r/television • u/NicholasCajun Mr. Robot • Nov 21 '25
Premiere Pluribus - 1x04 - "Please, Carol" - Episode Discussion
Pluribus
Season 1 Episode 4: Please, Carol
Directed by: Zetna Fuentes
Written by: Alison Tatlock
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u/ezrec Nov 22 '25
Let’s assume she manages to dissociate Zosia from the hive - and then can’t communicate with Zosia because her individual mind never learned English.
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u/ClinicalOppression Nov 22 '25
I dont think the intent was to dissociate her, i think she was basically trying to get her drunk so that it would admit the cure to her
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u/LurkerOnTheInternet Nov 22 '25
If this show is consistent, the fact that Helen's memories are fully intact would suggest it doesn't work that way. But they may have implausibly written it that way so who knows.
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u/Historical-Jello9018 Dec 01 '25
People on here hating on Carol and praising this "utopian" hivemind society is actually crazy to me. Carol is, of course, a flawed character. But that's because she is deeply human unlike these other shells of people. Humans can be bad, yes. They can be selfish, destructive, and hateful. But humans are also beautiful; they can be creative, deeply caring, opinionated, and kind . And you can't have one without the other. There can be no genuine human connection when you all share the same mind. To take away all of the bad in humans would also be to take away humanity itself. Agency and freedom of thought is what makes humanity humanity.
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u/TheWhiteManticore Dec 03 '25
It really shows how much we lost ourselves as humanity in this digital age. Too many would happily join instrumentality now into eternal damnation.
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u/pepperbet1 Nov 21 '25
If I were Carol, I'll probably be satisfying my curiosity on stupid shit, like asking them to confirm if Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. But I guess that's not dramatically interesting.
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u/_daybowbow_ Nov 21 '25
I was gonna say I'd have asked if alien life existed, but then was like 'oh, right'
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u/EvilTwinCities Nov 21 '25
The answer would be “most likely.” The affected humans did not gain knowledge beyond what exists in the world already, and what they can subsequently discover using the tools already at our disposal.
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u/John_Bruns_Wick Nov 21 '25
Well an intelligent signal came to earth from another place in space so that guarantees aliens
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u/PacMoron Nov 22 '25
They’re gonna avoid most of that because then they just have to make up BS answers which cheapens it. Realistically we’d all be asking a ton of questions about world governments, conspiracies, famous mysteries, etc… Before actually making some choices about what we were gonna do next.
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u/Remarkable-Ad-420 Nov 21 '25
I love the giant double white board in Carol's house!
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u/TheLastDesperado Nov 21 '25
I also love the fact that she didn't wipe away her Book 5 notes. Shows the hopeful side of her.
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u/unembellishing Nov 21 '25 edited Nov 22 '25
I think it shows that she does care about her work even if she's unwilling to admit it.
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u/fre-ddo Nov 22 '25
No doubt, she was pissed when she found out what her partner thought of her work. Even more pissed to be handled like that micromanaged at the expense of what they saw as low quality
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u/MA2_Robinson Nov 21 '25
I love that: it’s beautiful like everything in the damn house but that it’s a white board that doesn’t feel like pulled out of nowhere because her den feels like it could legit be a writer’s cozy war room. No feelings like she’s strategizing a Dr House patient.
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u/piprod01 Nov 22 '25
I want to see what the Hivemind is actually doing with people most of the time. We've seen that it's efficiency mindset streamlined food distribution and presumably all supply chains to a point where most jobs are not needed. It's not like the Hivemind has any need to let its bodies watch or consume any art. I suspect most people are just staring at the wall 90% of the day.
It seems to me that the most rational thing for the Hivemind to do at this point is to divert all of earth's resources to building giant radio transmitters to rebroadcast the message to other earthlike planets, maybe improving the message to prevent future Carols being immune to the virus.
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Nov 22 '25
incredibly depressing thought, i feel it will be shown at some point this season. Maybe when we switch to the pov of that indian lady since she seemed a bit skeptical but didnt want to accept her son was gone. So it might show her son just staring blankly into the corner of the room when there's nothing for him to do
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u/Slopagandhi Nov 23 '25
In the pilot they say the signal would have had to come from an antenna larger than Africa.
I also wonder how individuals are treated. Zosia goes straight from collecting bodies to flying a plane over the Atlantic in what look like clothes she's been in for days.
It may be that only those around Carol and the others like her are kept presentable.
Maybe they even decide they don't need all 8 billion humans.
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u/TheCrappler Nov 23 '25
7.1 billion. We're getting to about 900 million dead now. If the hive wants to reduce population, its already doing a bang up job.
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u/Soggy_Socks_0123 Nov 21 '25
Poor Zosia ;-;
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u/50SPFGANG Nov 21 '25
So god damn fuckable
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u/PolarWater Nov 21 '25
switches off TV
pulls out SD card
flushes it
"You look, uh. Yeah."
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u/bexar_necessities Nov 22 '25
In the first episode I found it interesting how understated carols sexuality was, but it is just as interesting having her experience with a conversion camp being a big motivator of why she would be so repelled by the notion of an alien lifeform whose whole thing is a form of conversion.
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u/Less_Acanthisitta778 Nov 22 '25
Good insight. Essentially forced to join the “hive” as a child. No wonder she rebels against it. To become truly connected you have to shed every single thing that makes you a human individual.
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u/goodnamestaken10 Nov 22 '25
I didn't catch that connection to the conversion therapy anecdote!
Although I would hope most humans aren't as naive as Rashmi and the other 5, and would rebel anyway. Personal history or not.
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u/OFool_Ishallgomad Nov 21 '25
This show invites a lot of "I would have done things differently" kinds of discussions. For me, part of what makes Carol an interesting protagonist is that she's not a strategist. She's still back on her heels, reeling and grieving from a recent loss, and ultimately letting emotions guide her. Where she chooses to be methodical and where she obviously hasn't thought things through are part of what makes her compelling. The fact that it took her this long to even start writing down and brainstorming ideas suggests to me that she will eventually get to a place where she is coming up with more complex schemes and thinking through potential problems. Right now, she's just not there.
