Vince Gilligan’s ‘Pluribus’: Episodes 1-2 Breakdown

Summary

The Prestige TV Podcast: Vince Gilligan’s ‘Pluribus’ – Episodes 1 & 2 Breakdown

Date: November 7, 2025
Hosts: Joanna Robinson and Rob Mahoney

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Overview

Joanna Robinson and Rob Mahoney kick off their weekly "Pluribus Fridays," analyzing the double-episode premiere of Vince Gilligan’s highly anticipated Apple TV+ show, Pluribus. The discussion dives into the show's themes, stylistic influences, Gilligan’s trademarks, and the risks and rewards of launching a big-budget, star-light, original sci-fi series in 2025. Episodes covered: “We Is Us” and “Pirate Lady”.

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Main Themes and Purpose

• Exploring Humanity in Crisis: The show uses a sudden, inexplicable transformation of most of the human race into a harmonious collective ("the others" or "the joined") to probe questions of identity, individualism, and what makes life meaningful.
• Anticipation and Impact: The hosts discuss Pluribus as both a “monoculture moment” and an experiment, given its non-IP status, lack of major stars, and its links to Vince Gilligan's legacy.
• Stylistic DNA: Focus on Gilligan’s procedural, visually inventive, and darkly comic style, and how Pluribus both draws from and defies genre expectations.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Premiere Hype and Streaming Crash

[01:18]

• Apple TV+ crashed during the premiere, possibly due to high demand, evoking past “event TV” moments like Game of Thrones and True Detective.
• Raises the question: can Pluribus become a monocultural phenomenon without established IP or a-list leads?

2. Gilligan’s Risk-Taking: Non-IP, Star-Light TV

[02:58; 03:52]

• The stars, notably Rhea Seehorn and Carolina Wydra, are fantastic but not ‘celebrity’ names; a notable departure for expensive Apple TV+ projects.
• “Are people gonna care about a non-IP show that doesn’t have a star in it in 2025? … the biggest hook they have is ‘from the creator of Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul.’ Not too shabby.” — Joanna [03:18]

3. Answering (Some) Mysteries Early—But Not a ‘Theory Show’

[05:25-06:56]

• Pluribus gives substantial answers in its opening episodes, contrasting with “mystery box” shows; but suspicion remains about how much can be trusted.
• “Were you surprised by how many answers we got…?” “Not really… in [Gilligan’s] shows, there’s a lot of ‘OK, that happened. So what’s next?’” — Rob [05:25]

4. Influences and Comparisons:

[07:49-11:31]

• Official and fan parallels: Severance, The Last of Us, The Leftovers, Lost, The Stepford Wives, and even comedic DNA from The X-Files’ Darren Morgan.
• “Gilligan goes Lindelof is a thing I saw.” — Joanna [08:41]
• Gilligan’s inspiration: The “last person on earth” idea; originally a male lead, but shifted to avoid “porny” implications, aiming for dramatic tension akin to I Dream of Jeannie and Bewitched.

5. Gilligan’s Visual & Structural Signatures

[12:32; 13:53; 48:08; 61:34]

• Pluribus leans heavily into Gilligan’s methodical process montages and object-centric shots (e.g., tight close-up on a whiskey bottle).
• Carefully orchestrated background performances—with a choreographer calibrating the unsettling-yet-pleasant aura of the “others.”
• “He loves an extreme close up of an object.” — Joanna [61:34]

6. Tone: Balancing Eerie, Existential, and Darkly Funny

[11:31; 48:08]

• Elements of humor persist amid the apocalypse (e.g., “smooch virus,” the donut-licking motif).
• The mesmerizing, creepy choreography of the “joined” amplifies the sense of alienation and tension.

7. Big Picture: What Pluribus Is ‘About’

[24:53-27:46]

• Core questions: Is life without friction truly living? Is “frictionless” existence (courtesy of the “joined”) a loss of humanity?
• Possible A.I. allegory: The “others” serve and anticipate every need—are they a metaphor for the dangers and paradoxes of a world optimized and sanitized by artificial intelligence?
• The show’s central philosophical dilemma: “Is a life without friction really life?” — Rob [25:06]

8. Individualism vs. Collectivism—A Divided Species

[27:19-32:17]

• Explores what it means to be the only "unaltered" person in a world now unified under an alien/viral collective.
• Direct ties to modern tribalism, “us vs. them” thinking, and whether radical unity (collectivism) is truly desirable.

9. Carol as a Reluctant Hero

[50:02-52:08]

• Carol—acerbic, self-absorbed, and crisis-addled—is nonetheless written to be the “good guy” in Gilligan’s eyes.
• Detailed visual cues (e.g., her car’s breathalyzer) build her character’s troubled backstory and flawed but relatable humanity.

10. Production Value and Use of Budget

[35:18-38:36]

• At $15 million per episode, Pluribus puts the money onscreen via:
  • Custom-built cul-de-sac set: “They built that entire cul de sac from scratch.” — Joanna [37:51]
  • Real C130 cargo plane, Air Force One facade, and international filming.
  • Rich background action and crowd choreography for realism.

11. The “Smooch Virus” and World-Building

[16:14-16:56; 38:45-43:27]

• Transmission: tongue-in-cheek suggestions, but saliva is key—“the smooch virus.” Modes: kissing, donut-licking, possibly airborne via synchronized “chemtrail” planes.
• Philosophical implications of instant, almost mechanical transmission of connection (or loss thereof).

12. Notable Visuals and Shots

[60:11-62:54]

• Gilligan Moments: The beer glasses trembling, the camera attached to a moving crane, tight close-ups on seemingly mundane objects made central (e.g., whiskey bottle, makeup palettes).
• “Cameras inside of those shows increasingly found unusual ways to shoot things up through the bottom of a glass table…” — Joanna [59:45]
• Slow, balletic movement and matching of the “joined” background actors; echoes of Stepford Wives and Lost.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “It can only be bitter, I imagine.” — Rob [00:32], on following the show “from start to bitter end.”
• “Is a life without friction really life?” — Rob [25:06]
• “What makes a human a human… I actually genuinely think that’s the question the show wants to ask.” — Joanna [07:12]
• “The algorithmically engineered woman of your dreams and the meal that you wanted…” — Rob [67:14], on the hollow triumph of frictionless fulfillment.
• “If you have to tell people ‘What we’re doing, we promise, is the antithesis of slavery’—I don’t know, if you have to make that pitch, it’s not great.” — Rob [46:54]
• “Not since Jon Hamm’s nipple rings (has there been a better email inbox)” — Joanna [70:56], referencing their new segment’s email address: [e-mail].

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Premiere Buzz & Apple TV+ Crash: [01:18]
• Star-Light, Non-IP Risk: [02:58–03:52]
• Show’s “Theory” Approach: [05:25–06:56]
• Visuals: Air Force One, Planes, Cul-de-sac: [35:18–38:36]
• Gilligan Stylistics: [12:32, 13:53, 61:34]
• Philosophy: A.I./Efficiency Debate: [24:53–27:46]
• Carol’s Flaws & Humanity: [50:02–52:08]
• Best Gilligan Shot(s): [60:11–62:54]
• Most Grating Smile: [63:55–64:20]
• “What Would You Do With the Hive Mind?” Segment: [65:00–70:55]

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Recurring Gags & Inside Jokes

• The “Smooch Virus”: Comic nickname for the show’s pandemic, transmitted through kissing and donut-licking. [16:14]
• Donut-Licking Email: Hosts create [e-mail] to solicit listener feedback and theories—many laughs about the “taken” variants, and curiosity about who else wants that email. [18:44–19:40]
• Book Titles/Parody: Carol’s romantasy is titled Winds of Wakaro, book four in a supposed trilogy—a sly joke about long-suffering fantasy fans and authors (e.g., George R.R. Martin). [71:04]

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Listener Interaction & Future Segments

• Naming the Groups/Virus: Hosts poll listeners on better terminology than “the others,” “old school,” and “the USA.” [15:56–17:49]
• Production Value Watch: Identifying “where the money went” in each episode (plane logistics, set builds, etc.). [35:18–38:36]
• Gilligan Shot of the Week: Noting exceptionally Gilligan-esque direction or flourishes. [59:45–62:54]
• Most Grating Smile: A punch-averse spin on “most punchable face;” this week’s choices include creepy children and a government undersecretary. [63:55–64:20]
• If the Hive Mind Served You: Hypothetical—what would you do with all your whims granted, but alone? [65:00–70:55]
• Send theories/answers to: [e-mail]

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Closing Thoughts

• Hosts admire Gilligan’s boldness: original, star-light, concept-heavy drama with staggering production values and a tone scaling from dread to absurdity.
• Carol, as a protagonist, is deeply flawed yet positioned as the “good guy” in a divided, frictionless new world seemingly lacking true individuality.
• The show is both an immediate, plot-driven ride and a vehicle for meditating on existential and contemporary anxieties—especially in relation to artificial intelligence, division-vs-collectivism, and the meaning of connection.
• Listeners are urged to contribute theories, scientific expertise (especially about virus transmission!), and answers to the weekly prompts.

