Summary: Elliot arrives to work but is confused and has no memory of the past few days. The news reveals that it is the day of the Congo vote. Elliot goes to log in and realizes his account has been locked. Samar tells him someone is going to be fired and Elliot realizes it's him. He realizes that stage 2 is happening and evades security in an attempt to find a terminal to work. He is found and escapes into an elevator. He accepts it is too late and changes focus to evacuating the building. After being escorted out through the mass protests, he is met by Darlene who reveals she has been working with the FBI and that Angela has been working with Mr. Robot. The protest turns into a riot and the mob attacks the E Corp building. Angela gets instructions from Irving to find Elliot, but in the chaos she knows she won't find him. Angela goes to the security room and does the hack herself. She is spotted there by Lydia and reports to Irving who says he will take care of her. Angela manages to escape from the rioters by wearing an fsociety mask. She returns to her office where Elliot is waiting for her.
The Good: It took me about 10 minutes to realize that this entire episode would be done in a single free-flowing camera shot. Or at least, with the illusion of a single shot, but whatever cuts there are were expertly hidden away to create a phenomenal, highly personalized real-time experience within the E Corp building. I can't understate how unbelievably impressive this episode is from a technical standpoint. The skill needed to execute something like this is unbelievable, and to even consider doing this requires some remarkable creativity and vision. I have to give points to this episode for pulling this off so perfectly. Not once did the style of this episode take away from the drama and the suspense, and it was a really inspired decision, contributing to this being such a brutally tense and suspenseful experience. And what a tense experience it was. From the opening minutes, things were suspenseful and I was on the edge of my seat. Elliot started the episode disoriented, but through a well placed bit of news we were told that it was the day of the Congo vote, meaning that it was the day of stage 2. Establishing this immediately ratcheted up the tension. Elliot was way behind on knowledge and so the first few minutes got their tension from us waiting for Elliot to catch up and realize what was happening. And from then on the episode grabbed on and never let go. From Elliot escaping security, to Darlene revealing the truth, to the pure chaos of the riot, and finally to Angela's suspenseful mission. This was non-stop suspense and I was on the very edge of my seat watching it the entire time. The episode is divided into three distinct parts, and all of them are great. The first focuses on Elliot getting his bearings and realizing what is happening. This sequence is terrific and highly engaging. Elliot is completely disoriented upon returning to his own consciousness and the episode does a splendid job of showing this through moments like the glitching effects and Elliot's brief rant to Samar, who provides lots of laughs early in the episode. But the entire sequence is shrouded in suspense because we know that it's the day of stage 2 and that Elliot's preparations have been overcome. It is a long and tense wait for Elliot to catch up with us and realize that stage 2 is underway, he has been fired, and that there is nothing he can do to stop it. The entire experience is fantastic and dripping with suspense once Elliot realizes what is going on. His attempts to escape are a joy. There's a brilliant moment where he tries to prey on an older lady only to discover that she's unexpectedly tech-savvy, forcing him to instead use intimidation to get a younger care-free guy off of his terminal. But the results are devastating for him, and his attempt to escape leads to him hiding and stalling within a conference room in a terrific scene that forces Elliot to confront his own social anxiety for self preservation. Rami Malek conveys this beautifully and elevates the scene further. Following this, we are treated to another excellent scene as Elliot's mind form a sort of "fake" Mr. Robot with almost perfect accuracy, which is sensible because Mr. Robot is part of him. And here we get a nice connection to "eps1.5_br4ve-trave1er..asf" as Mr. Robot plays the same role of telling Elliot that resistance is futile and that it is too late; he can't stop stage 2 no matter how he tries, so what he should focus on is minimizing the damage. The show portrays the gradual acceptance of defeat perfectly and it is impactful. With that, the episode shifts into the second part as Elliot steps outside and we are greeted to a protest far more intense than any we have seen in the show so far. I have to applaud the writers for turning these protests into a major plot point following a season and a half of them happening. Set-up that goes unnoticed followed by a pay-off is always so satisfying. Anyways, once we're outside we get greeted by Darlene who immediately changes everything by revealing all to Elliot. I was caught off guard by this, but I'm pleased that this wasn't stretched out. Elliot's entire world is turned upside down by Darlene's reveal, and suddenly he is unable to trust her and Angela, his two closest confidants. The moment lands well and works perfectly as an emotional hit in the midst of this chaotic episode. But the emotional slowdown is short-lived as we are immediately thrust back into chaos as the protest turns into a riot as several people invade and vandalize the E Corp building. It's a shocking moment that wonderfully pays off of the growing tensions in the community following 5/9, and the single-take is especially impressive here as we witness the sheer chaos in its full glory. At least that's what it seems at first until we get a fantastic reveal that the riot