Despite holding numerous animated shows close to my heart, Steven Universe is my favorite, and I hope to discuss the show and delve into some of the reasons why.
I saw some of the early show as it was first airing but dismissed it as a run-of-the-mill adventure fantasy. Fortunately, I eventually gave it a fair shot because it transforms into an inspired and life-affirming character drama that beautifully blends heartfelt pathos, embellishment of the mundane, and a gradual deconstruction of an initial childlike zeal. Due to their length, I avoid revisiting shows, but despite some jarring pacing, I found a lot personally meaningful to pull out of this and have returned to it numerous times.
Conversely, many have been quite critical of it (some of which I find to be a combination of prejudiced, tangential, pedantic, or baseless, and not worth a nuanced discussion here), and while I recognize room for improvement, these negative responses have mainly been alienating. However, giving the show the love I feel it deserves by delving into individual characters, their relationships, and the significance they have for me is daunting.
People are complicated and not easily categorized. However, fictional characters are limited to the imagination of those who wrote them and are often designed to serve specific purposes in a narrative. Often, character analysis can be easy when they have straightforward motivations like pursuing wealth, saving others, seeking freedom, or satisfying their egos.
In contrast, characters in Steven Universe grapple with morally conflicting and indecisive motivations. While some are confident in things they believe or know they don't want, they remain uncertain of their desires, and the show places meticulous focus on their dilemmas and introspection, such as Garnet. Fusion is important to Ruby and Sapphire; they despise how Homeworld treats it and take pride in being a fusion. However, their initial contentedness is undermined as they realize their relationship is codependent, and the show delves into the nuances of how fatalism played a role in forming their relationship, the conflicts their codependency causes, and how Ruby and Sapphire eventually confront this codependency.
Moreover, the show is provocative, investigating the struggles and cultivating factors behind various walks of life, and it offers a distinct approach to conflict resolution. Instead of violence, most interpersonal dilemmas are solved through emotional openness and revelation.
It also helped me to articulate some of my emotions and made me feel understood and respected. Steven Universe revolves around characters who are told their existence is wrong in their relationships, physical abilities, or identity. Yet those characters work to discover and accept who they are and demand respect from others. Through this, I was offered emotional validation and positive reinforcement, which has been helpful for me.
But it's still an engaging piece of storytelling. When I first watched the show, my passion for storytelling was waning, and it played a pivotal role in rekindling it. Additionally, my enjoyment hasn't been brief; I've frequently used it as an example of the type of storytelling I enjoy, and if I watched it for the first time today, I'm confident I would have a similar appreciation for it. Yet, part of me worries that someday this show will lose its magic, that my hypothetical rose-tinted glasses will shatter, but that has yet to happen.
However, despite this complexity of discussion, I believe the show's story is firmly grounded in authenticity. It delves into individual characters' truths and the joys/hardships of their relationships, and like anything honest, it can be uncomfortable and messy.
The show delves into rarely explored emotional territories or familiar ones with a unique approach. Most character arcs revolve around individuals grappling with their identities, and it comes across as an earnest, self-reflective effort to dissect emotional experiences people may often prefer not to explore, let alone discuss with children, in pursuit of personal growth.
The show also rejects traditional moral dichotomies, which is undoubtedly a point of contention. Stories sometimes avoid letting their characters commit indefensible actions, relying on villains as scapegoats for the heroes, or having conflicts that arise from accidents/miscommunications rather than deliberate actions. There's nothing wrong with this type of storytelling, but it's noteworthy that Steven Universe rarely does.
Many critiques of the show revolve around certain characters being unlikeable, coupled with the notion that one can't hold an affinity for a character if their actions cannot be exonerated. (In particular, many complaints about Steven Universe: Future revolve around the fact that it made Steven unlikable.) But often, I believe the show's events are mischaracterized; there's a tangential rabbit hole that I won't go down into of the plethora of examples and how some interpretations are misguided, taking nuanced situations and sometimes devolving into victim blaming and overdramatization.
But to be fair, like anything provocative, balance is vital. In the case of morally grey characters, it is best to refrain from having their actions be purely selfless or selfish (and in cases they are, you will often see them be self-destructive). However, people vary in ethical beliefs, so finding a perfect balance is impossible. Yet Steven Universe, where characters are motivated by love, devotion, or a desire for agency/self-actualization, and its avoidance of clear-cut judgments, having many conflicts where neither character is in the right, strikes a solid balance for me. It rationalizes its villains; the heroes aren't perfect, but neither are outright condemned.
Above all, the show focuses on its characters' emotions; it refrains from simply labeling its villains as evil; it demonstrates it by exploring an array of perspectives that illustrate the harm their society has had on others.
Similarly, the focus on its heroes revolves around their struggles with self-identity, self-acceptance, sense of purposelessness, regrets, etc. However, they are prone to making mistakes and being self-centered. They're also not motivated to change to enhance their heroism; instead, they embark on misadventures of self-discovery and confront their struggles to attain personal growth, even if these efforts sometimes harm those around them. A core aspect of the show is outlining a cycle of oppression and exploring characters who fail to recognize their influence on others, and it's compelling to see many characters' struggles addressed but remain relevant, transformative experiences.
Steven Universe is a profoundly pensive and sad story. Yet, it feels productive, with characters overcoming their trauma and reshaping their beliefs and identities. In essence, the show encourages self-improvement and empathy, which I believe are the primary takeaways intended for the story. But in discussing the show's broader ideas, we must consider the potential banality that various children's media encourage tolerance and individuality. These ideas aren't novel, and some will deem the overly empathetic perspective optimistically naive (something I'll delve into later.)
Yet, I rarely found the show's efforts cloying and believe it can be characterized by a broader skepticism. While the show encourages empathy, its story is far more about how situations are often more complex than we assume.
Its entire narrative centers on deconstructing the idealization of Rose, dwelling on the aftermath of her disappearance, the reignited conflict she believed was over, and the anguished friends she left in her wake. The final confrontation with White Diamond proposes a tangible and cynical ulterior interpretation of Rose. White Diamond claims that all of Rose's efforts were a ploy to cope with her feelings of inferiority.
Ultimately, the show raises the question: Did Rose sacrifice her life to bring Steven into existence? Even if you disagree with White Diamond's broader beliefs, this reading of Rose remains conflicting in its plausibility. However, the reality remains: Rose relinquished her life for Steven. Rose was taught by the systems she was born into to act as an oppressive force; however, she found value in life on Earth, and her voice not being respected by the other Diamonds led her to be empathetic. So, Rose decided to be the voice for Earth and ended up being influential in the lives of many. Then, she made a consequential choice that demonstrated how much she valued humanity but also a potential failure in understanding or caring about how influential she was to others. Rose may have frequently been selfless and well-intentioned, but she was imperfect, often insensitive and selfish.
