If the initials “HDP” now make your skin prickle, you’re in the right place. In Pluribus episode 6 (titled “HDP”), Carol (Rhea Seehorn) uncovers a deeply unsettling truth that only leads to more bewildering discoveries.
This installment is the most audacious since the show premiered, and there’s a lot to unpack. We took our questions directly to the show’s creator, Vince Gilligan, to get his take on the episode’s biggest revelations.
Warning: full spoilers for Pluribus episode 6 follow.
What happens in Pluribus episode 6?
To set the scene: at the end of Episode 5, the hivemind has turned its back on Carol, and she starts poking around to learn why they’re so fixated on milk. Her investigation leads her to a dairy processing plant where she finds an appalling secret — the hivemind has been converting human remains into a packaged dairy product.
It’s a chilling twist that evokes classic science-fiction horror — and even though it follows familiar genre beats, the reveal still lands, shocking both the cast and the audience. Seehorn admits she was stunned when she first read the script, but she also notes it’s a clever storytelling device that flips audience sympathy back toward Carol.
Just when viewers might be tempted to write off Carol as paranoid or high-strung, the discovery forces a reassessment: maybe her insistence on answers is exactly what’s needed.
Human Derived Protein — and John Cena
After recording a video to warn other survivors, Carol drives to Las Vegas to confront Koumba Diabaté (played by Samba Schutte). He’s oddly unruffled — not only has he already learned that the hivemind consumes human remains, but he also has a PSA-style clip explaining the logic behind it, narrated by a hivemind-controlled John Cena.
The hivemind’s product is given an unsettlingly clinical name: “Human Derived Protein.” As Gilligan explained, the writers imagined a society so committed to nonviolence that traditional agriculture and harvesting would clash with their ethics. If they refuse to harm living beings or force them, their food options narrow to preexisting, non-sentient sources — which, disturbingly, includes bodies that died by other causes.
Choosing Cena to deliver that explanation was deliberately unexpected. Gilligan said the contrast between Cena’s familiar persona and the bizarre, weighty justification made the sequence both disarming and darkly comic. According to Gilligan, Cena handled the dense, explanatory material with ease, giving the segment the precise tone the show needed.
Pluribus episodes 1–6 are streaming now on Apple TV. New episodes are released weekly on Fridays.
Source: Polygon
