Mr. Robot: eps2.8_h1dden-pr0cess.axx

September 7, 2016 10:15 PM - Season 2, Episode 10

Elliot wonders if Mr. Robot has been lying to him; Darlene attempts to do the right thing; Dom and the FBI get closer.

For me, this was roughly forty three minutes of escalating OMG. The overlapping editing towards the end really helped in that regard. Two really fun/revealing monologues (one from Price at the start, the other from Darlene). A whole lot of suspense. A whole lot more cliff hanger-y baiting of the audience, but ... Where last week it felt like maybe a little much, it didn't bother me this time around at all beyond, "NOPE. CAN'T KILL THAT CHARACTER. OR THAT ONE. OR THAT ONE."

Both Sepinwall and the AV Club seemed to really like this week's episode.

PS. was that Watch_Dogs that the driver guy was playing while chilling for a minute in Microcenter?

posted by sparkletone (45 comments total)

I was getting sick of "who's knocking at the door?" cliffhangers but "who is at that address?" is even worse, maybe.
posted by destructive cactus at 12:26 AM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

My only guess is it's the guy who got the job Tyrell wanted, but I'm sure that's wrong.
posted by destructive cactus at 12:27 AM on September 8, 2016

Loved the pacing of this episode - it absolutely flew by. That and the kiss.
posted by hoodrich at 12:37 AM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

Yep, that was Watch_Dogs and I had to chuckle when I saw that.

Great episode. For some reason I thought this was the season finale so I'm glad we have two more episodes to go.

Darlene isn't dead is she ? I'm betting on cap guy being dead.
posted by Pendragon at 5:15 AM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]

The filming of the last scene with Dom rushing up to the Lupe's, the motorcylists that we can see coming from the left side way before they're really in the frame. It's the opposite of the shootout in China, and it's really effective. The camera is just far enough away that we can't really see what's happening. Cisco can be dead, but I really want Darlene to live.

Loved Mr. Robot betting on a Trump insult still being timely at this time of year.
posted by gladly at 5:44 AM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]

How much will get wrapped up in the next two episodes? Mobley (Sunil Markesh - I had to look it up) and Trenton were unseen except in the "previously on Mr. Robot" beginning of the episode recap, and Sunil was mentioned by Dom in that they lost him. Darlene and/or Cisco may be dead, Angela is with someone, probably FBI or E Corp enforcement (Dark Army guys don't roll up in suits, they come in tandem on motorcycles and shoot up everything). Elliot lost Mr. Robot (or he's gone on to work on another project?) - meanwhile Phillip is trying to keep E Corp afloat while they take over more control of money in the US, if not abroad, too, with their E-Coins. Terry Colby isn't gone yet, though he seemed more like a pawn here than anything else, even if he has leverage on the mysterious Winston Campbell. And Whiterose is playing some long game.

Claudia Kincaid is from From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler a book and then movie where a character named Claudia Kincaid, a 12-year-old girl who feels unappreciated at home, runs away with her brother to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the Met) in New York City. She chooses her brother as her accomplice because he has money. Wikipedia summarizes one aspect of the book as such: "Claudia learns her deep motive for persisting in the crazy search: she wanted a secret of her own to treasure and keep."

This story is partially true for both Angela, who spent a lot of time at museums with Elliot, who was like a brother to her (and didn't they sometimes run away to a museum? I'll look at old transcripts later), and Darlene, who was unhappy at home and was apparently kidnapped by an old woman who wants a (grand)child of her own. But Elliot goes to see Angela on the subway, which is covered by ads for "Phase" audio that talk about listening, and there's a PSA that says "if you see something, say something," all indicating strongly that the subway isn't as safe as Angela thinks.

Theory: the two people who we only see from behind are there to get Angela because Elliot told them to be there. Elliot stalled Angela with a kiss, told us "I don't want to leave her," but hops off the subway before the doors close, leaving Angela to face two people in suits.

The Verge has a new Hack Report for this episode, but it's a light week for hacks, so they cover spoofing a FAX header and the Pringles cantenna.

As for China annexing the Congo? Wikipedia has an article on China–Democratic Republic of the Congo relations, charting (generally favorable) relations between the two countries back to 1887. The New York Review of Books has an article titled The Chinese Invade Africa (preview of the first 5 paragraphs for non-subscribers), and you can get a bit more from Pulitzer Center's article on Jacob Kushner's short e-book titled "China's Congo Plan", with an embedded Soundcloud copy of a podcast where Kushner talks more on the topic. You can also read China and Congo: Friends in Need (44 page PDF) from Global Witness, campaigning to end environmental and human rights abuses.

