In the wake of the last two tumultuous episodes of *Pluribus*, the limits of both human emotion and collective consciousness come to the forefront. In those installments, Carol—portrayed with sharp precision by Rhea Seehorn—found herself entangled in a pair of reckless and nearly apocalyptic misadventures: one involving the detonation of a live hand grenade, the other centering around her perilous experiment with an ill-conceived truth serum. These chaotic encounters inevitably prompted me to ponder a single, unsettling question: how much longer could the vast hive mind endure Carol’s erratic, self-destructive impulses before reaching its breaking point? Now, as episode five arrives, that speculation finally finds its answer. In a moment at once chilling and oddly tender, the collective delivers a recorded message that reads, with startling simplicity and resignation, “We just need a little space.”
Welcome, then, to another entry in our ongoing *Verge*-subscriber conversation about *Pluribus*, the enthralling new science fiction series streaming on Apple TV—an ambitious creation by Vince Gilligan, the acclaimed mind behind *Breaking Bad*. The narrative orbits the troubled existence of Carol, one of the rare individuals left unassimilated after a mysterious, virus-like phenomenon sweeps across the globe. This contagion does not destroy its victims in the conventional sense; rather, it fuses nearly every surviving human being into a single overarching consciousness—a hive mind incapable of processing or expressing negativity. Its members live in emotional equilibrium, stripped of anger, grief, and, crucially, of individuality. Carol, unfortunately, represents their antithesis. She is obstinate, volatile, and profoundly discontented, incapable of masking her misery in the face of their enforced serenity. Each week, this column will raise thought-provoking questions and observations surrounding the most recent installment, serving both as a springboard for deeper analysis and an invitation for readers to share their interpretations, speculations, and critical reactions. Naturally, a caution is in order: spoilers will abound for episodes one through five of *Pluribus*.
Episode five, aptly titled “Got Milk,” carries the story into darker, more introspective territory. Two significant developments shape its narrative arc. The first centers on the moment the hive finally reaches the limit of its patience with Carol. Her impulsive behaviors—marked by outbreaks of rage, reckless curiosity, and a near-pathological disregard for safety—have inflicted unfathomable psychological and physical damage on the collective. In light of these mounting disruptions, the hive mind takes a drastic yet nonviolent course of action: during one of Carol’s hospital naps, it abandons her entirely, orchestrating a silent mass exodus from the city of Albuquerque. Left utterly alone, Carol must now navigate both the physical emptiness of her environment and the emotional void created by the hive’s retreat. And yet, complete separation remains impossible; the collective, bound by its genetic programming or moral imperative, continues to tend to her material needs from a distance. They allow her to transmit voicemail messages, through which she can request deliveries or mundane services such as waste removal. These requests are fulfilled by drones—an intentionally impersonal method that permits the hive to avoid face-to-face contact, thereby minimizing emotional friction. This technological detachment carries an unmistakable air of passive-aggressive withdrawal, a silent protest born from their inability to confront conflict directly or inflict deliberate harm.
The episode’s second major plot reveals a deepening of Carol’s obsessive investigation into the hive’s physiology and sustenance. Having discerned that their energy source is derived from an unfamiliar yellow fluid, Carol embarks on a new line of inquiry driven by her scientific instincts and her refusal to remain ignorant. Her search first draws her to the seemingly unremarkable setting of a large dairy-processing plant and subsequently leads her to a dog food manufacturing facility. What she uncovers in these spaces gradually points toward the grotesque and the unthinkable. In the episode’s final, nerve-fraying seconds, Carol peers into a refrigerated storage chamber and glimpses—though the audience sees only her reaction—something so grotesque, so viscerally disturbing, that she can do little more than recoil in horror. The direction deliberately withholds the visual revelation, transforming her dread into a masterful cliffhanger that leaves viewers to wrestle with the same uneasy curiosity she experiences.
So, what precisely are the hive drinking? This week’s central question, of course, orbits that unsettling mystery. Whatever Carol discovers beneath that tarp must be repellant enough to shake her usual defiance. Yet this discovery sits uneasily within what we already understand of the hive’s nature: this unified consciousness, incapable of killing or consciously inflicting pain, should theoretically be immune to the moral horrors typical of survival-based narratives. The possibility that their sustenance is derived from something ethically abhorrent only amplifies the tension between their apparent pacifism and the biological necessities they cannot escape. The episode’s restraint—choosing not to reveal the answer outright—serves as an exquisite exercise in suspense.
Meanwhile, the emotional rupture between Carol and the hive raises another line of inquiry: have they truly severed ties, or is this just a temporary estrangement—a reprieve rather than a rejection? Their statement, “We just need a little space,” seems almost human in its ambiguity, suggesting fatigue, compassion, and avoidance all at once. The hive, bound by an instinctual obligation to preserve her wellbeing, cannot entirely sever the thread that binds them to her. Yet they also recognize that Carol’s emotional volatility threatens their collective harmony. This delicate juxtaposition—self-preservation versus empathy—promises to fuel some of the season’s most fascinating psychological interplay. It is conceivable, though not yet explicit, that the hive intends to maintain temporary distance until they can devise a means to neutralize or “cure” Carol’s negativity, perhaps even to fold her, at long last, into the network itself. For now, Carol wields a peculiar kind of power: her bad moods have become her most potent weapon, a threat that compels the hive to concede to her demands out of fear of emotional contamination.
The final thread worth exploring involves the question of Carol’s survival in a world left emptied of conventional human society. Though crime and interpersonal violence have effectively vanished under the governance of the hive mind, danger persists in subtler or more primal forms. The moment the hive vacates Albuquerque, nature begins to reclaim what had been abandoned. Almost immediately, a pack of wolves encroaches upon Carol’s property, targeting a freshly dug grave in her backyard—a grim reminder that life outside the hive remains governed by instinct and predation. In that image lies the essence of her predicament: she is simultaneously liberated and imperiled. Bereft of human connection, deprived even of the uneasy companionship of the hive, she must now contend with the raw, unpredictable chaos of the natural world. And if wolves are the first of her trials, one cannot help but speculate what other terrors might emerge out of this eerie new wilderness that Earth has become, now that she stands as its last true individual.
Episode five of *Pluribus* thus marks a profound turning point. It explores not merely the disintegration of a relationship between one woman and a vast consciousness, but also the consequences of solitude amid enforced unity. By the time its credits roll, Carol’s isolation feels both literal and metaphysical, a mirror of the human condition itself—a state of relentless searching for meaning in a world that either embraces or abandons us without warning.
Sourse: https://www.theverge.com/tech/829885/pluribus-episode-5-discussion-apple-tv
