Forbidden
This week we got a rare look into Whiterose’s (known only as Zhi Zhang) past with a terrific cold opening.
In 1982, Whiterose and his secret lover–Chen–were working on behalf of the Chinese government, landing a huge partnership with IBM. On this trip in the US, the two were able to be together more openly, even if it was still behind closed doors. The Chinese government forbids homosexual relationships, so the men were using this partnership as a way to leave China. Zhi would parlay this success into a US Ambassadorship. With success in their grasp, Whiterose came out to her partner as a trans woman, showing her even bigger secret presumably for the first time. Chen didn’t hesitate to accept this revelation. It didn’t change his mind on anything, the love of his life was still there and they were planning a future together. But the plan didn’t work as expected. With such success, Whiterose was offered an even greater role in the Chinese government, meaning they wouldn’t be leaving the country. This news comes on the day of Chen’s arranged wedding day to another woman. Fr
This devastated Whiterose in ways that still haunt her today. He uses Chen’s watch and inherited his obsession with time. His death–what Whiterose feels directly responsible for because of a choice she made–is most likely the cataylst for the plan that she’s been working on for more than 30 years.
When Whiterose is advised that Elliot and Page are probably in cahoots and they need to slow things down to keep an eye on them, she takes it as an admission of surrender. She demands that the shareholder meeting happen tomorrow (Christmas Day) to keep his adversaries from having the time to make something happen.
Elliot and Darlene are still under the gun, trying to figure out a way to get access to Whiterose’s financials when the shareholder meeting happens. They track down a contact of Susan Jacobs–Olivia Cortez–the only contact she had at the Cyprus Bank. Darlene is gung ho on helping Elliot with her and he won’t let her. He’s too afraid of putting her in danger and wants her to work on something else while he’s gone.
In typical Mr. Robot fashion, Elliot finds an in with Olivia. She’s divorced with a kid and she’ll lose custody if she gets caught using drugs again. With this leverage, Elliot is gung ho to simply blackmail Olivia into giving him her bank FOB so he can get the password into her work’s network. It’s impossible to get in without that FOB. Mr. Robot slows him down, saying he doesn’t need to go scorched Earth.
In one of the best character scenes in the show, Mr. Robot opens the door for Elliot to make a human connection. Something Elliot hasn’t done in a long time and is desperately needed because he’s extremely detached. Funny how the split personality, the one who isn’t actually a person, recognizes the value of not isolating yourself in order to truly fix things. Over the course of the night, Elliot discovers a kindred spirit and the keycode he needs.
Cue complications! On the way back from Olivia’s apartment, Elliot spots a Dark Army tail. He moseys back home in order to sell that he’s not up to anything only to find Tyrell Wellick in his apartment. The worst person to be caught with by the DA and he just starts running his mouth about stopping Whiterose.
While that is sending Elliot into a panic, the other side of the bear trap that he doesn’t know about is starting to shake loose. Vera is slinking around trying to figure out how to recruit Elliot to help rebuild his drug empire. He gets a whiff of Elliot’s problems with his ex-therapist, Krista Gordon. Just like how Elliot dug around Olivia to get leverage for what he wanted, Vera is doing the same to Elliot. It looks like the net of destruction around Elliot is about to get bigger.