Hopes for Pluribus Season 2
If you haven't watched all of season 1 you need to bounce out of this page right now.
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Right so, a while back I did a long post about how if you didn't like the pacing of the first season you were wrong. Well, you're still wrong but I deleted it because I hadn't finished the whole show and the post really leaned in on how cool it was that Carol wasn't giving into the hive mind.
Then like, the next episode after that post she caved and started playing house with Zosia just like the other survivors were playing house with their plurb'd spouses and kids. Through trial and error she comes up with the notion that the hive can't lie to her. It won't legally lie to her but it absolutely keeps information and its motives away from her. In the last episode when Zosia tells her she only has a few months until they assimilate her she realizes that Zosia is only telling her what the hive wants and is just trying to get her to join the plurb cult.
The entire premise of the show is that the most miserable person on the planet (Carol) has to save the world (humanity) from blind happiness. The hivemind claims to have solved all the worlds problems and conflicts and that everyone connected to it is gloriously happy at all times.
Of course we see the reality of this when Kusimayu agrees to join the hive willingly. As soon as she crosses over the hive abandons the village and the animals she was tending to, and her entire history and culture just dies in real time. All in order for her to be happy. But at this point we know why she feels so sad and lonely even with "humans" around her. We just spent several episodes watching Carol break down in front of us. Kusimayu didn't join flippantly, it was inevitable and there was nothing she could do to stop them.
Carol on the other hand has a chance at fixing things thanks to Manny. Everyone's favorite radio operator has an idea as to how to fix things to start with but because he has limited experience with hive members it's not a big help yet. Carol has figured out a few things due to her constant interactions with Zosia and others. Between the two of them they can wrangle a plan to do what I hope happens in the first few episodes of the next season and that is to disconnect someone from the hive - without killing them.
It's obvious at this point that the hive communicates telepathically and that wavelength can be interrupted by radio waves. We also know that individuals connected to the hive still retain their previous selves. The signal is just overriding them with happy feelings to keep them subservient. I often see commentary along the lines of "The hive is good actually..." without mentioning this concept whatsoever. The plurb victims are not consenting to anything happening to them. Which will be fun when/if they knock Zosia loose.
Speaking of which, there are the handful of occasions when Zosia's connection gets interrupted without her going into that kernel panic mode that happens when Carol or Manny get angry. That panic mode is clearly dangerous as we know it kills people. Hence why Carol went on her little ski trip vacation - she is afraid of Zosia dying like Hellen.
We end the season with a time limit. We see Carol get mad about Zosia telling her that she only has a few months to go because the hive has access to her eggs and she asks for the bomb and gets helicoptered home.
BUT
BUT
Hear me out.
Carol is no longer concerned with saving herself. She also doesn't care about the rest of the world. Manny cares about the rest of the world. He's got this in the bag. His name means Emmanuel after all. Carol is going to help him for her own personal reasons - saving Zosia.
Now, some conflict caltrops will get thrown in for sure. Manny could get plurb'd unexpectedly just as they are about to make a breakthrough. (They did just have him in the hospital.) The hive could mutate and actively stop them in some way, cutting power, not listening to calls, starving them, etc. It hasn't been that long since this started, and some people could start to disconnect on their own.
I really hope that we get some de-plurb'd people in the next season. Someone who obviously now knows who Carol and Manny are but is human again and can help them fill in gaps. We know that Zosia kinda snapped out of it a second when she was reminded of something from her past she really loved. But if all it takes is mango ice cream to snap her out of it I will turn the TV off.
Also, any de-plurb'd characters should know how to disconnect others ONLY if they keep all the hive info they collected. If that knowledge is lost or incomplete after disconnect they will have to just help out with what they remember.
Which leads to another issue, the main cast is dripping in plot armor. If Zosia dies Carol won't have a real reason to try and save anyone else. If Manny dies Carol doesn't have the skills or knowledge (or time to learn) to broadcast de-plurb signals across the radio waves. If Carol dies (like actually dead, not plurb'd) Manny will get hurt or killed trying to do everything on his own (foreshadowed in The Gap).
Who knows, maybe Diabaté and Laxmi will finally wake up and come help.
That would be nice.
Carol championing humanity again would also be nice.