{"id":138656,"date":"2025-11-17T21:35:17","date_gmt":"2025-11-17T21:35:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/138656\/"},"modified":"2025-11-17T21:35:17","modified_gmt":"2025-11-17T21:35:17","slug":"anti-ai-subtext-and-sprouts-scene-explained","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/138656\/","title":{"rendered":"Anti-AI Subtext and Sprouts Scene, Explained"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\t[This story contains spoilers from Pluribus<\/a> episode three, \u201cGrenade.\u201d]<\/p>\n

\n\tVince Gilligan<\/a> hasn\u2019t just created success stories and second acts for his talent on the screen \u2014 he\u2019s created just as many behind the scenes. And one of the most prominent examples belongs to Pluribus writer-director\/executive producer Gordon Smith<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Michigan native cut his teeth in a variety of assistant roles as of Breaking Bad<\/a> season three and beyond, including Gilligan\u2019s assistant on season four and the writers\u2019 assistant on the final two seasons. Then, when Gilligan co-created Bad\u2019s prequel-sequel, Better Call Saul<\/a>, with Peter Gould, Smith received a promotion to staff writer. Alongside director Adam Bernstein, he made his episodic television debut when he penned Mike Ehrmantraut\u2019s (Jonathan Banks) backstory in what turned out to be the most acclaimed episode of Saul season one, the Emmy-nominated \u201cFive-O.\u201d (Keep the prior statement in mind over the coming weeks.) Smith went on to have a decorated six-season run as both writer and director on Saul, tallying two Emmy nominations as writer, seven noms as producer and a WGA award for season three\u2019s \u201cChicanery.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tSmith returned to the small screen last week with Pluribus\u2019 third episode, \u201cGrenade,\u201d which he wrote and directed. As a now-senior member of Gilligan\u2019s creative team, he also directed the Ariel Levine-written fifth episode and co-wrote the season one finale with fellow executive producer Alison Tatlock.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tGilligan\u2019s sci-fi series \u2014\u00a0chronicling Carol Sturka\u2019s (Rhea Seehorn<\/a>) efforts to save the world from an extraterrestrial \u201cpsychic glue\u201d that\u2019s turned Earth\u2019s population into a collective hive mind \u2014\u00a0has provoked many different interpretations in its early episodes. But the most common reading so far has been that it\u2019s a condemnation of artificial intelligence. The closing credits not only include the pointed declaration of, \u201cThis show was made by humans,\u201d but Gilligan also routinely calls AI a \u201cplagiarism machine.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tCase in point, during Smith\u2019s latest episode, Carol invites Zosia (Karolina Wydra<\/a>), her liaison to \u201cthe Joined\u201d (aka \u201cthe Others\u201d), inside her home for a glass of vodka, and Zosia proceeds to rattle off some factoids about that specific brand of alcoholic beverage. After all, Zosia has access to everyone\u2019s thoughts, memories and know-how, including the vodka distiller\u2019s. Unimpressed, Carol shoots back that Zosia learned the aforementioned trivia by \u201cstealing it out of his brain.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThus, Smith certainly isn\u2019t surprised that the audience is construing the show as anti-AI, but the Pluribus brain trust would prefer not to undercut the overall viewing experience by explicitly defining it one way or another.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019ll beat those [anti-AI] allegations. There\u2019s things about AI that resonate with how the Others operate,\u201d Smith tells The Hollywood Reporter. \u201cBut it\u2019s less rich to say, \u2018Oh, this is a show about fill-in-the-blank.\u2019 It limits both the storytelling and the availability of the show to ask questions. This is such a conceptual show, and my hope is that it makes people think about and feel different things in different ways\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the interview below, Smith also acknowledges the other prominent theory that the show is commenting on political division, but there\u2019s another under-discussed topic that he raises. In the series premiere, \u201cWe Is Us,\u201d Carol\u2019s late wife and manager, Helen Umstead (Miriam Shor), due to Carol\u2019s earlier imbibing, refused to let her drive upon their return to Albuquerque\u2019s airport. Their Range Rover even had an ignition interlock device, requiring the successful use of a breathalyzer for the vehicle to start. Carol has presumably had more than enough DUIs to warrant the precautionary measure, and she\u2019s repeatedly turned to excessive alcohol intake throughout the first three episodes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tConsuming alcohol is a justifiable response to the Joining, its role in Helen\u2019s death and the post-apocalyptic world it\u2019s created, but over-reliance on it is nothing new for Carol. Nor is the Xanax-vodka cocktail she consumed opposite Zosia in episode three. The latter then compared Carol to someone who\u2019s \u201cdrowning,\u201d so perhaps one can view the Joined as interventionists for Carol\u2019s personal demons.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI\u2019ve heard people talk about it as a show about addiction, and from my personal experience with addicts in my life, that harmonizes very strongly,\u201d Smith says. \u201cThere\u2019s that pain that is so individual within you that you have to drown it with something, and that\u2019s Carol. So the Others offer a look at what peace looks like, but it is a peace that is fraught.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSmith also discusses the Hurcelean effort to unstock and restock an Albuquerque-based Sprouts Farmers Market. Read the chat, below.<\/p>\n

