The 'Breaking Bad' Creator Reveals He Has a Plan for How His Sci-Fi Series Might Finish... Currently.
Vince Gilligan did not foresee that the Apple TV+ show would become a breakout success. “I am so grateful to the audience,” he states. “It was unexpected the show being as passionately debated as it is, and it makes me overjoyed.”
With the first season of the hit series wrapping up—and Season 2 already in development—the writers' room opened up about the viewer reception and whether it will shape the future direction of Pluribus.
On the Tremendous Viewer Reception
It would be easy to get distracted by the rampant praise and audience predictions about Pluribus. He is doing his best to ignore the noise.
“It's like being constantly eating your favorite dessert and being laughing uncontrollably,” he explains. “It's the greatest thing, but I hear about it anecdotally, and that's on purpose. I have never searched for my own name online, nor do I ever intend to. Not because I don't care. It's a bottomless pit I know I would fall into and then I'd be living in squalor from the hardware store and I'd rarely emerge from my living room.”
Regardless of his concerted efforts, there’s it's impossible to ignore the extremely enthusiastic response to the series. The best he and his team can do is to acknowledge it humbly and try not to let it alter the course of the show.
“It is not our goal to adjust our writing,” says co-executive producer Alison Tatlock. “Our storytelling is not impacted by audience chatter.”
“Better to keep our noses to the grindstone,” he chimes in.
A Pressing Query: Will Vince Gilligan Have a Plan for the Ending of Pluribus?
Given that the writers are not listening by audience theories, does that mean they have already decided how Pluribus will ultimately end? The answer is yes… with some caveats.
“We have some compelling concepts about how the story could conclude,” Gilligan says. “however, we remain prepared to discard a decent plan for a more brilliant plan. This approach has served us in well on Better Call Saul and on Breaking Bad even before that. We throw stuff out when we find a more perfect path and I suspect we'll be doing that.”
Alternatively, if plans fall through, executive producer Gordon Smith has a pretty funny idea to serve as a last resort.
“I constantly suggest that everything takes place within a snow globe, and that we'll zoom out in the finale and the characters are inside it,” he says humorously, “but no one is buying it.”
Then again, why not reference the iconic TV endings?
“I want Carol to wake up in bed with Bob Newhart there,” Gilligan says with a smile.
Pluribus can be watched on the streaming service.
