Plur1bus: Apple TV+'s indictment of Mormonism

[Whiskey]

(mild spoilers)

Episode 6 has some theological heft to it for sure. Mr. Diabaté has found a casino and is living the life every Mormon man assumes to be rightfully his own. A life of opulence and personal importance. The life of a God, or a prince of the Most High. And don't let the "fakeness" lessen the fantasy, that may be the most realistic part. Mormon men in leadership are not turned off by the reality that members are playing roles and that Mormon life is "fake". A Mormon leader never wonders if a particular member really loves them or thinks they are the greatest, they are concerned if that member acts like they love him and thinks he's the greatest. I've said before that lying is essential to authoritarianism: a subject who advocates for the leader because the leader did a good job may not be loyal. A real disciple tells obvious lies in service of the leader. The fakeness of Mormon life is the mark of duty and loyalty.

(heavy spoiler this paragraph only)
Mr. Diabaté of the casino is much like Brigham Young of the state of Deseret. Mr. Diabaté trains the unity to serve his purposes much like Brigham Young trains the saints to serve his own. The contradiction between authoritarianism and a social trinity is on full display. The most powerful and uncomfortable moment of the show happens within the first few minutes. Mr. Diabaté enjoys a bath much like Dan's favorite actor Hugh Grant did in the movie Sirens, or as Brigham Young did with his many wives of the Deseret colony -- with some of his wives, that is. When an older woman happens by the others, the natural instinct of the Unity is for her to join in. Nope! Can you image one of Brigham's wives closer to his age getting the same attention as the youngest one? The first few minutes of this episode unravels the Plan of Salvation unlike any other fifteen minutes of television ever produced. There's so much more here such as the "terrible secret" of the orderly town, but I'll leave it here for now.

Meanwhile, Carol's obstacle seems to be her own toxic personality. She's the reimagined Jesus, the uncharismatic leader who can't figure how to get her 12 disciples in line to do the work. There will be some flirtation with deconstruction I would think, because the show has framed a perfect binary opposition between individualism and socialism, where Carol represents everything that is wrong with individualism. In order to win, she will likely need to be more like the Unity. Who among the Twelve will be her counselors and make for the first presidency and object lesson of social trinitarianism? Carol like the father embodies the rule of law, will her favored disciples reflect the qualities of Jesus and the Holy Ghost? I suppose we shall see.

Well. This is interesting. I watched it. Damn sure did not read anything into it about Brigham Young. Hive mind and empty douchebaggery for sure. The douchebaggery/imitation is core to this whole thing. The casino royale dude is a douchebag with douchebags. Looking forward to seeing how it plays out.

[Everybody Wang Chung]

(mild spoilers)

Episode 6 has some theological heft to it for sure. Mr. Diabaté has found a casino and is living the life every Mormon man assumes to be rightfully his own. A life of opulence and personal importance. The life of a God, or a prince of the Most High. And don't let the "fakeness" lessen the fantasy, that may be the most realistic part. Mormon men in leadership are not turned off by the reality that members are playing roles and that Mormon life is "fake". A Mormon leader never wonders if a particular member really loves them or thinks they are the greatest, they are concerned if that member acts like they love him and thinks he's the greatest. I've said before that lying is essential to authoritarianism: a subject who advocates for the leader because the leader did a good job may not be loyal. A real disciple tells obvious lies in service of the leader. The fakeness of Mormon life is the mark of duty and loyalty.

(heavy spoiler this paragraph only)
Mr. Diabaté of the casino is much like Brigham Young of the state of Deseret. Mr. Diabaté trains the unity to serve his purposes much like Brigham Young trains the saints to serve his own. The contradiction between authoritarianism and a social trinity is on full display. The most powerful and uncomfortable moment of the show happens within the first few minutes. Mr. Diabaté enjoys a bath much like Dan's favorite actor Hugh Grant did in the movie Sirens, or as Brigham Young did with his many wives of the Deseret colony -- with some of his wives, that is. When an older woman happens by the others, the natural instinct of the Unity is for her to join in. Nope! Can you image one of Brigham's wives closer to his age getting the same attention as the youngest one? The first few minutes of this episode unravels the Plan of Salvation unlike any other fifteen minutes of television ever produced. There's so much more here such as the "terrible secret" of the orderly town, but I'll leave it here for now.

Meanwhile, Carol's obstacle seems to be her own toxic personality. She's the reimagined Jesus, the uncharismatic leader who can't figure how to get her 12 disciples in line to do the work. There will be some flirtation with deconstruction I would think, because the show has framed a perfect binary opposition between individualism and socialism, where Carol represents everything that is wrong with individualism. In order to win, she will likely need to be more like the Unity. Who among the Twelve will be her counselors and make for the first presidency and object lesson of social trinitarianism? Carol like the father embodies the rule of law, will her favored disciples reflect the qualities of Jesus and the Holy Ghost? I suppose we shall see.

Excellent summary. Episode 6 was the best yet. Can't wait to see how this is going to end.

[Whiskey]

Spoiler alert:

I think this was the sixth episode. Not sure. If it wasn't called Boring as crap, they should rename it. Like the previous episodes, it was boring as crap.