\n\t***<\/p>\n

\n\tWe\u2019re talking right after Pluribus\u2019 two-episode premiere, and the series has now received rave reactions and reviews<\/a>. Was there a lot of relief around the virtual office this morning?<\/p>\n

\n\tYes, people are gratified that folks seem to be finding the show and enjoying it, and getting the questions it raises. Of course, for me, every time somebody says something nice, then it\u2019s like, \u201cOh no, what if they stop liking it? What if something bad happens?\u201d I just hope people continue to enjoy it and stay with us for the ride. It\u2019s a weird show. It\u2019s a very difficult premise in a certain way.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tRhea Seehorn<\/a>\u2018s Carol Sturka entertains Wycaro book fans in the series premiere of Pluribus, \u201cWe Is Us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tApple TV+<\/p>\n

\n\tVince Gilligan<\/a><\/a> was very hush-hush about Pluribus for the longest time. As Better Call Saul was wrapping up, was there a lot of whispered suspense as to how things would shake out?<\/p>\n

\n\tThe [Saul] writers office was long since gone by the time Vince said, \u201cOh, I\u2019ve got this other show.\u201d The first person who I knew had read the first two [Pluribus] scripts was my partner [writer\/co-executive producer] Jenn Carroll. Vince shared them with her, and then she said she wanted to work on the show. As she and Vince prepared to take it out to the market, they were figuring out whether it should be a limited or ongoing series. That\u2019s when I got involved with Jenn and [fellow Saul writers] Alison Tatlock and Tom Schnauz. We were the people available to have a mini room so that Vince could bounce questions off of people that he knew and trusted.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn other words, did you always assume your ticket was punched for Pluribus?<\/p>\n

\n\tNo, I did not assume. Of course not. I didn\u2019t know what the show was. I hadn\u2019t talked to Vince. Everybody\u2019s schedule gets weird, and when you are a TV writer, you have to stay moving. You have to have a bunch of irons in the fire, and you never know if one of those is going to come through. So I certainly didn\u2019t take it as a given I would be working on the show. I had time to be in the mini room, and once they sold it, it was like, \u201cThe room is coming together. Are you available?\u201d I was. I then ended up directing more episodes than I thought I would at the start, so that was surprising and nice.<\/p>\n

\n\tWas Pluribus ever actually called Wycaro 339? Or was that just a code name in the same way that Greenbrier was for El Camino?<\/p>\n

\n\tNo, it was never called Wycaro 339. It was always a code name. There were dark times. We pitched a ton of titles for the show. We had a list. And as we were figuring out what the show really was and really felt like, we would ask ourselves what title felt best. Some titles skewed too much into the horror of the first episode, and that\u2019s not really the tone of the show. Titles like Signal get a partial sense of the show, but they really miscue what the feeling of the whole thing is. So those got left by the wayside.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tWe had a variety of code names to sync up different parts of the process. So it was Wycaro for production, and then we had a different code name for post. People are detectives these days, and they like to find little tidbits, so we tried to keep things under wraps as we best could. My sister once said to me, \u201cYou don\u2019t even know what the title is?\u201d And then my niece \u2014\u00a0who\u2019s a Saul fan and spends time on Reddit \u2014\u00a0very confidently said to me, \u201cOh, I know what it is. It\u2019s called Wycaro 339.\u201d And I was like, \u201cOkay, sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tWriter Gordon Smith<\/a> at the 2018 Writers Guild Awards L.A. Ceremony at The Beverly Hilton Hotel.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCharley Gallay\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