Ultimately, we never get closure on Rose's character; she's dead, and while we get brief glimpses into how she feels, we'll never truly understand her inner world. In my view, this fosters a lack of cynicism—avoiding assumptions of selfishness and deception—and instead celebrating individualism, both the good and the bad. It's an eloquent and unique final confrontation that invites a reexamination of Rose's character upon revisiting the show.
Overall, it's a show where hardly anyone is deliberately malicious, yet people can be selfish and cause harm anyway. Taking parents in the show as an example, they are typically well-intentioned but frequently exhibit callous behaviors. Some are overprotective; some don't understand their child and silently disapprove of them; some make strong efforts to support their children, but not enough to understand them. Episodes like "The Test" explore the gem's conflicted efforts to nurture Steven and outline why adults may, in a sincere effort to assist and protect, lie or hide information from children. All of these lead to disconnection, but the show doesn't condemn the parents. Consistently, their efforts are earnest, even if some of their rationale is left up to interpretation.
Generally, the show seems to want to show that parents had their own lives before having children; they're human, and even if they care, they cannot raise them perfectly.
Pivoting, I'd like to discuss escapism.
I don't believe every story must challenge your perspective; it can be enjoyable to immerse yourself into a fantasy world with adventure, well-plotted melodrama, and elaborate worldbuilding. My issue is when they become tedious, as it doesn't take much of the same tropes, plotlines, and dungeon crawl/string of MacGuffins plotting to desire something different and be annoyed when stories fail to deviate, subvert, or elaborate on common characteristics. The early episodes of Steven Universe attempt this escapism, and I have mixed feelings.
One of the strongest aspects of the show's plotting is how its moral ambiguity evolves. The show is very malleable when shifting how you perceive its characters, and Steven Universe is a subjective narrative; you see the world through Steven's eyes as it's deconstructed. While characters grow and change, much of the show focuses on unraveling its initial status quo. The problem with early Steven Universe is that this unraveling has hardly commenced, and Steven's initial emotional immaturity can be grating. It maintains a consistent mystique, with the gems refusing to inform Steven; however, Steven taking the initiative to free Lapis opens the floodgates, and the early show still sets the stage for later parts.
I would still make changes, streamlining it by removing around five episodes. Nonetheless, the story simmering in an unpleasant and dysfunctional status quo makes the characters' effort to overcome this dysfunction more effective. For example, Amethyst and Pearl fight a lot early in the show. Often, their fighting devolves into hysterics, arriving from trivial things like Pearl being unreasonably mad at Amethyst for minor irritations. It's dull, but when we learn why Pearl and Amethyst behave the way they do and attempt to resolve their differences, it wouldn't be as compelling if the show hadn't spent time on the unpleasant melodrama between them.
As the series nears its end, Rose's escape from her issues becomes prominent. Yet, virtually every character grapples with emotional repression in some form, and a distinct approach is depicted to address it, emphasizing the importance of directly confronting personal struggles to resolve internal conflicts. Consistently, the challenges characters face are not physical, but in regressive ways they cope with their emotions, like compartmentalization and unbeknownst self-destruction.
Steven Universe begins as an escapist adventure fantasy, becomes more nuanced as it exposes the broader contexts of its initial melodrama, and then attempts to resolve these conflicts, celebrating the altered status quo as it improves. Generally, I believe it's essential to be a dreamer and try to imagine a better version of our current world. Here, characters face struggles common in the real world and ultimately thrive, allowing escapism into a better version of our world and ourselves.
This is another point of contention because it matters how these characters' struggles are resolved, as they can be unclear or contradictory. Criticism has been directed towards the show for only abruptly abandoning characters' issues, and while there are aspects of the show primed for continuation, I hardly agree with this notion, but it would be very time-consuming to justify that disagreement.
However, some find the ways characters achieve solace unrealistic or unhealthy. Take Spinel, for example, who struggles with abandonment issues. Some who've faced similar struggles raise concerns about Spinel finding solace in the Diamonds. Spinel states that the Diamonds remind her of Pink, and looking for companions that remind one of the people who abandoned them can be an unhealthy path. While I think there are positive qualities to appreciate about Spinel's character, these are the criticisms I want to hear, and I strive to have nothing but empathy toward them.
However, in this regard, the final confrontation is a crucial point of contention where I will attempt to offer a thorough discussion.
The main criticism to focus on is the show's supposed optimism, its resolution hinging on a non-violent overcoming of tyranny. While I understand this criticism, it has been overblown, and the show still has an eloquent ending that functions well within the narrative's context. Similar to previous conflicts, it's resolved through revelation. White Diamond, driven to affirm her beliefs at Steven's expense, is contradicted in her assumptions about Rose. Because White Diamond's ability is core to Homeworld's entire culture, rendering identity meaningless and the lives of gems worthless outside of utilitarian value, Rose's absence is disruptive, utterly recontextualizes how they perceive organic life, and leaves White Diamond in shock.
If you're against having a non-violent solution in general, that's another discussion. As someone who adores RPGs and finds it irritating when a conflict cannot be resolved with words, I'm accepting of the idea you can write a non-violent solution no matter how awful a character's actions are; generally, I think it's important not to oversimplify or mythologize the source of violence so we can prevent it. The problem is if it is problematic/sensitive in a political context, and with this, I believe the conversation has been muddied by the equating of Homeworld with fascism, as the prospect of seeking non-violent solutions with fascists is a complex and sensitive one. However, Homeworld, as a dichotomization of the show's ideas, would inevitably reflect fascism, and more than specifically fascism, I think it reflects a broader mindset.
Steven Universe is about the beauty of individuality and change. Homeworld reflects those against change who don't value individuality, wish to be uncritical of the world's current state, and only desire intellectual reaffirmation. It's a desire to find objective answers in life and rigidly uphold them. This defines Homeworld; White Diamond is a zombification, a removal of personhood, its pleasures and pains, to achieve intellectual contentedness in a supposed lack of bias.
Frankly, for a resolution with this much contention, I would have expected something more jarring; if Steven had merely asked White Diamond and received swift compliance, I believe it could be as dangerously idealistic as some make it out to be. But White actively tries to harm Steven and is defeated through Steven's individuality, proving Steven is a living being distinct from Rose, a unique and compelling solution for a protagonist who has long lived in his mother's shadow.
But after the conflict, how Steven handles the Diamonds is also a matter of debate. While some may argue that the show should have ended with the Diamonds' deaths, as the villain's death is common in fantasy stories, Steven's decision doesn't significantly affect my enjoyment of the show. The show has always been about characters discovering humanity's individuality and redefining themselves outside the strict and oppressive system of Homeworld. The show's resolution, while not thematically comprehensive, doesn't undermine that, and the Diamonds don't need to face retribution for the ending to be satisfying.
