Yours sincerely, wasting away
What is Stage 2? A new development of luxury apartments built on the site of the Washington Plant and ideal for a young family? The level you access only after you’ve beaten the big bad of E Corp in hand-to-hand combat? A situation that only occurs once a disease has truly suppressed the immune system?
Whatever it is, Stage 2 is Elliot’s idea. We know this because he hacked the phone of Xun, a Dark Army lieutenant, who told us as much. Darlene was monitoring the calls, and so became the first to know. This puts her in a sticky position, not just because her brother might be working in the interests of the Chinese government, but also because she beat her lover up with a baseball bat thinking it was he who knew all about Stage 2.
Elliot, for his part, would seem unlikely to be as surprised as his sister by the news. Not because he remembers what Stage 2 is – he does not – but because his Dissociative Identity Disorder has deteriorated to the point where very little makes sense any more. This week, Elliot has three out-of-body experiences, where he watches himself – as Mr Robot – from a distance. Also, and just as unusually, he actually shouts at someone (Xun, when he meets him in person). As Elliot consciously tries to take on more qualities of Mr Robot – assertiveness, determination – “Elliot” is being subconsciously pushed to one side. And yet … his encounter with his mother, where he asserted himself upon a mute party, suggested a non-chaotic alternative for our hero. He used an idea of his mother to keep himself sane in prison. Maybe he will gird himself again in battles to come.
[As a sidenote, I enjoyed the introductory sequence of Elliot’s prison compadres in their actual environment. As suspected, Ray was the governor.]
Will you still need me, will you still feed me …
In the penultimate episode of this second season we are offered several plot twists. We know why Elliot went to prison (that darned dog!). We know that Mrs Wellick has worked out who Elliot is. Dom DiPierro, meanwhile, could turn out to be Angela’s best ally, while there’s something going on in Sharon Knowles’s apartment. But for all the plotting, the psychology of the characters remains the most compelling aspect of this excellent drama.
Elliot’s may be the most complex, but watching Phillip Price at work is always gripping. The CEO of Evil Corp is the greatest villain in Mr Robot, mainly because we don’t know the depths to which he is prepared to sink. This week he faces off against Whiterose, his main rival in perfidy. Rose, who is both queen hacker and Chinese minister of state, reveals that she killed the last CEO of Evil Corp (and then, for effect, actually pisses on his grave). Such behaviour doesn’t cut much ice with Price. “I’m a mercenary,” he informs Whiterose. “I do what I want. Order will not protect you any more, I will rain chaos, even if it hurts me. Because I would rather see you lose than win myself.” That’s some baddie talk right there.
It’s a standoff. Price needs a bailout to refloat Evil Corp, while Whiterose can’t afford for the Washington Plant to close. Price asks Whiterose to get the Chinese government to step in, which may be humiliating for him. That said, his position is not as sticky as his opponent, who may threaten all he likes but can’t afford to see Evil Corp go bust.
Unless I’ve missed a vital scene (it has been known), we have no idea what the pair’s ultimate motives are. Price, after all, appears to be complicit in the hack that brought his company low in the first place. What Whiterose wants with all that leaky nuclear material is unclear too (though maybe one could have a guess at something military). I suspect we will learn more next week.
Indicate precisely what you mean to say
Angela turns out to have been a quick learner when it comes to electronic sabotage. She used her rubber ducky again, this time to hack into Evil Corp and get all the files on the Washington Plant. She wasn’t even nearly caught this time neither, as the one old doofus to stumble upon her couldn’t tell one woman from another and mistook Angela for a secretary.
Far less sophisticated was her subsequent willingness to share what she’d found with a federal body, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Surely if there’s one thing she’s learned from her time inside a massive conspiracy, it’s that it’s best to trust no one. Anyway, she may have to trust again after Dom played her hand. She knows a lot of what Angela has been up to, and suspects the rest, but she knows not to trust her superiors after the Chinese shootout and so might be able to offer Angela the kind of arrangement she needs. As she says to her: “You’ve got one hand left to play and it’s me.”
Order v chaos rating: 8
So Big Phil declared war on order (thus subscribing to Elliot’s “control is an illusion” mantra). But a more visible assault on everyday life is the arrival of electricity “brownouts”. With the economy floundering, electricity providers are struggling to generate enough power to meet demand. As a result everyone’s lighting is dipping to a moody shade of “cyber yellow” (yes, that’s a real thing). Also, credit cards don’t work any more. And if that isn’t anarchy I don’t know what is.
Self-assault index
Well the two aspects of Elliot’s personality are being pulled apart rather than pushed together. But this may yet may be more destructive. After all, had Mr Robot not been on the other side of the video signal at a closed circuit court hearing, Elliot might not have gone to prison in the first place.
Questions
You know, what is Stage 2? Why did the Chinese shootout affect the bail-out? What’s in Susan Jacobs’s apartment? And where is Tyrell Wellick?