\n\tIn case people don\u2019t know your origin story<\/a>, you were an office PA on Breaking Bad season three and then Vince\u2019s assistant on season four. That led to writers\u2019 assistant on seasons 5A and 5B. Then you became a full-fledged writer and director on Saul.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tYou missed the part about the radioactive spider.<\/p>\n

\n\tWell, now you\u2019re second in command from where I\u2019m sitting. You\u2019re the first writer-director up to bat after Vince\u2019s episodes, and this is similar to how Peter Gould would follow Vince on Saul until Vince bowed out for a stretch. Then Tom Schnauz followed Peter on Saul. Is it hard for you to grasp that you\u2019re now in that seasoned slot that once belonged to Peter and Tom?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tI don\u2019t think about it that way, but there\u2019s certain jobs I\u2019m doing that are similar to that. In the room, Alison Tatlock and I are the senior writers under Vince, which means that we have to help run the room in a different way. It\u2019s not really that much different than it was on Saul. It\u2019s just that there\u2019s a little bit more of an onus on us to keep the conversation moving in a certain direction or just to try to make sure that we\u2019re using our time productively.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBecause I was directing and in Albuquerque so much, I could bounce ideas off of Vince there. When you\u2019re actually making the thing, questions, thoughts and ideas emerge, so you want to have an outlet for those things. Jenn, Vince and myself were around for most of the production process, so that meant that the three of us would often bounce ideas around with some of the other producers that were around. So I did the best I could to be available to chat with Vince about whatever was on his mind.<\/p>\n

\n\tVince told me that it was refreshing to work with a blank canvas again after 15 years of writing within the Breaking Bad universe. On Better Call Saul, you often had to invent the past and future out of random lines that Saul blurted out on Bad. So did you also enjoy no longer having to work within the confines of what Bad predetermined?<\/p>\n

\n\tThere is a different discipline when you\u2019re building from scratch and asking questions about what the world is. It\u2019s a big premise. So trying to understand what those big questions are and how they illuminate something about Carol, or any of the other characters, was difficult. There was a lot more heavy lifting in the early going to just work out what the episodes were. Episode three, in particular, took us a very long time because we were figuring out how the rubber meets the road.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tVince had a vision for the first two episodes that he\u2019d written, but we also had more information as we went forward and as we were casting. Some things had to change, and we had to figure that all out at once. So it was liberating in a sense that we didn\u2019t have the same baggage, but the methodology was still very similar. We still interrogated questions in the same way that we always do. Different questions are now cropping up as we\u2019re getting back into the season two writers\u2019 room.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBad and Saul were well funded and well supported, but Pluribus is a whole other level of scope and scale<\/a>. It has to be due to the genie-like function of the Joined. Was it quite an adjustment to be able pitch such grand ideas and know that they\u2019re economically feasible?<\/p>\n

\n\tThey are, and they aren\u2019t. My God, there were still so many things that we couldn\u2019t do, and the things we did do were very hard to pull off on our budget and schedule. The Sprouts sequence that we broke in the room was much bigger. We then figured out how we were actually going to do it during production, and I was very naive about how hard it was going to be. I thought about it in the same way you just described: \u201cWe can do anything!\u201d But there\u2019s a lot of limits, and you only learn how difficult they are once you butt up against them. We kept swinging for the fences, but as responsible producers, we just tried to make sure that the important stuff gets on the screen.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere were great sequences, big sequences, that went by the wayside throughout the season. And never mind the money involved or how producible something is, it was like, \u201cDo we need this to tell the story? Is the story going to be that much better for having ten more shots of reloading a supermarket?\u201d Maybe not. Maybe we can tell this story another way that\u2019s going to be more economical without the impact being lessened or making it feel small. You never want to be put in a position where a character has to reference something amazing that we\u2019re not able to see.<\/p>\n