I am losing hope for Plur1bus. That casino and human parts episode gave me hope. I am losing interest with this one. Please tell me there is a Severance turn coming soon.

[Equality]

Spoiler alert:

I think this was the sixth episode. Not sure. If it wasn't called Boring as crap, they should rename it. Like the previous episodes, it was boring as crap.

I am losing hope for Plur1bus. That casino and human parts episode gave me hope. I am losing interest with this one. Please tell me there is a Severance turn coming soon.

What, you don't like literally* watching paint dry?

*Yes, literal literally not figurative literally. (She could have spent ten seconds leaving a message on the phone and accomplished the same thing she did with the paint).

To borrow from Simon Cowell: that was the most self-indulgent hour of TV I have seen in a long time.

The Panamanian bed-of-nails trees were kind of cool, but you could literally skip all but the last 15 seconds of this week's episode and not miss a single plot development.

[Whiskey]

Spoiler alert:

I think this was the sixth episode. Not sure. If it wasn't called Boring as crap, they should rename it. Like the previous episodes, it was boring as crap.

I am losing hope for Plur1bus. That casino and human parts episode gave me hope. I am losing interest with this one. Please tell me there is a Severance turn coming soon.

What, you don't like literally* watching paint dry?

*Yes, literal literally not figurative literally. (She could have spent ten seconds leaving a message on the phone and accomplished the same thing she did with the paint).

To borrow from Simon Cowell: that was the most self-indulgent hour of TV I have seen in a long time.

The Panamanian bed-of-nails trees were kind of cool, but you could literally skip all but the last 15 seconds of this week's episode and not miss a single plot development.

Shoulda called this dumb show 1shtar.

[Gadianton]

(mild spoilers)

I doubt Pluribus will surpass the depth of LDS theology found in episode seven, "The Gap". I may need to watch this one again because I'm sure I missed a lot. As we move into Christmas, it's not surprising the show would ask the very Mormon question, where did the greatest suffering of Jesus take place, on the cross or in the Garden of Gethsemane?

Prepare to have your mind blown if you haven't watched this emotive episode yet, because Manousos's journey explores the former while Carol's journey explores the latter. The writers of this show could put the entire correlation committee out of work. Manouso's theme of isolation and physical suffering explores the stoic attributes of Jesus, the self-reliant Jesus who fasted for forty days and forty nights while Satan tempts him -- why not turn these stones into bread? At every turn, Manousos rejects the temptations of the devil to ease his burden and makes it clear he has no price. This journey is juxtaposed with Diabaté's full embrace of temptation in episode six. Manouso is crossing South America, however, and things get bad. (spoiler) Crucifixion by a thorny tree followed by the baptism of fire mark the crescendo of his suffering (\spoiler). Like Jesus, he cries out in pain before he succumbs.

Carol's theme is psychological. She takes a hint from Diabaté and goes on a hedonistic adventure, but it's all alone. She doesn't have the supporting characters like Diabaté had that make it so fun. And it's forced, it's not her. This is Carol doing all these selfish things that more superficial people would do "at the end of the world". I think this was a creative way for the writers to represent Carol taking on the sins of the world in the Garden -- not suffering punishment for the sins, but showing how the sins themselves are the punishment. She experiences the apex of selfish loneliness here.

So who suffered more, Manousos or Carol? That's what episode seven was all about, and I don't think there's an easy answer.

[drumdude]

Breaking bad and better call Saul were all about showing plans as they are methodically laid out. You weren’t just told how Saul came up with his cell phone business, you watched him buy the phones and physically stack them in his store.

I’ll admit the last couple episodes have been a bit extreme. But it fits in line with that style. I’m still hoping for a big pay off from all of this.

[canpakes]

I’ll admit the last couple episodes have been a bit extreme. But it fits in line with that style. I’m still hoping for a big pay off from all of this.

To be fair to the pacing, Carol’s revelation at the end of E7 is a more natural and believable development for her character when given the amount of time in the lead up that the show gave it.

[Gadianton]

I finally took the time to view episode 8. It is slow. It does fill in the main arc a bit, but mainly it explores Carol trying to make peace with the unity, through Zosia, of course. It does comment on the social trinity. However, it felt like an acknowledgment that the idea of a social trinity doesn't make sense, and getting in front of that by throwing out certain objections so that audience members don't think that they're thinking of something that the writers hadn't thought about. To make it worse, if Zosia is disconnecting somewhat, then she's not a totally reliable source of information, and so her reporting about what it's like to be either the unity or Zosia may not be accurate, so I don't want to think much about it. On the other hand, a certain plot revelation does have a parallel to the Mormon idea of turning the universe into gray goo.

The most dramatic and important part of this episode gets revealed at around the 15-16 minute mark when Carol continues writing her notes on her whiteboard. If this was seen in previous episodes, I totally missed it. The whiteboard is encased in cabinetry, with heavy sliding doors that cover it. The doors appear to be hardwood, perhaps mahogany, and crafted into a giant starburst design. Not only is this really cool, but it is significant as in the sci-fi series Colony, when Will's family moves into a house later in the show in an occupied zone, their front doors are a walnut starburst. Other than these two shows, I've never seen such large scale starbursts. They totally capture the isolation of an alien occupation.

[Whiskey]

Too damn slow to matter. I am this close to giving up.