Originally Posted by
Endus
They stole the serum from her. She knows Sam and Bucky are on that trail too, and it was easier for her to insert herself than to try and work against them. That's how I read it.
It's a cover story. She needs to justify why she's in Madripoor and what she's been doing. It also makes her seem like she needs help, and they're both suckers for that stuff.
First, ask yourself why she had a sniper in place targeting Selby in the first place.
My best guess is that Selby was a problem for <insert reason>, and Sharon was going to remove the problem, and then Sam and Bucky walked in the door. Everything seemed tossed together over the next couple hours, IMO, because it was.
She developed that serum. She explicitly calls our Karli for betraying her by stealing it, in the final confrontation. She didn't risk the serum; Karli really did steal it and she really was trying to get it back. The pardon's just an opportunity, but she had reason to insert herself with Sam and Bucky to try and keep tabs on their pursuit of the serum even without the offer of a pardon; that just makes it seem like they're the ones helping HER out, rather than vice versa.
The pardon's still of value because she's worked that into re-inserting herself with the US government, which will help make up a lot of the loss of the serum, if not more.
I get what you're saying, but I think this was all adequately explained in the show. What we don't know is if Sharon's motive is "be the biggest, baddest crime boss because fuck the law, man" or "the US government is corrupt and stupid and I'm gonna slap a saddle on Madripoor and reform it into a force for justice". We don't actually see her kill anyone who isn't at least arguably a super bad person. Selby was gonna murder Sam and Bucky, Batroc's, well, Batroc, and shot her too. And Karli was giving Sam a run for his money, and had killed a bunch of people. She's definitely more ruthless and has less mercy in her than pre-Snap, but I'm not convinced she's actually villainous yet.