If the Diamonds refused to give reparations, I'd consider forcing them to. However, with their unique abilities, they continually offer amends despite an initial lack of enthusiasm. So, there's limited practical justification for why the Diamonds must be killed. And it's important to consider that it's framed as a conflict between a broken family. So, to frame the conflict like this and resolve it with violence risks teaching children to resolve their own familial conflicts similarly.
But when delving into a thematic exploration of whether to kill the Diamonds, considering Bismuth's perspective is crucial, as some see Steven's dismissive justification as murder being unjustified under all contexts. Where Bismuth's proposal to shatter the Diamonds removes between gems and their freedom, Steven's opposition to this idea would mean he believes that ending the Diamonds' lives, even if it alleviates the suffering of all other gems, is too great a sacrifice to justify. I would disagree with Steven if that were Bismuth's proposal.
However, I find this interpretation puzzling; I don't understand how one arrives at this conclusion in good faith. Bismuth harbors a deep resentment towards the Homeworld elites, but she's unequivocal about the scale of her plans. Bismuth seeks to reduce Homeworld's forces on Earth to shards and then launch a direct assault on Homeworld, culminating in the shattering of the Diamonds. Contrary to the interpretation of only shattering the Diamonds, this plan offers a conflicting and disturbing dilemma about killing a million to save a few, a desperate scheme aimed at preserving the ideas that profoundly transformed the lives of the Crystal Gems. It's conflicting: are the lives of gems under Homeworld's oppressive system awful enough to justify killing them so a few can secure freedom?
Steven Universe does not assert that violence is always unjustifiable or that preserving life must always take precedence, and it doesn't shy away from why one would pursue violence through Bismuth. Instead, it highlights the importance of seeking a non-violent solution, trying your best to understand a situation, and only using violence as a last resort, which I think is a good concept for children to internalize. Yet, I understand why some criticize the show's conflicts consistently being resolved without violence. This isn't always attainable in the real world, and it would be reasonable to argue that the show could have presented situations where Steven had to resort to violence after peaceful discussions failed.
However, much of this perception is because we're cynical adults. It's idealistic to believe everything can be resolved without violence because some people don't have to listen. But, in this regard, the show's optimism is afforded by its context; again, it's framed as a familial conflict. The only reason Steven can get an audience with White Diamond is because he's Pink Diamond. If he were an inconsequential gem, White wouldn't care; instead, she takes time to halt his charade; after all, there's no risk; White's confident that she's right about everything.
It's still arguably optimistic for Pink Diamond to have this utilitarian importance and, with Steven's experience able to function as a trans allegory, as the Diamonds rigorously misgender him, it can also be seen as optimistic for Steven to be capable of acquiring this gotcha moment out of reach for many real people. However, Steven getting an audience wasn't trivial. Pink initially failed to get one; it was only through her selfless and selfish decision that Steven could prove White wrong; there's something poetic about that I love, and even then, it's still a struggle for Steven to get a proper audience with White, requiring a consistent defiance.
The show may not delve into all of the intricate real-world nuances that can make non-violent solutions difficult, but that's kind of an adult topic and an easily forgivable missed potential because the show's central ideas, that people can commit horrible actions without malicious intent and that an open-minded, compassionate approach can change a person's mind remain potent. It's also a show where emotional openness is met with compassion rather than shame, and acceptance of differing identities ceases to be conditional. These alterations may not be similarly attainable in the real world, but isn't it nice to dream how they could be and have an engaging mystery show about acceptance and the diversity of people's experiences that introduces children to empathy and emphasizes resolving issues through listening or verbalizing your emotions, and tries to offer emotional validation and guidance to struggles many adults still deal with? Because I think it is.
This is an unpopular opinion, so a reminder: I'm not demanding that the show be a certain way, nor do I intend to invalidate the feelings of those who like it. People will enjoy art to varying levels based on their personal experiences. This show means a lot to some people; this (long) review primarily outlines why the show failed to resonate with me.
Firstly, I like some story elements in Season 1. I found the pilot episode engaging. Whiterose receives a strong introduction, and the conflict between Elliot and Vera is well-executed. Elliot turns Vera, a crime lord, into the police because he's supplying Shayla drugs, only for Vera to realize Elliot was the one who turned him in. He then forces Elliot to break him out, threatening to hurt Shayla. Elliot breaks Vera out, but it turns out that Vera has already killed Shayla. I found this an engaging conflict because the show gave Elliot compelling motivations to act as he does. We're shown that Elliot knows turning in Vera is risky but justifies turning him in because doing so will protect Shayla.
Shayla's death ends up compelling, as I relate with Elliot's grief, understanding why Shayla meant so much to him. Early on, the show establishes how Elliot utilizes hacking to cope with his social ineptness. And through hacking, Elliot manages to understand the hidden side of people without directly interacting with them. Shayla ends up being the first person with whom Elliot gains a sincere emotional connection with. Even though Elliot hacks Shayla, she voluntarily reveals intimate aspects about herself that Elliot failed to learn while hacking her. Elliot finds emotional intimacy within a world where he feels isolated and misunderstood. I love it; it's sincere and, ultimately, a semi-meaningful representation of neuro-divergence. But unfortunately, I also found this the most meaningful emotional beat in the entire show.
Ultimately, rather than the show feeling like it had a story it wanted to tell, Mr. Robot often felt like it was desperately trying to pad out its run time.
Moreover, its dramatics are an incredibly mixed bag. While the conflict between Vera and Elliot isn't incredible, I found it more textured than anything else in the show. Some of the show's conflicts are engaging, such as Elliot and Mr. Robot fighting for control. But with many other conflicts, the tension involved is nebulous. I either couldn't emotionally invest in the characters involved, or they needed to be more developed for the emotional beats in these conflicts to carry much weight. Season 1 is the central part of the show that offers engaging, self-contained story arcs, and after Season 1, the show's pacing screeches to a halt.
I feel that implies I disliked the show's slower pacing, but I didn't. It's what I enjoyed most about the show. It's soothing to watch, and even though I found it visually impressive but monotonous, it created an immersive atmosphere. And I can appreciate a slow and deliberate pace in storytelling. It allows for introspection and contemplation of hard-to-swallow concepts; it will enable viewers time to contemplate one topic before the next is introduced, and minimalism often results in more effective pathos. It can also be fundamental to immersing into the world the artist constructs by focusing more on characters than spectacle.