Back to the episode's mention of this: Phillip Price first dismisses Terry Colby's concerns over China annexing the Congo ("You're trading countries like, uh... like playing cards.") by saying "Isn't that what history is all about? Politically, economically, geographically... imaginary lines being drawn and redrawn, over and over again?"

But then he says "I intend to leave a legacy, the standard of which was set by God when he created the Earth and man after his own image." Which is it? Do the imaginary lines come and go, or are you recreating the earth in your image? Not the most coherent argument.

Parting note: I was confused by Cisco's "Coal Wolf" hat, and found it's a hat from Coal, a hat-making company. That's it, they make "headwear."
posted by filthy light thief at 8:12 AM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]

At least Mr. Robot was renewed for a 3rd season, to air next year.
posted by filthy light thief at 8:15 AM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

"Was it your dad then, too? Or was it someone else?"

oh, shit

Mr Robots
posted by eustatic at 11:17 AM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

I went and read the AV Club review linked in the post, and it reminded me of the moment that I think I liked best:

Speaking of key players, the boldest and most thrilling moment of the episode wasn’t even something that happened to anyone onscreen. It happened to us, the unknown, unseen companion of Elliot Alderson. And it could easily have come across as hokey, or some sort of absurdist stunt, like figuring out who shot Mr. Burns. When Elliot tunes out Joanna Wellick’s driver, the better to focus on us, he starts wondering what was so important in his apartment that it could have driven Mr. Robot back home. “Can you help? Can you look? Do you see anything?” he asks, and the camera rises to the ceiling, panning around the layout of his place, taking in every detail. What could the big clue be? . . . We’re a part of the story in a way we’ve never been before. It doesn’t matter whether some clever viewer susses out what the actual clue is—because the actual clue is us. We’re present in the room, looking around, a player in Elliot’s drama. And if we can be of assistance, we can also be affected by the material reality of the space. To paraphrase another troubled character, Elliot’s not caught in our story; we’re caught in his.

A moment like that should have taken me out of the story, but instead, I leaned forward and looked harder at the screen.
posted by gladly at 11:28 AM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]

"Was it your dad then, too? Or was it someone else?"

It kind of dawned on me as I realized this week still wasn't going to give us a real answer about Wellick that I should maybe prepare myself for the possibility that Wellick is an aspect of Elliot too. I'm far, far, far from the first person to think about it. I want to say it was even brought up here last season when Wellick and Mr Robot were having conversations in an SUV? And from Angela's perspective it makes perfect sense that if Elliot's been having a long relationship/conflict with this person in his head ... why can't there be more than one?

But I can't quite make all three of the characters being the same human being fit in a way that feels satisfying to me at all. As the AV Club reviewer puts it: "There are a thousand ways this could play out, but “dull” isn’t one of them. The reveal will likely either mark a thrilling new direction in the nature of the show, or it’ll be one hell of a shark jump."
posted by sparkletone at 11:44 AM on September 8, 2016

How would Elliot and Wellick being the same person even work ? Joanna is looking for her husband who definitely isn't Elliot.
posted by Pendragon at 11:56 AM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

nah, that's too much. what about Gideon? what about Ms Wellick? pulling off two jobs? that's too much, even though that scene where wellick tries to recruit elliot is extremely off

it would be more likely that 'Ollie' is Ollie is Elliot, and that seems unlikely
posted by eustatic at 11:56 AM on September 8, 2016

The only way I can imagine that Wellick is the third fella in Elliott's head is if he died much earlier in this narrative (for instance, during the on-site breach at that data center). That way, say Elliott or Mr. Robot DID shoot him later on, they'd just have been shooting another internal personality, which we've seen happen before (Mr. Robot shooting Elliott in his 'room' in early S2). There'd be SO many plot holes in this situation, though.
posted by destructive cactus at 12:01 PM on September 8, 2016

Yup, I agree with Pendragon: after this episode, I don't think Elliot could be Tyrell, because why would Joanna ask Elliot where her husband was? One oddity: Joanna first calls Elliot "Ollie," and the only other Ollie on the show is Ollie Parker, Angela's two-timing douche-bro ex-boyfriend. Did Tyrell get bad intel that Ollie was involved, which he passed along to his wife, who hadn't seen either of them? Or did Joanna get some other mixed messages about an Ollie and Elliot?

If you're looking for secrets in the room, Heavy has a series of lightened screenshots and a link to video of the scene where we're asked to find Waldo, or whatever.

