaphorical Raban-turned-into-Zosia scenario, because in the story, Estraven was ambisexual and androgynous. Now, time to get back to that crazy ending. Because just like Ai and Estraven, Carol and Zosia can’t seem to come to a place where they both get to be who they want to be. If Carol wants to be with Zosia, she has to be okay with the fact that she has only about a month or so until create her stem cells in a lab. The last thing Carol wants is to be one of them. Even if the cost is happiness itself. No matter how hard they try to sell it, there’s no way that Carol will ever want to lose herself. How are you actually even happy if you are not even you? The hive-mind may have the perfect hormonal blend up in their noggins that makes them feel content all the time. But that isn’t the same as the idea of happiness that humans live by. If it’s all the same, it’s not special. And boy are we driven by the urge to be special as a whole species! We can’t let it go. And I don’t think we should either. We should definitely not go all Manousos about it. Although ever since he’s been left alone, he’s spent his time learning about radio transmissions and electric currents and whatnot. So there might be a wild possibility that this maniac will eventually crack it after all. Let’s hope that happens before the hive-mind cracks Carol’s eggs. What? I don’t get to make one eggs are eggs pun? Give me a break! Carol’s over here doing the bravest thing possible–giving up on love, happiness, and all the reasons to get up in the morning. She’s come back home to figure this sitch out with Manousos. But not without an atom bomb, of course. They did tell her that they’ll hand her an atom bomb if she really wants one. She’s finally gotten on the same level as Manousos now that her individuality is threatened by the hive-mind. They have to think fast! Because I think Carol totally means to blow up the whole world before they come at her with a jar of happy infection.