\n\tSpeaking of Sprouts, how simply can you sum up the process of unloading and reloading a working Albuquerque Sprouts?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tAt first, we thought we\u2019d have the run of the place for a week, but as it went up the corporate ladder, a week became three days. Understandably, they had a supermarket business to run. So we had to shoot the exterior parking lot mostly at a different location \u2014\u00a0an abandoned Sears in northern ABQ. [Writer\u2019s Note: This is the same Sears that served as the interior location for the Lancaster\u2019s department store in Better Call Saul\u2019s \u201cNippy.\u201d] The truck action took place there for three or four days after we shot the Sprouts interior sequence.<\/p>\n

\n\tOur art department, along with the Sprouts team, emptied out the front of the Sprouts where Carol would be. We emptied half ourselves, and then we did the rest with VFX. When the restocking starts, the stuff that came off the trucks was furnished by the art department. The trick there was keeping tabs on what each person was holding and what their place was in line. We then had to get them to that same spot a week later when we shot the parking lot. Then, after the time jump, the Sprouts team essentially returned the store to normal overnight, with the exception of a couple things I wanted to feature, like the stand of olives. Then we had to stitch each location together with VFX when looking in the direction of windows and doors.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tMiriam Shor\u2019s Helen and Rhea Seehorn\u2019s Carol during a vacation flashback in Pluribus\u2018 \u201cGrenade,\u201d written and directed by Gordon Smith.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tApple TV<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Breaking Bad timeline became muddled due to mistakes on Walt and Skyler\u2019s divorce papers, as well as a few other details. But Better Call Saul had a much firmer handle on the when of it all. With Pluribus, the countdown and the countup are certainly a cool way to signify the before times and the after times. But was it also meant to keep you guys on top of your timeline in the most disciplined way yet?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tNo, I don\u2019t think so. But I hear you. I\u2019m sure we\u2019ve had to be a little bit fudgy with our timelines, but we were still pretty disciplined given how intricate the timelines were on the previous two shows. Breaking Bad had no conception of there being a prequel-sequel when it was being timed out, so we didn\u2019t need to know whether something was in 2008 or 2010.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBut Pluribus emerges much more from the big event. It\u2019s a big event that is about humanity becoming an entity that experiences an enforced synchronicity. The Others, the Joined, however you want to refer to them, they are all one. They are experiencing every moment in time as one. But Carol is not in sync with the Others. So keeping the clock in people\u2019s minds is about keeping tabs on where Carol is in relation to the event, and maybe it helps viewers figure out the time signature of the show.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere seems to be a united front in regard to not explaining the themes and subtext of the show. Theories have been floated involving AI, political division and religion. I\u2019m still attached to the idea that Vince is grappling with celebrity. I remember one of the Saul writers telling me about a time that his fame first registered with them in real life. It was during a walk to lunch, and some random person yelled, \u201cHey, Vince!\u201d from afar. Carol now lives that existence in the most extreme way. Anyway, are you willing to break ranks and shed any light on what Pluribus is ultimately saying?<\/p>\n

\n\t(Laughs.) What do you think it\u2019s saying?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tWell, let\u2019s drill down on one potential theme. Given the closing credits disclaimer about the show being made by humans \u2014\u00a0and Carol calling out Zosia and the Joined for stealing someone else\u2019s vodka trivia and generally being \u201cplagiarism machines\u201d \u2014 the AI commentary seems pretty apparent at this point. I don\u2019t think you\u2019re ever going to beat those allegations.<\/p>\n

\n\tI don\u2019t think we\u2019ll beat those allegations. But people were anxious in the early going of Breaking Bad to make it a one-to-one correspondence about the American healthcare system, which could not have been further from Vince\u2019s mind in terms of thematics. But it\u2019s there. It\u2019s a reading. So I\u2019m not going to say that anybody\u2019s reading of Pluribus is incorrect. Of course, because of the times that we live in, there\u2019s things about AI that resonate with how the Others operate.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBut there\u2019s also an incredible amount of political division, and there\u2019s a feeling that maybe things could be better if we were just all on the same page. But what gets lost in that?<\/p>\n