Here's the Reddit thread discussing what's in Elliot's room, which links to an interview with Kor Adana on The Hollywood Reporter about this episode with a none-too-subtle hint in caps. The Reddit thread also has people pulling audio from the episode and processing it in a few different ways, but nothing seems like a solid hit yet.
posted by filthy light thief at 12:07 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]

is the "one...or two" a reference to Price's uncertainty that whiterose = Zhang?
posted by eustatic at 1:29 PM on September 8, 2016

The audio editing and themes throughout this episode were incredible! Other things I loved:

• The opening title card with the screaming music kicking in
• Joanna's girly smile at the cheap fuck earrings
• the TWO Phase posters "Excellent audio for discerning listeners"
• the subtle pro-Clinton bit about no honest MAN in politics
• the bodyguard playing video games in the store and then later at Elliot's sitting on the bed like a little kid

posted by iamkimiam at 2:09 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

To be clearer, despite raising the question again (which I did while I was watching), I am still very firmly in the, "Elliot and Wellick are separate people camp." Whatever the explanation ends up being might be terrible, but it won't be that imo.

Joanna first calls Elliot "Ollie,"

Is that what subtitles said? I thought she'd said, "Ollie," last week, but in this week's hearing it again, I figured it was just an accent/intonation thing. (This is what I get for one of the few times I don't watch things with subtitles on.)

As for what that address is... What do we know of that would cause that driver to, "Oh, shit," like he did. "Previous associate of Wellick" makes more sense to me than "past unknown client of the driver," but we don't have that many to go with that I can think of. And I don't know why, say, Wellick would be hiding out with some side piece.
posted by sparkletone at 2:11 PM on September 8, 2016

Didn't Eliot introduce himself to Joanna as "Ollie" when he went looking for Tyrell in season 1?
posted by Kitty Stardust at 2:31 PM on September 8, 2016 [11 favorites]

is the source of the phone Price s apt? then? not Scott Knowles, even though bodyguard knows where Scott Knowles lives. after that, i'm all out of characters.
posted by eustatic at 2:41 PM on September 8, 2016

Didn't Eliot introduce himself to Joanna as "Ollie" when he went looking for Tyrell in season 1?

Ah, I'd completely forgotten that, but you're right.
posted by sparkletone at 2:51 PM on September 8, 2016

Theory: the two people who we only see from behind are there to get Angela because Elliot told them to be there. Elliot stalled Angela with a kiss, told us "I don't want to leave her," but hops off the subway before the doors close, leaving Angela to face two people in suits.

A better theory is that Angela was wearing a wire and trying to elicit a confession out of Elliot, and the two people in suits (who have been seen trailing Angela in the background in other episodes) are her FBI handlers come to pick up the wire. The very blatant audio-themed posters either side of Elliot and Angela as they speak is the best hint that this is true - the show consistently uses all-but-explicit clues to hint at things like this.
posted by kithrater at 4:11 PM on September 8, 2016 [7 favorites]

Just got to watch and and yeah, super tense episode. My DVR caught the very beginning of the after show and the first words out of the host's mouth were "That escalated quickly!" No, no it didn't. Do they even watch the episodes? The tension just built and built and built.
posted by LizBoBiz at 6:47 PM on September 8, 2016

That scene in Elliot's room reminded me too much of this.
posted by Catblack at 7:55 PM on September 8, 2016

My wild guess: Elliott traced the phone to the Wellick home
posted by trunk muffins at 8:34 PM on September 8, 2016

Darlene isn't dead is she ? I'm betting on cap guy being dead.

I hope Darlene isn't dead...but she redeemed herself by taking the injured guy to the hospital, had an epiphany about herself (in the hospital waiting room), performed that long and very intense monologue, and even made up with Cisco at the diner. In hindsight, that feels very much like a "goodbye" to me. So I'm worried about her.

A better theory is that Angela was wearing a wire and trying to elicit a confession out of Elliot, and the two people in suits (who have been seen trailing Angela in the background in other episodes) are her FBI handlers come to pick up the wire. The very blatant audio-themed posters either side of Elliot and Angela as they speak is the best hint that this is true - the show consistently uses all-but-explicit clues to hint at things like this.

Angela was definitely trying to elicit a confession out of Elliot. She kept trying to wring information out of him in general. She literally told him that he needed to talk. I don't know that she was necessarily doing it on behalf of the FBI, though.

