The creator behind Breaking Bad has released a new sci-fi-series that is also receiving quite good reviews. However, the premise is quite similar to an episode of Rick and Morty that the creator wasn’t aware of beforehand.
Warning Spoilers: The following article contains spoilers about the premise of the series Pluribus.
What series is it about? Vince Gilligan is mainly known as a screenwriter, producer, and director of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. Since November 7th, his new sci-fi series Pluribus has been streaming on Apple TV, and the three episodes released so far have been well received. On Rotten Tomatoes, the series currently holds a critic score of 99% based on 99 reviews.
However, the premise is quite similar to an episode of Rick and Morty. In an interview with Marco Risch from the YouTube channel Nerdkultur, the author comments on this.
Fortunately, I apparently hadn’t seen this episode yet
What are the similarities between Rick and Morty and Pluribus? Pluribus features a post-apocalyptic setting, but different from what you know. An unknown entity causes the majority of people to become a hive mind (everyone belongs to a higher self) that consists only of joy, optimism, and peace. Individualism is gone, but a utopia is created.
In episode 3 of season 2 of Rick and Morty (Auto Erotic Assimilation
), Rick, Summer, and Morty travel to a planet controlled by a hive mind with which Rick has a quite personal and intimate relationship. Here, themes like peace without individualism are also touched upon.
Regarding the similarity of the two premises, Vince Gilligan mentioned in the interview with Marco from Nerdkultur (via YouTube) in response to the question if he has seen Rick and Morty, said the following:
It’s an excellent series, very funny and very clever […] You’re right, there is an episode of Rick and Morty, and we were already on the way to making Pluribus when I saw it one evening and said: Oh! Oh, damn. Oh no […] Fortunately, I apparently hadn’t seen this episode yet. […] And had I seen it when I had the idea, I probably would have done something different.
In this context, he also explains that there probably aren’t that many ideas in the world. He had a similar incident with his hit series Breaking Bad, as another series resembled that premise as well.
You can watch the entire video by Marco on Pluribus here:
With Breaking Bad, Gilligan had a similar incident
What happened with Breaking Bad? In the interview, Marco points out to Gilligan that the author had no idea about the series Weeds during the pitch for Breaking Bad, which came out 3 years before Breaking Bad. In the dramedy series, a widow starts selling marijuana to support her family, and over the course of the 8 seasons, which can currently be streamed on Netflix, she falls into an illegal spiral.
As huffpost.com reported in 2012, Gilligan was unaware of it before the pitch for Breaking Bad and probably would never have pitched the series if he had known about Weeds: If I had known weeks or even days before this meeting about Weeds, I wouldn’t have had the will to go on. I would have told myself (and I’ve said this many times): ‘Damn! All good ideas are already taken!’
When he asked his co-producers about Weeds, they supposedly just said: Great show. But your thing is something completely different. She deals with grass, your guy with crystal meth. Apples and oranges.
Breaking Bad is known as one of the most famous and beloved series of all time, loved by critics and viewers alike. Whether Pluribus can maintain its initial reviews will be seen in the coming weeks. A new episode is supposed to be released every Friday. Did you know there is an alternate ending to Breaking Bad? In the better ending of Breaking Bad, Walter White wakes up in a legendary sitcom
