Mr. Robot FanFic - Season 4

I've been stuck with the flu this past week, so I've been dying to return to my favored hobbies. And I have a complete plan with plots, themes, and titles to round out two more seasons to follow.

Is there anything you as viewers are hoping to see make it into the show?

(I'm finding it difficult to write during this flu, making more typos than usual. Chalk it up to "febrile delirium," I guess.) :-D 😀

Fernando Frickin' Vera has shown up at Elliot's apartment, speaking to Darlene no less. What a messed up can of worms that is to deal with!

Let's start the episode with a character-fill flashback. Agent Dom hasn't had a turn yet, but she'll have to wait. We need a scene exposing more secret history of Darlene's young life... hopefully one to explain how she is so important to Elliot, yet she "vanishes" from his memory and his family polaroid.

Vera is there for some not-at-all-charitable reason, in which Elliot serves "a purpose to him." Most likely it would be "how do I rebuild my drug empire with the anonymity of E-Coin." (Yeah, that last bit is likely an oxymoron!) And rather than expect reciprocity of one good deed for another, it's Vera's style to extort and duress the right result from the wrong threatening behavior. ("But EVERYBODY knows to reward my hateful misdeeds with the riches I desire!")

This likely means Darlene is hostage until Elliot does the job. But since Shayla's death last time, Elliot has learned a few lessons, and continues to learn throughout this episode. He will not begin to work for his cause until he is assured of her proof-of-life and likelihood of her safe release.

Every Season Premier in Mr Robot deserves an awesome hacking suite scene. The pilot had a series of "I 0wn you" encounters, as well as the defense of server CS30. Season 2 had the awesome smart house hack. Season 3 had the Defcon CTF prelim at the HackerSpace called "1984." So here, we either need a tie-in to the massive "unhack" Elliot just did to reset the world... or we need a crash course marathon for Vera, likely a semi-fictitious lesson in "pseudonymity" as it relates to cryptocurrencies.

We know that we are awfully close to Halloween, which means that Elliot & Darlene are both looking optimistically forward to getting high and watching "The Careful Massacre of the Bourgeoisie" together. But this tango with Vera will make that very unlikely. Either they get their holiday uninterrupted, or Darlene is dead (which will NOT happen in my script!), or she ends up hospitalized... which sounds the most likely outcome.

So Elliot comes away with a few lessons quickly:

1. If Vera wants anything from him, it is on the sole condition that no harm comes to Darlene.
2. Vera is like the very Elites that Elliot has now vowed to destroy... demanding, capricious, self-centered, unfair, unaccountable, immoral, and exploitative.
3. When the line is crossed that Darlene is harmed, the gig is up, and Elliot will sooner see the world burn than to allow the unjust their spoils.

In the end, Vera is collared but Darlene is hospitalized. I guess Elliot puts the government trace on Vera's phone to where every sight and sound collectible is geotagged and forwarded to the FBI. (Maybe someone we know!) Elliot visits Darlene in the hospital, with laptop, to play "Massacre" together, whether she is still comatose or not.

Tyrell gets a check-in from his CTO chair at ECorp. Philip Price is as gregarious and helpful as ever... a veritable "anti-villain." (Unlike Whiterose, Philip is quite lawful... but the law is so deep in his pocket that what's wrong is lawful and what's right is outlawed... with the government becoming increasingly privatized by ECorp subsidiaries.)

Elliot is turning his focus to the Dark Army. It's a tenuous battle, for he has gone from pwning their entire network down to struggling to re-compromise each system they repair.

Yet amidst all this, he gets an email from a stranger... requiring a feat of hacking just to learn that much about him. Mr Robot reappears just to restate the obvious fear he should have that someone could penetrate his vulnerability... right at the time he's wrestling with the Dark Army.

Introducing a new character... I call her "Patience." (Maybe that's too on-the-nose?) She's a highly functional autistic hacker who has some rather 'idiot savant' or Rainman-like skills. She can shove aside emotion (if properly sheltered from stress) in order to deep dive into rationally explored deconstructions and evasive connections. For starters, she has followed her love of FSociety to its source, learned of its Dark Army counterpart in the revolution, and has witnessed everything from 5/9 to the recent UnHack.

Part of the theme of the episode "click" is about overcoming distrust to make a connection. Part is about how distrust [of authority] is actually pretty good policy. But the very name "Patience" brings up an important theme: Rational thought isn't just helped by patient focus... it requires it. Humans are wired to respond emotionally first. The Amygdala won't pass anything on to the Neocortex until it has as least 3/10ths of a second to react emotionally to a stimulus. Even after that, the rational brain may never get a turn, unless there is enough patient focus to ride it out and carry us there.

