benevolent cryptid

[image: a digital illustration of Carol Sturka from Pluribus cradling a baby goat in her arms. A blue, partly-cloudy sky with a radiating sun like a halo is behind them.]

thinking about the significance of “mi mamá es una cabrona” when it comes to Manousos and how he deals with Carol. No wonder he’s funny now. No wonder he doesn’t become angry or cut Carol off like the other survivors. He must be so relieved, so overjoyed, to show up in Albuquerque New Mexico after months of blank, dim, evil, smiling, acquiescent faces to be confronted with someone he’s known his entire life. He only gets angry at Carol when she’s not being a bitch. He’s a bitch. He was raised by a bitch. He travelled over 8000 miles and found another bitch. They’re going to save the world.

the entire kusimayu scene was devastating but to me the worst part was that by Joining she not only lost her individuality but her culture died with her. immediately the hivemind stopped chanting and singing and speaking the quechuan language and rolled up their blankets and packed up their things and walked away. the animals were set free and the goat that kusimayu had been cradling so lovingly just minutes earlier chased after the hivemind wearing kusimayu's body and bleated for attention and love and got none because there is no one left to care specifically enough to give it.

i feel like some people are hesitant to view carol's isolation as the genuinely traumatic event that it is. every little comment about all the things she does afterward being stupid or out of character can be explained by the fact that this experience has like. fundamentally altered the way her brain processes things, and how she makes decisions. it has installed a fear in her of being alone so deep she will do almost anything to avoid it. this isn't something she can just shake off, or move on from, it'll follow her for the rest of her life i think. but still we see her try to fight it ("even if you all leave me again..."), still wanting to do the right thing. of course she falters though. she's only human

extremely eerie and unsettling how the hive framed the joining as a ritualistic process, even if it was at kusimayu’s request, and then abruptly stopped singing the moment she joined. that was the very last instance of her culture existing on earth and they couldn’t even finish the song

the entire kusimayu scene was devastating but to me the worst part was that by Joining she not only lost her individuality but her culture died with her. immediately the hivemind stopped chanting and singing and speaking the quechuan language and rolled up their blankets and packed up their things and walked away. the animals were set free and the goat that kusimayu had been cradling so lovingly just minutes earlier chased after the hivemind wearing kusimayu's body and bleated for attention and love and got none because there is no one left to care specifically enough to give it.