Angela is really ruthless. I think that last season, when she bided her time with Ollie just so she could devastate him as completely as possible, it said a lot about who she is as a character. Everything she's done at or for E Corp seems to be part of some master plan of hers. Angela plays the long game. I don't think that she'd give that up by running to the cops, just because Dom told her that she'd better watch her back. I think she's most likely to go to whoever she thinks will be able to protect her from the FBI/anyone interfering with her plans at E Corp -- maybe even if she needs to give them Elliot and fsociety in return.

Elliot was clearly wigged out when Angela (gracelessly) asked him why he started fsociety (I think his apology for not "keeping her out of this" was him realizing he'd lost her), and the kiss was weird enough that it seems pretty plausible that Elliot had some practical reason for doing it, it wasn't just a spontaneous outpouring of emotion from him. I also think that Elliot is more lucid and more calculating than Angela realizes, so it would actually be very easy for him to set her up. So I think that it's well within the realm of possibility that Elliot knew that Angela was playing him, and he sprung a trap on her instead.

That said, I think that Elliot genuinely loves Angela, so she's probably better off in a trap of Elliot's than anyone else's. Elliot might manipulate her, but I doubt that he would ever actually hurt her. If anything, he has a history of being too protective of her.

Elliot lost Mr. Robot (or he's gone on to work on another project?)

Maybe the "secure Angela" project?!

Mr. Robot being gone is definitely suspicious. It's interesting that Elliot assumed that he ran off scared. Since when is Mr. Robot scared? Especially of Elliot or of what Elliot thinks?

Anyway, it's funny to contrast Darlene's story with Joanna's. Darlene starts out her story by saying that she knows she's not special, and Joanna ends hers by saying that those earrings are the cheapest thing she owns (but they're her favorite). Darlene talks about some woman stealing her from Coney Island and bringing her home, and Joanna talks about Tyrell doing whatever was necessary to get her those earrings from that woman. There was also that whole thing in the beginning of the episode where Joanna carefully applies yet another perfect coat of lipstick, and then Darlene keeps bringing up the old woman's lipstick. Honestly, I don't think there's necessarily any ~deep meaning~ in the comparison. But I think it's interesting/funny.

Oh also, I thought it was funny that Elliot STILL couldn't get a read on Joanna at all, and STILL has no idea what's going on with Tyrell. They're such buffoons, but apparently, they're the only two people on earth that Elliot just can't grok. He always finds them so freaky. His Seinfeld-obsessed prison buddy slit a bunch of people's throats right in front of him and then told Elliot to remember him to White Rose, which is so trippy that I still am not sure if it happened, and yet it's (stultifying) Joanna that gives Elliot the creeps? LOL.
posted by rue72 at 9:51 PM on September 8, 2016 [5 favorites]

I think Tyrell and Joanna freak Elliott out because he's idealistic and thinks about saving the world, all of humanity, and other things on that scale - meanwhile they're the opposite: they have ravenous, self-centered ambition, and not a care for anything else whatsoever. They're so far off of his radar he can't understand them one bit.
posted by destructive cactus at 11:07 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]

My wild guess: Elliott traced the phone to the Wellick home

That was the first thing that popped into my head when the map showed up, but I can't square it with anything else. The Wellick house doesn't exactly have a ton of places to hide, and why play this game with Elliot about finding him when ~the calls have been coming from inside the house~.
posted by sparkletone at 8:36 AM on September 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

This episode really drove home for me what a dismal story this second season is. I don't mean "bad TV", I mean "Elliott and his pals are truly fucked". I realized it when Elliott was talking in despair about how he'd left his friends hung out to dry... Nothing good has happened to anyone this season. No one's gotten a cool new job, no one's gotten laid, no one's accomplished their hacker goal of destroying the world economy. It's all just being in prison, hiding from the FBI, hiding from the Dark Army. And the slow realization that even destroying the world economy didn't work out so well. (The E-coin bit at Microcenter was great.) It makes for a great second of three seasons because it sets up some sort of triumph in the third. We hope.

Tyrell's location is given as 92 East 82nd St. That turns out to be a fake PC store on Google Maps. Hidden behind its website is a squirrely Javascript file and this bizarro website. More detail (from me) on Reddit. Could also be recalling Mr. Robot's own computer shop, but I think it's the wrong neighborhood.

Thanks to you FanFare lot for tipping me off that Angela was baiting Elliott into a recorded confession. I totally missed that possibility. Also I'm on the "Wellick must be a different person from Elliott" team; I may throw things at my TV if they throw in a third personality twist.