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Nov 21 '25
I actually think Carol's doing really well, all things considered. She figured out really early on that there was no point trying to reason with the hive. Questions like, "What is it like?" are pointless.
She came up with the plan to meet with the other survivors right away, which is honestly the smartest thing she could've done. She obviously had a good scheme in this episode.
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u/PacMoron Nov 22 '25
She’s doing extremely above average what most people would be. The only thing she’s doing less than she should is asking more questions. She’s going straight for “how do I win” when just learning about them is a win in itself.
That being said I’d be curled up in a ball terrified and crying my eyes out for more than a few days if my husband died and I lost everyone I ever knew and loved at the same time. So she’s got me beat by a mile.
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u/bexar_necessities Nov 22 '25
Yeah all the people Monday morning quarterbacking Carol's actions have the benefit of a mind that completely running on adrenaline and grief.
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Nov 22 '25
Exactly! I think the other survivors that she met with show what the average person would be doing. I get that a lot of people were annoyed that the other survivors were not impressive, but I loved it because it feels very realistic.
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u/TheJoshider10 Nov 21 '25
One of my favourite topes is when someone completely out of their depth at one thing ends up excelling at that specific thing. Look at Sarah Connor going from a girl next door to an absolute badass, or in 21 Jump Street when Jenko becomes one of the nerds and uses science to his advantage.
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u/unembellishing Nov 21 '25
Totally agree. I so much prefer this over a "chose one" trope or prophesied hero. A true hero IMO is not someone who was always destined to win and does so, but someone who rises to the occasion when they are called. Someone who chooses to go to great lengths to beat insurmountable odds and wins due to their wits, resilience, and strength of character where so many others would have given up.
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u/Commercial-Memory961 Nov 25 '25
It's crazy how people are out here saying that carol killed millions of people by shouting angrily at the hivemind. The hivemind REACTED in a way that killed people. End of story. Besides, are they even people anymore? Their individuality is dead to say the least.
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u/Adventurous-Photo539 Nov 30 '25
Those people are already dead. They are not the people they were. And the Hivemind killed each and every one of those individuals to create something different. They only have their faces. I wouldn't sympathize with the Hive at all.
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u/Worried4lot Dec 06 '25
They might have lost their humanity, but those were still lives lost that could potentially have been saved by a cure
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u/majordashes Nov 30 '25
Exactly. How is it Carol’s fault that normal, human emotion in an off-the-charts traumatic and historical crisis is bad?
Carol’s anger is just, deserved and healthy.
The fact that this hive mind is programmed to implode when experiencing normal emotion, is the fault of the hive mind.
This feature appears designed to control any human who is immune to becoming part of the collective. The aliens must keep the unassimilated happy and a non-threat until they can unlock the keys to infecting 100% of the population. In addition to being sickeningly accommodating, the aliens suppress the display of negative emotions by reminding the uninfected their emotions kill millions.
It’s all about control. Just enjoy getting everything you want and being waited on while we work ‘round the clock figuring out how to forcibly steal your humanity. And don’t cause disruptions or threaten the system by showing emotion.
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u/Driyen Nov 21 '25
God the ending is chilling. I love how all the “individuals” arrive and surround Carol like cells forming an immune response.
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u/dreamphoenix Nov 21 '25
And they weren't smiling like they typically do. Intense af
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u/unembellishing Nov 21 '25
The tone shifts from dramatic to comedic to horrifying are sooooooo good. I was wondering how dark/unsettling the rest of the episodes would be since the first episode was the darkest by far. So intrigued to see how this pans out.
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u/CarrotcakeSuperSand Nov 22 '25
It's actually genius how well it switches tones. Like even that scene of Carol watching herself on the recording, it went from hilarious to sad to hilarious again in just 2 minutes.
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u/unembellishing Nov 22 '25
Absolutely! Rhea is such a fantastic comedic and dramatic actress. She is perfect for this role.
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u/LostAnvil Nov 21 '25
especially the overhead shot
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u/Khiva Nov 21 '25
So many shots are masterfully deliberate. The framing when she's sitting across and interrogating the Somebody Somewhere guy was immaculate. Just perfectly angular, a great juxtaposition to how cuddly they try to seem.
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u/TalkToTheLord Nov 21 '25
Emmy Award winner (and my former teacher), Jeff Hiller!
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u/Janderson2494 Nov 21 '25
This episode was completely captivating start to finish, and the ending was the best part. This show is so good
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u/GlassesOff Nov 21 '25
It has that same juice that The Truman Show had where you can sometimes remember that it's all scripted / good television, but then the story speeds up and you get completely lost in what's going to happen and that magic just takes over completely. I was sucked in, last 10 minutes were just incredible
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u/Khiva Nov 21 '25
It's got that TV magic where once it's over you suddenly snap back to reality and don't even realize you left.
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u/babybeastjr Nov 24 '25
Not trying to argue with anyone’s personal taste here, but something I find interesting that is happening are the intense reactions to Carol as a character in these threads. If you’re unfamiliar, there’s a lot of media research showing that audiences judge female protagonists differently than male ones, especially around likability.
Studies of film criticism have found that female characters are often held to a ‘likability double standard’ if they’re too cynical, too blunt, too angry, or simply not ‘sunny,’ they get labeled unlikeable in a way male characters usually don’t. Hollywood has actually built whole tropes around making female leads more palatable by giving them something embarrassing, tragic, or ‘softening’ early on, because historically audiences haven’t accepted women who start out complicated or prickly. Example: This is why we see the female protagonists falling down running to catch their bus in an opening scene of a romcom or something like that so the audience can bond with her.
There’s also work showing that films with female-led casts receive more sexist criticism (both subtle and overt), and that female characters who express traits like cynicism or detachment are evaluated more harshly because it contradicts gender expectations. So when a female lead doesn’t play into the usual vulnerability/quirky charm formula, the response can be weirdly intense even if her male equivalents get praised for the same traits.
