After being very aggressive in her search for information in last week’s “Please, Carol” – it’s no surprise that the others are extremely reluctant to give any details about how the joining can be reversed – in “Got Milk” Carol wakes up in an empty town. Anyone left in Albuquerque is motoring on the highway right now. When Carol calls the help line, she is met with an extremely polite, unnecessarily verbose voice mail recording (“After everything that’s happened, we just need some space,” the faint sound of better call Saul(voiced by Patrick Fabian) That now he has to sit down anytime he needs anything.
And, although Carol insists that she is independent, she still needs the help of others from time to time. She begins recording videos for “my 12 fellow survivors”, which she asks others to translate (as needed) and distribute around the world. Their aim: to convey their findings to the world’s few remaining independent thinkers, but it’s also clear that making connections is important. She is now more alone than ever, and she is becoming lonelier every day.
“We have an obligation to humanity” to save the victims, she urges her assumed audience, although, as we have seen, most of the other “survivors” are not bothered by the current state of the world.
But from what we’ve seen of Manousos (Carlos-Manuel Vesga) – the self-storage guy hiding out in Paraguay – we can tell that he’s definitely a wild card; Pluribus Clearly moving forward to tell us more about him in future episodes. However, this week, it’s all Carol… and some New Mexico wildlife who’ve gotten excited by people’s newfound evacuation scenario.
There are some wonderful moments in episode five, including a quick glimpse of a highly appropriate book on the empty side of Helen’s painful bed (And then there were none by Agatha Christie) and the pathetic failure of the drone sent to pick up Carol’s overweight garbage bag. The image of the drone drunkenly wrapping itself around a light pole – then the bag burst open, spilling the trash on Carroll’s cul-de-sac – tells way more about Pluribus‘The world is now doing more than just any kind of communication.
The snafu means Carol has to deal with the trash herself, but while filling her trash in the public bin she discovers something strange: milk cartons. So many milk cartons. Others’ drink of choice…but why?
Carol’s detective work takes her to a factory that, until recently, was packaging a mysterious liquid made from a strange white powder mixed with water. Later, she locates the powder in a former dog food plant. We don’t see what she discovers, but we do see her gasp in shock as the episode ends.
Whatever she discovers will likely be revealed in episode six. But she can’t take the milk-carton route without setting off on a trip to the garbage – something she has to do when wolves start roaming her backyard.
This echoes what happened in real life during the pandemic. With everyone being kept indoors due to the Covid fear, nature started reactivating itself. Excited coyotes strolled suburban streets; Deer grazed in the city parks without any fear. in albuquerque PluribusA pack of wolves roam Carol’s upscale neighborhood, searching for food, moving to the one place where they can still find food left in the trash can: Carol’s house. When they first appear, she chases them with a golf club. However, another time, the wolves cross a line and begin digging Helen’s backyard grave.
This is a bridge too far for Carroll, who has kept his Helen-adjacent feelings well under control until now. In her panic, the only solution she has is to ram the police car she is traveling in at high speed with sirens and lights on. This is a messy but effective option, and the wolves scatter.
In the next sequence, we see Carol driving to a building supply store and loading paving stones into her trunk – enough to cover Helen’s grave site and more. As the sun sets, after a hard day’s work, she places a marker to memorialize Helen’s final resting place, and we see deep sadness mixed with determination on her face.
Even in these strange, mixed, isolating times, Carroll still enjoys the same freedoms she’s always had. No wolves are going to dig up his late wife. Not today, not ever. and there are others No are going to destroy the human race – that is, if Carol can find a way to stop them.
What did the gasping mean? What did Carol get? What riddle will she uncover next—and will any of the other 12 ever respond to her video messages?
There’ll be a lot of waiting until next Friday, when episode six arrives. Pluribus Hits Apple TV+.
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