However, I felt Mr. Robot rarely explored hard-to-swallow concepts. Although it aims to examine depression, anxiety, and its setting, I found its approach to these topics was often one-dimensional, vague, or callous. As a result, for the most part, I found the show's bleakness unnecessary and, at points, even mean-spirited.
It came across as a desperate bid at sophistication, portraying characters being abused and abusing themselves (and then pointless gimmicks like the "one-shot" episode and the heist where no one talks), yet I found it often shying away from sincerely delving into, and approaching with emotional intelligence, characters' trauma, and the whole affair, despite constant attempts at pathos, is weirdly cynical. For me, nearly the entire show is simply misery porn; it gets monotonous how every arc must end in tragedy. The show is hardly about working through or exploring trauma but more about presenting the ugly side of trauma and then one-upping itself. Even with its twist ending, what it unveils is not an anti-escapist message, but that Elliot had relied on escapism longer/and to a more extreme degree than we previously thought.
So, sadly, I found myself largely apathetic toward the story of Mr. Robot, so let's dive deeper into that story so I can attempt to explain.
With Elliot incessantly rambling on about the top 1% of the 1%, Mr. Robot attempts to discuss capitalism and class disparity. Unfortunately, I found the show's exploration of and the drama arising from the subject matter dull.
To explain why, I need to discuss the characters who are part of that top 1% of the 1%: Price and Whiterose. Price and Whiterose had the potential to be compelling characters; for example, they could have solid reasons for why they think they should be in power. Both had the potential to be compelling characters, but for me, they aren't.
Firstly, Price is unsympathetic. More specifically, his character doesn't have substantial motivations; I have an inefficient understanding of him, so I fail to empathize with him. Price is almost solely defined by the fact that he wants to be the most powerful person in the world. To my perception, he has a vague narcissism and therefore wants to be at the top of the human hierarchy, and unfortunately, that's all I find in this character.
On the other hand, Whiterose wants power to create her machine, and while I don't think she's unsympathetic, vital facets of her character are needlessly ambiguous. The device supposedly aims to create an alternate world; however, the show fails to address the rising moral implications of this machine.
Ultimately, both Whiterose and Price fail to have compelling goals because they fail to provide understandable arguments for why they could be in the right.
The most riveting thing about characters with this much societal influence is the dilemmas they face because it highlights their moral beliefs and explores their personal motivations/plans for those under their rule, but the show fails to provide this. Because both characters are wholly focused on their goals, they seemingly want to accomplish them by any means necessary. With characterization such as the dark army, the organization Whiterose runs, killing themselves rather than being captured, and Whiterose blowing up 71 buildings, killing over 3000 people. We're shown that Whiterose is willing to kill for her goals. (However, her willingness results from her belief that her machine can bring people back to life; Whiterose does care about human life, but she's killing people in the short term because she believes it can be undone.) Regarding Price, even though Price doesn't support Whiterose killing as many people as she does, thinking her to be delusional, he seems utterly unempathetic towards everyone except Angela.
With how Whiterose and Price are presented, I find the show wasting the potentially compelling ways it could explore people in positions of power. It had the potential to ask questions like: How much power should one person be allowed to have? And subsequently, how much control should a government be permitted over your life? You could write a thought-provoking story about exploring these questions and the dramatics that arise. However, Mr. Robot ends up only asking one much less interesting question: Would it be bad if people with selfish goals who are willing to kill large amounts of people to accomplish those goals were in power? Shockingly, the answer to that question is yes.
And herein lies the problem. The show shies away from exploring fundamental issues with its society because the conflict in Mr. Robot is positioned as individual rather than systemic. As far as I'm aware, if you were to try to fix the problems with the world of Mr. Robot, you wouldn't need to make fundamental changes to its systems; you would only need to remove people like Whiterose from power and the show reflects this. Elliot initially failed to fix society's problems by destroying the economy and all financial records. Many of those in power maintain their power, and rather than progressing society in a better direction, it creates chaos.
On the other hand, the Deus Group hack is portrayed cathartically. The Deus Group was created by Whiterose and encompassed some of the wealthiest people in the world. Through hacking them, Elliot succeeds in removing them from power. Ultimately, Elliot wins not by enacting changes to policy but with the temporary solution of removing those in power.
And to my memory, only assets with high liquidity. Core to socialism is the idea that the means of production are publically owned. So, I have to ask? Do they still own the means of production? You can redistribute cash, but there are other types of assets. So, how will the redistributed money be spent? People still have to produce products for purchase. Likely, the money will return to the rich, or maybe again, it's individual rather than systemic. Those who own the means of production are now penniless, so they will sell their assets to new owners. And maybe this is undoubtedly the case; the show may have contextualized that they only had monetary assets, and I sadly forgot. But I'm just nitpicking; this redistribution outlines the show's egalitarian sensibilities, and these actions are likely to have a positive impact, likely not to cause hyperinflation, and likely to cause an increase in the production of necessities over excess. As I'll reiterate, my core point is that I found the show's commentary on social issues lacking.
But of course, I'm not expecting the show to give a foolproof solution to these issues; there is no such thing as a perfect society, but its commentary could've offered more compelling storytelling. For example, the show could portray how Whiterose and Price exploited the free market to gain power. Through this, it could explore some of the issues with the free market. However, the show mainly explores why Price and Whiterose want power, and while we know Whiterose made Price CEO, the show is vague on how Whiterose acquired her power.
However, to be fair, the show does provide some good things. It provides some social commentary, showing that people in power will give the general public a false sense of security to retain their power. And it introduces certain ideas, such as commodity fetishism. It also outlines political corruption, showing large conglomerates being more or less integrated into the government, and one of the core issues with capitalism is its tendency toward monopolies. In the United States, because of monopolies in the past like Standard Oil, laws have been put in place to reduce monopolies, so this kind of political corruption would likely need to happen for the monopoly of E-Corp to arise. However, Whiterose having as much influence as she does and conglomerates being integrated into the government is simply the status quo of Mr. Robot; the reasons why capitalism could cause this are more or less implicit.
But the show presenting this is good; what it offers may be enlightening for certain people. Many people are wholly unskeptical of capitalism and never consider the possibility of another system. But I think the show itself isn't going to change anyone's mind; I can only imagine it doing so by proxy, in that the show would make people interested in the subject matter and seek answers elsewhere. But I can't even imagine the show doing this because its rampant cynicism is more likely to make everyone involved less interested. The show constantly labels those who disagree with its positions as "sheeple" without offering a proper philosophical position and research, so from people who actively disagree with the show, I struggle to imagine anything other than similarly brash counter-action.