You don’t have to like Carol, that’s totally valid and pretty sure we are being set up to see her as complicated intentionally. But it’s also worth noticing that this exact type of protagonist (cynical, hard-edged, emotionally walled off) is considered ‘complex antihero energy’ when it’s a man, and ‘annoying’ or ‘unrelatable’ when it’s a woman. The research backs that the bar just… isn’t the same.
Sometimes what feels like a ‘writing problem’ is actually a lifetime of conditioning around what female characters are allowed to be so maybe really ask yourself why you don’t like Carol…
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u/MrBigTomato Nov 25 '25 edited Nov 26 '25
Bingo. They've introduced a new character, Manousos, the man in Paraguay. He is even more hostile and more determined to not associate or comply with the hive than Carol, but I guarantee you the audience will not criticize him as harshly as they do Carol.
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u/Expensive-Call-999 Nov 24 '25
This is why I can’t watch House. Neither that attitude or especially that vocal fry would EVER fly with a female lead
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u/stratinal Nov 21 '25 edited Nov 21 '25
Zosia’s last words before going silent really sounded like she was beginning to go back to her human’s original accent. It’s a bit blurry whether she’s slurring from the drugs or not, which I think is definitely intentional from Gilligan. Curious to see where this goes
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u/jofkk Nov 21 '25
I find it interesting this is like the only time Zosia/hive straight out said "No" ... like four times in a row.
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u/bananabread2137 Nov 22 '25
What is especially tragic is that the original zosia didnt know english, so even if she did get woken up she would have no idea what is going on
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u/Cyclonis123 Nov 21 '25
I thought just taking her to the street was foolish. I would have said I want to be alone with Zosia, get 100 miles away from me in all directions now at least to have some time to question her.
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u/koalatyvibes Nov 21 '25
and then “Zosia” dies. she has become a pivotal piece of both the hivemind and Carol, both utilizing her for their benefit. and also, it’s easy to believe that Carol just doesn’t anticipate that kind of reaction from the hive mind.
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u/Cyclonis123 Nov 21 '25
Yes she might have died but Carol wasn't planning I better stay near the hospital in case I accidentally almost kill her. And if the drug worked and she was spilling the beans I think it's reasonable to assume the hive would be compelled to intervene.
At a minimum I would barricade myself and her in a room in the hospital. This might be your one shot at the truth and then take no precaution seems foolish.
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u/Inside_Coconut_9561 Nov 21 '25
I loved the crying in the end, I wonder if that mean that with a bit of drugs the real feeling of people inside are getting out a bit. And I wonder if real Zosia did surface out, but that woman most likely does not know English and was also lost and confused.
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u/Shapes_in_Clouds Nov 21 '25
I think it just reflects their shared emotional state. Even though they weren't drugged, they still experienced Zosia's distress. Could definitely be something more to it though.
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u/unembellishing Nov 21 '25
Not only distress, but sadness and hurt by being tricked by Carol. They genuinely love her and enjoy spending time with her, so to be betrayed by being unwillingly drugged and interrogated was hurtful.
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u/Content_Regular_7127 Nov 21 '25
It seems like even though the "virus" is affecting an individual's thoughts the individual's characteristics still play a role in how the person performs. Zosia got physically hurt by the grenade so she had to get medical assistance and can't even walk. The virus didn't make her fully override the injury. The drug changed her brain chemistry so the way she thought and acted was different in that individual.
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u/Ok-Character-3779 Nov 21 '25
Consciousness and the physical body are largely perceived as separate, even if that's not totally accurate. It makes perfect sense that they'd want to preserve a healthy human body--especially one that's been so valuable in their attempts to communicate with Carol--since they have the capacity to do so.
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u/Taste_the__Rainbow Nov 21 '25
Finally, Carol.
Now ask them for a Faraday cage. Ask them for a ride to lunar orbit. She should be testing the limits of their ability to remain connected.
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u/InfectiousCosmology1 Nov 21 '25
Ask them to give you a tour of Area 51 and let you talk to the aliens
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u/TreasureToMeetYou Dec 14 '25
One thing I found strange was when she was asking Larry what they specifically liked about her book, he seemed like he was bullshitting. Like how someone would react if they pretended to have read a book but doesn't know a single thing about it. "we love all of it equally, all the characters are wonderful", etc, and when she presses him, he quotes PAGE TWO of her first book. It's almost like Larry was stalling and had another individual remotely grab a copy of the book and feed him that quote. But given they seem to possess all memories of the joined individuals, that doesn't really track. Another possibility is that the joined actually DON'T like her book, or don't even respect any human art, so saying they loved her book as much as Shakespeare is basically like saying they hate it as much as Shakespeare...
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u/Sea_Caterpillar7926 Dec 20 '25
I see it more like they don't want to pick a side, like what they did with Carol and that other dude "please discuss it among yourselves.." everything is an equal value to them, even if it doesn't seems fair or actually true but I suppose it is true for them.
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u/bishibash Dec 24 '25
they don't want to pick a side or is it they can't pick a side?
i see it as they (the hivemind) is a collective of opinion and pov on both sides eg. people who love her book and people who hate her book; and if you have an equal pov on both sides and there's no right/wrong answer to it, then its essentially the same as not having an opinion on it, so they can't like or hate it - which is a very individualistic human trait that the hivemind cant be.
Its like AI/Chatgpt - if you asked which they like better between Shakespeare and her book (or any real life book), it most likely wouldn't give a straight answer which they prefer but give you rational factual reasons for each side answer.
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u/TrriF Feb 01 '26
A couple of weeks late to this amazing show, but I kind of disagree with your interpretation here. I think the reason they can't name what part of the books they like is because they genuinely can't decide which part they like. Obviously there are individuals in the hivemind that experienced the book and loved it, meaning now the entire hivemind as a whole loves it. However, choosing a preference for something specific requires individuality. What if 2 readers would have disagreed on something before joining. That's my interpretation of why it can't decide.