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Next Week

Joanna and Rob will be back for episode 3 and beyond—send thoughts, questions, and donut-related theories to [e-mail].

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“Stay safe, and don’t eat the licked donuts."

Transcript

[A]

Hello. Welcome back to the Prestige TV podcast feed. I'm Joanna Robinson.

[B]

I'm Rob Mahoney.

[A]

And it is Pluribus Friday, the first of many Pluribus, Pluribus Fridays we'll be sharing together. Rob and I are here to cover the Apple TV plus show Pluribus from start to bitter end.

[B]

It can only be bitter, I imagine.

[A]

Do you think this is sweet? Oh, I've seen this movie. You've seen this movie? You've all seen this movie. We are today going to talk about specifically episodes one and two because they dropped as a double premiere last night, Thursday night. So if you have not seen episode one, We Is Us, written and directed by Vince McGilligan.

[B]

Or as I prefer, we as y', all.

[A]

We as y'. All, as we said before we started recording and in Rob's the local dialect. And then episode two, Pirate lady, written and directed by Evince Gilligan. So we will be talking about those two episodes. So spoilers for those episodes. But go, go watch the show. We should say, you know, before we start everything, this premiere, I don't know, it was correlation or causality.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But when this premiere dropped last night, Apple TV crashed for like, hundreds and thousands of users. Now, what I like to believe is because everyone was eagerly tuning in to this Vince Gilligan show. I would like to believe that. But Rob, any. Any thoughts about that?

[B]

I mean, you can't pay for press. That coincidental? Yeah, to the point that, you know, like, my. I'm starting to wonder, you know, is this choreographed? Is this plant? Is this show that is about the mass manipulation and choreography around the world? Like, it would not surprise me if Apple TV plus all of a sudden had all of its ducks in a row to shut down at just the perfect time. So either congratulations or congratulations, whichever way.

[A]

It went the last time. I remember this happening. I mean, I know it happened with Thrones a couple times, and I remember it happened with the true. True Detective season one finale for the old. The old HBO GO days.

[B]

Well, Thrones was just a rendering issue, right? Like, they just couldn't get the blacks black enough on screen. And so, you know, we all suffered together.

[A]

We really did. We really did. Anyway, I would love for a monoculture shaking, groundbreaking premiere to have crashed Apple tv. I don't know if that's the case, but Pluribus is here. We've. We've talked about a little bit in our anticipation of it. It is from Vince Gilligan, who created Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. It is a hugely expensive show. Surprise Surprise from Apple tv. We're going to talk about sort of some where we see those dollars because it's not in the usual place you see on an Apple TV plus show, which is in the cast. Right. We don't have.

[B]

Well, Jennifer Aniston could show up in episode three. We don't know.

[A]

I can't wait to see her eerie smile like, so racy Horn is the star of the show and that's it. I mean, you know, we get Miriam Shore as her sort of scene partner for half of season one, episode one. And then Carolina Wydra shows up as Zoja, who seems like she's the co lead of the show maybe going forward. But there are no huge movie stars in this, which is something we've kind of come to expect from an Apple TV plus show. So this is. This is the sort of like hand wringing so many people have done at the top of their pluribus, like reviews or articles or whatever is like, are people gonna care about a non IP show that doesn't have a star in it in 2025? And that the. And that sort of like the biggest hook they have is four from the creator of Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul. Not too shabby. What do you think, Rob?

[B]

I think it has about as good of a shot as a show with those parameters has. And like, you were talking about how it would be great if we had this sort of monocultural moment around a show. Again, this feels special. This feels like something that, yeah, there's familiar beats, there's obviously familiar filmmaking, but the subject matter, the pacing, it feels grabby in a way that is really exciting. And once it grabs hold of you, it. It just begs you to want to ask questions, to like, have a deeper understanding of what's happening, to look inward as far, it's a classic, like, what would you do in this situation kind of show that I could see it like really having a moment and getting some momentum. But it is an uphill battle when you don't have that kind of star power. It is an uphill battle when you know, when you are putting the money on screen in impressive ways. It's still not like action set pieces, right? Like, this is not. Not only do you not have Idris Elba, you don't even have the hijack. Like, what is one to do?

[A]

But Air Force One is here, Rob.

[B]

I guess we did h. You know what? You're right.

[A]

That's. That's a great point. Leads me in sort of my first talking point, which is you put up this question about, like, the questions we want to have answered, but this isn't. Isn't a theory show, like, in the way that, like, what is happening? Question mark. What is the nature of this epidemic or whatever you want to call it? Question mark. There are so many answers that come at the end of episode one and in episode two. Whether or not we want to believe what we're being told is a question we can ask. But were you surprised by how many answers we got in just these first few episodes?

[B]

You know what? I'm actually not. And some of that is because it is a Vince Gilligan show where the pacing and, like, his shows do just kind of move like they are plot machines. They like, I guess, better.

[A]

They don't. Because it takes his time with these sequences in a way where I love them. But then I get anxious. Like, are people going to want to watch this lady go from Morocco to Albuquerque, not. Not even knowing why with, like, for 12 minutes with no score behind it? Like, is that. Is that something people are excited about? I think it's really cool, but I have questions about that.

[B]

So it is. It is a completely fair question. But I. I do think in his shows, generally speaking, there's a lot of, like, okay, that happened. So what's next? Like, the big thing is out of the way, like, sometimes very quickly. Yes. Sometimes it's like you wait season upon season until you have an epiphany on the toilet. Like, yeah, that is a thing that can happen in these shows. But ultimately, like, his projects are very interested in, like, the very sometimes grounded and real repercussions of the things that happened. And it's like how you pick up the pieces, how you reckon with everything that's. That's transpiring. And so in order to do all the reckoning, there's got to be a lot of transpiring. And so I. I didn't think this was going to be a show where everything would be teased out until the end. That said, we're just kind of getting the first turn and there could be, I don't know, other viruses or alien species. Like, there's so many possibilities as to where a story like this could go that it's okay to reveal some stuff right out of the gate. And it really only kind of adds to the baiting of the hook in a lot of senses.

[A]

Rob, I don't know if you know this, but they told us we are not aliens. So they did say that, you know, but they're.

[B]

But they're an RNA programmed strand Sent from space.

[A]

Right. Alien Enhanced.

[B]

Is an alien virus an alien?

[A]

This is a great existential question that we should ask ourselves. What makes a human a human? Like, I actually genuinely think that's the question that the show wants to ask straight up. Right.

[B]

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[A]

Okay, so to get back to the sort of Gilligan core idea, what makes a Vince Gilligan show? Because this is what Apple is is bank banking on. Apple is banking on the fact that we will be excited about a Vince Gilligan show from the creators of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. That we will be thirsty for something that feels more Severance esque, you know? Except again, unlike Severance or some other mystery box shows, this is not trying to hide the ball from us in a meaningful way. Unless it is and. And we're being duped. And I think that's interesting. I saw a lot of comps to Severance from people's reactions to the first two episodes. The Last of us, of course, got called out. Especially like when we're watching racy horn drive in a truck through like murder and mayhem in the. In the first episode in order to. To try and fail to save the person who's most important to her. That's very. Season one, episode one of the Last of Us, the Leftovers, definitely. You know, I saw Gilligan Goes Lindelof is like sort of a. A thing I saw. So. So what makes this a Gilligan Vince Gilligan show and what makes this not a Vince Gilligan show, in your view?

[B]

Before we even get to that, Joe, I'm curious. With all those shows kind of in the sauce here, I was getting some Last man on Earth. Did you get any of that? The Will Forte scenes?

[A]

Wow, I have not thought about that in a very, very long time. But yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

I hadn't either. And then all of a sudden it's like, like over the top doofus flies in on Air Force One and it's like, oh, yeah. Like there is just something about the opportunity that a world like this provides that's tapping into all of these different properties. And so it's. It is post Apocalyptic. And it is existential. And it's also like having its fun with some of these ideas too.

[A]

Absolutely. I mean that. So a couple things I want to say about that. First of all, on the official pod, which I rec. I always recommend an official pod around a Vince Gilligan show. They've been doing it like before podcasts were a thing on Breaking Bad. And I've listened to every single one of them and they have like all of the behind the scenes people on it. And like, not that I love to advertise for other podcasts on our podcast. You should listen to us too. But the, the. The Gilligan verse official podcasts are always extremely good. And on the episode about episod, he talked about his inspiration for this, which was years and years ago they're working on Better Call Saul. And he was taking a walk and he was like, what if you were the last person on earth? And suddenly everyone around you was really solicitous to your needs? And he's like. And I started thinking about it. In his original concept, the main character was a, was a male. And he was like, then it got really porny really quickly. Yes, is what he said. So I think that that's what Samba's character is supposed to represent in episode two. And so he's like, okay, well, what if it's a woman? And then he was think about I Dream of Genie and Bewitched and sort of like, what makes those stories work? And it's someone who's resistant to. There's someone here, be it your wife who's a witch or a genie, that is your girlfriend who is like, I will do anything you want. And you're like, I don't want that. That's where there's like, good dramatic tension. So those are some of the bones that are here. And then also before he did Breaking Bad, a Better Call Saul. Of course, Vince Gilligan worked on X Files, and he cited Darren Morgan, who's my favorite X Files writer, as an inspiration here for that comedy that you're talking about. Darren Morgan wrote the episodes Humbug War, the Copper Phages, Jose Chungs From Outer Space, Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose, a couple different, like, bangers, classics, classics that are weird and, and most even by X File standards, very weird and most specifically, very funny. And so that is like a tone that he's reaching for in this. And I think when he said Darren Morgan, I was like, yeah, that's, that's a lot of what we're dealing with here. Which is really exciting to me.