When it comes to skepticism, especially in leftist spaces, I think it's important that skepticism be constructive; otherwise, it hinders our ability to seek genuine solutions. And in human societies, I believe we should be skeptical of any form of hierarchy. Mr. Robot tries to be, but unfortunately, all the skepticism it offers are strawmen and caricatures. The show's heart seems to be in the right place; it's a self-important effort to highlight real-world issues; however, it seems afraid to say too much. What it offers is simply not constructive; it's a thick layer of vague cynicism that I feel is likely only be particularly enlightening for idealistic people who think capitalism is perfect, and I find the inclusion of these themes adds little to its story, so for me, its efforts are an utter waste of my time.
And also, for me, a core issue is highlighted. Mr. Robot has a very jarring balance between its cynicism and its compassion. The show can surely be classified as contemporary art; it seems egalitarian, wants to be critical of current society, and offers quite a bit of queer rep. It intends to highlight differing perspectives, but despite clearly wanting us to care about Price and Whiterose, I also find it strangely misanthropic; I find all its villains relatively unsympathetic. Ultimately, I find the show only pawning at a vague anarchist/anti-society message; I honestly thought the f-society title was satircal, but the show hardly elaborates further than that. Ultimately, I feel the show mainly serves to allow those who already agree with its broader political positions affirmation and little else.
Anyway, I want to continue elaborating on my issues with Whiterose and Price.
I stated that I found Price unsympathetic. However, the show attempts emotional catharsis with him, and I want to explain why it didn't work for me. Price goes through a massive shift because of Angela's death at the end of Season 3. Whiterose explains to Price that Angela forced her hand because she looked too much into the toxic waste that killed her mother. After all, the plant is the power source for her machine. Fundamentally, Price thinks that Whiterose's machine won't work and that she's killing Angela out of delusion; this causes Price to drop his pursuit of wealth to team up with Elliot. But unfortunately, I found this transformation nebulous, and I think two changes could be made to offer more coherency.
The first would be to flesh out Price more in general. For example, the show could've given Price compelling reasons why he believes he should be in power or added some reason behind his lust for power. If they did something like this, it would add moral complexity to his character. Even though these changes are unrelated to Angela, I would better understand his character and how he thinks, inherently making his transformation more understandable.
The second way would be for the show to further develop Price's relationship with Angela, clearly establishing some basis for how much she means to him. Because in the show's current state, we don't understand Price's relationship with Angela further than she's his daughter. And, if anything, what we're shown suggests that he doesn't care much about her. He is still working as CEO of the company that killed Angela's mother, and, for the most part, Price ignores her. He does hire Angela and, at some brief moments, shows a fondness for her, and Price tells Angela that her mother took her away from him because he was a monster. But that raises the question: Why didn't he relinquish his goals sooner if Angela meant so much to him? Price's feelings towards Angela are vague, and Angela's death catalyzes a character shift for Price. The lack of a substantive logical basis behind their relationship makes that an ineffective catalyst.
And because I didn't find his transformation compelling, I could hardly care about his death. Price sides with Elliot and succeeds at avenging Angela. But Whiterose kills Price, which is fine. Price seems content with dying, yet I found that contentedness jarring. Unfortunately, again, I fail to understand this character enough for his death and the attempted emotional beats to carry any weight.
Also, I think catalyzing Whiterose and Price's conflict with Angela's death is a missed potential. A feud between the two characters in positions of power is intriguing; for example, Price and Whiterose could greatly disagree on certain things, such as how they should handle homeless people. Maybe Price believes homeless people should be killed because he thinks they're unproductive, but Whiterose empathizes with the homeless, feeling they are victims of a broken system. There's potential to offer a conflict that's genuinely provocative and confront relevant ethical questions by contrasting differing worldviews. Of course, it doesn't necessarily have to delve into ethics, but I still want an engaging conflict, and unfortunately, I found Angela's death an arbitrary catalyst for this conflict.
Regarding Whiterose, her introduction is engaging, but I didn't care for how her character was handled later in the story.
I mainly want to focus on the final scene in "eXit," when Whiterose kills herself. Elliot confronts Whiterose at the power plant, and they converse. The show continually alludes that Whiterose has some deeper secrets, and in "eXit," it seems primed to reveal. Whiterose tells Elliot what her machine is. A device that will transform their world into a parallel world, bringing people back to life. If this machine works and she can create a parallel dimension, that's morally conflicting. And by further fleshing out the machine's function, there's a lot of potential to delve into some rich thematics and character drama.
But what's Elliot's response to Whiterose is frustrating, and I believe it to be out of character: "You're not liberating them. You're forcing this on them."
We later learn that Elliot isn't Elliot; he's a created personality that embodies Elliot's rage, and he was "the mastermind" who orchestrated the 5/9 hack. Elliot's rage's core motivation is to make the world Elliot lives in better. His key character flaw is that he's willing to take radical action to accomplish this goal, and his efforts have caused many of those he cares about to be killed. This response to Whiterose makes no sense. He tried to destroy the economy; he's not a stranger to "forcing things on people," and it seems his goal is to improve the world around Elliot; if anything, the prospect should pique his interest. So, I found this dismissive approach a bit absurd for his character.
Following Elliot's rebuttal, Whiterose keeps insisting that she's right, alluding to what she previously showed Angela, but Elliot doubles down and doubts her machine even works. Nevertheless, Whiterose keeps implying that she has strong evidence her machine does work; however, Whiterose gets a sense of destiny. She states that all she wanted was for Elliot to believe in her, and "Our paths were too precisely linked to this moment for there not to be a reason," and this evidence never reveals itself. Then Whiterose kills herself. So, what does Elliot do? Well, he tries to stop her. Whiterose never explains why her machine will work, yet she has enough faith in it to kill herself and is convincing enough for Angela and an army that would rather die than be captured. Whiterose allows Elliot to stop her, claiming she could substantiate her position, but doesn't because of destiny.
When trying to stop Whiterose's machine, Elliot thinks he has succeeded, but it turns out it is too late, and her machine activates. But this is a fake-out; her machine doesn't work. And the show doesn't specify why, which makes Whiterose's character ambiguous. The show doesn't determine whether the machine didn't work because Elliot tried to stop it, it didn't work because it would never have, or it didn't work because she didn't have the necessary resources. So, with Whiterose's character, there are two ways to view this situation. That Whiterose was simply insane, Price was right, her machine would never have worked, and she needlessly killed many people for it, or Whiterose did have a point to make; she represents a conflicting philosophical position but refuses to reveal it because she gets a sense of destiny. Either way, it's a cop-out.