\n\tIndividuality.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tYeah. On both sides of the political divide, people feel that something has been lost in terms of being able to be of one mind as a nation and as a species. We can\u2019t agree on anything. You can say the simplest things right now, and someone will contradict you in ways that you just didn\u2019t think were possible. It\u2019s like we\u2019re not living in a shared reality. But the trick of Pluribus is that the Others are definitely living in a shared reality that Carol is not a part of, as her reality is very different from theirs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tSo there are themes that come to mind, but it\u2019s less rich to say, \u201cOh, this is a show about fill-in-the-blank.\u201d If I said that it\u2019s a metaphor about not using your phone, you don\u2019t need to watch the show. The show becomes useless. The show becomes meaningless. There are AI proponents that are going to watch the show, and they might feel attacked or they might feel supported. But for us to say, \u201cNo, it should just be this one-to-one correspondence,\u201d it limits both the storytelling and the availability of the show to ask questions that people are going to be interested in. This is such a conceptual show, and my hope is that it makes people think about and feel different things in different ways.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tRhea Seehorn as Carol Sturka in Pluribus.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tApple TV+<\/p>\n

\n\tDoes it strike a chord with you in any particularly unique way?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tI\u2019ve heard people talk about it as a show about addiction, and from my personal experience with addicts in my life, that harmonizes very strongly. There\u2019s that pain that is so individual within you that you have to drown it with something, and that\u2019s Carol. So the Others offer a look at what peace looks like, but it is a peace that is fraught. So I can\u2019t really say what it\u2019s about to me other than it\u2019s about Carol.<\/p>\n

\n\tI don\u2019t want it to ever collapse into a trend that\u2019s been in horror for a long time: \u201cThe monster is trauma,\u201d or, \u201cThe monster is grief.\u201d That really is a one-to-one correspondence that\u2019s being worked out, and while some really great horror has emerged from it, I always feel like that works well for movies but not as well for TV.<\/p>\n

\n\tCarol decides to take her Xanax with vodka instead of water. To what degree was she trying to harm herself here?<\/p>\n

\n\tI don\u2019t think she was trying to harm herself. What it says to me is that it\u2019s not the first time she\u2019s done that. She knows exactly the dose. To me, it says, \u201cYeah, I need something stronger.\u201d It\u2019s dangerous, and no one should do that. But she\u2019s done it before, and she\u2019ll probably do it again. If it\u2019s a cry for help, it\u2019s a cry for help that shows how far this person has gone. We saw that she has a breathalyzer car ignition, and that\u2019s not something a casual drinker would have.<\/p>\n

\n\tCarol\u2019s emotions are already an existential threat to the Joined, so was there a lot of debate about how to justify them giving her additional weapons?<\/p>\n

\n\tYeah, there was a lot of conversation about figuring out what they would do. Some of the best scenes in all of our shows emerge because there is a lively debate in the room about an issue and a question emerges from it. People then take different sides, and you come to a conclusion. So that particular scene really came from us going, \u201cWhat would they do for her?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe joke that I constantly make in the room is a joke with a core of truth. The Others are basically saying, \u201cI would do anything for love, but I won\u2019t do that.\u201d And so the question is, \u201cWhat is the \u2018that\u2019 they won\u2019t do?\u201d A lot of the course of the first season is discovering what they will and won\u2019t do, and it\u2019s even more about what they won\u2019t do. I take them at their word that they will give her an atom bomb or a bazooka.<\/p>\n

\n\tThey love her, and they\u2019re not scared. They have peace. They\u2019re not faced with loss in the same way. Everybody who joins, their memories, their thoughts are preserved. So what does it matter if you die in that circumstance? What is the meaning of death in that circumstance? They don\u2019t have the same corporeal fear that is very natural to the rest of us because we are fragile and we are not eternal. We do not have some sense of self that\u2019s preserved.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tSo we pushed on the question of whether they\u2019d give her these weapons, and they would. They\u2019re so indulgent, and they really want to see Carol happy. Of course, to them, the ultimate happiness would be Carol joining them. But until they can figure out how to do that, they\u2019ll give her anything. They\u2019ll do what they can. But the question is still going to be, \u201cWhere are the lines?\u201d What is the \u201cthat\u201d in \u201cI would do anything for love, but I won\u2019t do that\u201d?<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tMiriam Shor\u2019s Helen Umstead and Rhea Seehorn\u2019s Carol Sturka talk moments before the Joining in Pluribus\u2018 series premiere, \u201cWe Is Us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tApple TV<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Joining took nearly 900 million lives including Carol\u2019s wife, Helen (Miriam Shor), and that immediately put the Joined in a big hole in terms of audience sympathy. Did you partially weaponize Carol\u2019s emotions and put blood on her hands so that the Joined weren\u2019t forever written off as villains?<\/p>\n