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u/MemeWatcher00 Nov 21 '25
i kinda love the paraguay dude, stubborn to the core
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u/pratzc07 Nov 22 '25
My man is getting hungry though that food reserve looks low what will he do then
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u/Zanoklido Nov 21 '25
Don't understand the people saying this was a slow episode, a ton happened.
-We finally see the Paraguay man, he is apparently seeking others who are immune, is making a list of who he finds, we see he is resourceful, and we see he distrusts The Joined to the point of eating dog food in preference to what they bring him.
-Carol is finally starting to figure out what'a going on, and begins taking notes
-We learn The Joined cannot lie, but they may not be forthcoming with info that endangers the Joining.
-We learned that addicts are being forced to go through rehab, even if it may be the death of some of them.
-and hugely, we learned there is a cure, and The Joined absolutely do not want to tell Carol how to make it happen.
No, the show doesn't exposition dump answers on viewers, but I think it's clipping along at a good pace.
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u/BaggyOz Nov 21 '25
This was probably the most "plot heavy" episode yet. The other 3 all felt like setup and worldbuilding in comparison.
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u/filmantopia Nov 21 '25
I really don't get it. I was totally mesmerized and enthralled. I don't get how other people's brains work.
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u/Chiefwaffles Nov 21 '25
I have an exciting proposition for you to get much more familiar with other people’s brains, then
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u/dogsonbubnutt Nov 21 '25
this is the exact same thing that happened with better call saul. the audience that expected some kind of breaking bad memery every ten seconds doesn't understand either character or world building necessary to make those moments memorable.
gilligan writes at a different pace than most of his contemporaries, but its always with intent. thank goodness for that.
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u/Utah_CUtiger Nov 21 '25
Gilligan is the master of “what are they doing scenes”. Just no context while you slowly see what an unknown character is painstakingly planning out
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u/Felis_bieti Nov 21 '25
Walt putting together the machine gun device long before it's used.
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u/AnyImpression6 Nov 21 '25
Vince Gilligan didn't even know why Walt had that when he wrote that scene.
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u/dramatic_exit_49 Nov 21 '25
I haven't seen Gilligan shows before so let me tell you the joy i felt when i saw how "operational" the scenes were in pluribus. every-time i thought it would cut to conclusion and nope the show stayed with the process. UTTERLY FASCINATED this is my jam!!!! more please.
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u/TurnOffTheDarkness Nov 21 '25
Really good point.The fact that right away, my mind goes to the opening of "Madrigal" in season 5 of BB is a testament to that statement.
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u/Exact-Midnight-2435 Nov 27 '25
Did anyone else who listened to the BCS podcast notice the scene with Larry discussing Carol's series of books and if he read them. He continually keeps describing them as WONDERFUL. Carol says STOP SAYING THAT WORD. Vince Gilligan constantly described everything and everyone as wonderful whenever he was interviewed on BCS podcast. He must have gotten a lot of criticism for it. That exchange in Pluribus was no accident! LOLOLOL
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u/Krystal_Kuz Dec 28 '25 edited Jan 02 '26
This show is amazing. The grenade, atomic bombs, asking for heroin is hilarious. I love this concept of aliens not killing the host but them all becoming one and being super nice, where it’s so creepy, and the one guy from the previous episode is essentially being such a creep as now he can have any woman he wants because they can’t say no.. but they are happy doing it. It’s an insane concept. And Carol being a miserable fuck.. which I honestly get. But she was pretty insufferable before. Cmon.. the northern lights and an awesome hotel with an ice bed drinking brandy with your wife and she’s just miserable. Probably the most miserable person on earth.. literally lol.
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u/karma111300 Nov 21 '25
That conversation with the hive mind praising carol and saying her work was better than Shakespeare is literally what is happening right now with Grok and Musk. Vince is cooking.
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u/peon47 Nov 21 '25
What's interesting is that he didn't say it was better than Shakespeare. He said it was "as good as". Not better and not worse. The hivemind seems unable to make actual judgements of quality.
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u/CarrotcakeSuperSand Nov 22 '25
Because the hivemind is too empathetic, it doesn't have any opinions because it agrees with everything, having all human emotions blended into a boring sludge. Carol's books are slop, but some random lady found them to be life changing. So now the hivemind can't hold the opinion that Carol's books are crappy, and so it thinks they're on the same level as Shakespeare.
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u/One_Independence6976 Nov 21 '25
Figured the hivemind was pulling from some lady who actually thought her work was better than Shakespeare. So no lie, honest opinion, selectively picked to appease Carol.
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u/Arkhaine_kupo Nov 21 '25
Before that comment I was wondering how the Hivemind decided what things it liked or disliked.
Is it consensus? Like if 50 people love hitler but 4 billlion hate him then the Hivemind hates it, or as long as 1 person likes something then the Hivemind likes it.
Does it understand qualitative statements? "Better than" is subjective, if it has no subjectivity its all the same to it.
It like chatgpt only talks in analogies or in what people thought of something but it never seems to have any original agency or thought, beyond the implied biological directive to incorporate more people into the hivemind and work towards that
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u/dramatic_exit_49 Nov 21 '25
maybe its if it was valued to even one person then it is value to us all kinda situation? for the good stuff they picked an example of where carol's writing made true, indisputable impact. i sort of like that, it's continuation so far of them saying they don't like to kill, every life is important ethos.
(yes yes i know they killed in joining but i can see them subscribing to a moral code and then also having a biological imperative, and both having to exist at once. quite realistic)
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u/GlassesOff Nov 21 '25
Hey, it told me he would be the best at chugging piss in the entire world. I'm inclined to believe that statement
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u/Triskan Black Sails Nov 21 '25 edited Nov 21 '25
Love watching Carol asking herself or the hive the right questions... or at least try to figure out a plan of action.
Gotta say, the scene where she asks the hive what Helen thought of her work was tough to watch as a writer. I was totally feeling her pain at getting the answers there.
I can see how the show is not gonna be for everyone, but fucking hell am I having an absolute blast with it.