The most likely interpretation of Whiterose's character is that, in one way or another, she was incredibly delusional... Whiterose is transgender, and because of that, I kind of take issue with this. Many transphobes will attempt to label gender-expansive people as mentally ill and want to dehumanize and immoralize them. Obviously, queer representation is a complex topic, it's important to recognize that policing representation can support bigotry, and we shouldn't discourage writing flawed queer characters. If you found yourself meaningfully represented in Whiterose, I would never want to take that away from you, but I found the ominous send-off for her character insubstancial. It seemed like Whiterose would have a lot to say for herself but doesn't, and I found her portrayal as delusional to be disconcerting.
Whiterose is a character with potential; however, it feels like her character only existed to serve as an initial over-looming threat and for the show to later deceive its audience into thinking her machine worked. It saddens me that I felt this way about Whiterose's character; trans representation is currently scarce. The show provides a compelling base for Whiterose's character; we're shown her struggle against a lack of trans acceptance and her partner's suicide due to it. But I'm left desperately wishing the show handled her differently later on. But to be fair, Whiterose may have been written this way to contrast Elliot, who developed multi-personality dissociative disorder to cope with his trauma and frustrations. In contrast, Whiterose creates the delusion that she can bring people back to life to cope with her partner's death. However, I'm still off-put by the idea of making your trans character a delusional mass murderer.
Anyway, next, I might as well discuss specific side characters. Firstly, Tyrell Wellick.
When writing a loose-cannon-type character, there are two things I want to see. Firstly, if they receive substantial screen time, which Tyrell does, I want to see them consistently utilized as a loose cannon. Secondly, and most importantly, I don't want the fact that they are a loose cannon to define their character.
So firstly, regarding Tyrell Wellick being underutilized, he receives a lot of screen time dedicated solely to characterizing him as a loose cannon. The problem? So much time is spent building him up, but it's arbitrary, only coming to fruition in the Season 2 finale. Tyrell shoots Elliot, but even that is arbitrary and is only a death fake-out. In the overarching narrative, the only purpose Tyrell ends up serving is as a scapegoat for the 5/9 hack, which feels inconsequential. Did anyone need to take the fall for the 5/9 hack? I feel Tyrell's taking the blame for the 5/9 hack is only to serve his arc in that Elliot betrays him.
But secondly, I felt Tyrell Wellick's motivations remained ambiguous. As far as I could tell, they don't go further than: "He wants money and a legacy." We also know he loves his wife and likely has feelings for Elliot, but those feelings are nebulous. Regarding his feelings for Elliot, we know he has a sense of destiny, believing that he and Elliot are: "destined to do great things together." Otherwise, I found it vague and struggled to have any emotional investment in Tyrell's feelings for Elliot.
But also, this lack of development is detrimental to his arc because, like Price, who is also seeking exceptionalism, I think it makes his shift unbelievable. His wife's death and Elliot's betrayal catalyze a shift in Tyrell's character, yet this shift is obscured because I didn't understand enough about his relationships with these characters. And because of this, the maudlin tragedy that the latter part of his arc becomes carries little weight. When he struggles, and Elliot says he doesn't care about him, I struggled to understand how he felt about all of it, and when he sacrificed himself, I was relieved because it meant the show would stop wasting time on him.
Suppose they provided anything substantial to Tyrell's actions. For example, giving him a backstory or contextualizing him as having been in extreme circumstances as an immigrant. In that case, I can have some way to relate to him. But no, Tyrell seems to be already living in excess, is only killing people and the like in pursuit of further wealth, and falls in love with Elliot because he's exceptional, I guess. I just don't know how to feel about Tyrell's character because I failed to understand him as a person. Overall, I feel Tyrell's existence in the story is inconsequential and doesn't further any specific themes the story is going for. He mainly exists to add to the list of people around Elliot who died, so his eventual death carried no thematic or emotional weight.
But also, I disagree with how they handled Tyrell's death, where Tyrell finds something glowing blue from the ground. I found it incredibly portentous, suggesting that he may not be dead. Knowing that Tyrell stays dead, I don't see the purpose of doing this other than serving as a superfluous metaphor for his death, seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, a computer's blue screen of death, or some other nonsense. My problem with this is that suggesting he may not be dead during his death quickly removes most of the potential weight it could have had; however, I was already apathetic toward Tyrell, so I just found it annoying.
Anyway, Angela. I admittedly found Angela dull in the first two seasons. She has some decent points, such as her interactions with Elliot. Yet she also receives substantial screen time covering her independent misadventures, such as being hacked by Cisco and going undercover at Ecorp. I found these dull and ultimately irrelevant. Some of them do a decent job at humanizing her, but the show spends a lot of time focusing on her, and the only thing that feels impactful is her work at Ecorp because it's tied to Elliot.
Now, the bulk of Angela's arc takes place in Season 3, and initially, I thought it was fine, but there are some notable facets left undefined. At the end of Season 2, Whiterose shows Angela something that enthralls her but remains ambiguous. This is key to her character because it drives Angela to betray Elliot and work for Whiterose in Season 3.
Later, we learn that Whiterose's machine supposedly creates alternate dimensions. This could explain why Angela sided with Whiterose because Whiterose's machine meant she could get her mother back. The problem is how Whiterose used this machine to convince her remains vague. As a result, I fail to grasp Angela's internal conflict in deciding to betray Elliot.
Angela's arc has clear potential. The pieces are all there; Angela goes behind Elliot's back only to feel responsible for getting many people killed and then finds out that Price is her father. And we could've watched her battle with her temptations, ultimately deciding to betray Elliot. This could be great, but her motivations remain ambiguous; all we know is that what she was shown was potent enough for her to betray Elliot. The pieces are there, but the core decision-making that sparks this conflict isn't compelling.
There's also Trenton, Mobley, Cisco, and Romero. All four of them are killed by the Dark Army because they're considered loose ends, with Cisco only becoming a loose end after a police sketch is made of him and shown on the news. The problem with the Dark Army is that their hunt for these four carries no weight because the Dark Army is a nebulous entity, so their pursuit after these characters isn't engaging. All we know about the Dark Army is that Whiterose is their leader, and they're cautious about staying enigmatic. Also, their motivation to tie up loose ends is dull; their killings only give a repeat characterization of the Dark Army as careful about staying enigmatic, and generally, I simply lack a solid bearing on their capabilities.
Though, let's talk about these four characters. Elliots states that Trenton, Cisco, and Mobley worked with him because they wanted to change the world. However, Trenton is the only one with tangible motivations to change the world; her parents are immigrants and financially struggling. It makes sense why she would join an organization trying to ruin the world's economy. This isn't great, but it's better than nothing. And the other characters are nothing; Mobley and Romero receive little characterization. At points, Romero doubts Elliot's ability to carry out fsociety's plans, but that's about it. And while Mobley is rather charming, often being used as a source for comedy, I don't know anything about him or why he decides to work with Elliot. Cisco is part of the Dark Army and serves as Elliot's connection to them. However, all I know about Cisco's character is that he and Darlene are in love. He dies because Dom finds a keycard with his face on it, and he's announced on the news, making him a loose end. The Dark Army hunting these four characters down is not very engaging, and their deaths carry little weight.
