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Khane

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who do you think is doing the spreading of this aersolized virus in this hypothetical of yours?

wait aren't you the guy who didn't pay attention to anything that happened and wondered how they virus even started?

remember just because you dont understand something doesn't make it dumb, it makes you dumb.

They could do both? In fact, they did do both.

Its pretty hard to write a story where an alien race can get another planetary species to infect themselves but only in one way and only aggressively at first, but then theyre totes super nice and have it actually make sense, logically
 
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Khane

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How would they know they need a human to receive it? How would they know it's a "virus" at all, necessarily? Maybe they were just blastin' shit into space, humans received it, interpreted that as pertaining to nucleobases, and essentially infected themselves.

Sure, yeah. What are we even discussing then?
 

Juvarisx

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Was that signal that Paraguay guy picked up the frequency the hive uses to communicate? I figured it was but I didn’t know if it was meant to be that or the signal sent to Earth
 

Grez

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Was that signal that Paraguay guy picked up the frequency the hive uses to communicate? I figured it was but I didn’t know if it was meant to be that or the signal sent to Earth
i dont think the hive needs to use electronics to communicate. At this point of time, I suspect the only people who are going to use electronic communication are the immunes. So its either the immunes (which is doubtful) or the signal.
 

Attog

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I'm late to this episode but had a good laugh when I found that Vince Gilligan appears to have anticipated the retardation of watchers concerned about caloric intake of the swarm and has headed it off at the pass.
 
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velk

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If it's a weaponized virus to eradicate sentient life, the different treatment between human slaves and every other organism tracks very well.

Them treating Carol and her 12 disciples different is of course not explained by that, unless they've got crossed wires between enslavement and starvation of sentient life and complete freedom for non-sentient life. Effectively treating her like non-sentient life while being somehow obliged to acquiese to her demands.

Sure it does - if it is a doomsday weapon designed by politically correct enlightened liberal sensibilities.

Sure, we are going to kill everyone, but there's no reason to be *rude* about it, everyone will be happy and get along, there'll be no violence, just a slow, happy, peaceful end, hell we are basically doing them a favor, they probably would have killed themselves in horrible ways anyway.
 

Kajiimagi

<Aristocrat╭ರ_•́>
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i really like how it only took 1 dinner w/ ppl
8 days serving her
and the nog couldn't even stand another night w/ her

rhea seahorn really is playing the annoying blue haired lez no one can stand

i just hope they keep it up, i don't want her to have any redemption
Vince Gilligan does anti-hero really well. Could happen
 

Sylas

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They could do both? In fact, they did do both.

Its pretty hard to write a story where an alien race can get another planetary species to infect themselves but only in one way and only aggressively at first, but then theyre totes super nice and have it actually make sense, logically
So I dont understand what you are saying. You think the virus is a hivemind that infects the targets, makes them work together to spread the contagion to every corner of the earth super secretly at first, and once "x" happens (some amount of time, or some percentage of infection rate?) The virus naturally mutates into a super lethal variety that kills all the hosts?

How do you know that it isn't already going to do that? It's just waiting til it achieves 100% infection rate before phase 2 triggers? And its best method of achieving 100% infection rate is to be super nice to all the unaffected so that they allow them to live with them, study them, ask for there help/genetic material to tailor the virus to them, etc? And if it was just time based, remember they spent 2 months secretly spreading the virus slowly person to person until they had a large enough host to initiate the aerosolized version and they only did that when they were threatened with extinction once the military learned about them. So if it is a ticking time bomb its dormant timeline is months or years anyway.

I dont see how the virus just being lethal is in anyway an improvement over the current virus as shown thus far.
 

Khane

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I don't *think* anything. I'm just curious about why this invasive species has been at odds with its own narrative. Like everyone else in this thread. And I'm just here as part of the conversation responding to people with my own curiosities.

This is a pretty good show.
 

Sylas

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Im not sure why you think its a species instead of a bioengineered weapon, and I dont understand why you think its at odds with itself. It seems to be pretty fucking effective at doing exactly what it was designed to do.
 

Khane

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Sorry, I meant to specifically say this suddenly sapient collective *thing* is at odds with itself depending on what stage of the lifecycle its in.

