Throughout Pluribus‘ first season, I tried to convey why I find this strange sci-fi show so heartbreaking. I thought I had done a thorough job explaining myself. I was wrong. Pluribus‘ fantastic season finale made me realize I had yet to fully capture why the hive mind offends me at my core. It took the most human person left on Earth to do that. In the highly entertaining, incredibly revealing, wildly moving “La Chica o El Mundo,” Manousos perfectly conveyed the real tragedy of the joining: “They have stolen everyone’s soul.”
With respect, truly, to those who consider all living things equal, I agree with Manousos: it is evil to value a man the same as an ant. I would sacrifice every ant to save the life of one person. The hive mind on Pluribus would not. It treats everything, even an apple hanging on a tree, as important as a human. It believes an inanimate piece of fruit is the same as a person who can feel and think, who can love and hate, who can feel grief and regret. The collective sees no difference between anything. It can’t even dislike something, let alone hate anything. And for that reason, the enjoined can never truly love anyone or anything. It can’t connect with another because it connects to everything equally. If you love everything, you love nothing. If you value everything equally, without question or thought, you don’t have any values.
On Pluribus‘ finale, Zosia told Carol the hive mind loves Manousos just as much they love her. The hive does, but in a way that renders its love meaningless. That empty love briefly blinded Carol until she realized the hive doesn’t even see her as a person. But you know who does love everyone on Earth in a way that means something? In a way that matters? Manousos. He cares about every person in the world, not because of a biological imperative. He cares about every person in the world simply because they are all people. People with souls.
Manousos showed what real love looks like on Pluribus’ season finale when he tried to speak to Rick during a gorgeous moment, the most powerful scene of the season. When Manousos gently held that stranger’s hand and his face so he could speak with worry and hope to the person locked inside, he showed more compassion, empathy, and love than anything the billions of enjoined ever have. Manousos doesn’t care about Rick because he loves everyone and everything equally without question or thought like Pluribus’ hive mind. He cares about Rick because Rick is a person. He is a person, and that is all that matters.
As demonstrated by the brutal opening scene of Pluribus‘ finale in Peru, where we saw an entire culture die, the hive mind destroys everything that makes humans special. Not perfect. Not above reproach. But special, because humans have souls. They write songs, form bonds, pass down traditions, and carry those who came before them with them. We love and hate, truly love and hate, with our soul. And whatever a “soul” may be, and however it may manifest inside us and endure (or not) when our bodies stop working, our souls are ours and ours alone.
The hive mind didn’t just steal individuality, personality, or humanity, ideas I focused on this season. It stole the essence of what makes us “us.” Every hug we’ve ever given, every laugh we’ve ever shared, every tear and loss and hope and smile and burst of anger we have ever felt was an expression of our soul. And Pluribus‘ finale made this achingly clear.
The concept of the soul might seem inherently religious to some, but Pluribus isn’t about the afterlife or supernatural beings. It’s a humanist story about being alive right now, about being a person and everything, good and bad, that makes our brief existence in the universe matter. Fortunately for Carol and everyone else on the show, the world had one person left who remembers that. He’s angry and frustrating. He’s stubborn and determined and rude. And he can’t help but show his total disdain with every facial expression. He’s wonderfully human, and as he told Rick with love, “I am here.”
He’s also here with a plan he’s working on and researching.
After a slow (at times way too slow) first season, Pluribus‘ finale “La Chica o El Mundo” was full of tension, excitement, and payoffs. As we theorized, the enjoined have nefarious plans for Carol’s frozen eggs. Manousos’ meticulous work with radio frequencies also paid off, as he realized that one strange frequency interrupts the electromagnetic field that connects the hive mind. He can seemingly use it to speak to the people inside. And, they are still in there, something we realized when “Zosia” had to talk about what it was like being Zosia the person who loved mango ice cream more than every other flavor.
People aren’t gone. They just needed someone to remember that. They need someone who speaks to the very thing that anyone who cares about us speaks to, their souls.
A sad, angry, disappointed Carol returned (with an atom bomb as backup) to help Manousos save the world on Pluribus‘ finale. But she only did that when she realized the same thing about the hive mind that I finally understood this episode. It’s the real crime of the collective, the reason I truly despise it and would fight to save every Rick myself in Manousos’ shoes. The soulless enjoined committed the greatest crime anyone ever could on humanity. The hive mind stole the very thing that makes each of us human.
Mikey Walsh is a staff writer at Nerdist and Manousos number one fan. You can follow him on Bluesky at @burgermike. And also anywhere someone is ranking the Targaryen kings.