Gen X Just Found Its New TV Icon

Her name is Carol.

What would you do if everyone on the planet had been taken over by aliens except you, and you were left alone to do whatever you wanted in the comfort of your own home?

If you’re Carol Sturka, you wrap yourself in a blanket, sink into the couch, and watch The Golden Girls on DVD, like it’s 1996.

Carol is the lead character of Pluribus, the new sci-fi drama on Apple TV that’s occupying a 100 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

When we first meet her, she’s a wildly successful fantasy romance novelist who’s embarrassed about selling out and treats her book tours like a punishment. She’s smart. She’s sarcastic. She’s tough. She’s fiercely independent. She’s cynical to the core.

She also might be the most unmistakably Gen X character to show up on television in years, and I love her.

Played pitch-perfectly by Rhea Seehorn, 53, and dreamed up by showrunner Vince Gilligan (Breaking Bad), 58, Carol watches her world flip upside down when an alien virus sweeps across Earth and links everyone into a single hive mind. People stop saying “I.” They share the same thoughts, memories, and pain.

But unlike the flesh-eating zombies in The Last of Us or the cruel, true believers in The Handmaid’s Tale, Earth’s new population is blissful. They’re calm. They’re overly friendly and eager to please. They prefer to kill you with kindness.

For reasons we don’t fully understand yet, Carol is one of the few people on the planet who isn’t effected by the virus. Although this new collective clearly wants her to join the ranks, they don’t force matters. They do the opposite, accommodating her every need.

But here’s the Gen X part. Carol isn’t having any of it. She’s highly skeptical. She doesn’t want to be a follower with no original thoughts. She doesn’t want to live in their fantasy postcard world. She constantly tells them to fuck off, calls them brainwashed, and begs them to leave her alone.

And the poor snowflakes, who look a lot like Millennials, cannot handle the abuse. One sharp comment or a raised voice sends them spiraling into full-body meltdowns.

Reminds me of some people I’ve worked with!

A Welcome New Trend

I can’t help but notice that Carol’s arrival comes at a moment when streaming platforms are filling up with Gen X protagonists.

Keri Russell in The Diplomat. Jason Bateman and Jude Law in Black Rabbit. Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon in The Morning Show. Pedro Pascal in The Last of Us (RIP). Even Gen X icon Noah Wyle is back in the mix in The Pitt.

And this is not just me hallucinating. A USC Annenberg study of Netflix found that 44.4 percent of characters were “middle-aged.” Another industry study reported that 46 percent of male characters on broadcast and streaming shows were age 40 or older. Hopefully, Carol will inspire additional female protagonists.

More Gen Xers are being cast, not out of charity, but because Gen X is actually watching. We may be a smaller cohort, yet we show up in mighty numbers for the good stuff.

And Pluribus and Carol are good stuff. It’s a bit early to tell where all of this is going, but the show does seem to be a commentary on how out of place a Gen Xer can feel in a world obsessed with constant connection and dopamine hits, and the dangers of hive mind.

Here’s hoping Carol survives it. Something tells me she will continue to make us proud.