\n\tTo some degree, yeah. But Carol\u2019s culpability is for people to decide. If she yells at people and the result is them dying, how culpable is she for that? She didn\u2019t join them and make them susceptible to this horrible disharmonious shaking. But she did it, and she did it twice after she knew that doing it would cause some shaking. So the question of Carol\u2019s culpability and guilt is an open question for the show.<\/p>\n

\n\tThis was also not the Joined\u2019s plan. They really wanted to roll the Joining out quietly. The planes that dusted the skies in episode one caused the Joining in Albuquerque, and they did that late at night. They were hoping for everyone to be asleep. They were hoping to get as many people as possible while they were in their beds at home so that they weren\u2019t injured. They really did want things to go safely and smoothly. But they have a biological imperative that they have to adhere to, and that meant that nearly a billion people died.<\/p>\n

\n\tYes, the deaths of innocent people are going to make us go, \u201cWow, these people are horrible.\u201d So we had to put our thumb on the other side of the scale and say, \u201cWell, how can they be mustache-twirling bad guys, but not be mustache-twirling bad guys?\u201d At this point in the show, they\u2019re certainly Carol\u2019s adversary, but it\u2019d be less interesting if we were just waiting for them to put the brain slug into her ear or slip something into her skin. That\u2019s where everyone\u2019s head is going to go. Like Carol says, we\u2019ve all seen this movie, so the challenge for us is to show you the movie you haven\u2019t seen.<\/p>\n

\n\tRhea\u2019s line of \u201cChinga tu madre, cabr\u00f3n!\u201d is one of the funniest deliveries of her career, and it\u2019s a perfect example of Carol\u2019s fury. I remember saying to you a couple of months ago that Pluribus is The Leftovers meets Sense8. That comp was partially because Carol has a righteous anger that\u2019s reminiscent of Carrie Coon\u2019s Nora Durst, and they both lost their loved ones during transitional events. So was Nora Durst ever a reference point for Carol?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tRhea and Carrie Coon are both stellar actors as well. It\u2019s hard to find better. But we did talk about The Leftovers. Some people were more familiar with the show than others. But I don\u2019t think it was necessarily that Carrie\u2019s character came up, so much as the various features of that show that feel reminiscent in a certain way. So I would hope that Leftovers fans watch this and feel a similarity, if not a sameness. I do think Pluribus is hoping to chart a slightly different course, but we have discussed things about The Leftovers. It\u2019s a great show, and there\u2019s a lot of stuff that we love from it.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tKarolina Wydra\u2019s Zosia in Pluribus\u2019 \u201cGrenade,\u201d written and directed by Gordon Smith.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tApple TV<\/p>\n

\n\tYour fondness for cats has been established in your previous work. When you wrote that a couple of the non-English-speaking Old-Schoolers are cat lovers, did Vince roll his eyes at your cat PR?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t(Laughs.) Vince is well aware that I have a lot of cat love. The specifics of the remaining Old-Schoolers that are laid out in episode three, we didn\u2019t break any of that in the room. Before I wrote my draft, Vince was just like, \u201cLet\u2019s make them geographically diverse and distinct from the people that we\u2019ve established in episode two.\u201d So I was trying to come up with names and places and things like that, and in my first draft that Vince read, I put in one that said, \u201cHe speaks Turkish and loves cats.\u201d And Vince liked it so much that he added, \u201cHe also loves cats,\u201d to another character. So Vince definitely embraced it. He was like, \u201cIf we\u2019re going to make the joke, let\u2019s really make the joke.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tI thought my days of hunting for Better Call Saul and Breaking Bad \u00a0Easter eggs were finally over, but you just won\u2019t let me rest. You inserted a FionaCom envelope that established Helen\u2019s last name of Umstead and their street name of 1208 CIelo Rosado Court. FionaCom is a phone company that was invented on Saul in honor of Peter Gould\u2019s daughter.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tCorrect.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile a Los Pollos Hermanos truck in the Sprouts parking lot would\u2019ve gone too far, was there ever a discussion about tucking a Regalo Helado truck in there?<\/p>\n

