Vince Gilligan never expected Pluribus to be a hit. “God bless the fans,” the creator of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul tells Polygon. “I did not foresee the show being as talked about as it is, and it makes me deliriously happy.”
With the first season of his hit science-fiction show coming to an end — and season 2 already in the works — Polygon caught up with Gilligan and his writers to discuss the fan response so far and whether it will have any influence on where Pluribus is headed next.
On the fan response to Pluribus
It would be easy to get distracted (or even influenced) by the rampant praise and fan speculation around Pluribus. Gilligan is doing his best to avoid both.
“It’s like being force fed hot fudge Sundays and being tickled to death,” he says. “It’s the greatest thing, but I hear about it anecdotally, and that’s on purpose. Never in my life have I Googled myself, nor do I ever intend to. Not because I don’t care, quite the opposite. It’s a rabbit hole I know I would disappear down and then I’d be pooping in a five gallon bucket from Home Depot and I’d never leave my living room.”
Despite Gilligan’s best intentions, there’s no way to avoid the overwhelmingly positive response to Pluribus. The best he and his team can do is take it in stride and try not to let that response influence the direction of the show.
“We don’t try to tailor anything,” says Alison Tatlock, a writer and executive producer on the show. “Our storytelling is not impacted by what people are saying,”
“Better to keep our noses to the grindstone,” Gilligan adds.
Does Vince Gilligan know how Pluribus will end?
So if Gilligan and his team aren’t being guided by the fan response, does that mean they already know how Pluribus will ultimately end. The answer is yes… sort of.
“We have some interesting ideas about where the show might end up, but we are always ready to throw out a good idea for a better idea,” Gilligan says. “That has held us in good stead on Better Call Saul and on Breaking Bad even before that. We throw stuff out when we get a better idea and I suspect we’ll be doing that.”
Then again, if all else fails, Gordon Smith (a director, writer, and executive producer on Pluribus) has a pretty idea to fall back on.
“I keep pitching that it’s all in a snow globe, and that we’ll pull back at the end and we’re in there,” Smith jokes, “but nobody’s taking me up on that.”
Then again, why mess with the classics?
“I want Carol to wake up in bed next to Bob Newhart,” Gilligan says with a smile.
Pluribus is streaming now on Apple TV.