[B]

Yes. Yeah, I think the Vince Gilligan formula does include all of those kind of fundamental things. And you could even see it in supposedly more serious fare. Like the humor can't help but creep out. The weirdness can't help but infiltrate a lot of the characters and beats and things like that. And his shows are also great premise shows, especially Breaking Bad, very famously like the Mr. Chips to Scarface model. And then how do you get there? This is a different inversion of that where it's like we don't know where we're going and so we don't have the reverse engineering of trying to guess ahead of the plot. To your point about how this isn't like the most theory friendly show, but I think it will be theory friendly in the open endedness of it. And that's kind of what feels like a new frontier for Gilligan is like we don't have, you know, characters we're familiar with, like Saul Goodman and kind of know where he ends up more or less. And we don't have the Scarface endpoint kind of plotted out for us in interviews. This could be anything. It could be about anything. It could take us anywhere in the world. Like, the possibilities from a filmmaking perspective I think are kind of dazzling. And that from an audience member, I think opens up a lot too.

[A]

I think that I love that point. And I think something that I. Something that felt so Gilligan to me in watching this was again those slow, patient. He's so interested in procedure and process.

[B]

This appeals to me, Joe, I have to say, just like the OCD in me watching everything slide into place. I want to come back to it, but it's very appealing.

[A]

The Cook montages in Breaking Bad, of course, were sort of like the most famous again, example of this. But he loves a sort of establishing montage. This is something he built up to, you know, you. And I just recently watched the Breaking Bad pilot. It's not really there. But eventually he will get to this point where it's like, you know, you're watching a symphony of a sort of like quotidian, like a car wash or something. You know what I mean? It's just something like, let's take this ordinary thing and show you sort of the way in which the pieces of it are rhythmically, balletically, sort of working around each other and give you some like visual eye candy to go with it. And it's just sort of mesmerizing. These, these and very patient. And I was really excited to see a lot of that Especially in episode two, but also in episode one when we see the, like, the scientists and their sort of candy colored, you know, protective suits, sort of like working with the petri dishes in. In concert with each other and stuff like that. Like, that's so very Gilligan. So completely.

[B]

I. And you know, in conversation with those other pilots we watch, not just Breaking Bad, but I think this also has some in common with the Lost pilot as well, in that very, like, throw these people into the heat of something that they have no means of understanding. And it is first, the initial rush, right, of like, how do we get out of this situation? How do I get my friend who's in peril to the hospital? Like, how do we put out the fires that are engulfing Albuquerque into. Okay, like, you get past the first fire and then it's like, what is, what is life like now? Like, what do we do on the next day? And that's, that's such a great formula for a double pilot and I think a situation that completely merits it. Like this pairing of episodes, I think is such a great way to kind of catapult us into the season.

[A]

I love that you invoked Lost, not just because personally, it thrills me to have you have a working understanding of Lost. Rob. Rob Mahoney, who's watched all of Lost.

[B]

Now, it really was a, you know, a toilet style revelation for me, finishing Lost, Lost, and then replaying in my head all of the conversations and podcasts I have had with you in which you have attempted to compare things to Lost while I stare at you blankly, nodding along, pretending that I understand what you're talking about, or at least, you know, pretending to continue the conversation. And now it's all just clicking into place. I feel like my whole life has been recontextualized. Joe.

[A]

Oh, a real Joanna listens to Rob. Talk about the NBA moment for you anytime. I talked about Lost, but on the Lost front, let's talk, let's. Let's talk about a little bit of terminology. On the official pod, they. They said the. This they are calling the U.S. and the. The 12 people who are not the U.S. and they're calling the U.S. the others, which is a classic Lost terminology. You didn't like that. What do you, what do you want to go with?

[B]

I don't have a better solution. Like, this is the problem at this point is we don't know enough about who they are or what their aims are to give them, like, a really evocative term. And they don't seem too interested in pr Themselves, Hence the joining. You know, it's like they. They're just going to kind of roll with the low hanging fruit with this stuff.

[A]

That's the best they came up with the joining. Maybe the joined is like, you know.

[B]

If that's a little better.

[A]

The others that joined. If you have a suggestion, prestigiouspotify.com or. Rob and I will have a show specific email for you before this episode is over.

[B]

I do have one proposal for you, Joe, regarding the name of this virus. Again, we don't know a lot about it or what its aims are or exactly. I mean, it clearly can affect humans and also ra at the very least, maybe other animals. We'll see over time. Babies communicated very critically by saliva. You know, you can lick a donut. Or as we see over and over, just people making out left and right. I propose to you the smooch virus. How do you feel about the smooch virus?

[A]

I don't hate it. You know, I don't. But like, do you think mono will get upset? Because isn't it like the kissing disease? Is it mono? Like, that's my.

[B]

Mono's gonna be suing Apple immediately. Like, this is critical. This is all mono hats.

[A]

Exactly. All right, so they call. They're calling the us, the others, and then Carol and the rest. And this, this is the others I can roll with. This is the one where I'm having some issues with. But they're calling the 12 the old school.

[B]

No, simply not.

[A]

Ms. Gilligan, we think you're an actual genius. But, but Rob and I don't like this. So. No, the. What do you want to call them? Do you have any thoughts?

[B]

I mean, the leftovers, the immune, like, again, something, something. Okay, this, this is one that I think we very crucially do need to crowdsource. Joe, as you said, please email [e-mail] or our show specific email to be announced at any point during this podcast. Who's to say? But we need help.

[A]

Do you want to do it right now?

[B]

Let's do it. Let's. Let's battle it out.

[A]

Okay. Rob and I have dueling ideas. I really only have one idea. Rob has several. Rob, what do you have?

[B]

So my initial idea was your life is your [e-mail]. that's obviously taken by some Instagram guru. Like, that was never going to be in the cards. I did consider proud, haughty Raban. Yeah, but the spelling on Raban is like, maybe could. Could trick some people. I don't want anyone's emails to get lost out in the Ethereum. I came down to21 psychic gluemail.com which I like, but I much prefer lightningboltunicornmail.com Very good.

[A]

The hood decoration on the truck that Carol would drive that truck. For the record, fantastic stuff. Here's my one and only. And I'll tell you this. I had to workshop it because versions of it were taken. But I settled on. Okay, I wanted to do donutlicormail.com but that is.

[B]

How did I miss donut liquor, disturbingly.

[A]

Take it right there. So I got licking the donutmail.com that's very good. Do you like that?

[B]

I think we have to go at licking the donutmail.com.

[A]

It'S licking the donut. Thank you, Rob, for letting me have this.

[B]

I am slightly terrified to see what emails we receive at licking the donutmail.com, but that's part of the fun.

[A]

That is the risk you take. I want to Hear, however, from donutlickermail.com. who are you? There were several iterations that I had to go through. So, like, this theme of licking donuts has been taken by several Gmail users. I'm curious if they're related to Pluribus or. This is a long established I love to lick donut sort of things.

[B]

Anyway, if you're out there and squatting on it, I will pay $5 for donutlickermail.com I'll throw it another five.

[A]

That's 10 whole dollars.

[B]

That's a match right there. Let's get a GoFundMe going for donutlickermail.Com.

[A]

But in the meantime, licking the donutmail.com is. And not licking donuts. Licking the singular donut gmail.com is diabolical joke. Phrasingly, what we have here for this particular podcast. Okay, to go back to the others versus old school or please send your other suggestions to [e-mail] something they talked about on the official pod that I really was fascinated by. First of all, they hired a choreographer to work with all the background, you know, actors in all of these scenes. And at first they had everyone moving exactly the same and speaking in precise unison. And they decided that the effect was too creepy, that they're not trying to go for, like, that creepy. We do get some, like, Children of the Corn energy from the neighbor kids and stuff like that, but for the most part, they were really trying to calibrate. And Vince Gilligan said things on the pod like, we still don't know what makes the others tick or other things like that, which is classic Gilligan. Like, I haven't figured it out yet. I'll figure it out. But calibrating the level of the smile, that's something they talked about a lot. Like, they were like, how do we convey pleasant and not menacing and. And so not overtly menacing, but still disquieting to us at. At home. Do you know what I mean? Like, that. That sort of thing is something they really, really worked to get exactly right. And especially with Carolina, who plays Zoja. Like, that is something that, you know. And I think she's fantastic. She has an episode two really, really good, but she. She has to really nail it because she's the one who's gonna be here and has to be, like, aggravating to Carol, but also someone that Carol will run and stand in front of Air Force One for by the end of episode two, you know what I mean?