\n\tIt would\u2019ve been fun. Obviously, FionaCom is a slight crossover \u2026<\/p>\n

\n\tWayfarer is a much bigger one.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tIt is. But we don\u2019t want to necessarily be so literal that people think Breaking Bad starts on the other side of this. We don\u2019t want a crossover that makes it feel like these are two universes that are supposed to shine light on each other. It\u2019s more, \u201cHey, isn\u2019t this fun to see?\u201d We have to acknowledge that we\u2019re shooting in Albuquerque, and so there\u2019s images that are going to cross over. But they are just little winks and nods to the fans that say, \u201cWe see you. We know you\u2019re going to be looking for some of this stuff, and hopefully you\u2019ll be delighted by it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBreaking Bad had X-Files Easter eggs, but we weren\u2019t trying to say, \u201cHey, this is an X-Files episode, and something weird is going to happen.\u201d Don Eladio\u2019s name came from Raymond Cruz\u2019s X-Files character, Eladio. Craddock Marine Bank from Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul started on X-Files, but we were just saying, \u201cHey, we love The X-Files. Wouldn\u2019t it be cool to reference Vince\u2019s long history with that show?\u201d So that\u2019s how those things play to me on Pluribus, but I could be wrong. Maybe we\u2019ll discover that this is a prequel, but I would be surprised.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tRhea Seehorn\u2019s Carol Sturka takes a Wayfarer flight on Pluribus\u2018 \u201cGrenade,\u201d written and directed by Gordon Smith.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tApple TV+<\/p>\n

\n\tThere\u2019s an incredible Easter Egg coming up that is loosely tied to Bad and Saul\u2018s Lydia Rodarte-Quayle, and I\u2019m not saying Laura Fraser shows up or that it\u2019s something obvious like Stevia. Only a certain type of viewer will catch it. But I do want to use this as a shameless excuse to ask you about Lydia.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tSure.<\/p>\n

\n\tShe was going to appear on the final season of Saul until COVID upended that plan. When she met Walt at the Grove in Breaking Bad\u2019s \u201cGliding Over All,\u201d she mentioned that she had pitched the Czech Republic distribution plan to Gus before Walt killed him. Would we have seen her propose that same arrangement to Gus on Saul?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tI honestly don\u2019t know. Maybe. We had so many other issues. We had so many chickens coming home to roost. We had pitches for a lot of characters. We were like, \u201cOh, wouldn\u2019t it be fun to see this person and this person?\u201d We got in as many as we could, as many that had a light to shine on the current story. So I honestly don\u2019t remember if we had a specific plan [for Lydia], but since we know what the pitch is from Breaking Bad, what would be the new light we can shed? We love to show scenes that were referenced elsewhere in dialogue, but it\u2019s only on the condition that you learn something new about how an event went down. If it\u2019s just visualizing it, then it\u2019s usually not worth doing. But it\u2019s worth doing if it\u2019s something where you go, \u201cOh, that<\/a> is why Saul would be worried about Lalo on Breaking Bad.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t***
Pluribus is currently streaming new episodes every Friday on Apple TV. Read THR\u2019s previous interviews with creator Vince Gilligan<\/a> and stars Rhea Seehorn<\/a> and Karolina Wydra<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"[This story contains spoilers from Pluribus episode three, \u201cGrenade.\u201d] Vince Gilligan hasn\u2019t just created success stories and second…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":138657,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[75229,74469,146,86040,85,46,68266,68263,75230],"class_list":{"0":"post-138656","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-better-call-saul","9":"tag-breaking-bad","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-gordon-smith","12":"tag-il","13":"tag-israel","14":"tag-pluribus","15":"tag-rhea-seehorn","16":"tag-vince-gilligan"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=138656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138656\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/138657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=138656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=138656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=138656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}