Taken at face value, Pluribus‘ logline of “The most miserable person on Earth must save humanity from happiness” can be seen as an attempt at humor. Here’s Carol, who already hated most other human beings before the apocalypse hit. And now, post-apocalypse, every other human being on Earth showers her with their undivided attention and superficial love.
Because this is a Vince Gilligan character study, it was always obvious that Pluribus would go much deeper than that and really, properly explore the source of Carol’s misery. With the show’s fourth episode, we finally get some answers.
After the grenade incident from episode 3, Carol starts to grapple with the limits and the boundaries of the hivemind as she tries to figure out how far they’d go to make her happy. When she realizes that the hivemind can’t lie, she decides to visit Zosia again to ask more questions about the virus, and the two end up in a bit of a debate over one’s individualism and happiness.
During the conversation, Zosia says something that clearly triggers Carol: “You’ll understand soon enough.” From Carol’s perspective, the hivemind is talking down to her and telling her that they know best. This brings up a traumatic memory for Carol from when she was a teenager and was sent to a conversion therapy camp by her mom. The parallels that Carol draws between the camp counselors and the hivemind are horrifying; just like this alien organism, the counselors must have also talked to Carol in a way that suggested that they knew better and how to “fix” her.
While I’ve never experienced conversion therapy first-hand (and hopefully I never will), I’ve certainly heard enough stories to be convinced that it’s one of the most brutally traumatic things that can happen to a queer person. You’d essentially be surrounded by people smiling and telling you that there’s no need to worry, that they’ll fix whatever’s wrong with you, and once you’ve had the queerness beaten out of you, you’ll be so much happier as part of the majority without any of that anxiety and misery following you around.
Put that way, it’s incredibly easy to see why Carol is fighting back against the hive with everything she has. After all, isn’t the hivemind acting in the exact same way those camp counselors probably did? They know what’s best, they know Carol will be happier once she joins them. They’re trying to change her. This goes beyond just wanting to fight for humanity; it’s about changing the very core of your person and what makes you you. It’s about preserving all the unique things about you and who you really are. By surrendering to the hive, it would be equivalent to Carol giving in to the camp counselors from all those years ago.
This small tidbit also helps to inform Carol’s hesitance in telling her fans where the inspiration for Raban came from. Originally meant to be hot female corsair, Carol opted to make Raban a man instead to appeal to the straight majority. Even when asked about her inspirations, Carol says it’s “safer” to say she was inspired by George Clooney or some other conventionally attractive straight man. It’s incredibly sad when you think about it, considering that Carol is now a successful author married to a woman, yet she’s still afraid to be too public about her sexual orientation. Episode 4 finally explains why that is, and the answer is, of course, queer trauma.
Pluribus has done a great job of surprising me in every episode so far, but the show being Gilligan’s attempt at telling a story about a queer heroine (played by the lovely Rhea Seehorn, no less) trying to save the world was something I never expected, and certainly something I never knew I needed until I saw it. While she certainly could use a bit of work when presenting herself to the other survivors, Carol’s fierce defiance in light of these new facts is something to be admired, and she’s certainly a heroine I’ll be rooting for throughout the story.
Pluribus is now available for streaming on Apple TV.