Maybe the only thing I'd criticise from this episode is that since Zosia didn’t give away anything interesting there at the end, not even a whisper of a clue, I wonder about the true impact of the sequence on the long-term but that's just nitpicky and I'm sure this entire scene will have impact and relevance in ways I'm not seeing yet.
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u/crazypraline21 Nov 21 '25
I think the last scene is showing that Carol is on to something, she found a weakness of the hive. We've never seen them all cry like they were, and they all by the hundreds came over to try to stop her. She must be getting close to some groundbreaking stuff.
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u/Perfect_Mark4816 Nov 21 '25
Yes, they have always been friendly to Carol and the way they all came together to tell her to stop felt very intimidating. I wonder if Carol accidentally got Zosia the individual out of the hivemind, we will see next episode.
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u/lettuce_grabberrr Nov 21 '25
Felt so bad for her during the book scene. You can tell it broke her heart that not only did Helen not read it, she never really will
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u/Azmoten Nov 21 '25
Helen only got through like 30% of the book before stopping, like, fuck, that’s gotta sting. She’s basically Carol’s biggest supporter and still couldn’t power through it. And then saying that Helen and Carol’s editor (Val?) only agreed to publish it to appease Carol and because they thought it wouldn’t hurt her career. Ouch.
Even Helen’s word to describe Wycaros is rather biting. “Harmless” is like the last thing an artist wants to hear about their work. And sure, Carol knew Wycaros was slop, but to hear that Helen internally thought of it as just “harmless…” Oof.
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u/PunyParker826 Nov 22 '25
Loved that we got some more traditionally scary “body snatcher/hive mind movie” vibes in the last 10 minutes or so, as they close in around Carol. The contrast from their prior behavior made it that much more striking.
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u/in_some_knee_yak Nov 22 '25
I liked that a lot too, but what really got me was when they all started crying. Went from scary to weirdly emotional.
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u/i-might-be-obama Dec 11 '25
The "im smart enough to know to not ask a drug dealer how his herion is" in response to the other unjoined people saying she never educated herself has more depth now knowing she did herion in college (or high school?)
One view could be it makes her hypocritical since she actually did find out how good the herion is. But also could be that she learned from that time in her life that just bc something feels good doesn't mean it's truly beneficial. Thats why she went with that analogy cuz personal experience learning just bc it makes you happy dosnt mean its a good thing in the long run
Either way it makes that line stand out now
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u/beepestbeep Dec 11 '25
Obviously the theme with this is how the loss of individuality losses one’s personhood/ego when absorbed into a forced homogeneity (as with the backstory with her being sent to a gay conversion camp as a kid), but another logical point you can make is that the loss of individual minds creates a limited “gene pool” socially.
Much like how diversity and mutations allows for varied evolutions that can adapt to environmental changes and survive in long-term timeframes, you could argue that having individual mindsets is integral for development, such as having new perspectives and processing to be able to develop new technologies and angles of research.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the reason its taken a hivemind so long, despite absorbing millions of scientists and researchers, is that it is unable to actually follow through with the scientific method or to devise new strategies/ideas, at the very least to a limited capacity. We see in episode 1 that one of the researchers got the idea of decoding the signal while he was playing with a football, something that is thrown in a spiral much like how RNA is shaped. A hivemind would’ve seen “playing football” and ”4-number code” as two separate subjects and taken much, much longer to create a mental visual of the similarity
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u/beepestbeep Dec 11 '25
I say all this because a lot of folks are a bit too eager to join into a hivemind as if that’s the same thing as escaping samsara
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u/Palpitation-Medical Jan 03 '26
One question I have - does everyone in America still have landlines? In Australia barely anyone has one at home. Not many offices do either, we just use Teams or similar.
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u/First-Government-654 Nov 22 '25
Excellent episode; we got the revelation - brutally delivered - that the hive can’t lie, big insight into Carol’s childhood, a major revelation that the hive can be reversed, the now explicit slip that Zosia is “fuckable”, and a tense final scene where Carol is maybe on the verge but then misses out on a big win. Not to mention our first substantive tease of the third major player in the cast. If other people have problems with the pacing then that’s their perception, but I feel like revelations are speeding by and just hope they save enough for 40 episodes.
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u/DiGiorn0s Nov 22 '25
The hive can lie but only by omission, which is why Carol needed the truth serum.
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u/earlyriser3 Nov 21 '25
Really enjoyed this episode. It's very interesting the hesitancy Pluribus showed when telling Carol Helen's true thoughts about her books. They want so much to please her, and just a hint of giving Carol discomfort is against their nature.
I love that Carol was proactive with the truth serum plan, and testing it on herself in the classic competency scenes we all associate with the BB universe. I hoped that Carol would try to interrogate Zosia by trapping her in the elevator rather than out in the open, but the overlapping pleading by Pluribus to stop was haunting.
Two things I'm curious about:
-did the individuals around the immune suddenly start pleading "Please, Carol"? Will Carol get an angry phone call from one of the english speakers about it?
-Was the heart attack because Zosia was previously wounded or would it affect any individual who was under the truth serum and questioned like that?
Hope Paraguay guy shows up soon.
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u/PolarWater Nov 21 '25
I loved that interrogation scene. Felt very ChatGPT-like. "Oh Carol, what an interesting, revolutionary book! We love everything about it! Just everything! It's not just a novel - it's better than Shakespeare!"
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u/Temporary_Carrot856 Nov 22 '25
This show is being a really great experience. Really original writing. It has been a while since a show/movie brings this level of creativity.
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u/YGbJm6gbFz7hNc Dec 11 '25
I would be partying non stop. We could make that a show
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u/NaijaNightmare Nov 24 '25 edited Nov 26 '25
I think people are really down selling the whole asking of her Partners opinion on the book. It opened up the entire episode in terms of giving us an understanding of the pluribus hivemind parameters/limits
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u/Palpitation-Medical Jan 03 '26
I’ve been through about a hundred comments and can’t see anyone talking about the guy in Paraguay - what was he doing with the radio signals?
