If you thought that the non-stop tension of last week’s episode of Mr. Robot meant that things would calm down this week, then “eps3.5_kill-process.inc” should serve as a reminder that when you think you’re in control of things, you should probably think again. The following contains spoilers, so beware.
See You In Another Life!
The episode takes us back in time for a party…of sorts. What we’re looking at is a living funeral for Emily Moss (Angela’s mother), who has decided to discontinue the treatments for her cancer. A young Angela is reluctant to talk to her mother and needs some coaxing from Mr. Alderson (before he too died of cancer caused by E-Corp and came back as Mr. Robot) to be brave and talk to her mother. He also asks that if Elliot ever needs a push and he’s not there, that Angela be the one to push him.
Antara Nayar (the lawyer Angela worked with against E-Corp before taking a job there) tells Emily that an anonymous benefactor has offered to pay for Emily’s treatment, but Emily refuses. When Angela finally comes over, her mother tells her that she doesn’t believe that this is the end. She believes that they will be together again in another world and asks Angela to believe with her. Is this other world the afterlife, or does Emily know something about the plans White Rose discussed with Angela? We’ll have to wait to find out as we shift to the present (or the show’s present, 2015).
“You Sound Like Him”
Elliot confronts Angela about Phase Two and her working with White Rose. How can she go along with the plan, knowing that it will mean that hundreds of people working in the building will be killed when it explodes? Angela is not just following Mr. Alderson’s advice in pushing Elliot, though. She seems to believe that White Rose has a way to undo all of this; from the pending explosions back through the death of their parents. Elliot doesn’t share her faith in White Rose, whom he calls a terrorist, and so he goes to stop the explosion himself.
But doing something yourself isn’t easy when ‘yourself’ is multiple people. The Elliot and Mr. Robot sides of his brain duke it out first figuratively, then literally, in another scene reminiscent of the show’s spiritual parent, Fight Club. Mr. Robot throws Elliot/himself down stairs and into walls in an effort to thwart him. Eventually, Elliot gains the upper hand, convincing Mr. Robot that there is no reason to let people get killed by the explosion when it won’t even destroy the physical records. They have been rerouted back to various locations throughout the country.
“It’s Not Going To Work Out The Way We Discussed It”
How do you tell someone that the trip to the Ukraine they were planning on taking with their wife and child isn’t going to happen because you’ve been keeping the fact that their wife was murdered a secret? If you’re Irving and the someone is Tyrell Wellick, you tell them with a letter and make sure you’re not in the room when they read it. Assuming that is what the letter says, Wellick reacts by lighting it on fire and escaping through an underground tunnel.
When Darlene lets FBI agents Dom and Norm know where Tyrell Wellick is, they are hot to go after him, but Agent Santiago (whom we know is working with the Dark Army) refuses to let them move, claiming that the information is potentially unreliable. Dom, not one to give up, decides to go “get some lunch” at the location, which happens to be a Red Wheelbarrow BBQ. While (not officially) investigating, she sees the smoke from Tyrell’s fire and ventures down into the catacombs in a chilling scene that looks like something out of The Silence of the Lambs. What she finds is…nothing. Wellick has already fled. After getting lightly (given that she disobeyed a direct order) chewed out by Santiago, she goes to a food truck (poor Dom never got her BBQ) and that’s when she hears a commotion. Someone has been arrested out on the street and that someone is none other than Tyrell Wellick. Sometimes when you think all is lost, the universe has a way of giving you what you were looking for.
The Agony of Defeat
Unfortunately for Elliot, the opposite can also hold true. In sports, every huge comeback requires an equally huge collapse by the other team. Just when Elliot thought that he had everything under control, he sees the tear-stricken faces of people outside all looking at the same thing on their phones. He gets to a window display TV and sees that 71 E-Corp locations (with all the physical files) have been bombed by terrorists. His efforts to stop Phase Two have been rendered meaningless by White Rose and the Dark Army.
Lingering Questions:
Why does China want to annex the Congo? My best guess is they probably have some large deposit of a rare mineral needed for White Rose’s machine.
Who was Emily Moss’s anonymous benefactor? Could it be Philip Price? Or possibly White Rose herself?
What did the letter to Tyrell say? What were the handcuffs for? Did White Rose think that he would burn himself alive? If you have a theory, let me know in the comments.
What is in the Red Wheelbarrow bag from the last episode? It must be important since Angela refused to give it up to an armed robber on the train.