[B]

I can tell that they got that calibration right just based on my physical response to watching these episodes. Well, there are those Children of the Corn moments and the synergy of just the slow walking of all of these extras in the background. And I think one of the joys of the first episode in particular is as everything is going to absolute shit, including when everyone is just kind of seizing, watching everything that is happening in the background. All of the. These singers who are frozen in place and the band members and the waitresses and the people in the hospital waiting room. It's like everyone is so perfectly mid something and in a way that is kind of frozen in time, but obviously not and incredibly eerie. And then once they do start moving in unison, it is unsettling. And yet, like, intellectually, I do go through the paces with these two episodes of being like, you know, what does the virus have a point? Like, we. I wouldn't say we had a good run as a species, but we did have a run. I don't know that we made the best of it at all times. This is where I come down to with this show and why I'm so impressed with where and when it is happening. Everything right now in real life is so fundamentally broken that I am very open to the virus pitch.

[A]

Okay? Your team, Lakshmi, your team, like Carol, stop ruining it for the rest of us.

[B]

I'm just saying I'm here for the presentation. I'm not buying the timeshare yet, but I'm open.

[A]

Okay? So this. This feeds into the next thing I want to ask, which is, what is this show about? You know, and I've seen a lot of people wonder how much this show is about artificial intelligence. The way in which Zoja and the rest of them have access to all this information, can kind of scrape information and sort of feed it back to you in the sort of, like, most pleasant, ingratiating way that they could possibly. How can I help you? How can I be of service to you? I have access to all the information in the world, and how can I do this for. But also, did we get this wrong? Did we, in literally trying to serve your needs, mess this up somehow or what? What are the fundamental ways in which this is not the human experience? Like, I was thinking specifically in episode two, when we get the contrast of when we first see Zosia in Morocco, she's wandering out of, you know, grubby and wandering out of, you know, not the desert, but sort of the countryside to pull a crisp burn body out of a car, and a guy rolls up in a. In a bakery TR. With a burlap sort of body bag. So there's that approach, and then there's Carol finding quilts and lovingly wrapping Helen up in a quilt. That means something to both of them. That is like, sort of the human emotionally connective experience. And so there's this sort of, like, pleasant, solicitous. We're here to remove the bodies. We do want to remove the bodies. The bodies are unpleasant. We want to remove them, but we're not going to lovingly. We're not callously tossing them around, but we're not going to lovingly take care of them the way that a human would so completely, you know. And Vince Gilligan has talked in. In various interviews around the show about. Not about this is a show about AI, but about how he specifically is, like, in a very anti AI headspace right now, as I think, are most original thinkers. So. So how does that AI metaphor work for you? What are you thinking about that?

[B]

You know, I hadn't put it in those terms for myself, but now that you're explaining it, it makes a lot of sense. And I think one of the sort of philosophical things that I was left with after these two episodes is. Is a life without friction really life.

[A]

Right.

[B]

You know, like, if everything. Like, there is an appeal to the. Like, there's an easier way to do this proposal that Zojja comes with of, like, we're just gonna airdrop a crane into your backyard, an excavator to your backyard, and it's good. Like, all that pickaxing you've been doing, you didn't need to do that. It could have been this easy the whole time, but without the friction, without the creative process, without the labor, without the love. You don't get that moment with the quilt. And RHC Horne's so great in these episodes, and her taking the beat to smell the quilt before she uses it to wrap her friend is heartbreaking stuff. And that's heartbreaking stuff from a character who it's kind of hard to be on Carol's side a lot.

[A]

Can I say really quickly? Her wife, I believe, just, you know.

[B]

Oh, is it her wife?

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

Oh, See, I wasn't sure if it was like a. More of a business relationship.

[A]

No, there's like a wedding photo of them next to the phone at one point.

[B]

So I'm negligent in my duties as a freeze framer. Joe, thank you for correcting me. Yeah, but, yeah, like, you don't get any of that if you are just optimizing. And so, like, this fundamental tension between what is human and what is efficient, I think is kind of part of where the show starts butting heads. But I love that AI comparison. I just had never really contextualized it in that way.

[A]

I really agree with you in that if it's too easy, if you're not sweating and getting grubby and to dig the grave, are you really engaged in this human moment of mourning at the same time? And this is what I like. There are no easy answers. The fact that Zoja's like, you don't have to do this by yourself when Carol is such a stubbornly independent person. You know what I mean? Like, or. Or. Or maybe that's unfair to Carol because she is trying to form community with the other English speaking of the remains. You know what I mean? Not well, but, you know, so. But. But this idea of like, I don't need anyone or anything. I can do this myself.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Versus accepting help when you need help. Like, I think there is a lesson for Carol to learn there as well.

[B]

Oh, many.

[A]

But. Oh, yeah. But. But can you do that while holding on to what makes a human a human sort of thing?

[B]

So see, this is why for me, in terms of like, the. What is the show about? My brain went to. This is pointed right at like the. These divided times sort of rhetoric and cliche. It's like, what if we weren't divided at all? Like, what if we were completely unified in functioning as a collective species? Like, what does that mean? What does that look like? Like, what is the polar opposite of division and is There anything even remotely human in that kind of universal agreement.

[A]

I love that. I think that. So that tribalism idea, the us versus them, right? We get that very clearly here. But except for, you know, the other old school people that, that Carol meets with are like, well, we have family members who are part of the others. So for us it's different. You're all alone. You had one person. She's dead. You're a slightly unpleasant person. Carol is a slightly unpleasant person. That's not great by design, you know. And so you had the one. You're one person. Your one person is gone. Because. Because there were adoring masses who wanted to have connections with. With Carol and she sort of held them at bay, right? Because she's just sort of like rolling her eyes at them. So there was like people wanting to be in community with Carol already. Her. Her readers. But she had her one person. Her one person's gone. And so she's like, oh, it's an us versus them. And then the other people are like, it's. It's the us is them that. This is our. These are our family members. How sad for you that you don't have any family members here to show up with you. Like, that's, that's tough. And that, that goes back to the Leftovers comp. When you have a character like Carrie Coons character Nora, whose entire family disappeared in the event that. That instigates the Leftovers versus other people. Lost some people, but not everyone. And so I think that's a. That's a really interesting thing.

[B]

It puts you in a totally different kind of purgatory. Right? Like if you are that isolated within a world that is already so isolated. But I like, I love to kind of like thread these, these ideas together. Joe, like you bring up earlier, you know, the, the sort of like gender swapping in the script of this initial or the ide initially being a male character. And yes, we've made Carol a woman, but she also exercises a kind of I dream of Jeannie wish fulfillment professionally. Anchoring this in a romantasy author who is catering to the whims of these women who she has a lot of contempt for. Is just such an interesting place to start this story and then have that character have to interrogate what it means to have her own wishes fulfilled. And if she even wants any of that and if she wants to be a part of. Of any of this with any of these quote unquote people.

[A]

I love that. I. It's interesting. I was talking to someone who had watched the episodes before they came out, and he was asking me, like, do you think the romantasy contingent will be offended by the way in which they are sort of portrayed in this episode? And I was like, I don't know. I think Carol. Carol is very clearly, like, I think Helen is the voice of reason. You're bringing pleasure and happiness to these people.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

That's not a bad thing to do.

[B]

That line has to come back. Right? Like the, like, if you can make one person happy concept that it feels like it's spiritually going to be a part of this show.

[A]

Absolutely. So I just think that, like, I don't. I think Carol is sort of being positioned as being in the wrong there, though. The comedy of the book signing was very funny. Genuinely great. The guy with his, like, rapier. Well, actually, like the schooners and all that sort of stuff was really, really fun.

[B]

But that's how you get to have it both ways. Like, you get the comedy and then you get back to the car and it's like, oh, this woman is terrible in her treatment of, like, she's putting on this facade, but, like, this is what she really thinks of them. And then you have incredible empathy for even the guy with the rapier.

[A]

Yeah. To go back to your. In these divided times point, I think that's really interesting. And I think that, like, yeah, what is the danger? It goes back to this idea of tribalism, which came up a lot in the Last of Us. Us? Who. Who is the us inside of this? And the fact that, like, when Helen collapses, Carol's entire purpose from then on out is just sort of like, how do I help Helen? Right. She's not. How do I help anyone in this bar? How do I. She's just sort of like, I need to get this one person help. And that is not only.

[B]

Joe. Is she, like, how do I help people in this bar? She's bowling over people in the bar. She's running over people in the waiting room with the stretcher. It's like these people basically don't exist.