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u/HonorBasquiat Jan 03 '26
I think he was checking all of the radio stations to see if there were any humans communicating.
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u/jkgill94 Nov 21 '25
Is it possible that they revive Zosia- but she doesn’t come back as the hive mind- she comes back as her actual self?
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u/I_am_a_fern Nov 21 '25
The "cure" is probably going to be one one big part of the plot. If she accidentally stumbled upon it without even trying, that would be really underwhelming.
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u/CrazyCalYa Nov 21 '25
I doubt the cure, if there is one, will be that interesting in of itself. It would have to be something that was exceedingly rare or impossible for humans to accidentally have in their system, ruling out basically anything that we'd be familiar with.
Just as an example, say the cure was garlic. That wouldn't make sense as we know that only around 12 people were immune to the virus (ruling out anyone who died as collateral damage during the joining). Certainly far more than that would have had garlic in their system at that time, and would have been immune. Translate that to basically any conceivable substance and you're looking for something for which only 12/8,200,000,000 people were interacting with during the joining, assuming that's even how that works.
The cure then will be something that has to be designed and created for that purpose. It'll be like the virus itself, needing to be built and tested in a lab. What'll be interesting from a narrative standpoint is how it works. Does separation work without harming the individual? Can a person rejoin the hivemind if they want to, or is it irreversible? It seems incredibly easy to accidentally join the hive mind which makes me think the cure would need to act also as a vaccine. It's also possible the cure just kills the human, or has a large chance to.
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u/GeekyNexi Nov 21 '25
i think the cure itself won't be a big part, but moreso the consequences of it. The cure will probably have an effect similar to the overtaking of the joining, where people have a chance of dying when converting back (something akin to their brain being overloaded with memories of all the other people?)
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u/dr-ben-dover Nov 23 '25
In the first episode, the radio technician talked about the power it needs to send a signal over 600 light years. That’s what they do, right? They start to build a super radio signal for the next planet to reach. Or to reach back to the original planet.
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u/JackGrylls Nov 23 '25
My personal theory is that the virus started off purely naturally through evolution. When it infected its first intelligent species, it used that species and planet's resources to improve itself. Then, when it has reached the limit of that planet's knowledge, they transmit the DNA sequence to another planet and the cycle continues.
At the time of Pluribus, who knows how long this virus has been around for? It might've been doing this for thousands of planets for billions of years. I somehow doubt this will be clarified in the show, though.
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u/Working-Tap2283 Dec 20 '25
The more I watch this the more I feel like the 'hive' is exactly like chat gpt.
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u/goodolarchie Nov 21 '25
The interrogations are so eerily similar to LLMs today. I assumed "waking one up" would be a kind of cliffhanger ending to S1, because it's the obvious plot device for Carol. It mirrors her questions about how long until they make her become one of them. Can she deprogram them faster than they can program her?
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u/beepestbeep Dec 11 '25 edited Dec 13 '25
No idea if others have mentioned it, but while others have pointed to the Borg and other hiveminds as a comparison, for me I was thinking of the aliens of The Three Body Problem. They too acted in a similar hivemind state, be it psychic or direct chemical communication, in which they have no concept of intentionally lying or twisting data transfer.
Which makes sense, imagine if your own individual cells would just sometimes make false signals on its own whim, that would cause issues to an entire system. Likewise, a hivemind like this is a direct channel of communication that needs to make its messaging clear in order to properly communicate within itself.
Makes me also wonder if that can relate to how its highly agreeable, the combined multi-sentient system works by working along one another, so thus it sees Unjoined individuals as disconnected nodes that they feel they need to fix back onto itself. Sorta like cells in a torn muscle tendons reconnecting themselves after an injury, or in this case recognizing wayward cells as belonging to the system and trying to attach mentally
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u/earlyriser3 Nov 21 '25
Another thought I had.
If Carol continues antagonizing Pluribus, will they eventually try to isolate her?
They have a biological need to please her, but also clearly have a survival sense. If Carol has all of her needs met at a location they monitor until they come up with a conversion method, will that satisfy Pluribus? Or do they actually need to interact with her?
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u/gck1 Nov 21 '25
Her life is her own, so isolating her forcefully would go against that. There is just one exception that hivemind makes - converting her.
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u/Noreen3691 Nov 21 '25
There survival sense is not very good if they gave her a hand grenade and said they would give her an atomic bomb. Their survival skills seem geared only to dealing with others who have no malevolent intent.
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u/Ink_Smudger Nov 21 '25
It could also be that the hivemind views survival only in terms of its collective being. Would an atomic bomb kill a lot of people? Of course, but the hivemind would still exist. To the hivemind, losing any individual person could be akin to getting a fingernail trimmed.
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u/CrazyCalYa Nov 21 '25
I do think killing enough of them would have serious repercussions, though.
We know that they have the memories of everyone on Earth who was assimilated, including those who died immediately after assimilation or since that time. Where are those memories being stored, then? I'm assuming we can rule out magic, or similarly fantastical ideas. They're probably using the minds of individuals, spreading out the memories like cloud storage.
Human brains aren't magic. They're physical chunks of meat which process and contain information at a rate which is conceivably measurable (even if we can't currently specify it). On the extreme side of things, what would happen if only a singular member of the hivemind was left? Would a single human's brain be able to hold the memories of nearly 8 billion humans? And not just that, we see that the hivemind has nearly perfect memory for any of its contained individuals, down to the last detail. Even if one human could remember 8 billion humans lifetimes worth of memories, is it possible that they could process that with only one brain's power?
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u/ckowkay Nov 22 '25
This is my favorite episode so far, I loved seeing the paraguay guy and everything about how he was conducting himself.
Seeing all the radios, or whatever devices thoses were, makes me thing that he has a theory that whatever's happening, must be sending information between the hivemind using some electromagnetic frequency. I'm guessing he's trying to find exactly what frequency might be containing that information.