Patience has hacked Elliot, but has also got her fingers into ECorp (FSociety's public focus), and Dark Army (FSociety's known accomplice during 5/9.) She has leverage against his enemies to share... but she needs discretion and guarded shelter. They "click," and Elliot vows to be her protector.

Dorothy Bush: Well thought out, Twisty. 
(Even though I don't follow the series).

Open a long-due flashback to Dom DiPierro and her heyday in law school. Let's give her some dialog with her brother, while she's getting ready for a restaurant date with the girl she's hopeful will be "the one."

Cut to modern times, and she's now in Santiago's old office; the new Agent In Change of the rapidly closing 5/9 task force. Her new tasks within the FBI are unpleasant, mostly to do with seeking Iranian links in the 71 cyberattack bombings against ECorp. Her double-agent Dark Army responsibilities are less difficult: Keep reporting back any 'change in temperature' about the Bureau's investigations.

Now cut back to Darlene at the hospital, out of her coma and eager to vanish. Elliot is there for her, every day, and his backpack conceals hers, packed to hit the road. (Angela's been visiting, too... They're like sisters.) Darlene knows every HackerSpace in or near NYC, but she's more interested in finding her educated "Lady of the Night" friend in Chinatown. Elliot updates her about the new ally Patience.

Eyes are not yet on Patience, and not yet on Elliot. He's been "indirecting agency" so that he cannot be seen directly hacking the Dark Army, but he is growing rooted servers and botnets that can do his bidding at times and targets from which he has alibis.

While they are clean of Dark Army's focus, he and Patience are covertly surveilling Whiterose and her Lieutenants. (Leon got promoted, Irving is vacationing, and Dom is undergoing 'indoctrination.' She doesn't easily break skepticism, but she can 'make believe.') More Lieutenants are also coming to surface that seem strangely important... one "Dwarf" ("侏儒") who operates in NYC HackerSpaces (we actually met him in s03e01), and "Barbecue" ("烧烤"), who evidently runs the Red Wheelbarrow chain. (This will, in my writing, turn out to be the man credited since mid-season 1 as "Hamburger Man.")

Whiterose and Philip Price tango some more. Philip has no motive to name a successor, now that the world-winning ECoin and Elliot's "UnHack" are moving him back on top. Whiterose is seriously plotting out ways he could be killed off.

Tyrell is finding himself on the fence... His title is a barb in his side, a bruise to his enormous ego... but the pay and acclaim are both comforting and intoxicating: If it feels so good to enjoy the privilege, security, and power of great wealth, does he really want to try to overthrow that? He reaches out to Mr Robot to argue their goals.

We know there are things Tyrell hates about his dad, so much he never wants to become like him. Some we know for fact that he came from Europe, speaking no more English than William Carlos Williams' "The Red Wheelbarrow."

A Tyrell childhood flashback would likely entail chopping wood on some farm in Sweden. His dad, like most of our, was likely all traditional employment "Poor Dad, not Rich Dad." And it's a fair bet that's also where Tyrell learned misogyny, old testament intolerance, and his contempt for wage slaves dying in debt. Maybe he showed early talent for computers. And maybe, to his religious dad's dismay, he might have found affection for a fellow rural farm boy.

Mr Robot meets Tyrell at his favorite "Wheel of Wonder" ferris wheel in Coney Island. "To see what's above us, it helps to get the higher vantage." When the ticket person asks "How many," Robot says "one" at the same time Tyrell says "two." "My bad, autopilot response," apologizes Robot. They get in the ferris cart.

Darlene is staying with her "Lady of the Night" friend, who has an amazing collection of bookshelves in her apartment. The two start discussing the difference between Marx the Economist, and Marx the Philosopher. "The real dysfunction of society is this class separation between those that work and those that rule them. Even Athens was less democratic than they seem, giving the vote to the privileged white men while the labor continued on the backs of women and slaves with no vote."

We begin a back-and-forth parallel conversation between Robot/Tyrell and Darlene/Night, both discussing class separation and inequality. Tyrell asks "But how can the leisure of the rich be wrong if that same leisure is what gave Athens its art, science, philosophy, and culture?"

We switch to Night replying, "It's the nature of one disinterested class taking rule over the others that is unfair. They grow uncaring, cruel, and lost in fantastic indulgence for having been separated from the cost of their privilege." Darlene responds, "Well, yeah, that's the traditional employment model of wage slavery when you've got 'em by the short hairs. So, what to do?"

