Warning: Spoilers for the latest episode of Mr. Robot, "eps2.5_h4ndshake.sme."
"This will be the last time I keep things from you, I promise."
If Season 1 of USA's trippy, compelling Mr. Robot taught us anything, it's not to trust our own eyes. But after the big reveal that Mr. Robot himself (Christian Slater) was actually only a figment of Elliot's (Rami Malek) imagination -- a more confident and aggressive side of her personality who appeared in the form of his dead father -- would the show be so bold as to dip into the "things aren't what they seem" well again during its sophomore run?
Well, yes. It did. And in a big way. Of course with viewers having learned a huge lesson about the show's unreliable narrator last summer, trust issues were going to be abundant heading into Season 2, and so many folks were able to guess the true nature of Elliot's "regimen" ahead of time. As far back as the season premiere, in fact. Still, just like in Season 1, knowing the outcome or predicting the "gotcha" twist doesn't necessarily diminish things on a show like Mr. Robot. By the time we found last year out that Mr. Robot wasn't an actual person, most viewers already had the puzzle sorted. Now the Darlene twist was another story, but for the most part, the show's audience was hip to the Tyler Durden-ness of it all from early on.
As was the case with this season's big curtain yank - the twist that Elliot, for the entire season so far, has been in prison. Just the mere fact that Elliot was so removed from everyone else's story this year, from the get-go, put people on high alert. Sure, he claimed was it was due to a self-exile treatment of his own design (and that's still half-true), but it wasn't hard to figure out that something else was going on down on a different level.
Again though, Mr. Robot has twists and turns, but it's never actually out to pull the rug out from under you completely. It has a tendency to lay out its own breadcrumb trails and spruce things up with an assortment of Easter Eggs. So whereas some shows have learned the hard way -- like Dexter and American Horror Story -- that you can't drag out a twist on TV, Mr. Robot seems fully aware of this and does it anyway, knowing that we're all invested in Elliot's mental and emotional journey more than we are the bells and whistles that come with a shocking swerve. Overall, it's never about the twist itself, rather what the twist reveals about Elliot's headspace and history.
Perhaps this week's big reveal may have faltered a little bit given that just last week Elliot experienced a sort of mental shielding, in the form of that extended '80s sitcom world that Mr. Robot used to numb the beating, and now he we've learned that everything we've been watching since the premiere, through his eyes, has been another coping mechanism. We're now layers deep into various altered mental states that Elliot and/or Mr. Robot use to warp reality and that can get a bit murky. Also, I can't imagine the show returning to this type of surprise again. We've now seen both Elliot get tricked by his own mind and Elliot trick us with his own mind. Time to salt the earth on this one.
Still, I'm very curious to see the rest of Elliot's story get filled in. We know he's in prison, but for what exactly? Hacking his therapist's creep-of-an-ex? It can't be for anything like murder or the E Corp hack since a long stretch would mean out hero couldn't be released without some sort of time-jump. Also, what was it he was doing for Ray in prison? Were computers actually involved? I mean, they'd have to be if Ray needed "Mr. Robot's" expertise. And what about the moments when we actually saw Ray by himself, or with other people who weren't Elliot? Was Ray a guard who could go to the outside world? Even with this reveal, there are still parts of the story that need assembling. Like, what was up with the days when Elliot was abusing Adderall? And why is Whiterose protecting him on the inside?
I liked the twist, as much as the show has sort of become overrun with gimmicks this year. I mostly enjoyed it because of what I mentioned above. I'm looking forward, in the next few weeks, for more light to be shed on Elliot's half-season story. Season 2, with Elliot off to the side and some notably longer and self-indulgent episodes, hasn't quite reached the heights we were hoping for heading in. Now though, we've got a "handshake" between Elliot and Mr. Robot -- and one between Elliot and us viewers as well -- indicating that he's ready to take the reins on the 5/9 aftercare.
What did you guys and gals think of Mr. Robot's latest venture into Elliot's shattered, untrustworthy mind? Did you like that he wasn't floored by the reveal but instead he was the one who was lying to us? Or are you over this show's slight of hand and (over)use of smoke and mirrors?
Matt Fowler is a writer for IGN and a member of the Television Critics Association (TCA). Follow him on Twitter at @TheMattFowler and Facebook at http://ift.tt/2aJ67FB.
Aucun commentaire:
Enregistrer un commentaire