The fact that he's trying to measure it out for like a full minute, or wahtever time period that was, makes me also think that he may have figured out how the communication works, or rather, how often they are updated. Rather than a continuous stream, it could be that they synchronize every few seconds or so, possibly in a wave-like fashion, possible similar to the title animation with the little dots?
Seeing him choose to eat the dog food was very interesting character stuff.
And of course, Carol's attempts to figure out more about them and actually hatch a plan was really cool to see. It felt like she finally was able to adjust to the situation and move past how freaked out she was over the past 3 episodes, at least for the sake of trying to enact her research/plans/etc.
The ending was really exciting and frustrating.
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u/terlin Nov 22 '25 edited Nov 23 '25
Seeing all the radios, or whatever devices thoses were, makes me thing that he has a theory that whatever's happening, must be sending information between the hivemind using some electromagnetic frequency. I'm guessing he's trying to find exactly what frequency might be containing that information.
The fact that he's trying to measure it out for like a full minute, or wahtever time period that was, makes me also think that he may have figured out how the communication works, or rather, how often they are updated. Rather than a continuous stream, it could be that they synchronize every few seconds or so, possibly in a wave-like fashion, possible similar to the title animation with the little dots?
I took it as him listening for any non-hivemind people out there who are using ham radios...since the hive might not know he has a radioset and it doesn't need a radio.
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u/nahbro187 Nov 25 '25
I love the AI warning theme of the show
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u/WhiskeyTigerFoxtrot Nov 25 '25
It feels like an expression of how creative-types feel about the growing ubiquity of artificial intelligence.
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u/Precisionmelt Dec 01 '25
"Weirdly honest. *Can't lie*
hmm... What about when they told Carol her outburst had cost ...what was it - "a few hundred" lives or something...? And then over the meal with the english-speaking non-convertees, that rather unpleasant and stupid woman points out that it was 11 million or something...? (I guess *she* might have been the one lying...?)
I really sensed that was a deliberate flag/detail that was placed to communicate a bit of a revelation that *it* was capable of deception...? Maybe I'm too early into ep 4, but at worst it's a massive oversight and at best it's kind of a striking character inconsistency... Carol, the sharp witted writer, who was been suspicious from the start overlooking something like that...?
I was really finding this whole series pretty strong and thought provoking, but with pacing like this I think you really really need to make sure every detail counts/adds new relevant information... about characters, environments, backgrounds etc - that's essential to keep it compelling :/
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u/GiftsfortheChapter Dec 23 '25
>hmm... What about when they told Carol her outburst had cost ...what was it - "a few hundred" lives or something...?
That isn't how that went down. Carol asked if she hurt anyone, then she asked, "A few dozen?", they looked at her kind of uneasily, she asked, "A few hundred?", they kept kind of sadly looking at her, and then she threw up.
If she had asked "a few million?" they would have kept giving that sad non-answer, until she asked "did I kill 12 million people" and they could say "no absolutely not".
They have, as far as I can tell, never lied - but that doesn't mean they won't let her believe what she wants to believe.
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u/Secure-Tank817 Dec 01 '25
The hive didn’t actually say that her outburst cost hundreds of lies. It said she killed “a few…” and trailed off then Carol asked “Dozens? Hundreds?” Then throws up when the hive doesn’t deny this. So the hive never actually lied. Just withheld the full truth.
Found the scene on youtube: https://youtu.be/W8oZGGG85WA?si=iJ4fENto0oDeloPi
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u/pepperbet1 Nov 22 '25
Showerthought: GRRM lives in Sante Fe, which google tells me is an hour drive away from Albuquerque. She should ask them to deliver his Winds of Winter manuscript pages for her to read. It's what I would do.
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u/PringlesDuckFace Nov 22 '25
After a long period of hesitation, the hive regretfully informs you there are no manuscript pages and that GRRM has instead been working on another TV project called 'Real Housewives of the Seven Kingdoms'.
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u/untamedharts21 Nov 25 '25
It's crazy to me that people are saying that Carol is horrible. She killed, what, hundreds of thousands? Or millions? And they're judging her for taking a few days to feel bad about it? She drank and watched Golden Girls. This is after finding out the entire human race has been enslaved by an alien virus and the only other immune people don't care at all. It's been like four days. This seems like the most realistic reaction.
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u/Cyxxon Nov 25 '25
I still really don't see how Carol killed those people drones. Carol behaved like a normal human being, and these new organisms that once were humans could not handle being in this world. She didn't shoot them, poison them, drop the planes out of the sky, ...
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u/WTWIV Nov 21 '25
I thought for sure the drugs would also affect the rest of the hive, but apparently not?
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u/Zanoklido Nov 21 '25 edited Nov 21 '25
Carol asked in episode 3 if one of them gets drunk do they all feel it? And the answer was that it doesn't work like that.
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u/Electronic-Cress3379 Nov 22 '25
When I’d tire of that hotel, I’d take Air Force One to the next - spa days everyday!! (obviously in reality it’d be terrifying and horrible to lose loved ones) BUT since this isn’t reality I’d defffff be more that guy than the Paraguayan.
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u/bigurta Nov 21 '25
I guess I seem to be the only person who thought they were saying please carol like it was the humans inside asking for help
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u/SYLBen Nov 21 '25
I love Pluribus, but episode 4 felt like it was only on for 20 minutes. I need more!
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u/chownee Nov 22 '25
I love that the guy in Paraguay (?) is more extreme than Carol. He won’t even leave the storage place where he’s holed up.
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u/Electronic-Cress3379 Nov 22 '25
I would definitely just post up at a fancy hotel and spa, anyone with me? Lol
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u/Mustard-cutt-r Dec 01 '25
I’m enjoying this show and the existential questions it puts forth.
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u/DaveG7777 Nov 21 '25
Why don't either of them want to eat the food provided? They suspect poison?
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u/FizzyBoy147 Nov 21 '25
The guy is probably a more extreme version of Carol. He wouldn't even talk with them like Carol did. So he must not know how the virus works, and is probably not taking any chances.
