Pluribus’ third episode throws a bomb into things

If you didn’t know exactly what a miserable person Carol (Rhea Seehorn) is, episode 3 of Pluribus It sure is obvious. It opens with a flashback, as Carol and her partner Helen (Miriam Shor) are having a dream vacation at an ice hotel in Norway, and all she can do is complain about the cold. When Carol sees a stunning aurora borealis, her only thought is “that looks like a screensaver.” But that cynicism might also be her superpower as she prepares to solve the hive-mind apocalypse that has befallen Earth.

Besides really showing how grumpy Carol was before she became one of the only non-hive-mind humans on the planet, the episode also showed how difficult it will be for her to live independently of the hive, as well as the lengths the hive will go to to make her happy. Including, uh, maybe giving her a nuclear weapon if she asked? Anyway, here are the things I’m wondering about.

Obviously, being part of a dozen non-hive members is pretty isolating. But things got even worse in Episode 2 when she tried to connect with the English-speaking survivors, and they were hardly interested in changing the world as it was. But there may be some hope: a man living in Paraguay named Manousos (Carlos Manuel Vesga) seems to hate the hive even more than Carol. The problem is that he is on the other side of the world and only speaks Spanish. Their first phone call ended with lots of screaming. Still, Manousos seems to be Carol’s best hope of finding another human who sees the supposed problem of world happiness the same way she does.

How will it coexist with the hive?

For now, Carol, the rest of the unaffected people, and the hive all share the same planet. That is, at least until either party finds a “cure.” But in the meantime, this creates some tension for Carol, who considers herself an independent person, and yet relies primarily on the hive to support herself. The problem became apparent when she tried to buy food at a grocery store and had to wait for it to be restocked.

Can the hive say no to everything?

The flip side of this tension is that, it seems, the hive seems incapable of doing anything that would upset Carol. That means fulfilling her demands, as ridiculous as they may seem, which is how the episode ended with a grenade exploding inside Carol’s house, injuring her chaperone Zosia (Karolina Wydra). Before that, however, Carol was able to push the hive to see how far it would go. “We would move heaven and earth to make you happy, Carol,” they tell her when she asks if they would give her a nuclear weapon. “Would be do you like an atomic bomb? Very curious how she uses this to her advantage.