And now Robot gets to go on another counter-society tirade as only Christian Slater can deliver: In a nutshell, he'll conclude "It's time we elevate the whole of humanity to a new standard of leisure, a new freedom from duress. It's time we end this zero sum game and put the planet back on even footing."

Elsewhere, in Africa, Whiterose is staging more mass slaughters, waging more cold wars over rare earth metals, and coordinating more worldwide attacks to tip the scales of power.

Patience is rather unchanging from her childhood flashback to modern times. She's a "slow cooker," loving to get lost in patches of clover or other patterns, looking for nature's exceptional rarities. She has a good sense of humor with her friends, but might miss a point until she's hit with a "Wait, What?" moment a minute later. :-) She's also got a rare grace, that when she hears, sees, or remembers something incorrectly, she can laugh it off without any of the loss/anger triggered in the average person.

Patience wants to visit FSociety in NYC in person. Darlene wants to rally her findings from Night. Tyrell is eager to reorganize the group's new directives. Even Angela feels left out too long, stewing for retribution against Whiterose.

Elliot and Darlene must first meet Patience. They practice counter-surveillance methods to "dry clean" any tails. After a few SDR stops and checks, they proceed to the meeting. (I'd like something as "romantic" as the old Arcade, but logically this should be something unburned, and closer to town. A good candidate would be the Confectura warehouse where Elliot got shot.)

Revolution seems to be a potluck of carry out fast food. The meeting starts out poorly, scattering targets among Whiterose, Price, Dark Army, ECorps, the FBI, the drug cartels, etc... Everyone wants to lead with their personal vendetta, and it looks as if there is no common ground at all...

...but as emotions escalate, Elliot shares a lesson of patience he learned from Patience. Our top priorities are often self-centered, but our second priority is often what unites us: the focus that places "the greater good" ahead of our myopic selves. Amazingly, the group's objectives become crystal clear... We want to end the culture that feeds class separation and rule by disinterested parties. We want to elevate humanity into new standards of leisure and security. And we want to disempower the greed of the Elite, now feasting on ECoin, by inventing a more democratic, more secure and anonymous, form of currency we'll call "Flowz."

Flowz will break the contradiction of how money is defined: Money wants to be both "a store of wealth" and "a currency of exchange," but stops being one whenever acting as the other. Flowz, like Bitcoin, will place the focus on being currency. Storing wealth is an unhealthy focus, trying to pay wealth to wealth just for existing. Extreme ownership has been the exception, not the rule, yet everyone is a consumer to finite degrees. Negating interest tends to forgive debt... so the more consumers bail from ECoin in favor of greater anonymity and currency, the more Flowz will liberate the consumer.

The group also arrives at more "post-capitalist" insights: the revolutionary wealth that money cannot buy. FSociety will need volunteerism and advocacy. If not in rule of law, it will find its love in justice. And the self-owning cooperative model will keep the producers under their own voluntary rule.

Angela sets a bed in her apartment for Patience. Yet they are being watched, by ECorp, which is watched by Dark Army, which is watched by Whiterose. Whiterose tells a lieutenant that another rare meeting will have to be set up.

In a pattern very similar from Angela's experience, yet very different for Patience, she gets abducted by the Jersey interracial couple who drive her to the suburbs. But almost like a scene out of Demolition Man, Patience isn't fearful about the abduction. In fact, she's practically manic, singing along with the outdated radio tunes from the 80's.

When led into the suburban house and to the darkened room with the fish tank, Patience wastes no time placing herself in the chair behind the computer. She begins writing a program in Commodore BASIC that plays a selected song from the radio out as an 8-bit chipmod melody. When the little blond girl arrives, floppy disk in hand, she's unnerved, and says, "You need to sit over there."

"Oh, you brought a floppy disk! How wonderful. Ya know, back in the day we used to call those 'flabbies.' I mean, it wasn't bad enough they were vulnerable to speaker magnets and static electricity, but made to crumple in your pocket by design? What were they thinking?" She prattles on without giving the girl a word edgewise when she asks, "Oh yeah, Am I free to go?"

The girl rolls her eyes and tries to begin business. "We have a lot of questions, and we haven't got much time." Patience points out, "I asked first." The interrogation exercise becomes futile, as Patience becomes a stickler for protocol. "I did ask first, and that wasn't a 'no'." She drags her chair to the door and proceeds to loop her button holes over the hinge pins, removing each with an easy pull.

