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This article contains\u00a0spoilers\u00a0<\/strong>for “Pluribus”\u00a0season 1, episode 4.<\/em><\/p>\n Vince Gilligan’s “Breaking Bad”\u00a0and “Better Call Saul”<\/a>\u00a0both introduced their breakout characters very early in the game. Aaron Paul’s Jesse Pinkman was supposed to die in season 1 but became the true heart and soul of “Breaking Bad.”<\/a>\u00a0Meanwhile, Rhea Seehorn’s Kim Wexler stole scenes from the beginning of “Better Call Saul,”\u00a0which led to a fan-favorite status and, of course, Seehorn’s role as Carol Sturka on “Pluribus.”<\/p>\n Since “Pluribus”\u00a0focuses on the complete upheaval of humanity as we know it, such an early-game introduction wasn’t viable. On the contrary, the stellar first episode does introduce Carol’s charming PR manager-slash-partner Helen (Miriam Shor), only for her to die during the hive mind’s “Joining”\u00a0event. Since then, the show has brought in a fair few new characters, but none of them has really radiated the patented Vince Gilligan breakout character aura that was immediately there with both Jesse and Kim … that is, until now. “Pluribus”\u00a0season 1, episode 4 finally introduces us to Carlos Manuel Vesga’s Manousos, the mystery Paraguay guy who the hive mind has been unable to communicate with so far, and honestly? He’s great.<\/p>\n Manousos is a container unit company manager who’s dealt with the hive mind situation by putting his workplace into lockdown. He performs strange frequency experiments with the implied intention of figuring out the hive mind virus, and is so determined to survive on his own that he rather opens his customers’ containers (after writing an apologetic note, just in case) and eats dog food rather than accept gourmet meals from the infected. Intense, quirky and captivating, everything about Manousos already screams “Lovable Vince Gilligan Secondary Protagonist,” and I find myself unreasonably invested in whatever his arc turns out to be.<\/p>\n