Season 1 of the USA Network show ended in the first step toward Elliot’s revolution, with the deletion of all records of Evil Corp’s loans. His hallucinated alter-ego has apparently been shooting him in the head quite a lot (which is never good!), and he retains enough control to override Elliot’s program at night to set up secret meetings with unusual dog aficionados (also probably bad!). Without Elliot’s knowledge, Mr. Robot has been taking control of Elliot when the latter “sleeps”. “She’s constantly trying to manipulate herself into being able to make these decisions”. Slater’s Mr Robot is eventually revealed – via Elliot’s flashbacks – to be a larger-than-life, 2.0 version of his deceased father, Edward (sort of). What does Angela want?
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We first see Angela Moss (Portia Doubleday) holding an agitated conversation with her boss after a well-coordinated hack against their company’s biggest client. You’re just as disoriented as the people of Mr. Robot who just got all their banking history wiped. Two new characters – E Corp counsel, Susan Jacobs (Sandrine Holt), and the Federal Bureau of Investigation agent, Dom Dipierro (Grace Gummer) have also entered the storyline. Darlene is not impressed with their accomplishments. “I absolutely felt like I was there and a participant in the whole thing”. Granted, the issues with which he grapples in the season premiere are all a part of his complex character, but giving Elliot plenty of time to hash out his demons but no outlet plays up the show’s weakness-that his mind itself, written as a mélange of well-chosen Fight Club references, is not as new or as interesting as the reconstructed world that mind has the power to create.
During a reception for the Peabody awards in May, Malek told me he had developed a strong working relationship with Esmail for this second season – learning after their success past year to trust his executive producer’s creative instincts.
This much is clear: The hack worked, and E-Corp (or Evil Corp, as everyone refers to it) was successfully breached, throwing the global financial market into chaos as a process. All acts of protest, hacktivism and any manner of public political statements should be accompanied by Phil Collins and/or Genesis.
Angela (Portia Doubleday), a childhood friend of Elliot’s who, like him, lost a parent to the careless actions of E Corp, was involved in a class action suit against the company a year ago.
Angela is working at E Corp. In the upcoming weeks, we’ll be getting the answers we seek AND more questions, I’m sure. But Tyrell, already at his breaking point, ends up strangling her instead. In short, it’s a new season and Joanna is still the most interesting, scariest and weirdest character on this show.
Darlene’s separation from Elliot also doesn’t make her situation any easier.
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Frustrated with his lack of promotions at E Corp., Tyrell allies himself with Elliot to bring down his former place of work. His boss, Gideon (Michel Gill), and therapist, Krista (Gloria Reuben) also seem to be his well-wishers but he maintains some distance from them. It’s not a surprise then that the final moments of the episode end with Gideon being shot, and presumably murdered, by a “fan”. He knows who hacked them, the CEO claims.
