TV Genre: Hour-long science fiction

Story DNA

Heroes: Carol Sturka, a successful American fantasy romance author, one of the 12 humans in the world who are immune to the alien virus

Goal: To stop or reverse the Joining before she succumbs

Obstacle: Carol has no idea how to stop or reverse the Joining before she succumbs and, inconveniently, starts to fall in love with one of the Others

Stakes: The future of life on Earth

Save the Cat! Beat Sheet Analysis for Pluribus

Opening Image

The enormous scope of the story is made plain very quickly by its first shots: the on-screen super of a giant time clock ticking away to God knows what, followed by a huge airfield of satellites turned up towards a cloudy and rather ominous night sky. In a wide shot, a teeny-weeny car blazes across the horizon, signifying a seemingly vital mortal purpose set ironically against the backdrop of the vastness of space.

Yep, we get it: despite our enthusiasm, mankind is no match for what’s coming.

Theme Stated

Nerdy scientist #1 tries to understand why the E.T.s would send such a mysterious signal, saying, “you go to all that trouble to send a message, it’s gotta be more than just ‘hello.'”

The naivete of this brilliant man, the certainty that such power would certainly be beneficial, or at least benign, and the hubris of assuming that humans are capable of managing a force so far beyond our understanding, seems to be Vince Gilligan’s nod to the dangers of unchecked AI and what this technological groupthink might do to our humanity and individuality.

Set-Up

In our thesis world, a bunch of nerdy scientists geek out over a signal from space, a four-tone radio transmission that they quickly realize is not a “we’re making contact” message from extraterrestrials, but a recipe for an artificial RNA sequence, possibly a lysogenic virus. They try to recreate it in labs and test it on animals, but as the giant clock tells us, many months pass with no success.

Meanwhile, we meet our unlikely Hero, Carol Sturka (Rhea Seehorn), a curmudgeonly romantasy author with many things that need fixing: she hates the books that have made her successful, has a significant drinking problem, and can’t be honest about being in a relationship with her manager Helen (Miriam Shor) because it might harm her reputation for spicy scenes about muscular men bodice-ripping seductive women.

Catalyst

One of the scientists, Jenn (Blair Beeken), is bitten by a rat infected with the lysogenic virus.

Debate

What should be a simple fix—a rinsing of the wound followed by a decontamination shower—quickly spirals out of control as a bizarrely transformed Jenn manages to spread the virus by kissing other scientists, a night watchman, and even the poor old guy polishing the floors. She seals the saliva pact by licking the backs of donuts offered in a big communal box, a sly wink to the germy ickiness of shared food in a workplace, and within moments, the entire lab is presumed to be infected. And perhaps beyond the lab…?

Carol and Helen go to a small tavern on the outskirts of Albuquerque, where Carol is in an even grumpier mood than usual, disparaging her own books and the people, sorry, “dummies,” who read them.

They walk outside to have a smoke and in what appears to be a rare moment of vulnerability/exasperation, Helen encourages Carol to just go ahead and release the serious book she’s been writing (“Bitter Chrysalis,” which may be the most “serious book” title ever) and respond to a reader’s comment about the inspiration for Carol’s sexy male character, Raban, by admitting she’s queer. Carol can’t bring herself to do it and they have a tense, sad moment, interrupted by:

Break into Two

A pick-up truck careening past them and smashing into another car, startling the women.

B Story

Although we don’t meet either of them in the pilot, Carol’s B Story relationships with the Other, Zosia (Karolina Wydra), and the uninfected Manousos (Carlos-Manuel Vesga) will mark the extreme poles of her ambivalence about the Joining; she’s every bit as resistant to the assimilation as the single-minded Manousos, but her intense loneliness makes her believe that she’s falling for Zosia.

The love story or the survival story, which will win out in the end?

Fun and Games

As Carol tries to aid the accident victim, Helen collapses in a seizure. A distraught Carol runs inside for help, only to see that every person in the bar is having the same seizure.

The slow burn of Carol’s realization that she’s entered some sort of antithesis world is a master class in suspense (and acting, thanks to Rhea Seehorn’s phenomenal performance) as everything goes to hell in a gradual handbasket. The phones don’t work, people are bleeding on the ground, and Carol can’t even escape because her car’s breathalyzer ignition locks up at one puff of her alcohol-laced breath.

Desperate, Carol pushes the body of the accident victim into his passenger seat, hoists Helen into the truck bed, and steals the vehicle to take Helen to the hospital

Midpoint

As Carol drives frantically on a mountain road, she pauses for a moment to look out over Albuquerque— which is on fire. The stakes are raised as Carol registers that whatever terrible event is happening, it isn’t limited to her partner or the small area where the bar was; it appears to be citywide.

And we see in her terrified eyes that she fears it goes even beyond.

Bad Guys Close In

At the hospital, every person in the ER is also catatonic and seizing, including the doctors, so Carol grabs a gurney and dashes out, leaping into the truck bed to see Helen as her seizure dissipates. She looks up at Carol with a gentle smile… and promptly dies.

As Carol wails in despair, suddenly all of the people who’d been seizing and collapsing in the hospital get back up on their feet and come outside, walking like zombies.

Carol tries to talk to one of the doctors, but he responds by kissing her. She pushes him away and screams at the crowd, “What the hell is wrong with you people?!” She’s obviously not expecting a response, but gets one anyway; in unison, the entire crowd says, “We just wanna help, Carol.”

After delivering the best “WTAF?!” face imaginable, Carol jumps into the truck and escapes, driving Helen’s body to their home.

Barricading herself and Helen inside, Carol slugs down some whiskey, grabs the remote, and tries to locate a working TV station. She finds one, all right; in fact, it’s personalized. A White House official waits patiently as a news crawl requests that Carol call a phone number to have her questions answered.

Carol calls and listens in stunned disbelief as Davis Taffler (Peter Bergman) explains that humans have been the recipients of extraterrestrial technology, given an RNA sequence that’s a “psychic glue that binds us all together.”

In other (disturbing) words, all humans on earth are now one person, of one mind: We Is Us.

All Is Lost

Even with this batshit insanity, there’s still a topper: Taffler assures her they will figure out what makes Carol and the other 11 immune people different. Filled with dread, Carol asks why.

“So we can fix it. So you can join us.”

Dark Night of the Soul

Utterly overwhelmed, Carol collapses onto the sofa, hyperventilating and sobbing, faced with the horrors of an ultimate synthesis world.

Break into Three/Break into Series

Even from her vulnerable, prone position, Carol digs down deep and with just a hint of steel in her voice, asks, “So what happens when I say ‘no’?”

And as Taffler launches into the wonders of the hive-mind, she hangs up the phone, turns off the TV, and launches us into the battle of Pluribus: the one against the many; individuality vs. conformity; uniqueness vs. sameness; and a cranky, alcoholic, gay romance writer kicking the collective asses of an entire planet.