I also found Dom and Darlene dull. Early on, there were some decent parts with Darlene, such as the show's brief exploration into how Darlene feels insignificant compared to Elliot. Later in the series, Dom and Darlene have drama with the dark army; however, I found this plotline irrelevant and not nearly interesting enough to stand alone. Both characters are underdeveloped; Darlene is primarily defined by her vague angst, while Dom is defined by the fact that she's tired because she's been working for the FBI for too long... I guess. They're both just nebulously struggling, and the time spent on them feels pointless. I was simply left apathetic toward both of them.
Lastly, though, we need to talk about the show's larger mystique. Let's discuss the show's twist ending.
My understanding of the show's twist ending is that the Elliot that we've been with was not the real Elliot. He created Fsociety and planned out "Stage 1" and "Stage 2." Then lies to the audience, making it out that Mr. Robot did all these things to feel like a hero. The show reveals that Elliot was the "rage" personality taking radical action and "the mastermind" behind the plans just mentioned.
Generally, I don't like puzzle stories. I care more about a story's characters and the emotions it incites and explores. For me, stories having an unfolding mystery are additive; for example, twists can enhance a story through recontextualization.
So, for me, there are three relevant things when analyzing a twist. How does the twist add to the prior story? How engaging is the twist's setup? And does it take the story in a compelling direction? (But this is irrelevant because the show has a twist ending.)
Firstly, and because it's what I care about most, I have negative feelings about how this twist recontextualizes the prior story. It's a massive cop-out that creates a lot of aimless ambiguity.
Of course, there's nothing inherently wrong with ambiguity; on the contrary, I'd argue it's one of the strongest tools in a storyteller's arsenal. However, I can't entirely agree with the creative choice of using ambiguity like this on such a vast scale. My problem is that the ambiguity here makes everything we see from Elliot's perspective unreliable regarding continuity, which is most of the show.
In the realm of art, this type of total ambiguity is frustrating, a slosh of symbols with little discernable pattern. Some may love this for its capacity for overinterpretation in an endless search for coherency, but I find it betraying.
Suppose I try to discuss parts of the show from Elliot's perspective. There's always the interpretation: "No, that's not what happened. Elliot was tricking you." And this is the problem. When discussing the validity of differing interpretations of a story, whether it be what the story is about or how it's told, the debate relies on whether you can provide evidence from the story to support your interpretation, and of course, there can be a myriad of interpretations that are all not mutually exclusive. However, usually, these differing interpretations are derived from the same story. But with Mr. Robot, rather than having various ways of viewing the same story, you're told that parts of the story might be completely fake, so you can make up whatever you want to replace it.
And because a lot of the show is vague, this causes many scenes to have various conflicting interpretations without any way to debate their validity. For example, there's the scene where Whiterose shoots herself. Now, you could take this scene at face value, how it's presented to you by Elliot, but you could also argue that Elliot lied. You could say that, in actuality, Elliot killed Whiterose, and Whiterose never explained why her plans would work because it allows Elliot to preserve his perception of the 1% as evil and make himself look like a hero stopping a villain rather than a murderer killing someone who had a point. But I could also say that Elliot let Whiterose run away, telling her he'd fix her machine.
All three are drastically different interpretations.
So far in this review, I've been discussing what the show presents at face value, specifically what Elliot shows you. But because of this ambiguity, the show's story becomes malleable enough for interpretations of Mr. Robot to have drastically different themes.
But character analysis is where it's properly crippling. Because Mr. Robot is a character-driven show, the most substantial engagement factor should be exploring the psyches of its characters and indulging in their conflicts. Now, I've already discussed my problems with individual characters. But similarly, my problem with this ambiguity is that it utterly destroys my desire to dissect these characters. When a character interacts with Elliot, anything they do in that scene is ambiguous, as Elliot could be portraying their behaviors inaccurately. This causes problems. I already discussed the different interpretations of the scene where Whiterose dies.
I like subtle storytelling; simplicity often makes things significantly more effective on an emotional level, but here, rather than subtle or minimalistic, the show's text is inexplicit and malleable... for me, that's incredibly emotionally dissociating.
But how does the twist add to Elliot's character? The main thing this twist directly changes is how we perceive Elliot. In Season 1, it's revealed that Elliot has multi-personality dissociative disorder, creating Mr. Robot to cope with societal issues and the abuses of his father. I found this rather bland; it's the plot of someone having trauma and creating a delusion to escape from it. This concept of utilizing escapism to escape one's trauma has been done to death, and I don't find Mr. Robot offering specific trauma or subverting traditional ways of telling this story. Or at least that's how I felt regarding Season 1, so does the final twist change my initial feelings?
Short answer: This twist adds nothing to this concept. Later in Season 4, we learn Elliot was sexually abused by his father, but I honestly don't understand how this abuse, on top of other physical abuses, added to the story. And the final twist reveals that our Elliot embodies Elliot's frustrations with the world when initially we thought it was Mr. Robot. This only changes which character embodies Elliot's rage, not why that personality was created.
Furthermore, regarding the twist's setup, (I will continue discussing whether or not the twist adds to the show, but I will now do so in tandem with discussing how the show builds to this twist.)
There is a clear distinction between a story with an unfolding mystery and any other story, and that's what questions you ask while watching it. With a regular story, your question is simple: What direction will the story go in? While a story with a mystery will bring up specific questions. For example, a murder mystery starts with the question: Who is the murderer? As the story progresses, more questions arise to answer the core question, and then, in some cases, more questions arise once you receive the answer to the core question. This type of plotting is engaging: a string of interconnected questions to follow along with.
Or the story will introduce an inconsistency: This character couldn't have possibly committed the crime, so who did, and who has the capabilities this character lacked? These make a story more engaging because anything that relates to this inconsistency will stand out and sit in the forefront of my mind. And, even if they're only red herrings, I'm still engaging with them.
Throughout the majority of Mr. Robot's runtime, the question I was asking myself concerning Elliot was: What direction will they take Elliot's arc in? And with the show suggesting that Tyrell may be a created personality, I began to believe that Elliot may have created more than one. But I hardly engaged with that question, and it wasn't until 407 (nearly the end of the show) that I was provided proper reason to engage with the mystery. This episode proposes Mr. Robot as the protector personality; I recognized this as an inconsistency; Mr. Robot's been consistently putting Elliot in harm's way.
