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After last week’s crackling season preimere, I thought the train would keep barreling through but instead Sam Esmail turned the burners down to “keep ’em sizzlin'” which was a surprisingly good idea.

The show opens with Price giving the background of how Whiterose became so powerful, starting is opening in the late 80s when the Berlin Wall came down. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, it left an opportunity to fill in the power vacuum with an eager cabal of investors that Whiterose assembled. This group, called The Deus Group, is the conspiracy theorists Illumanity come to life. Deus runs the world behind the scenes but the rest of the investors were fooled into thinking they had any say in what the company did. Whiterose steered the ship from the start for the sole purpose of getting her Congo installation done. Price, having saved Elliot’s life from the OD, tells him there is nothing he can do, even pulling off the hack he wants to will barely dent TDG. Much like the late Angela, Elliot is too stubborn for that message. He convinces Price to try to get all the members together while he works on a way to hack the group when they are together. He just needs an appropriate entry point. Susan Jacobs, who worked for ECorp as a liaison for the Cypress Bank is the best bet, but she’s the one who had a bad run-in with Darlene…but no one knows that.

With some kind of plan in mind Elliot gets a call from Darlene. She got a call from the assisted living home informing them that their mother has died. To say the kids didn’t have a good relationship with their mother is one way to put it so neither are invested in having anything to do with her. Being last of kin, they are forced to handle their mother’s stuff.

This episode mostly serves as a reconciliation for Darlene and Elliot. They’ve been drifting different streams of misery for some time now, and those streams have come to merge. Elliot is so pre-occupied with tracking down Susan Jacobs, that he barely registers anything. Darlene gets pulled in as they start to clear her room. When Elliot finds his old Walkman in a drawer, it makes Darlene think and evaluate their past. They also stumble upon a bank receipt that says their mother had a safety deposit box, Darlene insists they go see what’s in it. Annoyed that his sister is putting any value to anything their mother had or has, he reluctantly goes with her. She needs some kind of closure, she can’t detach like Elliot. At an E Bank branch (ugh) there’s nothing to find.

This entire sequence was fascinating to watch. Fantastically written and acted, I liked how this experience brings the two siblings together. Back in Elliot’s orbit, she notices he’s much more fidgety than normal and manages to get him to talk about what he’s up to. That leads into her admitting–but not officially saying why–he won’t be able to find Jacobs. That’s a huge speedbump in the plan but this also puts Darlene back on the hacking team. Elliot won’t be doing this hail mary to stop Whiterose by himself. This conversation also drops a massive bomb on Elliot.

She mentions Fernando Vera, that he approached her outside Elliot’s apartment. Blindsided, he doesn’t recall her telling him that and she replies, you didn’t seem to care when I told you so I didn’t either…should I worry about him? Vera’s been gone a long time, the ordeal with him was horrific, so him sniffing around is bad news. Elliot doesn’t let on. He also doesn’t let on to his sheer panic that she didn’t tell him, Mr. Robot kept this info from him. When Darlene leaves, he confronts Mr. Robot about it and he swears up and down that he doesn’t know what Darlene is talking about. He hasn’t kept any secrets from Elliot. So that means, Elliot has a third personality…

This scene with Darlene shows off one of my favorite visual storytelling techniques Esmail uses. Here, right after she says Vera’s name, Elliot’s eyes flick away from her, off to the right. There, in the pews behind her, Mr. Robot sits. To Darlene, he’s just checked out, she doesn’t know where his mind went. She steps over, unknowingly blocking his view of Mr. Robot, into his line of sight, forcing him to focus on her. She knows how to reengage him when he retreats.

Earlier in this episode, when Elliot gets frustrated with Price, he tags out of the conversation. Mr. Robot has been shown to be sitting behind Elliot has he talks to Price, and he starts talking to Price instead. Last episode, a similar moment happens when Elliot gets frustrated with Darlene and he taps out, with Mr. Robot quickly taking over, taking care to talk to Darlene gently as she’s in a bad state of mind.

If you don’t watch the show, you’d think that it’s a three–person conversation, not two personalities of one person navigating challenging moments. It’s deftly done and a treat to watch with subtle set-ups and follow-throughs (Esmail is such a good director).

While Elliot is with his sister, Dom is doing as she told to keep the Dark Army happy. She’s being interviewed by a superior about her partner Santiago. As far as they know, he’s AWOL, only she knows he was murdered with an ax in front of her. Right when you think she’s going to tell them the truth, she goes with the lie, Santiago was working with a drug cartel. Janice calls her that night and Dom tells her that she’s 99.9% sure the agent believes the cover story. It turns out Janice is a real stickler for efficiency and has the agent killed. This woman really loves her job.

Finally, Price visits Whiterose (who is decorating a Christmas tree as Zhi Zhang) and pulls the only card he can to get the Deus Group members to gather quickly: he’s retiring. Whiterose is pissed–which Price rather likes–because this throws her timeline into chaos, she had no plans for this to happen. With about a week to go before the Congo delivery, everyone has their back pressed to the wall.