is a sham, just a distraction organized by the Dark Army to ensure that stage 2 goes through. This caught me completely off guard and did a terrific fob of reinforcing the themes of the show. Free will and power to the people is always an illusion; nothing can get done without somebody in the top 1% justifying it. This is further explored when you remember that all of this chaos and death does not actually have a greater purpose to it; Whiterose didn't need to execute stage 2, she did it only to punish Price because of a wounded ego. The middle and lower class people will always face the worst consequences while the top 1% indulge themselves in their petty power struggles. The riot also serves as a perfect transition to Angela, who now has the difficult task of executing the plan for stage 2 under enormous amounts of pressure as she endangers her life by walking around the destruction in the E Corp building. The scenes with Angela are ridiculously intense as she goes from bad situation to bad situation, relying on her resourcefulness and terrible lies to help get her through. She quickly realizes that using Elliot is not an option and that she will have to do it all herself. And accomplishing this task comes at the cost of her soul, and Angela knows it. She can remind Irving about the evacuation all she wants, but she knows deep down that he is doing nothing to save the people. I'm sure that a part of her is already accepting it. After all, in her scramble to make it out unscathed she gets lives put on her conscience. She calls over the rioters to the security guard, knowing full well that they will kill him, and she informs Irving about Lydia, knowing full well that "taking care of her" means that she is going to die. Angela's actions have a big cost, and we can see at the end of the episode that it weighs on her (see: Best Moment). There are some lovely little details in Angela's story. You can see that her deflecting skill is getting better, especially when she makes a joke to the security guard in the elevator. The pepperspray moment is intense and you can't help but feel the pain for Angela as she has to put on that mask covered in pepperspray to get out safely. Furthermore, Angela wearing the mask is a lovely bit of symbolism. Even though she isn't officially part of fsociety, she may as well be with all of the work she is doing to further their goals. The Bad: I have one problem with this and it is that I was unsure if I should be rooting for the success of stage 2 or not. I felt that I shouldn't because the Dark Army is surely bad news, but with so many characters on different sides I felt confused. When following Elliot, I was sure that I would be rooting for him to stop it. But then when the episode switched to Angela, I wanted to root for her to survive and succeed, but I was unsure if I should be supporting her because her actions were to promote stage 2's success. It was a strange change in my own morality to root for Angela, and that created some uncomfortable discontent within myself when I was watching, and I don't think that it was intentional and it did weaken the experience for me a bit. The Unknown: Who was the German man at the start? What did he say? What caused Elliot to glitch? Did Angela and Mr. Robot set this up somehow? What else happened on Elliot's missing weekend? What did he do to prepare stage 2? Did Angela execute everything correctly? Or did she miss something? Are there any loose ends that she may have left behind? What's in the package that Angela was given? Was it really just food, or did she receive something more important? What did Elliot do while Angela was working on stage 2? Did he successfully evacuate the building? I strongly doubt that Irving actually did evacuate the building, but maybe he was aware of Elliot's actions? Will stage 2 be successful? I suppose we're going to see in the next episode. What will Elliot say to Angela? How will their relationship be affected by what happened? How did Elliot get back into E Corp through all of the chaos? Best Moment: Angela completes her task and gives the package to the Dark Army operative who always seems to be eating something. In return she receives a package in a Red Wheelbarrow bag. What's in this package is anyone's guess, but I think it would be a wonderfully fitting twist if it really is just a meal. Angela has risked it all and potentially is now responsible for the deaths of dozens, even hundreds, of people. And all she gets is a fast food meal from the higher-ups, because this kind of carnage means nothing to them. Regardless of what's in the bag, what comes next is brilliant. In the final tracking shot of the episode, Angela heads back to her office and she starts to break down. She can't hold in her emotions anymore, and I can only assume that she is really contemplating the weight of what she's done. She has gone past every boundary and broken down every moral barrier, and for a cause that she is starting to feel increasingly uncertain about. Is it worth all the chaos and death for whatever it is that Whiterose has shown her? It's a fantastic moment that more than delivers. And at the end of her walk, Angela already seems to be facing her reckoning: Elliot is waiting for her, his anger and disappointment clear as day. It's a perfect place to conclude the episode. Character of the Episode: Angela. Conclusion: A magnificent episode. The technical prowess is what everyone will be talking about, and it is astonishingly impressive, but let's not let that hide the fact that this was an anxiety-inducing, tense experience as the ever-building plot of "Mr. Robot" reached a thrilling climax. I can't wait for the next episode. Score: 82
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Aaron DhillonJust a university student who loves to watch TV. And analyze it way too much. Archives
March 2024
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