TV

The sixth episode of Apple TV+’s Pluribus dropped this week. If you haven’t heard of the new series, you may want to check in. It starts like the movie Contact, has elements of 3 Body Problem (including the clock), and turns into The Last Man on Earth, though in this case its an angry, lone woman dealing with Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Interested? Oh yeah, it comes from Vince Gilligan, the same guy who also gave us on Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. It also stars Rhea Seehorn from Better Call Saul.

It all starts when a radio signal from a civilization about 600 light-years away is intercepted by Earth. This signal contains a RNA sequence. Of course, the dumb Earthlings find it necessary to recreate this sequence, lose control of the experiment (alla Jurassic Park), and thereby release a virus that turns the human population into the Borg. The rest of the story is how one woman and twelve other unaffected humans make their way in this new world.

It’s an odd start to a very odd show, but it is fun and thought-provoking in its own way. It also doesn’t have simple story lines where the everyone agrees there is a problem with the new human state, or at least not all of the 13 remaining people agree. We know the collective mind seems to work in nature, be it bees or ants, so it is not impossible.

It is too early to know whether this show has a soft landing or even a future, but it’s the type of show, like Severance, that is sure to be discussed at the virtual office water cooler.

Okay, that’s enough references to other shows and movies. I counted eight, but I can also say that Pluribus is unique enough that none of those references really does it any justice.

While I am very happy with the sci-fi shows from this past summer, I would be happy to see the return Seth MacFarlane’s The Orville, if only rumors were true. Yes, the series seemed to start as a spoof of Star Trek, but it found its own unique footing and grew on me over time. Hence, I was not happy to see it end in 2022 after 3 seasons and 36 episodes.

You may remember back in January 2024 when MacFarlane told The Wrap somewhat cryptically:

All I can tell you is that there is no official death certificate for The Orville. It is still with us. I can’t go any further than that at the moment. There are too many factors.

And then this time last year, some sites, such as The Cinemaholic, were reporting that filming for season four was to start in January 2025.

While the filming rumor was false, as recently as August of this year Seth MacFarlane kept rumors alive when he told Ted Danson that he still plans to do a season four, or that’s how the media reported it. Actually, if you listen to the interview, what he said was, “We still have yet to do a season four.” This is a correct statement, but not really a statement of intent.

Can we hang our hats on the word “yet” and start to assume a fourth season? That would not be a safe bet. Many artists feel their work deserves more running time and will not let go, if only for the sake of the fans.

So I am deciding to focus on the new sci-fi shows from the last 12 months that really are returning or seem to have a strong shot at another season, which includes:

• Dune: Prophesy – already renewed
• Murderbot – already renewed
• Alien: Earth – still up in the air, but an announcement should be made this month

That said, I am not giving up on the return of The Orville.

I already miss the weekly episodes of Alien: Earth. The acting, story line, and overall energy far surpassed anything I expected going into this series. And while it was gory in the typical Alien way, it had more to say than some of the earlier movies. Fortunately, with a cliff-hanger like the last episode, we still have plenty more story to come in a second season.

[Spoiler Alert: Do not read any further if you have yet to complete the first season.]

Will there be a second season? I certainly hope so, though showrunner Noah Hawley did not specifically confirm it in a recent interview:

So for me, I never hedged my bets. This is not a closed-ended season. This chapter is closed, but Yutani troops are landing. The balance of power has shifted. These children have no idea what’s coming. The last line of, ‘Now we rule’ is triumphant and uplifting. But cut to 10 minutes later, what is going to be happening? So I like that it has that real-time urgency to it.”

The series could not have been more timely as the daily news discusses the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in our future. Fortunately, we have yet to face a battle between (1) Synths (fully artificial beings with AI), (2) Cyborgs (biological humans enhanced with technology), and (3) Hybrids (synthetic bodies containing uploaded human consciousness).

Even so, we have plenty of corporate weirdos (some role-playing with Roman fashions) who can still do plenty of damage. Our growing dependence on social media, crypto-currency, and other forms of electronic assets and infrastructure (slowly soaking up more and more of our energy supply) has primed us for some real and permanent damage in the wrong hands.

While the theme running through the series was Peter Pan, I think the larger theme was Frankenstein’s monster learning the truth about his creation and his future (or “her” in this case). It did not end well for the monster, and the new kid-monsters in Alien: Earth are unlikely to find a more receptive world.

We can only hope that AI holds off on its reform of the world as we know it until after the last season of Alien: Earth drops.