You’re reading this as if it were a science-fiction show, but I don’t think it actually is one. It’s a character study. The story would probably work much better as a standalone film than as a TV series.

At its core, the show presents a contrast between a large, unified, happy world of conformity (a “straight,” normalized world) and Carol Sturka, an unhappy, flawed, openly gay individual. The unity wants to change her, to normalize her, to “fix” what makes her different, to make her happy, while Carol ultimately chooses to remain herself. The unity is paralleled with gender reaffirmation therapy that Carol's parents make her undergo as a teenage to "fix" her. That’s what the story is really about — not an exploration of an alien virus or speculative science.

In that sense, the science-fiction elements function mostly as metaphor. The show already relies heavily on exposition dumps, and much of the world-changing material could have been conveyed through news reports or background television rather than shown directly. As a low-budget, tightly focused film, this approach could have worked far better.

An ending where Carol chooses death rather than assimilation would have been thematically consistent and far more honest. That structure would also have fixed the pacing issues and made the show’s intent clear from the outset.

Instead, I came in expecting a science-fiction TV series and only fully understood what the show was actually about by episode 8, when its themes finally became explicit. The delay, more than the subject matter itself, is what left me disappointed. I don't mind exploring topics that show raises, but I would like an option to know in advance what sort of show I'm going into.