[A]

She does say, sorry, but, yeah, it's. I guess. But, yeah, that sort of like, where do you circle the wagons? And also, like, can you be an us of one? Like, you can't. Like, the way that episode two ends with her running after Zojja, someone who she resents and all these other. And yes, they have handpicked the person who's most likely to appeal to her.

[B]

So gross.

[A]

Physically so gross. Like, all of. But also just this idea of, like, she needs Someone to talk to. Not just for us viewers at home, but, you know, just in general. Like you, she can't navigate this alone, so she might as well have this person with her. And it doesn't hurt that that person looks like her physical ideal of a person, but, you know, here we are.

[B]

Or at least her physical idea of a space pirate.

[A]

There you go. Also, shots fired at Brandon Sanderson, I gotta say, because a ship that runs on colored sand is the premise of Trust of the Emerald Sea. And I was like, oh. I was like, is that a brand? Sando direct hit.

[B]

Did you sense a parallel? I was very curious if this was, like a thing that people would have the call out for. That I don't understand. When we do the book swap at the airport, Diana Gabaldon. Yes. The Diana Gabaldon text. Like, is that a reference I should know or could know as Outlander?

[A]

So, I mean, you know, Outlander, right? Time. Time traveling, romance.

[B]

I just did. I didn't even realize what the subtext of that might be.

[A]

I mean, well, what I will say is that Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series is like. Like, not the first Romantasy, but like, also, she insists it's shelved in fiction. Not. Diana Gabaldon's a very interesting person. But anyway, that's like, gosh, what's the comp. What's the comp in, like, the sci fi section? Like, moving Michael Crichton out of the way for your book.

[B]

Sure thing.

[A]

Like that.

[B]

Gotcha.

[A]

So, yeah, that's a very dusty reference, Michael Crane, but there we are. Okay, so back to the COVID idea, which was something that our. Our pal Miles Sorry wrote in his review on theringer.com. what a great website. Isolated, locked in your house, nobody's around. Does any of that strike you as specifically Covid or specifically interesting to you?

[B]

A little bit. I think the part that struck me as Covid is the same part that, you know, you know, I wanted to talk about, like, where does the money show up in this show? And for me, it is the empty space. It is like we cleared this area the fuck out. And we, like, not just are descending on a set to shoot there, but it has that 28 days later kind of feel of where are the people? And then they're all in their houses coming out in unison in a way that is terrifying. Again, another thing that's kind of in the ether and in the air with this show is you get a lot of Stepford Wives. And some of that is because it is Suburban. And some of it is the killing with kindness and compliance, very suburban kind of conformity that is happening with this group. But ultimately, for me, like, that's where it felt most. Covid Coded was just like looking out on a street that you're used to seeing full of life and people, and there's just nothing there because it's been meticulously scrubbed clean by all of these people who are picking up the bodies and moving the cars and putting out the fires like they're all perfectly good little worker bees. But the result of that is something that doesn't much resemble normal human life anymore.

[A]

Where do you think they sleep? And do you think they sleep?

[B]

No, they don't.

[A]

They don't sleep. They just keep working.

[B]

They like Donal Gleason style or just, like, eyes open in a closet somewhere.

[A]

You know, this is something that we're gonna check in with every week. I decided and Rob agreed, which is that this show has a $15 million budget per episode, which is not as big as, like, Thrones or something like that, but.

[B]

No, but it's a lot.

[A]

It's massive.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And so the question we want to ask ourselves every weekend, and I think we could do both episodes here. Pick your moment. Like, what is the moment where you looked at this and you said, is it the empty streets? This. This costs $15 million. That's.

[B]

Maybe it was. Maybe it was tricker. I'm sure this is, like a trick of cinematography, too. But even seeing, like, the planes simultaneously pull up to five consecutive gates, Like, I'm sure that is a trick or an effect of some kind. But I'm like, here's what I don't know. This feels expensive to me.

[A]

Planes was initially my answer. And then I have another answer. But listening to them talk about the podcast, here's what. The C130, which is the plane that Zoja flies from, from Tangier to Albuquerque.

[B]

The big old cargo plane, was a.

[A]

Plane that they flew in from Malaysia. So that's a real plane that they got. She, Carolina, who plays Zoja, learned how to taxi the plane. Not fly, but taxi it. So that is actually her in the plane on the, like, tarmac of Albuquerque airport, like, taxiing the plane. So that's one thing. I don't remember if they talked about the other planes all sort of landing together. But as for Air Force One, they built that. So they built not a whole plane. I think when she's standing in front of the nose, that's digital effect.

[B]

That looks like an effect for sure.

[A]

But in terms of. And this is. This is what we're talking about in terms of like, seeing the money on the screen. Vince Gilligan wanted. They're all on the ground. They see it sort of roll into frame. He wanted that. The production designer was talking about how usually when you do something like this, you just have to build the door and we can go from there. Vince Gilligan wanted the whole thing. So they built this enormous metal. It's a. It's like a facade. It's like a metal facade front that has set built into it so they can walk up the stairs onto set, but like a metal facade. So it's like they're talking about the Albuquerque winds because it's just like sheet metal, like flat sheet metal. Because just one side of the plane, like, rolling into view and stuff like that. So. But that's astounding. But here's.

[B]

Looks amazing.

[A]

Here's what's even more astounding, Rob. This is where I think I would put the. I can tell this cost $50 million. They built that entire cul de sac from scratch.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

They built houses. I mean, I'm not saying those houses are full or furnished, but they built houses. They poured concrete. They bought some land, and they built houses on that land so that they could film there and do whatever they wanted there. I mean, I think Vince Gilligan is still scarred from, like, the Breaking Bad house becoming this, like, national monument that.

[B]

People, like, throw pizzas on the.

[A]

You know, so he's like, we wanted to do whatever we wanted to do on the street there. So we just built this entire cul de sac. That's. If you. If you go rewatch those episodes and look at those houses, which are like, they're not tract housing. They're like intricate, interesting houses that they built from scratch on this street. Astonishing stuff.

[B]

That's like some Deadwood level production happening.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. Really good stuff. Anything else you want to talk about in a big picture way? Before we maybe go through some of.

[B]

The episode stuff, maybe let's iron out just, like the nuts and bolts of what exactly happened in terms of the invasion itself. I want to make sure we're all on the same page. Namely me, and in particular, the one jump. Right. Because we get the information that, like, this message has been transmitted through the cosmos. They're trying to figure out what it is. It's clearly like this formula for an RNA strand that is then tested on the rat, among other animals, which I guess, like, fakes its own death, goes rat playing possum to get out of the cage to then bite a person.

[A]

Is that what it does? I thought it was sort of like. It's the sort of like everyone's frozen version of, like, the rat version of everyone's frozen.

[B]

You think it was having a little. A little mini rat seizure?

[A]

Yeah, maybe.

[B]

It's adorable and very sad. See, I thought it was doing it on purpose to get. The only way it could spread would be to get out.

[A]

Interesting.

[B]

And if it is that cunning, you know, that I have questions about, you know, the nature of this virus and what it is trying to do. But clearly it needs to spread. It needs to, you know, bite the nearest hand and then make out with somebody and then lick a donut.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then clearly the plan is accelerated by. We learn or are told, like, quote, unquote, the military has found out about the spread of some issue or this virus. One of my favorite bits of choreography are like the 8 simultaneous jet stream jets flying overhead, which I. Is this the mechanism that is. That is leading everyone else who has not been licked or kissed all the people, you know, Helen, all the people in the restaurant. Like, is that what is ultimately triggering them to join the others?

[A]

I don't know, but I had that question too. Like, is that. Is that actually just indicative of people are flying the plane in. In concert? Like, you don't see chemtrails like that because you don't usually have planes flying in formation like that outside of when the Blue Angels come to San Francisco. But, like, so is it that? Or is there something. I mean, chemtrails is just sort of feeding right into the Qanon folks. So perhaps. But I think it's hits. I don't know, because. Yeah, because it hits everyone at once. Like, everyone in that bar. But my thought about the bar was sort of like, was it in everyone's drink or something like that? But it hits them all simultaneously. So is it sort of sort of drop somehow from the chemtrails? And if so, like, how. What's the smooch version of that? Like, you know, is it like droplets? Like, what do you. How do you. How do you do that?

[B]

Gotta be droplet. The droplets per mooch are obviously off the charts, but the droplets by airdrop from chemtrail, much more complicated.

[A]

Okay. Licking the donut. Gmail.com. if you are working infectious diseases and you know how this might work. But yeah, I. I really love the opening. We get this sort of like contact esque sequence right? With first we've got the astronomers. And I love the comedy of like, it's two guys and then it's like a group of people and then it's like, you know, the guys.

[B]

All the cars and trucks piling up as people come to check it out.

[A]

Alan McLeod, who plays like the first guy, who is a real. That guy for me, from you're the worst. And then in the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, which is emrid, I think is how you pronounce that acronym.

[B]

I buy it.