I agree the assassination scene at Lupe's was amazing. It's not exactly a spoiler since it aired already, but via Reddit here's slo-mo of the shooting.
posted by Nelson at 9:39 AM on September 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

Someone on Reddit went to Tyrell's location in New York and found a van with a crooked E logo parked there.
posted by Nelson at 10:26 AM on September 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

you guys, now that we know Leon is working with Whiterose, and we know how zealous Dark Army operatives are, I am very worried for him :(
posted by trunk muffins at 12:35 PM on September 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

It's all just being in prison, hiding from the FBI, hiding from the Dark Army. And the slow realization that even destroying the world economy didn't work out so well. (The E-coin bit at Microcenter was great.)

It turns out being around after those buildings blow up at the end of Fight Club really sucks for a while, eh? It's actually one of my favorite things about the show so far, that The Greatest Hack Of All Time™ wasn't the end of the story and actually has pretty terrible consequences for everyone.
posted by sparkletone at 12:59 PM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Tyrell being at either the Knowles' or Wellick's house feels the right sort of dumb for this season - sadly obvious, serving no real purpose, and fuel for yet another season's worth of door-knock-cliffhangers. I have faith that it'll be something smarter, just, y'know, not a lot.

Angela plays the long game.

Disagree on Angela being the master of her own fate. She is the true epitome of this season's message of control being an illusion. Angela thinks she's being a secret corporate ninja making her own way through the world, but the truth is she is just fulfilling the agendas of those infinitely more powerful.

"I intend to leave a legacy, the standard of which was set by God when he created the Earth and man after his own image.

Price is increasingly just a bad caricature of how powerless people think powerful people act behind closed doors. I suppose it's a small blessing that his backstory didn't start with him complaining about his father beating him as a child, and how his created his drive to have the fanciest cufflinks in the world or whatever.

It's actually one of my favorite things about the show so far, that The Greatest Hack Of All Time™ wasn't the end of the story and actually has pretty terrible consequences for everyone.

Eh, I feel this is really badly underdone. What would be the consequences of erasing all consumer and business debt? Too bad we need to spend five episodes pretending Elliot isn't in jail first. And then... I guess there's some brownouts, trash piles up, and it's hard being a small sandwich shop owner? This is like if the sequel to Neuromancer was about how those biggest consequence of unshackling an AI was that the airport payphones are now super glitchy.
posted by kithrater at 4:28 PM on September 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

Joanna carefully applies yet another perfect coat of lipstick

I actually found the application rather sloppy and in the close-up we get of her hand, her manicure is far from perfect. I saw both as signs of her becoming more and more unhinged.
posted by paperback version at 6:10 PM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

Oh, speaking of Joanna, I love the "behind the scenes"ish glimpse we get of her and her driver before Elliot arrives at the car. In the last episode, we just see her coolly "roll" down the window as though she were born sitting there, perfectly composed. But this ep we see that she has to actually prepare herself to come across that way, and the driver has to say, "He's here" (or whatever the line was), because she's not actually a master of timing. (Reminds me of that scene from "30 Rock" when Liz is amazed that Jack knew she was right behind him, until he confesses he actually turned around for the wrong person several times).
posted by paperback version at 6:23 PM on September 9, 2016

Yeah, the quality of Joanna's manicure really bothered me. I'd like to believe it's a sign of how unhinged she's becoming, but I don't know if I completely buy that.

I really hope the phone isn't a "the signal is coming from inside the house!!!" thing, but I am worried that it is.
posted by minsies at 1:16 AM on September 10, 2016

What would be the consequences of erasing all consumer and business debt?

You misunderstand me a little. I mean the consequences for the people what did the deed (Elliot in particular). Society at large, much less so... I mean they need to show us a bit for it to be believable. It needs to be clear that change is happening and it's all pretty bad (albeit in slower motion than feels intuitive). But I don't want some dry accounting of details. Do we know the pay phones didn't get messed up by those voodoo gods in the matrix in count Zero? Gibson didn't quite imagine cellphones then.

But anyway, the scrappy underdogs blew up the death star figuratively and now everything sucks for them. This makes sense. It makes sense that Elliot would have some consequences for kidnapping some random asshole's dog and hacking all his shit last season, and that being much more straightforward for the cops would mean it happens faster than the big hack catching up with Elliot. It's clever (at least for TV thriller definitions of clever) to use that to duck the immediate fallout of everything.

Tyrell asked Elliot in the arcade just before the hack why he was doing it and Elliot says it's because he wanted to save the world. Welp, the world sure ain't saved and they might've just made it way harder to save the world (or even themselves barring that). Angela's at least trying, or was for a minute there at the cost of her soul.

