Copyright The Boston Globe
Speaking of what’s going on, this might be the right time to explain. The series logline is intentionally vague: “Follows the most miserable person on Earth, and the one who must save the world from happiness.” Carol is, in fact, a little bitter. She writes what appear to be highly successful romantic pirate novels — “mindless crap,” she calls them — and puts on a good front for her fanbase. Unbeknownst to her, an alien virus is about to infect the planet. It doesn’t turn everyone into frothing zombies. Instead, they — ahem, we — become blissed-out members of a hive mind, individual identities subsumed into one being that wants nothing but the best — for those who survive, anyway. The virus also kills millions. Carol, however, is immune, along with a handful of others around the world. Naturally, she’s none too happy about what has transpired. Gilligan, who ended up shooting his previous two series in Albuquerque almost by accident, has learned to use the locale to his full advantage in “Pluribus.” The skies go on forever, creating stark images of cosmic wonder that work equally well in day and night. Faceless cul-de-sacs provide a sense of suburban eeriness, cut off from the city and just about everything else. The shiny, happy people of “Pluribus” have been granted a sort of faceless terra incognita in which to create their new conflict-free world, a Shangri-La of strip malls and anonymous ranch houses. The tone is tricky, and Gilligan, Seehorn, and Co. prove up to the challenge. “Pluribus” is, at heart, a comedy of absurdity in which some very bad things happen. The happiness of the hive mind is conveyed in all manner of droning ways, from chipper phone recordings to masses of bit players speaking their lines in unison (“We just want to help, Carol!”). Sometimes these masses are framed in overhead shots, like geometric shapes in a Busby Berkeley musical. Carol doesn’t want to go where everybody knows your name, because everybody knows everybody’s name, and date of birth, and favorite color, as well as minute biographical details. I am he as you are he as you are me, and we all come together. The big question for the TV-watching collective: Does “Pluribus” work as television? Within the six episodes I’ve seen, sometimes. In these binge-happy times, with a kajillion other entertainment options vying for our precious hours, we’re usually in a hurry for everything to come together (I swear, that’s the last Beatles reference). “Pluribus” willfully frustrates this desire. It’s a work of long-game world building that can feel like a cool concept in search of a story. It doesn’t take more than a quick consideration of the premise to realize “Pluribus” might have a hard time making it all literal and concrete. It helps that Apple TV releases its series gradually, which means you couldn’t shotgun “Pluribus” even if you wanted to. It will have time to grow, and Apple TV has already renewed the series for a second season. I look forward to giving it a chance. Embedded in each episode is a constellation of philosophical questions: What does it mean to be happy? If you’re always happy, are you ever really happy? Perhaps most crucial of all, how much do you value your individuality? “Pluribus,” which is Latin for “of many” (or “for many”), is just as concerned with conformity as blind bliss. Carol is fighting less for her right to be miserable than for her right to choose who she is. Such matters are less important to the majority of her scattered fellow virus-immune earthlings, like the fatuous playboy (a very funny Samba Schutte) who happily assembles a harem out of newly pliant women. There’s also a fellow skeptic, Manousos (Carlos-Manuel Vesga), whose grumpiness rivals Carol’s. But the relationship that offers the most possibility for Carol, and “Pluribus,” is with the mysterious Zosia (Karolina Wydra). She’s one of the happy people, and Carol turns to probing her for weaknesses, and perhaps a way to reverse the virus. Complicating matters further, Carol also thinks Zosia is kind of hot. Through Zosia, we learn that Carol also has the power to harm her chipper opposites. They are, let’s say, conflict-averse. If the series goes down — if it can’t ultimately put its pieces together — it will go down swinging. It plays like the vision of a genuine individual. In the world of “Pluribus,” and in the world of TV, that in itself is something to celebrate. PLURIBUS Created by Vince Gilligan. Starring Rhea Seehorn, Karolina Wydra, Carlos-Manuel Vesga, Miriam Shor, Jeff Hiller, and Peter Bergman. Premieres on Apple TV Nov. 7.
