Summary: A flashbacks shows Elliot's father's relationship with Elliot in the store he owned, "Mr. Robot". In the present, Elliot talks with his father, furious that he's been alive all this time. Mr. Robot takes him on a journey for answers, taking Elliot to his old house where he reveals that Elliot threw himself out of the window out of guilt. Elliot throws Mr. Robot out of the window and then they go to Elliot's father's grave. Darlene gets in touch with Angela and lets her know that Elliot has forgotten again and they track him to his father's grave where Elliot realizes that Mr. Robot is somebody inside his head - an alter ego. Tyrell is rejected by Joanna and he returns to work only to be fired. He finds Elliot and threatens him to tell him about fsociety. Tyrell intends to join Elliot. Gideon tries to put the honeypot back online but finds no success. He goes to meet Tyrell, who has given the order to keep it offline, but finds that he's fired. Angela goes back home where Colby is waiting for her. He offers her a job at Evil Corp.
The Good: I appreciated the flashback to open the episode. Elliot's relationship with his father is a critical aspect of this episode, so it is important that we get to see it and conclude things about it ourselves. This opening sequence tells us everything we need to know about Elliot's father, and we learn about his morals, his righteousness, and his parenting style, and we can see why Elliot formed a connection with him. Furthermore, this flashback helps explain why Elliot is so willing to play the hero and punish people doing bad things in previous episodes, like with the child pornography supplier back in "eps1.0_hellofriend.mov". The flashback pays dividends in the present because we now understand what exactly Elliot's father meant to him. So we can understand why he feels so betrayed when he finds out that his father seemingly faked his death. Rami Malek portrays Elliot's rage superbly, and it is incredibly jarring in a good way since we have always seen Elliot maintain his calm in practically every situation. Hearing him shout and feeling his rage emanate from him is a completely new feeling, and it adds that extra level of engagement in his scenes. The rest of the episode takes Elliot on an interesting journey as he accepts his guilt over his father's death by revisiting the pier, his old home, and ultimately his father's grave. This is all fascinating to watch, and while we can clue in pretty quickly that Mr. Robot is only a vision of his father that is in Elliot's head, it is engaging to see Elliot make this realization and see how it affects him mentally. This captured the questionable reality of a schizophrenic perfectly, and I'm curious to see how Elliot's loose grip on reality affects his future. Tyrell's story is pretty strong. Logically, he faces major consequences for what he has done. Joanna, while she saved him from imprisonment, is unwilling to put up with him any longer. Funnily enough it seems to not have anything to do with Tyrell being a murderer, but more that she is tired of putting up with someone who is so impatient, reckless, and unhinged. Following this, Tyrell gets fired from his job and he is properly set adrift. The firing scene is fascinating, capitalizing on Tyrell's unhinged personality perfectly with his initial rage at Philip's revelation, which eventually devolves into pathetic begging. The scene is acted brilliantly and it is easy to empathize with Tyrell's loss. It's impressive that the show can make us feel something for a man who murdered somebody in cold blood two episodes ago. Tyrell's losses take him straight to Elliot where he threatens (or maybe trusts? See: The Unknown) him into revealing everything about fsociety. The other characters had decent progression. Gideon appears to be built up for something in the next episode. Angela has been hit with a big choice in this episode and I'm intrigued by the prospect of her working for Evil Corp. Angela and Darlene got some nice moments to bond more and expand on their relationship with Elliot as they hunted for him in this episode. The Bad: I'm not quite feeling this show as much as I should be just yet. This is all very good stuff, but "Mr. Robot" seems to have plateaued at very good. This is because the show has several flaws in how it tells its story. For one, it bounces around a lot. You get the sense that we needed an episode centered specifically around Elliot as he goes through this intense emotional experience, but the episode spends lots of time away from him with other characters. And that sucks the emotion and momentum out of his story because we are getting his story in pieces. It takes something that can potentially be great and turns it into something that is only good. It doesn't help that the other characters are nowhere near as interesting as Elliot. Every second we spend away from him is time that I'm itching to get back to Elliot. The others stories and characters are fine, but that's just the problem. They are only fine, and never threaten to be anything better. Tyrell is fascinating but I'm not emotionally engaged in his plight. Gideon is a good man but he's not fleshed out enough for me to care. Angela has been given a lot of time all season but she never felt relevant. Darlene has taken time to grow on me, but I still don't quite care about her. These characters need screentime to develop further, absolutely, but don't focus on building up their stories when the main character is going through an intense emotional experience. Just imagine if "eps1.5_br4ve-trave1er.asf" was bogged down by other characters' storylines. The tension would dissipate and the emotional stakes would not have been there. Unfortunately this episode is bogged down by those problems, and its suspense and drama suffers as a result. This episode has some centerpiece scenes but they don't land emotionally in the way that the final five minutes of the previous episode do. Elliot discovering that Mr. Robot is fake is actually hurt by predictability because we know what's going to happen pretty early in the scene, and the emotional impact isn't as strong as it should have been. And of course, the episode is quick to cut away to someone else. The final scene between Elliot and Tyrell had all the right pieces to be fantastic. Engaging dialogue, great acting, a fantastic soundtrack. But it just doesn't have emotional impact. On paper, this scene is a huge winner but it ends up feeling more like spectacle than something emotional. We don't have a clear enough picture of how Elliot and Tyrell feel about each other, so I'm not sure how to feel about them working together. It's an exciting plot development, but nothing more. All spectacle, but no substance. The Unknown: So are all the scenes with Mr. Robot meant to be Elliot instead? Is it just an alternate ego of him? When Elliot is Mr. Robot, is this when he remembers everything? Does he only forget when he is Elliot? Did Darlene only return because of fsociety? Or did her return spur Elliot on to create fsociety? Why did Elliot forget all about her and his own creation of fsociety? How did nobody else notice that Elliot forgot about their entire plan? I have a lot of questions about the timeline of events. Is there more to learn about Joanna's past? How was she affected by giving up her baby? What's Gideon's plan to attempt to save Allsafe? Will he be successful? Will he get in the way of Elliot's plan in the finale? How will Tyrell bounce back from being fired? What is his plan? Why has he joined Elliot? Does he actually intend on working with him, or is this a ploy to turn Elliot in and win back the trust of E Corp? Also, did Tyrell threaten Elliot into revealing everything about fsociety by threatening to kill him? Or did he perhaps intend to reveal his darkest secret in the hopes that Elliot would take this as a sign of trust and reveal his own secret to him? I can make a case for both interpretations. Will Angela accept Colby's offer? I suspect that she will because her storyline would be aimless if she doesn't. Best Moment: Elliot throwing Mr. Robot out of the window was the highlight for me. A nice moment of realization for Elliot while continuing to give Rami Malek the chance to shine as he portrays Elliot's unyielding rage. Character of the Episode: Elliot. Conclusion: I have some reservations about this, but for the most part I was impressed. "Mr. Robot" is doing something very unique with its story, and while this first season hasn't been perfect, its been consistently good due to its innovation, style, directing, and unique storytelling. It's difficult to find something so inventive and consistently well written. The show still has problems with engagement and hopefully that's something that is corrected with time. There's still 1 more episode left and I'm interested to see how this season comes to a close. Score: 66
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Aaron DhillonJust a university student who loves to watch TV. And analyze it way too much. Archives
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