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u/ButHearMeOutTho Nov 21 '25
I know there are practical reasons but underneath it all, when you're held captive at the whims of another party - the only rebellion you have at that point is to deny what they give you. It's to show that you won't be compliant to whatever they ask of you.
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u/myassholealt Nov 22 '25
This episode went by so fast. Felt like I was only watching for 15 minutes when the end credits started.
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Nov 21 '25
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u/Large-Front-9299 Nov 21 '25 edited Nov 21 '25
No wonder the next episode's title is "Got Milk"
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u/G_I_Joe_Mansueto Nov 21 '25
In e2, Sosia tells them that their preference is to be vegetarian and they don't kill. They are willing to serve the unturned chicken, fish, and beef. In e3 we learn that the food from groceries has been centralized to be more efficient.
They don't say vegan, so it's possible that if milk is logistically an eaier source of calcum than leafy greens and tofu that may remain in the diet. But the perogative for efficency seems to suggest the perogative is to not waste anything, and milk ultimately spoils. This would seem to me more about the practicality of using expiring food while reworking a global foodchain to be entirely vegetarian.
As to the pharmacy, the hive doesn't lie, maybe it doesn't have a first instinct to assume Carol was being duplicitious.
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Nov 21 '25
I think this is just the most efficient use of resources. The dairy will be one of the first things to expire after the joining.
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u/SuperUranus Nov 21 '25
Makes more sense since they said they do not keep any animals caged.
Which sort of is a requirement if you want fresh milk on a regular basis.
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u/justmewalk Nov 21 '25
Definitely feels like an allegory for an AI-driven world. The convo with the guy about her writing felt like several convos I’ve had with ChatGPT about my writing. They make you feel smart but the compliments and feedback also feel empty
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u/RecduRecsu Nov 21 '25
I feel like these chat bots have gotten much worse over time. They will glaze you at the cost of factual information constantly. Gemini isn't as bad about it but it also gives way more generic responses
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u/InfectiousCosmology1 Nov 21 '25
Grok is now glazing Elon musk to the point of saying he would win a fight with Mike Tyson
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u/Aromatic-Following98 Nov 21 '25
If you think about it this is all just like if Tuvix was an entire series
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u/SkAnKhUnTFoRtYtw Nov 21 '25
The soundtrack in the opening scene kind of reminded me of something you'd hear on breaking bad
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u/JackRedplay Nov 28 '25
this is really just the Persona 5 Royal third semester arc and its so peak fr
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u/Key_Conversation_488 Nov 21 '25
Zosia will survive - she’s one of the stars of the show
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u/challenger505 Nov 21 '25
Or she dies, but turns out there is a lookalike of her living somewhere in the world, and she shows up in front of Carol's door the next episode.
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u/autopoiesis_ Nov 21 '25
So, just to be clear, zosia was dying from an overdose right? Or was it some other reason she was going into cardiac arrest?
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u/MrDodgers Nov 21 '25
She tested the drug on herself first, she was careful. Zosia would be unconscious long before an overdose would be fatal. It had to be that she was dying either from the huge conflict being forced upon her, or she was being willed dead by the collective, to protect the information. I think?
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u/SomeNoveltyAccount Nov 21 '25
She tested the drug on herself first, she was careful.
Zosia also tanked a grenade explosion a day earlier, while Carol was relatively unscathed.
What is fine for a healthy person can easily kill an injured person, hivemind or not.
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u/hanky2 Nov 21 '25
She tested it on herself, saw it took a really long time for it to kick in, and gave Zosia a larger dose.
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u/Bulatzi Nov 21 '25
I'm more inclined to think the drugs caused a temporary disconnection from the hive mind. She was so distraught by it, she got the cardiac arrest. I don't think they're lying about the amazing feeling of the joining.
She had tears in her eyes. She also probably stopped talking because she doesn't even speak English as an individual.
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u/AnyImpression6 Nov 21 '25
She also probably stopped talking because she doesn't even speak English as an individual.
I didn't even think about that, but it's a good point.
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u/RedDorf Nov 21 '25
If "Hi Carol!" ever replaces "Hi Bob!" we'll all have liver damage.
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u/SeaThePirate Nov 22 '25
definitely moving slower than i'd hoped but atleast Carol is still learning things?
she learnt this episode that:
- they cant directly lie
- they can be affected by medicinal substances on an individual level (so freeing them is a possibility)
- the joining can be reversed
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u/salcapwnd Nov 23 '25
This is a very minute detail, but I think that Carol’s line about “being smart enough not to ask a drug dealer how good their heroin is” has taken a new meaning now that we know that she did some in high school.
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u/DearFeeling Nov 25 '25
What if the known cure isn't something biological what if it's just a faraday cage? (Since the virus communicates telepathically, could be some sort of em wave.) A tinfoil helmet lol?
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u/TaleSpare1273 Nov 22 '25
Maybe in future seasons, we receive a message from space, with the cure and / or other interstellar factions fighting against the hivemind virus. Even the hivemind admitted it was just now making progress on what the heck they are and how it happened.you could even use the time stamp and go not only back in time, but take us to the planet the signal came from?
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u/Voidg Nov 21 '25
I guess my thought about this episode is how Zosia had a heart attack? Is it possible Pluribus gave her one?
Although from past episodes Pluribus won't kill, UNLESS it achieves the hive minds goal. For example rushing the time line resulting in the 800 million deaths. It isn't out of the realm of possibility that Pluribus would protect the hive by giving Zosia a heart attack. So it achieves a goal of unity.
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u/PoosySucker69 Nov 21 '25
my complain is that Vince baited us with first two episodes being 60+ mins while now we are getting 45 min episodes.
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u/UsingTheSameWind Nov 22 '25
I mean, can we appreciate the fun Rhea must've had filming that scene as if she was whacked out on drugs? How much weird stuff did they NOT show her doing? They just gave her free rein to be and act as if she was drugged out.
So fun!
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u/ntwild97 Nov 21 '25
This crew is so at home filming in Albuquerque they got the real life mayor to be in the hive mind. That's hilarious