My apologies.
 

Kirun

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Sure, yeah. What are we even discussing then?
I just think people are getting ahead of themselves assuming we understand the aliens' motives. Nothing in the show has actually confirmed why they're doing this or whether a human host was even necessary, or whether the intention was a virus at all. Everyone keeps jumping to "they're saving us from ourselves" or "they're setting us up for extinction," but so far that's all speculation. The narrative hasn't established any concrete intent.

What's driving me nuts is that none of the characters seem remotely curious about this. Nobody is asking the obvious questions. The USDA guy throws out a couple of vague lines to Carol that amount to pseudo-explanations, and she just shrugs and goes, "Sure, that checks out," without pressing him further. It's hard to stay immersed in a story where the characters themselves don't seem interested in understanding the biggest mystery in front of them, other than Carol going hardcore, "I MUST REVERSE THIS!!!!!!!".
 

Khane

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I just think people are getting ahead of themselves assuming we understand the aliens' motives. Nothing in the show has actually confirmed why they're doing this or whether a human host was even necessary, or whether the intention was a virus at all. Everyone keeps jumping to "they're saving us from ourselves" or "they're setting us up for extinction," but so far that's all speculation. The narrative hasn't established any concrete intent.

What's driving me nuts is that none of the characters seem remotely curious about this. Nobody is asking the obvious questions. The USDA guy throws out a couple of vague lines to Carol that amount to pseudo-explanations, and she just shrugs and goes, "Sure, that checks out," without pressing him further. It's hard to stay immersed in a story where the characters themselves don't seem interested in understanding the biggest mystery in front of them, other than Carol going hardcore, "I MUST REVERSE THIS!!!!!!!".

This was actually part of my original point. This show is odd because we get basically no perspective from the antagonist. In fact, we dont even actually know, as the audience, if the writers intend for the invaders to be the antagonist. We are pretty sure, based on how we would feel ourselves, but we pretty much only get Carol's perspective with a few moments here and there of Creepo's or Paraguay's perspective.

Its different.
 

Sylas

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Again i have no idea what you are trying to say or why you think it is at odds with itself?

You asked why wasnt the virus immediately lethal or why it didn't turn people into cordycep zombies or whatever and you dont understand why its just a super nice hive mind and the answer to all of those questions are the same, because that is the only way the virus was ever going to escape containment and actually infect anyone, much less infect virtually everyone on earth, save 13 immunes. The virus is the most virulently successful infection in galatic history, and it still will, without fail, kill every single person it has infected.

not only that, it still has a strong chance to spread itself to the remaining 13 immunes, and at the very least leave behind a world that guarantees the extinction of its hosts. At this time only carol, french black guy, and Paraguay guy are the only ones "resisting" the hive and once the mass starvation starts those 3 wont even be able to reach each other much less rebuild humanity, they'll simple starve to death themselves. By being so helpful and friendly, the hive is keeping the "resistance" utterly dependent on the hive despite their "protests". Only Paraguay guy is actually independent of them and he was down to eating dog food by day 3.

The virus is batting one thousand here it doesn't need any improvement, and everything you suggested is a huge downgrade in effectively.
 

Pasteton

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You could easily have a bioengineered weapon that could kill off an entire planet. Given the level of tech on display here, there is no reason it couldn’t be something with a long incubation period before symptoms occur, or allow for it to spread worldwide before it self triggers a lethal change like releasing some cytotoxic proteins that result in sudden death. From a biological point of view it’s actually easier to consider the feasibility of something like this ; something 100x more contagious than measles, lethal as rabies, spreads while asymptomatic etc. the idea of a virus that can instantly takeover a brain(there needs to be some latency period for it to multiply or something at least , if we are trying to be realistic ) and somehow transmit signals across radio waves is of course silly.

I think the reason they didn’t go that route is that isn’t the narrative gilligan is trying to create , it’s a completely different show at that point. Call me out if I’m wrong later but I think he is uninterested in the origins of this thing, and I doubt he will ever explore that other than dropping a few vague /indirect hints. He seems much more focused on carols character and how she approaches this situation as opposed to the black dude and others
 
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