Headscratchers / The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals

• How does the Hive Mind know the lyrics and choreography... to the title number of Workin' Boys? It's Hidgens's own original composition, and they don't assimilate him until after the number is over.
  • Hidgens says that the Infected all contain a special organ that's ultra-sensitive to sound and can detect it from miles away; the Infected show up at the compound in the first place because they were attracted by him singing "Showstoppin' Number" and instantly learned it as soon as they heard it.
  • That explains why the Infected showed up, yes, but how do they know Greg and Stu's lines, and the second chorus which is slightly different from the first? Hidgens has never shared the musical with anyone before, and nothing about the Assimilated suggests that they learn the entirety of any song that they hear, we're led to believe that most of the show's other songs are of the Hive's own composition (save "Cup of Roasted Coffee", which Nora or Zoey wrote pre-assimilation, but even then, the Hive invents a Dark Reprise of it, which can't be the case with "Workin' Boys" because they're in perfect sync with the non-assimilated Hidgens). I mean, I know the actual reason, it's because TGWDLM is a musical and "Show Stopping Number" is a musical number, but the whole point of it is that the entire musical aspect is diegetic, and they seem to break that rule at this particular moment.
  • The most likely answer is that they didn't. You'll notice that "Greg" and "Stu" don't actually have any original lyrics and just copy what Prof. Hidgens was singing earlier. As for the choreography, once again, they just copy what Hidgens is doing. Now, that would be pretty much impossible for a normal person to do, but infected people are shown to able to launch into heavily choreographed song-and-dance routines on the fly. As for the hive mind somehow knowing Greg and Stu's lines? The most likely answer is that it didn't, and that "Greg" and "Stu" were just ad-libbing. After all, the Hive mind is shown to be able to do VERY convincing impressions of other characters, as shown when it convinces Charlotte to untie one of the infected zombies by pretending to be Sam. Why wouldn't it be able to imitate "fictional" characters as well?
  • Also, a popular theory is that this whole musical is a retelling of events by the Hive after the world is fully assimilated. Of course the musical numbers are going to be a bit more streamlined than is realistic, for Plot Reasons.
  • Assimilation isn't all-or-nothing, as demonstrated by Paul doing a fair bit of singing and dancing before successfully finding the will to blow up the meteor. And early in the show, assimilation seems to begin by making people sing. Presumably, by the time Hidgens is near the end of his show-stopping number, the Hive has enough of a glimpse into his head to send in appropriately Greg-and-Stu-like zombies and finish the number with him.
• Just how does the apotheosis work? Charlotte's line, "Your own body is your front row seat, TO DIE!!!" and Alice's line, "I'm not your girl anymore. I overtook her body with an infectious spore." imply that infected humans have no control over their actions, and that the hive mind is just puppeteering their dead bodies. However during the "Let it Out" sequence, Paul has an entire moral dilemma over whether or not he would be happy as part of the hive... all while singing. This shows that his apotheosis has been completed, as at this point Paul is only able to communicate by singing, but, If the hive mind really was in full control of him, why would it bother pretending to act like Paul? This seems to imply that Paul and the others really do seem to have at least some autonomy after being infected, so which is it?
  • It's important to remember that literally nothing the Hive Mind says can be trusted. Throughout the musicals we see that it will try any approach to get people to join it, ranging from simple "Join us and be happy" (La Dee Dah Dah Day) to "Join us or we'll kill you" (Join us and Die). It's therefore very likely that any account of what it is like to be assimilated will be either outright lies or tailored either to sound appealing to future infectees, or to break their spirit entirely so they'll be easier to assimilate by force.
  • As for Paul's parts of "Let it out", notice the lyrics "Is this me? Or is this you?" which are sung in distinctly different voices. Presumably, Paul is arguing against the hive mind/the part of him that has been assimilated already. As for why he's singing, we know the assimilation process is partially physical. At that point, it's likely just that enough of his body has been assimilated that he feels compelled to sing along even while retaining shreds of free will.
  • It's also important to note that most people assimilated were killed first. Paul is fully conscious during his assimilation, so it makes sense why he'd have a moral dilemma.
• How does the Hive mind infect people exactly? The method of infection seems to differ each time. The beginning of the show implies that Mr. Davidson, the Greenpeace girl, the homeless guy, Sam, Nora, and Zoey were infected by the rain that fell after the meteor entered the atmosphere, while Ted and the people at the coffee shop had to be force-fed the blue shit in order to be assimilated. Meanwhile, Paul was infected merely by breathing in the spores, while Charlotte and Professor Hidgens had to have their guts ripped out for some reason.
  • The meteor's spores are brought up a few times, so that is presumably the primary vector of infection. Once a body is assimilated, it starts producing spores in the form of that blue shit. The first people were assimilated when they came into contact with raindrops that contained spores. The coffee shop assimilated then removed some of their own blue shit (presumably by puking as is mentioned a couple times) to put in the coffee as a quicker way of assimilation. Paul got infected because he was close enough to the meteor that the spores got in through his airways. The disemboweling is just a very gruesome way to get the blue shit into the body, which the Hive Mind presumably resorts to For the Evulz.