The latest series from Vince Gilligan (Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul), Pluribus dropped onto Apple TV last month with some mysterious advertising. That does the show a good service. Going in blind, I was smacked by one of the best pilots to air on TV in a while. So, if you want to experience the same surprise and get hooked, know that, four episodes into the show, it’s very, very good and has one of the best sci-fi premises this side of the original Twilight Zone.
Ready to be spoiled? OK.
“We just want to help, Carol” aren’t exactly the scariest of words, but when spoken en masse by the people surrounding you, all of whom a few minutes prior were violently seizing all around the world, it couldn’t be more terrifying. That’s the situation facing Carol Sturka (Rhea Seehorn) as she comes face to face with the Others, the new, hive-minded humanity. See, about 16 months earlier, astronomers discovered a signal from hundreds of light years away which turns out to be a code for an RNA strand. After being synthesized by the government, it escapes and begins infecting people. But these aren’t rage zombies or alien sleeper agents. No, the Others are wholly human, pacifist, vegetarian, and relentlessly cheery and only want to make the world a better place and serve the few like Carol, who remain independent. But for Carol, this is a perfect hell. She’s a bestselling author of trashy romantic fantasy who loathes her own work and views her adoring fans as a “bunch of dummies.” She’s also fiercely independent, at best a functioning alcoholic, and is miserable whether she’s on a book tour or in Norway seeing the Northern Lights. Carol is, to put it kindly, kind of a piece of shit, but she and her “I demand to see the manager” energy may also be the best hope for saving humanity. And the clock is ticking, because while the Others are determined to make Carol as happy as can be, they have a “biological imperative” to make her join.
If that sounds like a creepy stalker giving you attention you don’t want, then you get Carol’s plight. Gilligan’s time writing on The X-Files serves him well here, as he and his writers infuse Pluribus with that show’s expert mix of terror, tension, and a little comedy. The events of the Joining are portrayed as straight horror, with a timer ticking down the days from astronomers discovering the signal to the apocalyptic results of everyone in the world suddenly seizing at once, then ticking forward hours and days into the age of the Others.
Dramatic, sinister music cues accompany Carol viewing the destruction wrought by the Joining and her talking with a politician on C-SPAN explaining the situation to her, including that the individual she’s talking to “happened to be nearby, intact, and wearing a suit.” Carol’s constant misery contrasted with the Others going out of their way to befriend her, feed her, even fly her around the world leads to solid laughs as well. But there’s always the undercurrent of horror knowing that they’re working to find out what makes Carol special “so we can fix it, so you can join us.”
The show also wisely takes its time, scenes unfolding at a relaxed pace in the same way they did on Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, building tension and atmosphere and showing character growth well. The first 10 minutes of the second episode unfold with very little dialogue, but everything, from Carol’s determination to bury her lover Helen (Miriam Shor), who died during the Joining, in their backyard to her emptying a bottle of water brought by a helpful Other, show her personality and build up the fraught relationship she and they have. Not to say that the show is slow paced. Episode 3, “Grenade,” is well named and features a great, tense use of its titular weapon.
One of the best things I can say about Pluribus is that I have no idea where it’s going. I don’t see Carol arming up and going Daryl Dixon on a bunch of Others, and neither she nor any of the other independents are scientists or doctors, so there likely won’t be any race-for-the-cure Andromeda Strain-style thrills. It almost has no genre template. And that, on top of everything else, makes Pluribus a must-watch.
Pluribus
Starring Rhea Seehorn, Karolina Wydra, and Carlos-Manuel Vesga. Created and run by Vince Gilligan. Airing on Apple TV. Rated TV-MA.