[A]

Don't know. Karen Sony, who plays like the second. The guy who. The other guy in the lab who like, then sort of waltzes down the stairs to smooch the janitor. Another like, actor I always love to see. And I just really loved his, like, whimsical approach to assaulting and assimilating the janitor here.

[B]

Well, see, that one is assaulted. But then, look, we already know that just like as a species, we are vulnerable to, I mean, a species level alien invasion and under the skin type of alien invasion. My main question was the speed at which we go from assaulting one janitor to now an entire squadron of military police have been smooched and brought into. To, you know, to swab and box. Like, I think our smooch defenses just leave a lot to be desired.

[A]

I think that's true. Or do you think they were offered donuts? That's, you know, that's a question.

[B]

You just walk around the door. I mean, who among us simply. I. I would be incredibly susceptible.

[A]

Be careful. Look at your. Look for glistening saliva on your donuts from now on. It's not always glaze. Sometimes it's infectious diseases. Okay, Any part of. Part of what we should talk about here in terms of like this. This moving through various scientific disciplines into the outbreak is we have this clock that I'm actually a little confused by because it's counting down. It feels like it counts down.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And then it counts back up.

[B]

Right.

[A]

So which is fine. Right? We go to like zero hour when everyone except for the 12 are infected.

[B]

The takeover moment.

[A]

Right. And then. And then the after. I'm just a little surprised there isn't like a BCE like, you know, like before or after or like it's a different color or like something like that. I was just like, I guess now we're going back up. But I think the thing that confused.

[B]

Me about that was that as Zoja tells it, like, this wasn't the exact plan. So it's not like, you know, the hive mind itself had the countdown clock of like, we are all working to this Time to take over. It's like, oh, no. We had to jump our process by eight different steps, which. That is kind of confusing from a Countdown perspective.

[A]

We've already talked about the book signing scene. I don't think there's anything else. Anything you want to say about this Sort of like, so shout out Bitter Chrysalis, by the way, as like a name of a. Of an unpublished novel. Great story.

[B]

You're very serious novel that you're terrified to actually publish when.

[A]

When Helen says, talking about Finnegan's Wake. I tried it in grad school. It's probably great. Very good stuff.

[B]

This is how I feel about most fiction jokes. It's probably great. I'm sure it's good for you, Rob.

[A]

Don't remind me of your one flaw. Okay, so we go through all of that and then the outbreak. So anything you want to say about this outbreak sequence?

[B]

I mean, I think it's incredibly thrilling television. The moment in which Carol gets clear of the initial bar and is trying to get to the hospital. And you have the overlook moment of seeing Albuquerque in flames. Like a legit goosebump situation for me, of just like that kind of zoom out, I think plays perfectly there. Of like, we know instinctively that it's obviously not just this bar. Like there's going to be wider implications. But seeing just how fast everything has gone to shit and how isolated Carol already clearly is, you know, you have that. You have all of these slow moving extras in the background. You have the jet streams, even just like the very particular way that the cop car has flipped over in the middle of the road, like almost on its side, pinning someone underneath. Like, there's just something so evocative about so many of the visuals in these first two episodes, specifically in this takeover before the cleanup really comes in full force.

[A]

I also think it's really interesting. We get a couple moments here in the escape that sort of flipped. I think it's an ambulance. It might be a cop car. But anyways, it's something like where when she first hears the siren, sees the light, she goes, oh, thank God.

[B]

Sort of like, I think that's the.

[A]

Cop car rescue is here. And then it's like, oh, no, that's not gonna help me. Oh, no, this doc. Dr. Nguyen's not gonna help me. In fact, he's gonna try to smooch me.

[B]

I mean, this. This ain't a pit, Joe.

[A]

And a reference I now get. And then, and then, and then, yeah, like, God bless America. When she turns on the TV and she thinks someone Authoritative is there to help her. So like all these moments of like someone will come. Someone, someone official. The. The system is here to come help me and save me. And the. The escalating realization that none of those infrastructures are in place anymore. In fact they all belong to the other side. So what do you have now? Only their do no harm sort of.

[B]

They're very insistent.

[A]

Yeah, exactly.

[B]

So you know what if, if you have to tell people what we're doing, we promise is the antithesis of slavery. Like I don't know if you have to make that pitch, it's not great.

[A]

It's really tough.

[B]

I do want to give a special shout out, Joe to whichever pod person over at C Span is updating the Chirons from the broadcast. The your life is your own. We are one cycle. I just laughed every time it changed.

[A]

We are not aliens was just like creme de la creme. Really, really good. And the actor playing that tremendous really good stuff. So I want to note something else in. In her escape after the hospital. We are. The camera's on her and we're seeing her react to things. But we don't get to see what she's reacting to until it's in her rear view. We see it at the back, which I thought was really cool and unusual. And this is where sort of a, A, a topic I thought we might do every week is like tiny detail you loved or something like that. I'm going to go with the person being helped into a car who's missing part of their leg. And then someone running up with the leg helpfully afterwards to get in the car. She is missing part of her leg. And he's like, here's the leg I have. It is like pretty top tier visual gag in the background.

[B]

The background stuff in this show is so good. And yeah, that's another area in which a lot of tv, even high budget tv, tv, there's just like there is nothing happening in the background of screens. It's so static. Like this feels like a world that is constantly shifting in again like a very alien sort of way that is alarming and is unusually helpful and compliant in a way that I think puts a twist on that whole formula. Like we have seen these movies, we have seen these stories. I don't know that I've seen one that's quite this helpful before that is like so insistent on like please let us service your every need as you alluded to with the premise. Like it, it gives this basic idea a totally different kind of life.

[A]

I love that Anything else you want to say about this sort of like escape to the house or. And maybe anything else in episode one? Well, here's something I want to say. A little detail we get in the pre pan. Is the breathalyzer on?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Carol's Range Rover. That is not a default thing you can get on a Range Rover. That is ignition interlock devices required after a DUI conviction usually. So just a detail we get about Carol, we see. This is something I also want to start tracking, which is alcohol consumption. Because, like, who among us would not wake up on the floor with a drink, a dripping whiskey bottle too, or guzzle a lot of Chablis or whatever it is that she is enjoying? That's another place where the budget is evident. They, like, actually went to Basque country for that sequence where they're outside.

[B]

I mean, why not? Frankly, they'.

[A]

We saw Succession do it. We're just gonna Globetrot if we want to. So enjoy your vacation, Vince Gilligan. You've earned it. But Carol had a drinking problem before this. And so that's just something to know about her character, which is interesting.

[B]

I mean, she has this drinking problem. Even separate from it, she's incredibly self absorbed. Like, you know, it's called out in this episode in a way that, honestly, I'm a little on her side about. About. Like, maybe you don't ask the drug dealer about the heroin pitch. That part makes sense. But she is not someone who has a lot of questions or interest in other people other than Helen. You know, as you mentioned, Jo, like, her us has been ripped from us, or ripped from us, ripped from her. And all that she's left with is everything that's bouncing around in her head. This kind of contempt she has for the rest of the world. And yet she's the one trying to save the world. It's such a great juxtaposition for that character.

[A]

I love that. I think that. I think that's another thing that I'm really interested in in terms of, like, who Carol is. Something that they said on the official pod is she's the kind of person where even if she's enjoying something, she has to make it negative. Right. This is something that Helen calls her out for where it's like, oh, poor you. How horrible. Be surrounded by adoring people who give you a lot of money. You know, she's like, book tours are hell. And she's like, oh, poor you.

[B]

So, like, you get to go on a book tour in 2025, ma'. Am. That's pretty good.

[A]

So I think that, like, this. This natural tendency she has to yuck her own yum. Like, that pre exists this idea of this psychology of like. And you know, Vince Gilligan has talked about this in interviews where he's like. He is famously like one of the most genial people that has, you know, if you've ever heard him talk, if you've ever talked to him or whatever it is, he's just got this very aw shucks accent. You know, he is constantly giving credit away to other people. Like, he's just like a very, very genial guy. And in interviews he's like, actually, I'm quite dark when I'm on my own. So, like, this. This something that he said about this show is that he wanted. He was tired of writing bad guys. And in these divided times, Rob, he wanted to write a good guy. So he sees Carol as a good guy. And I think we all do. Maybe Lakshmi Lakshmi certainly doesn't, but. But also a good guy that, like, reflects his inner darkness, I guess. I don't know. That's interesting.

[B]

Well, I mean, like a true author, he's reflected by all of these aspects. Like, the Geno part of him is Zosia, right? Like, there is a part of all of us that is like, wanting to be helpful and compliant, and some of us service that part and some of us quiet that part. It just, like, depends on what you want to channel into. But that, to me, is kind of the fundamental tension of the show. I mean, we talked about this overarching, like, just a way of thinking that has now descended upon the earth and is surrounding Carol and these other, like, survivors, basically. And it's like that part of thinking is not human, but is also maybe in the best interest of humans. And one thing I also kept coming back to with this show is like, the pitch from these, like, infected people is not, like, drastically different from the pitch that we ultimately get to in a movie like Arrival, for example, which is like, we want to fundamentally alter something about the human experience in a way that in this moment, you need to survive. And maybe that is true for us, maybe it's not true for us, but we're just kind of pushed and pulled through them. And Carol, God knows, is pushed and pulled through them.

