Method Not Allowed

Hacking! Lots and lots of hacking!

It’s been a while since we’ve gone on an elaborate hack with Mr. Robot but gadzooks did Sam Esmail pull off another one. These episodes are always a ton of fun and some of the most riveting to watch. There’s some crazy direction going on in the entire hour (Esmail could direct a fantastic action movie) and I think there were all of five lines of dialog spoken. Some gap filling is done with text messaging but besides that, this was a kinetic episode right from the start that rarely slowed down. After last week’s slow moon groove, this was like holding on to a rocket ship.

Darlene finds Elliot right by the crashed Dark Army van and he hops in without a word–and without Tyrell. Zero word on what happened to him which is the biggest disappointment for me. The Alderson’s have a busy day ahead of them, so they speed off back to the city leaving the burning van far behind them…

With the Cyprus Bank servers located in a company called Virtual Reality, the siblings get to work at 11 am sharp. Being Christmas Day, there’s no one in there except for two security guards and a handful of people in the gym that’s right off the lobby on the main floor.

Darlene and Elliot’s plan is elaborate, to say the least. I won’t be able to do that half hour of screen time justice, you have to see it. I will say there are fake IDs, fingerprints, and a whole lotta fast typing and running involved. They do all of this without a word too, which worked surprisingly well. Considering what Elliot has been doing, it’s safe to say Darlene came up with most of the plan and by the time they drove up to the doors, they had the plan memorized to the second. They basically sprint to each step, knocking down each barrier as they come to one. The best was when Elliot wordlessly ran distraction for Darlene and she improvises her own way out.

In addition to getting this huge step done, other important plot progress is made:

• Price finds when and where the shareholder’s meeting is. The timer for that has started–8 hours.
• Vera finds Krista as she comes home from running errands. He’s going to get dirt on Elliot. How horrible he is to get it remains to be seen.
• Dom is ordered around by Janice, the world’s most chipper taxidermist/shadow organization handler. The Dark Army put her onto finding out what happened to their van and to do everything she can with her FBI credentials to cover up any evidence about them. When Darlene got Elliot away from the scene of the crime, she ran a red light, which took their picture. This puts Dom back onto a head-on collision with the Alderson’s.

A lot of plot threads are now being held by the same hand and are we’re beginning to see them be pulled together. Dom has been separated from Elliot for some time now and Vera has been out for a few seasons. It’ll be interesting to see how these roads intersect, the big question is when. Eight episodes are left and that’s quite a bit room to move around in. The obvious next event is the shareholder’s meeting. That’s just a few hours away in the show’s universe, so will we see that next week? Or will next week be devoted to Dom and Vera’s movements? I’m also wondering how far past Christmas this story will take us.

Elliot and Darlene are in the dark about Dom and Vera so they are going to be wildcards being thrown down. I don’t think Darlene really knows Vera, so when he shows up it’s going to send Elliot for a loop. Vera’s goal seems simple in comparison to what else is going on, he as no idea about the Dark Army. So will coming into Elliot’s orbit put him into the DA’s crosshairs? The go-to scenario for Dom is for her to work with Elliot and Darlene but with Janice on her tail, that’s going to be a challenge. There are a lot of possibilities.