"I want my phone back!" she tells the little girl, who is already on the rotary phone, giving a play-by-play of the chaos over the line. When she gets no response about her smartphone, she tugs at the hinges, and the door opens from the side opposite its knob.

Patience arrives at a payphone, but the receiver is busted off. It's rare to find technology unvandalized when left outdoors... especially after the 5/9 meltdown. Leon pulls up to her corner, and says, "I'm here to save you a lot of trouble and drive you straight to our friend Elliot." On the drive, he observes, "I've never met anyone on the planet who gets a chance to meet Whiterose, and turns her down. I don't know if she will take too kindly to that or not."

"Yeah, my greatest strength is slowness. I think we'd never get beyond the first barriers of basic language."

This would likely be a "rolling feature" episode for the season with a focus on counter-surveillance.

We begin with Leon dropping Patience off to Elliot's apartment. It makes sense that finding a parking space in Chinatown is insanely improbable, so Elliot comes out front to walk her inside. There inside, it is shown that he is already assembling a "decoy party," in which every participant has a hoodie and an FSoc mask. He gives her a burner phone with the battery removed... untraceable while powered off, but useful for a later place and time.

Elliot "plus one" arrives at the HackerSpace "1984" (as seen in S03E01) and spots a familiar "little man" back in the corner. It's the kind of corner that gives him "command of the room," with a vantage to see all who come and go from the doorways and staircase.

Still in FSoc mask, he sits beside him, lifts the mask, and strikes up a talk. "Robert Frehley, I'm sure you know who I am and why I'm here." Robert first dons a bewildered look and replies "No and no?" but once Elliot opens the laptop from his backpack, he affects a more candid smirk to say "Holy sh*t, the whole network. Well, Mr. Alderson, how may I help?" He looks left and right to assure a certain level of privacy.

Elsewhere in the subway, Angela and Patience enter down a stairway. They quickly race to an upward staircase, and two middle-aged men scramble after them, talking into their shirt cuffs. Turning the top of the stairs, they ditch their hoodies and masks in exchange for glasses and caps. They leisurely stroll down the same stairs that the men race to exit.

Back at 1984, Elliot declares that Patience is in his protective custody. His "plus one" unmasks to reveal just another decoy. Robert concedes that he'll inform the others.

Tyrell is seen negotiating property purchases. But in time, it is revealed that all his work is nothing more than misdirection.

Eventually, Angela hands off Patience to Darlene, who has secured an apartment. In this case, it's the building where Cisco lived not too long ago.

Philip Price visits Tyrell at his office to discuss the celebration of his son being returned. For Tyrell, this is a great moment of liberation, seeing that Santiago's sadistic threats have been defeated. But for Price, this is an opportunity to spin good ECorp press even better: ECorp, making our futures brighter.

It was part of the plan to let ECorp pay for an Au Pair/Nanny, providing care that a busy single parent could not. But Tyrell is intent to veto the choice. Price senses that this is going to get personal, so he moves to the couch with a posture open to discussion.

Tyrell begins "I will be the kind of father for my son that my father could not be. I will not bind my son to slavish labor. I will not indoctrinate him into ancient superstitions and fears. And I will see that he gets a proper role model for critical thinking and patient temperament. You see, this recommended nanny is much like his mom, just the kind of bullying sadist my dad would approve... and I do not."

Back at Elliot's apartment, Angela arrives with MacBook in hand. She has a focus on how to take down Whiterose and the Dark Army... all wrapped up in a neat powerpoint presentation. Elliot is surprisingly supportive, but offers refinements in a "how can we make this work?" Specifically, how can their vulnerabilities be exposed, their funds seized, and the causes be kept anonymous?

Darlene checks in with her friend Night once again, gaining more philosophical insight into inequality, debt, wage slavery, and the innate corruption of campaign funding. Some wealth money cannot buy (volunteerism, advocacy), but modern currency too often rewards property for property's sake. In time, ECoin will need be targeted, but for now it's time to focus on driving the Dark Army out into the light of rule of law.

Angela sets a meet with Price to discuss settling her outstanding wish for "retribution." He sends a car to get her.

Tyrell, Elliot, and Darlene work at developing a new brand to replace FSociety. The old brand served well at first, providing an anonymous enemy of ECorp and its role in enslaving by debt (and a lesser degree the FBI). But at the hand of Whiterose, this hero of the people became an Iranian anti-American villain. (This didn't seem to effect their image as Dark Army's partner in crime.)

