Carlos-Manuel Vesga

In Pluribus (2025), Carlos-Manuel Vesga has little dialogue to explain Manousos Oviedo, so the physical performance has to do much of the work. We can follow his thinking without being talked through it. We were unsettled by his near-silence, because it offers so little reassurance in a series built around compulsory happiness. It is a persuasive performance, and a good reason to take an interest in an actor whose work has so often involved playing antagonists.

The route here began in Colombian telenovelas around 2000, with Samuel Medina Uribe in Amor sincero (2010) providing the breakthrough. Antagonist parts became a recurring assignment during the 2010s, while Loving Pablo (2017) brought wider international visibility. The Hijacking of Flight 601 (2024) continued both the villain casting and the move towards an audience beyond Colombia. We would be careful about calling this a limitation in his acting: repeated casting tells us what an actor is being asked to do.

His own description of acting helps make sense of that ease with physical work: “The secret to acting is to be playful. To go back to when you were a kid and you were playing pirates with your friends.” It is a useful way of thinking about a part with few words, where commitment to an action matters more than explaining it. In Pluribus, that commitment gives the character an inner life without requiring a running account of it.

Vince Gilligan's series gives us enough to recommend despite the slow pace. Rhea Seehorn gives its questions the stubborn human centre we admired, while Vesga's physical work rewards close attention. There are stretches when the pleasure of thinking things through wears off, however, and an actor's restraint cannot make them shorter. Start with Pluribus, but do not expect it to hurry.