[A]

What do you make of the increasing lore info that we get in episode two that Carol's negative outbursts have these global death toll ramifications?

[B]

I mean, real, like, you're not allowed to be angry at me. Like, again, just like a very insidious form of control. That I think is echoed in, you know, creating like bringing this woman who, as you said, is like the closest approximation of the love interest she almost created for her own novel. There's all of these aspects in which even if the intentions of this virus are pure, which. Who's to say the way in which it's going about it, it's incredibly manipulative and incredibly manipulative in a way that. That it just activates that very allergic reaction in you as a human where you feel like your free will is being slowly stripped away. I'm not allowed to yell. And yet another moment where I thought Rhaeus Hjorn was just incredible is her first explosive outburst. Carol's at Zosya in which she yells. And then she as a character has that moment of like, I don't know how these people will respond to this. Like she is waiting for like the pushback and then it's just a full on collapse.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

In a way that again, like, it's hard to watch these first two episodes and not feel like these characters even as they're being told, we will give you anything you want. We will take you anywhere you want. We will provide for your every need. But you just feel the box being closed around them.

[A]

Well, and there's the seduction of that frictionless life. Life. You can have anything you want, but now you kind of belong to us. Or you're distract, you know, talking about. It's gonna take us some time to figure out how to fix you. So there's. There's a clock on that, right? Where, Where Carol.

[B]

That's something someone wants to hear, right?

[A]

You know. Right. And you know, these other people are distracted by. We could go in. We can go to the Guggenheim. We can go, you know, we can go to Vegas. We can plow as many supermodels as we want. Like, you know, all this are like.

[B]

Distracted shout out to the harem.

[A]

You know, distracted by these, These pleasures that are provided to them by these. This benevolent quote unquote force. And Carol's the only one. Carol. And it seems like perhaps one other on the other side of the. The phone call, like is. Is committed to rejecting this, which I think is interesting. But the, the person that she calls, the one other English language speaker that she calls, he seems like he's like one more degree removed because he's not even like wanting to find common cause with the other survived. Unless he like, doesn't believe. Thinks he's being lied to. I don't know. That's interesting too. That's an interesting little seed to plant.

[B]

You know, how could you not, in light of everything else that is happening, not think you are being lied to in some way, even if it's just by little bits of omission, right? Like, they don't want to tell Carol that. That she killed. I say she killed. They killed millions of people through the specifics and logistics of their takeover and her not being allowed to raise her voice a single time.

[A]

I love that. I wanted to ask you about that because Zoja, all of them, but like, Zoja's are the most time we spend with someone who's like this. There is this almost. Is there any sort of individualism left in the US? Is there something in Zoja that's different from the chick from TGI Fridays who's flying the plane? You know what I mean?

[B]

Like, there is very good at all her jobs.

[A]

There is. There is the we. There is the. We all have access to the same expertise. We're all the best at everything that we do. We all have the muscle memory of what it means to perform open heart surgery or whatever it is. But is Zoja, I think this is a question that the show wants. Is Zoja capable of like, like forming an attachment to Carol, like, you know, like some of her reactions? There is the we care that you're okay, Carol sort of like blanket mantra. But is there room for a character like Zoja to have, like, an individual affinity for Carol? You know what I mean? That's something I'm interested to watch.

[B]

I mean, can you have any choice at all if you are only working in service of humanity as a whole? Like, I think the answer to that fundamentally, like, on a. On a black and white level, is no. And it's why someone like Carol would push so strongly. And not only is it good that Carol has all of the flaws that she has as a human being, but also very fitting that she's an American who's pushing back against this idea. It's like we are the most resistant to any kind of communal responsibility. And so the fact that she would give up everything that makes her her just would never happen in a million years for a character like that. I think as far as what we've present been presented so far, the answer would suggest no. But because this is a TV show, I think maybe we'll see a little daylight there. And certainly, you know, I think if you are somebody like Kumba, for example, he sees something in Zojja. He sees many things in Zojja. And that he would like to be in Zojja, but I don't know that he's entirely right about it.

[A]

I love that. Anything else you want to mention specifically in episode two that happens, that it felt particularly striking to you?

[B]

I do have something, Joe.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And we've actually already gotten an email, so I'm going to raid the inbox for an email we got from Sarah flagging Chekhov's Nuclear Football.

[A]

Oh, yes.

[B]

Pops up on Air Force One.

[A]

Very good.

[B]

You know, anything that could change the fate of the world, you want to have that kind of heft to it. So I'm glad it has its moment. I'm glad we're introduced to it. But as we're talking about big global solutions, I kind of am with Sarah that I think this might come back into play.

[A]

Are you really excited that. That Kumba is the one who has control of it?

[B]

I mean, he, at minimum, seems to know the plot of Air Force One in and out, you know, so he's. He's up on, I would say, current events, but at least on pop culture, some films.

[A]

All right. Anything else you want to mention? We have a couple other sort of, like, categories you want to get to.

[B]

I mean, just one really important thing. Joe. On hands and knees, he scrubbed, his sinewy forearms stretched taut as he washed away all trace of the day's fight. With a languid nod, Lucasia bade him to follow her to her cabin. Little did this callow deckhand know that serving at his captain's pleasure might take on this sweet meaning. That's it. That's all I got for you.

[A]

That's one for the listeners. Thank you, Rob. All right, let's talk about most sort of Gilligan version.

[B]

So.

[A]

So Vince Gilligan directed the first two episodes. He's not directing every episode this season. So I don't. I wanted to call it like the Gilligan shot, but famously, if you were not watching Breaking Bad or better cross all, I'll let you know that, like, the cameras inside of those shows increasingly found unusual ways to shoot things up through the bottom of a glass table. You know, famously, et cetera, et cetera. So what is the most sort of like, Gilligan versus shot in these first two episodes?

[B]

I'm torn between two, so I'm trying to steal an extra one in here. The shot of Carol returning to the bar, seeing the. The glasses of beer on the waitress's tray shaking. That perspective shot, I think, is, like, absolutely gorgeous stuff. It's so great in that moment, as we're all trying to get Our bearings.

[A]

Together with the audio of the singer just breathing into the microphone. Very good.

[B]

Grunting into the microphone. Everyone kind of struggling to stay upright, but it's also hard not to pick the camera attached to the crane as Carol drags a dude across the side of a building while trying to save him. Wonderful.

[A]

Very good. Very good.

[B]

Really wonderful.

[A]

I love all that. I do. I do think in terms of, like, pandemic outbreak stuff, I think the first infected the fact that she's, like, in soft focus behind her fellow scientists, and she's at the sort of sink that's full of water. So you hear, like, that. You see her shaking, you hear the splashing. That's very good. But that's not the one that is more. Gilgamestomy is episode 2 open, not opens on after some of the Zoja stuff, we get tight in on the whiskey dripping slowly out of the neck of the whiskey bottle as we pan out. And then we see Carol's on the floor and Helen's also on the floor. But like that. That just like, we're in so close and tight on the neck of the bottle. And then we. We build out from there. It was just like, very. He loves an extreme close up of an object.

[B]

He does.

[A]

He really does.

[B]

But. But this show lends itself to it so well. You know, obviously, like, someone would create the show that serves their sensibilities. But in terms of Vince Gilligan's directorial style and visual flair, the combination of the very precise choreography that's happening with all of these people working wordlessly in unison. The Zoja handoff that opens episode two, you talked about it. Of truck to motorbike, to plane to landing, to getting in the shower as someone prepares your mate. It's like all of that choreography, I think, is so in his bag. And at the same time, the fact that this is a world where at any moment, something could be left teetering on an edge because somebody went into a seizure. It's like that object, whatever got left, whatever fell over, it's just begging for these kinds of shots.

[A]

I really agree with that. I also. In that the shower waiting for Zoja moment, I found, you know, there's the opening of the makeup palette, which is just like a beautiful. I've never seen something like that. But this, like, eyeshadow flower thing, that's, like, incredible. But someone is like, curling extens. The extensions were so insidious to me of, like, the attention to detail of, like, we need her hair to be longer in order to maximize appeal is just like.

[B]

Well, she's got to be ready for a romantasy cover. You know, like, if it can't flow in the wind, is it even worth it?