The new brand will need a different common enemy. The old face of 'Mr Monopoly' scored nicely, but it says too little about career politicians and the financiers they bed. Judges' wigs and robes? Uncle Sam in Riddler green? It should be another mask: simple enough for followers to don without being elaborately attired. Instead of the antisocial "F*ck Society," they need a symbol of equality.

Price welcomes Angela into his "home theatre war room," centered around screens, but floored with couches and desks. There is even a roll-up wall concealing a concession stand, which can serve anything from popcorn to foie gras, at the whim of the occasion. She quickly plugs into the HDMI to show the extensive deep dive Elliot got on the Dark Army, not only mapping resources, but chronicling their history of crimes. "My goodness... What are the odds that his access and your willful management would meet with my unmatched political prowess at just this advantageous a time?"

Meanwhile, the rebranding team takes another beat. Darlene starts "What about a motto? Why not target their outrage instead of this kumbayah equality sh*t? How about something like 'Deny the Unjust Their Spoils?' " New icons come to mind, including a mask of a wigged pirate skull. "What's more 'equal' than Death and Taxes?"

In Price's war room, news stories of hot and cold running warfare are breaking from Africa and China. "It seems we need to act fast, or we may be unable to update their rap sheet at the pace it's unfolding."

Elliot is cutting out a paper plate mask in the shape of a robot head. He grabs his father's jacket from the closet, and puts it on. "What about the way we all feel robbed of our humanity? How we are enslaved to labor for our masters? And who is left to become the impartial referee that we've all come to need?" He slides the handmade robot mask onto his face, and a new icon (acted by Elliot? by Robot?) is born.

This season finale brings to head the competition between the unjust Dark Army led by Whiterose, and the seemingly lawful ECorp led by Price. It begins with a flashback of the moment Price is approached to become CEO. Whiterose (as Zhang) makes clear his capricious 'my-agenda-first' policy. Price assures him that collusion is stronger than competition, timely payoff results in power, and Washington Township will get its needed protection.

The lieutenants of the Dark Army convene. Irving, Agent Dom, Leon, Robert the Dwarf, and 'Hamburger Man.' Leon boldly leads. "I just gotta say, I'm not happy abut this hot and cold running warfare in the Congo. So I'm not out to burn the bridges over all the trust we share, ya know? But I must protest... and I think until I see the immigrants get refuge, I've got to go on strike, and slow my roll on giving agency."

Robert is quick to offer a differing opinion. "I just don't find myself mired in the worries of the common people. Maybe my work is easier than most, working the tech sector. But I'm not stopping operations; we've got too much leverage growing from consenting participants."

Agent Dom chimes in, "It's been a madhouse at the FBI. Investigations are erupting everywhere over the past crimes that the Dark Army has been involved in. They're even on top of current operations and some future preparations, so our whole network is seriously compromised. Meanwhile, I'm doing all I can to obstruct justice by crashing databases. We're now at the point we need to be hiding the football."

Irving responds, "You mean to say we need to hide the movements of Whiterose herself?" Dom replies "If we don't keep her and her Zhang persona free from extradition situations, she could get trapped at any point along her international travels." With a nod and exhale, Irving replies, "Eh Huhn."

Philip Price gets Whiterose on the phone to begin a tango of taunts and threats. Price is hosting Angela all this time, (as well as Elliot, Tyrell, and Darlene), and signaling aides, techies, and legal assistants to enact attacks upon the Dark Army throughout the phone conversation.

A montage of scenes unfolds to show a major power game at play. The CIA seizes Dark Army assets. Agent Dom continues to compromise and misdirect FBI intel. Whiterose redirects flight plans. Irving wages combat between Federal Agents and Dark Army.

In the end, Whiterose (as Zhang) is taken captive by a Marine task force. She is clearly unhappy, yet not shaken.

Every season finale of Mr Robot has to feature an ending scene focused on a slow-rolling car taking us to the next page of the story. Here, a white limousine approaches a security gate at the White House.

Accompanied by a silent Tyrell Wellick, Philip Price meets again with Jack the Secretary of Finance. He asks why Philip is so unafraid of running afoul of the law in the many ways that the Dark Army has. He replies, "But I am the law. I have the world using ECoin as its new standard of currency. I have financed the campaign livelihood of every politician that matters. I have even privatized much of the government and intelligence community to give me rule of information itself. And should I ever need to make any wrong behavior of ours to be legal... or make any right behavior illegal, I am just the person to do that. If ever asked who is the leader of the free world, you should know the real answer to that by now."

...And before the scene ends, the room is being monitored remotely by "Hamburger Man," still in his clean suit as he overhears the private conversation.