Which is Carol and (hate to cite his main cast existence) Manuoso somehow too. And maybe Zosia will provide more info and perhaps be an ally after sharing a bottle of 50 year old scotch instead of tossing a grenade.
I’m getting “they killed Kenny” vibes …
She’s gonna be right back to that bedside next episode feeling guilty.
I dunno, I’m guessing Zosia is a little different after she recovers from her drug dose and cardiac arrest. Probably not completely un-joined, but she’ll be more than just another member of the collective. I don’t think Manousos will be Carol’s only ally.
Carol’s plot was interesting. She clearly views herself as the resistance trying to save humanity. There’s a bit of a problem with the structure of the story. The hive mind is willing to talk to her all day, answer all of her questions except those that would lead to its destruction, but she tries to avoid it and rarely asks it interesting questions. She even asked something to the effect of “have you learned more about how the whole hive mind things work?” and I’m thinking awesome - we’re getting somewhere with the mechanics of the hive mind - but she never follows up on it. It’s just to ask if it can be undone.
Realistically, if she wanted to be the human resistance, she wouldn’t go from 0 to 100 (drugging / tricking one of the hive mind’s bodies) so quickly. She would spend days questioning them about how they work, how the change worked, etc. Questions that they would probably happily answer if she didn’t declare her intention to be to basically kill the hive mind. She would learn a lot more by asking reasonable, non-hostile questions than going right for the throat like that.
But those questions (and their answers) are probably going to become future plot points in the story, so she can’t just sit down and have the hive mind explain everything to her (and the audience) even though that makes the most sense for the character. This sort of writing dilemma makes you remember that you’re watching a TV show with mystery elements that’s trying to string you along rather than how a real character might react in this crazy situation. I don’t like it, it’s anti-immersive.
I reckon Carol will say immediately what she injected Zosia with. Sodium thiopental is the “Hollywood truth serum,” though it’s mainly been replaced as the initial knockout drug by anesthesiologists by Propofol.
I would WAG that Zosia was connecting to the collective and getting back “invalid request - die” from whatever secret-keeper is encoded into this virus.
Inventory, surveillance, and the Heroin diversion will certainly be enough for whatever a “conviction” is to these people. She flushed away her use on herself, yet that would only be mitigating. Carol actually looked more like she scored some good peyote.
Maybe a trip to Paraguay, along with Super-smiley guy, will be punishment enough and keep her away from Carol, while she recuperates (nothing to suggest their biology is now superior), who I reckon will - like they all do - forgive her; yet no more hospitals or pharmacies for Carol.
I really like the music chosen for the show. It is to the same high standard used in Gilligan’s other series.
I thought it was interesting that Carol didn’t even bother to learn Zosia’s name (calling her “pirate lady”) until one of the others in Bilbao (I think Koumba Diabaté) mentioned it.
I imagine it’s got to be a lot like going for high score on CIV II. I mean, sure, you could end the game on Deity-level difficulty by conquest in the 13th century. But if you want to maximize points, you’ve got to keep at least once rival civilization (reduced to a single city, surrounded) around and preferably at peace (for the peace bonus each turn), let the game play out to 2020, and time your spacecraft launch so that it arrives at Alpha Centauri with the maximum population just before the game would end on turns.
What do you do in the meantime? Make your population as numerous and as happy as possible (to maximize points) while researching future technology as fast as possible (to maximize points).
Maybe terraform the world and out down a bunch of railroads while you’re at it? Fill out and develop the unpopulated lands with perfectly spaced cities? Just for kicks?
Replace “spacecraft launch” (&etc) with “giant antenna to spread virus to distant parts of the galaxy” and I’d imagine that’s what life for the hive mind would be like, if they were really stoked about the possibility of achieving max score.
I think they’re being meta, drawing a parallel between the lead and her relationship with her deceased partner and these elderly women happily living together as the main cast, with men as mere side characters. How many other sitcoms are like that?
In-universe, perhaps it was aspirational. Or a gag gift from one to the other. Or, maybe it really was just what they had around, having long ago transitioned to streaming. In Iraq, I watch the Garry Sanders show and 1960s Dragnet just because (1) my parents sent me the former for Christmas and (2) the latter was I think the only series in our collection of left-behind DVDs on the FOB. So what else was I going to watch?
I’m thinking you meant Larry Sanders/Garry Shandling, both excellent programs. 
I assume the DVDs were slim pickings, and she certainly didn’t seem to be enjoying them. I take your point about the lack of male characters tho. The reveal this week about the summer camp was rather telling.
Oh. Yes. Larry Sanders. It always confuses me, how he sort of but not quite uses his hame.
What an awesome show. I remember the Garry Shandling Show episode , which was set in his living room, and Tom Petty comes over to return the gardening shears. And sing a song.
How are they going to get 4 seasons out of this premise?
Its a good show, but I wish they’d just release all the episodes at once. I hate waiting. If I get into a show, I like to binge watch multiple episodes a day.
I’m really happy they’re releasing them once a week. Binging a mystery show reduces the enjoyment of it because you don’t have time to let it process, think about what’s going on, speculate. You can’t have a discussion because people are on all different episodes. It’s really hard for those netflix style episode dumps to gain traction with people.
Edit: That doesn’t really just apply to mystery shows, but anything that benefits from reflection, but mystery shows definitely have the speculation component as part of the fun.
I actually made a thread about my dislike of Netflix style season dumping release style a while back.
If a show is worth watching, I also prefer a measured release schedule. Especially if it’s also discussion-worthy.
Four seasons? I believe Apple has only ordered two seasons. As for Vince Gilligan series, I don’t know if AMC ordered any number of seasons of “Breaking Bad” yet I seem to recall it was always going to be six for “Better Call Saul”.
They can certainly do the 9 + 9 planned. If whatever metrics Apple TV uses for ratings look positive, I could see them announcing at least another 9 early second season, unless Gilligan has scoped out only 18,
And while I’ve not yet read SenorBeef’s thread about Netflix season dumping, I (eta: strongly) agree with the premise.
Did no one other than myself notice that when Zosia was dying, none of the spectators had the standard self-satisfied happy grin? They were actually rather grim-faced.
After EP4, I still feel the story is allegorically about addiction or abusive relationships. And it’s only when she does something destructive does she appear to gain insight. And if every episode is just that, I may fall off.
Also when she discusses what they think of her books, I did find it interesting to think about, that she is the only fiction writer that the collective didn’t absorb and obtain first hand knowledge of. Her books could be the only sense of entertainment that they have, which could also explain why they fawn over it so much.
I hadn’t thought of that, but that would seem to be a reason to not want to assimilate her.
The inquisition over their opinion of her books drew real parallels to AI conversations. Carol spent much of this episode carefully considering the “prompts” she should use with the Others.
There are literally thousands of fiction writers they have not absorbed. Millions, perhaps. All pf the dead ones.
So it can’t be that.