[A]

Hot pirate lady. Gotta love it. Okay, the. The other. I will mention the shot that. That Vince Gillian himself mentioned, which is the introduction of. Of Ray Seehorn, where we get. He calls it a slider. I confess, I don't know exactly what that is and how it is different from a tracking shot, but you slide across the crowd and you get the back of her head. And he called it, wanting to give her a movie star entrance. And Ray Seehorn on the podcast was like, but you don't see my face. And he's like, yeah, that's how we meet Indiana Jones. He's like, that's a really cool thing to do. He's like, you just don't. Like, we wait to show them the face. And he's like, but you know that this is the person in. And then Ray Seahorn was talking about how what she loves about that shot is if you did not watch Better Call Saul. Racy horn. Incredible on that show. Her character, Kim Wexler was, like, very famous for this ponytail, the Kim Wexler ponytail. And so the fact that you, like, open on the back of her head, and it's like, this ain't your Kim Wexler. The ponytail is gone. It's someone else here.

[B]

The ponytail days are well and truly over, Joe.

[A]

All right.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Another category we're gonna do is Most Grade. I'm. I'm changing the Most Grading Smile. That's what I've decided to call it specifically because I originally called it Most Punchable Smile, but my nomination is one of the kids. And so I just feel a little, like, weird about saying punchable. So I would say small male child helping with the. The. The key is he was so helpful, though. My most grading smile. Do you have a. A nomination, Rob?

[B]

See, I thought this was going to be unanimous. I thought there was not going to be any conflict at all. I think it has to be Davis Taffler, the Undersecretary of Agricultural Farm Production and Conservation. Like that. That smile is plastered on in a way that demands to be.

[A]

I love him. I think that's. I think they said that's a soap opera actor. And, like, it's perfect. It's like, perfect. I love that. And then last but not least, and this is something that I. This category kind of reminds me of when we were asking people during severance, like, what would you sever? I think this is a Good prompt for our listeners. So please recall licking the donut. Gmail.com is where you can reach us. Us, Rob. What would you do or where would you go if the hive mind was at your beck and call?

[B]

Thank you for asking me this, Joe. You're welcome. It really sent me down a rabbit hole because I would say the premise of this show invites what to me I personally call based on personal experience. The Time Crisis Problem. Are you familiar with the arcade video game Time Crisis? No. It's a classic. Like, you have a little plastic gun, you point at the screen, you shoot the guy. It's kind of. I once went to a video arcade where it was like they had unlocked all the games, all the games are free. And you would never believe how fast the life is drained out of that game when there are no stakes or consequences for dying. It's like you could sit and play this game for a solid 30 minutes pumping quarters into it, but as soon as you don't have to pump the quarters in, is any of it fun anymore? And I think there is part of that. In a world like this where it's like, if there's no cost, does it mean anything? If there's no scarcity, does it feel special at all? And I think most importantly, if you.

[A]

Are alone, can't share it with someone.

[B]

Does it register with you at all in any meaningful way?

[A]

Yeah. Do you have an answer?

[B]

I do have an answer. Sorry, that was a lot of preamble.

[A]

I wasn't. I like the preamble a lot. And I think especially your point of if you don't have someone to share it with, like, does it hit. Yeah.

[B]

So because I don't have those things, my brain went to two places. One, should I try to go somewhere that I wouldn't ordinarily be able to go everywhere? Kind of felt like a version of the same thing. Like, yeah, I could go to a nicer beach than the beaches I've been to, but they would be disconcertingly empty and I would be a little distraught at that. So I came back to, you know, very tangible delights. I would have a series of, you know, the Infected's finest chefs with all of the culinary knowledge on the planet prepare for me a series of meals that would draw not only from the best things I've ever eaten, as they try to do for Carolina, but also the best things I've never tasted. And I think this is. This is kind of one of the problems with living in this world is like, to the AI of it all they are trying to algorithmically engineer the woman of your dreams and the meal that you wanted. But it's like, I also need to invite a little bit of, like, ingenuity in this. Like, how do we shake up the formula to the point that I can be surprised by what they are doing?

[A]

Well, here's my question. So you're like, you know, gather the world class, class chefs, but if everyone has the same information.

[B]

That's what I'm saying.

[A]

Anyone can do it, right?

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

You're assigned. Zoja could cook this meal for you. Okay.

[B]

Zoja has a mastery of every cuisine across the world. Like, you don't have to go very far.

[A]

Okay. I knew your answer would be some sort of elaborate meal.

[B]

And I think I am who I am.

[A]

I feel like, in terms of. I think you're right about, like, I don't. I don't necessarily want to go to an empty beach, but, like, maybe I want to go to the top of Everest.

[B]

Okay?

[A]

Like, maybe that's where I want to go and just sort of like, look on my works. You mighty and despair myself at the top of it and then call it a day. I don't know, just somewhere. Somewhere I could never get myself.

[B]

But, Joe, you could go there right now if you wanted.

[A]

How can I go to the top of Everest?

[B]

You can climb.

[A]

I. I don't know that I can, but thank you so much in me, you know?

[B]

Can they, like, helidrop you to the top of Everest? Is that a thing that can happen?

[A]

No, I think you. I don't think you can. Maybe if you're like Elon Musk, you can, but I think you have to at least start at some sort of base camp and, like, hike your ass up there.

[B]

Well, so how are you getting there in this world?

[A]

Well, in this world, I do get helidrop.

[B]

You two have helidrop privileges.

[A]

Do I am the Elon Musk? Chilling thought. Or maybe, yeah, let's. Let's musk it up and go to space, you know, why not?

[B]

See, no interest in space. Keep me out of there, please. Oh, absolutely not.

[A]

Okay. I want a view. I want a view that I would not otherwise be able to obtain.

[B]

I do, like, in this show, though, that we've already tied up the loose ends. Like, we've already rooted out some of the theories of, like, at least Oja, you know, if we want to take her at her word. Like, they've already gotten to the people in the nuclear subs. They already got to the people at the International Space Station. It's like that's where they started their kind of slow encroachment into human life. And so the fact that those people are already off the board. I don't have any reason to go to space, I don't think. I'm not looking for anything out there.

[A]

Yeah. Don't want to hang out with the pod people in space. That's true. All right, so licking the donut. Gmail.com, if you have a better answer, bearing in mind that you have to do it alone and there's. There's no earning it. There's no sweat equity placed into this. You're just given it and so does it even. Is it even enjoyable in Rob's arcade game?

[B]

You know, I guess you could have the sweat equity if you. If you could engineer it. Right. Like, maybe it's something where there's a long line to get the opportunity to do something difficult. Like Everest is a good example of like, I think there's like a lottery system or like a lot of hoops you have to jump through. So maybe you could cut the red tape in a way that is satisfying to then try to do the hard thing on your own.

[A]

So spend my time rather than like trying to out figure fix this. I'm like, oh, I have some time before they pod person me.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

I will train to climb from base camp to the peak of Everest. And I will cut the line of anyone else who pretty good because they're too busy doing whatever it is these pod people do. Donald. Glazing themselves in a closet. I don't know.

[B]

Okay, but this is where it's tempting is like, I would like to not have to like go to the DMV ever again for the rest of my life.

[A]

You know, it's like now we're back inside severed territory. You're just trying to sever yourself from experience. Okay, so that is episodes one and two of Pluribus. We will be back every Friday. You know, God willing. The creeks don't rise to. To bring these episodes to you. We invite. It's not a. You know, there's a lot of answers. Not like a classic theory show. But we invite your questions, your theories, your expert. I know how infectious diseases are transmitted. POVs your desires of where you would go and what you would do and what meal you would consume, et cetera, et cetera, at Licky the [e-mail]. that's licking the donut. Com.

[B]

Just some of your best work.

[A]

Thank you so much. Not since Jon Hamm's nipple rings. Anything else, Rob, before we go?

[B]

I think that's about it. I mean, if I could draw attention to one more thing I loved from these episodes before we veer off the romantasy path, which I fear we may never return to again. So if not now, when? The fact that her new book is the fourth book in the Winds of Wickero trilogy. Fucking great.

[A]

Winds of Wakaro is Wakaro.

[B]

Sorry.

[A]

Okay. Winds of Wakaro is pretty excellent, but.

[B]

Somebody dangling that check to write the fourth book in the trilogy is just wonderful.

[A]

On the on the Pluribus Reddit boards, which were hopping last night, someone made such a good George R.R. martin joke where they were like talking about something about George R.R. martin and then someone replies, George, George R.R. martin will do anything other than complete Winds of Wakara. So that was really good.

[B]

Sorry those jets blogs aren't going to write themselves.

[A]

It's really true. Okay, thank you to Donnie Beacham for working on this episode. Thank you, Justin Sales. Always. Also, Christopher Ryan, our pal, has a chat with Vince Gilligan. I can't. I don't know if it's actually currently up on the Watch feed or will be up on the Watch feed, I believe. So it's currently up. Okay, great.

[B]

And double the Vince Gilligan. Ben Lindbergh has an extensive interview on the Ringer TV YouTube channel in particular going through the plot hole or knothole of some of the deepest mysteries in Breaking Bad. So an incredible watch. And listen.

[A]

Yeah, a Tahaji deep dive we we didn't deserve in 2025. Thank you so much, Ben. All right, so we'll be back next week and we'll see you soon. And stay safe. And don't eat the licked donuts by.