I do have problems with the season for all that I really like it so far. Much like last season around this point, I'm a little worried they'll completely drop the ball right at the end for various reasons. But last season worked out pretty well, and hopefully this one will too.
posted by sparkletone at 2:14 AM on September 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

Setting the record straight.. I may have gotten a little over-excited about real-world events at Tyrell's presumed location. That crooked E van reportedly is a coincidence, and the smart money is the funky websites I was tracking down were created by a fan, not the show.
posted by Nelson at 9:20 AM on September 10, 2016

"Nothing good has happened to anyone this season. No one's gotten a cool new job, no one's gotten laid, no one's accomplished their hacker goal of destroying the world economy. It's all just being in prison, hiding from the FBI, hiding from the Dark Army. And the slow realization that even destroying the world economy didn't work out so well. (The E-coin bit at Microcenter was great.) It makes for a great second of three seasons because it sets up some sort of triumph in the third. We hope."

At the beginning of the first season it feels like everyone was full of a new hope for a new world, what with rebels attacking the empire. This season, though, it is clear that reality has struck back - very bleak, and looks like it's going to end on a real downer. I can only hope for some sort of return of the jedi in the third.
posted by komara at 10:45 AM on September 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

and ewoks. totally looking forward to ewoks in S03.
posted by komara at 10:45 AM on September 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

Given that Elliot has so far hallucinated a fish voiced by Keith David and a bizarre 90s sitcom
mashup... I wouldn't say it's out of the realm of possibility.
posted by sparkletone at 1:18 PM on September 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

The phone calls are coming from Joanna's lovers place.
posted by hoodrich at 9:36 PM on September 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

This episode has a quick shot of software I and a bunch of friends built ten years ago. *squee*
posted by joeyh at 9:04 PM on September 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

The calls are coming from that E Corp executive guy whose wife Tyrell killed. He believes Tyrell is behind 5/9 as well. He was all drunk and unhinged last time we saw him. Maybe he's taking revenge on Joanna to flush Tyrell out.
posted by Kitty Stardust at 1:32 PM on September 14, 2016

Oh, and MAC lipstick Joanna? Basic. I'd expect a super rich lady like her to use only Chanel, Dior, Armani.
posted by Kitty Stardust at 1:38 PM on September 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

I missed this last week: the second Hacking Mr. Robot live post-show discussion, in which:

• Good cheesy puns and riffing about brass balls and shocking people
• This is quite possibly the most dysfunctional family on TV
• A look at Darlene and Cisco as a (happ[il]y/dysfunctional) couple
• Whiterose was originally scripted as a trans woman forced to pretend to be a man, because she's competing in a man's world, which is painful and false to her (via a clip from BD Wong)
• Christian Slater prefers the paternal moments, like when he and Elliot hugged, which was a day when Robert Downey Jr. visited the set
• Rami really liked the Adderall adventure bit, because he got to do crazy things and be happy
• Portia thinks the kiss was a long time coming for the two characters
• And she thinks her (one-shot!) E Corp femtocell hack was her most badass moment
• Carlie thinks Darlene would undo the 5/9 hack, but she wouldn't admit that to anyone
• Christian would enjoy playing Tyrell for a day, Portia would enjoy being Elliot (in part to be comfortable in her costume), Rami would be Alf, to which Carlie said the right answer would have been he would play Darlene
• Anastasia White, production designer, talked about all the attention to detail in making Elliot's mom's townhouse a mirror for the prison, down to the wallpaper selection
• Rami: "If Stage 2 comes to fruition, I think it will be very devastating; and if State 2 doesn't make it all the way, it will also be very devastating"
• Biggest revelation: Alf killed Giddeon. JKLOL it's the Prison theory-turned-reality, citing redditor Extenso's theory from July 11, 2016, shortly after the first episode was "officially" leaked
• Grace Gummer came on to talk about her prep for the role of Dom, which included meeting with female cyber crime FBI agents, who told her "some secrets," did some gun training, and watched some Real Housewives of New Jersey
• A chat about screennames: Dom's "partner" happyhardonhenry806, Elliot uses "samsepi0l" in a nod to creator Sam Esmail and USA exec Alex Sepiol; Angela's Wickr handle of Claudia Kincaid (mentioned above); Darlene uses D0loresH4ze after the character from Lolita
• And it ended with some bloopers

posted by filthy light thief at 10:44 AM on September 15, 2016 [3 favorites]