This is an intentional inconsistency because Mr. Robot is the protector personality; it's just that earlier in the show, our Elliot, Elliot's rage, misrepresented him.
My main problem is that this inconsistency was too little too late. When it was introduced, I didn't contemplate it; I only continued questioning the direction the story would take. Confronted with this inconsistency, I merely waited to see whether or not this was a purposeful inconsistency or some mistake.
Of course, certain elements hint towards this twist, such as the meetings between Mr. Robot and the other personalities in 4x09, alluding to the fact that our Elliot is a created personality. And some parts allude to the fact that Elliot is deceiving us, such as the end of 4x06, where Mr. Robot muses: "What if Elliot isn't the hero?"
However, many poor allusions are mixed in, such as Angela handing Elliot a key and saying: "Elliot, you are the-" and it cutting out in 1x04, just to be reincorporated in the series finale as: "Elliot, you are the mastermind." My problem, if not obvious, is Angela could've just said anything like: "Elliot, you are the coolest person in the world." Stuff like this doesn't imply anything; it's claptrap you can gawk at on rewatch.
Unlike many mystery stories, this twist isn't revealing a specific aspect interconnected with a broader story; it's exposing that the story is being told in a certain way and why it's being told that way. This twist feels like it exists despite the rest of the show because I felt the show lacked a tangible gradual progression leading up to this twist. It lacked a sense of unfolding mystery because rather than peeling back layer after layer by fleshing out aspects and progressing specific themes, eventually concluding with this reveal, it felt like this twist more or less happened out of nowhere. Most hints towards this twist are scattered allusions to the fact that the story is being told in a certain way and why, and I feel the reveal in 407 that Mr. Robot is the protector personality is the only reveal that sparks genuine engagement.
Anyway, this lack of unfolding mystery caused me to be apathetic toward the mystery. I believe you can categorize the way you're brain handles information into two general systems. System 1 is fast thinking; it's an intuitive way of thinking through a situation. When your brain operates in this state, its experiences are stored in short-term memory. This is because the task is repetitive. Say you take out the garbage. Unless something particularly unique occurs, you'll never remember it. The action relies on long-term memory from when you initially learned to take out the trash. System 2 is slow thinking when you are presented with new problems. This is more likely to be placed in long-term memory. Mr. Robot is a show full of cryptic and vague elements, many of which are never fleshed out nor have any relevance. The problem is that rather than the story introducing some vague/cryptic and then fleshing them out shortly after, it overwhelms you with these elements. And this is where the problem lies; because of this, I began to engage with the show's cryptic and vague elements with System 1. I would put them into the backlog of my mind and potentially forget about them. I just pointed out some sequences that were definitive setups for the twist; however, these sequences were cryptic. So, unfortunately, when they were shown to me, while I did remember them by the time of this twist ending, I didn't engage with them beyond any superficial level. If I ever rewatched the show, I can take pleasure in recognizing hints I didn't pick up on and forgot about, but that's hardly engaging. Again, its plotting is a convoluted slosh of symbols with little coherency.
But what about Elliot lying to the audience?
Lying can be compelling in storytelling; however, usually, it's a character lying to another character. In these cases, the audience is either aware of the lie or unaware of the lie, but so is the perspective character. However, Elliot is not lying to another character but directly to the audience. Elliot has solid motivations for lying; he wants to make himself out as a hero, but again, the setup is hardly engaging.
Elliot was an unreliable narrator from the show's beginning. But they were minor things, such as his perception of E-Corp as Evil Corp. However, now, we find out that Elliot is an unreliable narrator who maliciously hides information from the audience. Early on, with Elliot's multi-personality dissociative disorder, we would experience his struggle with him. We saw the same delusions he did and shared his gaps with him, but now we find out that some of his gaps were sequences he didn't want to show the audience or whatever. Again, it creates a lot of ambiguity.
But how does this reveal change Elliot and Mr. Robot's characters? We were initially supposed to believe that Mr. Robot created the plans to take down the "top 1% of the 1%" and that Elliot spent the first three seasons trying to stop them.
This conflict is recontextualized. Now, Mr. Robot was trying to stop Elliot's rage from carrying out his plans, with Elliot's rage trying to preserve those plans. In Season 3, Elliot was trying to stop Whiterose because she went rogue... I guess. Also, when Elliot gets himself put into prison, we are led to believe he did so to stop Mr. Robot, but actually, Elliot was trying to stop Mr. Robot from ruining his plans.
These aren't engaging recontextualizations, and Mr. Robot's and Elliot's conflict in the show's early stages doesn't suggest this twist. Again, the setups are just allusions to the fact the story is being told in a certain way and why.
I've claimed that the twist feels like it exists despite the rest of the show. I want to do what I can to continue justifying that. I just talked about Mr. Robot and Elliot, but we also need to discuss what this twist adds to other characters.
With many characters, the only relation they have to this twist is that they died, fueling Elliot's general angst so that the story can be tragic, such as Trenton, Mobley, Angela, Tyrell, Cisco, etc. Concerning the twist, these characters could be put in numerous other tragic stories; they do not feel like they were written with this specific twist in mind.
With Whiterose, in the later seasons, which flesh out her tragic past, she feels written so that the fake-out that her machine worked is tangible. As I've previously outlined, I don't find this twist adding anything to her character; it just makes her character ambiguous.
And lastly, Darlene: In the final episode, Darlene admits she knew the entire time that our Elliot wasn't the "real Elliot." Here's the problem: many different things fueled Darlene's angst, all of which are only vaguely coped with. The twist recontextualizes her character so that she had multiple things we were already aware of that caused her angst, but knowing our Elliot wasn't the real Elliot was a cause we weren't aware of. And regarding her choice to work with Elliot on fsociety, it's initially contextualized that she worked with him to change the world because she cared about him. Neither of those motivations is altered by her knowing this, and I know of nothing that signifies Darlene is aware Elliot is a personality until it's revealed.
So, unfortunately, I was disappointed by this twist. The show failed to provide an engaging mystery, and the twist tells me nothing about the world of Mr. Robot. Generally, I found it adding nothing to its thematic dimension; it's just a neat turn of events, I guess.
For me, Mr. Robot was a string of missed opportunities: a show that steps up to the plate to address real social issues, explore interesting ideas, or provide compelling characters but backs down instead. It entices with moral ambiguity, characters preaching in grandiose deadpan ambiguity, and some intriguing ideas but fails to capitalize on them; instead, I found myself uninvested in characters and certain essential elements nebulous. And at its bitter end, I thought it made a damning decision, creating an extreme amount of ambiguity that encourages wild theorization rather than a simple, compelling story with unignorable themes. Mr. Robot left me enthusiastically intrigued by the end of its first season, but by its series finale, apathetic and let down.
