(Spoilers) Mr. Robot final season

[SpaceChampion]

7 hours ago, Relic said:

How do you feel about all of the above given the events of episode 11? Do we think the two worlds will merge? 

Thematically it seems on track for Elliot for becoming at peace with himself.  Plot wise I can't predict specifics, but I wouldn't expect him to choose that world over the real one he came from.  This seems one last attempt by the Destroyer personality (echoed by Whiterose) to deceive Elliot. 

 

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Whiterose:  "You think I'm the one that wants to destroy the world? I'm the one that hates people? That can't see the good in it? Look around you.  Everywhere we turn, all we see is spite from our so-called fellow man. Every day we turn on the news, we're constantly told by our leaders, our scientists, our  religions that our world is crumbling, and that we are the problem.  We are the root of everything that is wrong, that we don't stand a chance. We are told this so much that self-hatred is no longer considered an anomaly but a given, and yet you dare point the finger at me when I try to bring order to its chaos? When I have sacrificed everything to make it better? Please! Don't make me laugh.  On the contrary, it is my love for people that drives me.  It always has been, because I know, deep in every person's heart... They are trying to be good. They were just dealt a bad hand by a world unfit for us so please don't make me fucking laugh and accuse me of hating people when you, Elliot, wear that hate like a badge of honor!  Shall I remind you of your group's name?  Admit it. Hatred has been your anthem, not mine.

 

Quote

Elliot:  "You're right.  I hate people.  I'm scared of them. I've been scared of them practically my whole life. People I loved... people I trusted... have done their absolute worst to me. And for a long time, that's all I ever knew. So, yeah, I called my group fsociety, because you know what? Fuck society. Society deserves to be hated for everything you said they did and more. Fuck every last one of them for what we've all been through. But then there are some people out there...  And it doesn't happen a lot. It's rare. But they refuse to let you hate them. In fact, they care about you in spite of it. And the really special ones, they're relentless at it. Doesn't matter what you do to them. They take it and care about you anyway. They don't abandon you, no matter how many reasons you give them. No matter how much you're practically begging them to leave. And you wanna know why? Because they feel something for me that I can't. They love me. And for all the pain I've been through, that heals me. Maybe not instantly. Maybe not even for a long time, but it heals. And, yeah, there are setbacks. We do fucked up things to each other. And we hurt each other, and it gets messy, but that's just us, in any world you're in. And, yeah, you're right. We're all told we don't stand a chance, and yet we stand. We break, but we keep going, and that is not a flaw. That's what makes us. So, no, I will not give up on this world. And if you can't see why, then I speak for everyone when I say, fuck you!

So I think Elliot has arrived at a truth he can live with.  But the trick of the Destroyer personality is it can seem like the well-adjusted, authentic Creator personality.  It is a chameleon, inauthentic because it lies to itself.  I think choosing to stay in this new world would be denying himself, another form of repressing his trauma.  I don't think the two worlds can merge.

The test is if Elliot can recognize which version of these personalities he is being.  He knows the truth, now he just has to accept it.  The existential crisis choosing between Destroyer and Creator should be a hard choice.  He has to make this choice without the insight of Mr. Robot.

I think Darlene's choice whether to get on the plane last week was a similar choice.  She chose the reality of who she already was rather than the fantasy of starting a new life with a whole new identity, untraumatized by her life so far.  You can't escape  yourself.

I think the ultimate message is:  you can't heal by hating your traumatized self.

Plot-wise, I think we'll get an ambiguous ending whether that other world is real or not.  I think is many senses it is real -- it's the Destroyer's world.  We already live in both simultaneously.

 

[Nictarion]

I really loved the 2001 theater scene at the end. Pretty satisfied with how it wrapped up. I honestly didn’t see the super-hacker Elliot being the final personality coming at all. A little uneven in S2 & 3, but overall I think this was one of the best shows of the decade. As was Rami Malek’s performance. I’ll miss it. 

[Martini Sigil]

I was satisfied with the finale ... it was confusing until it wasn't.... It was smart to have a pre-finale in ep 11 by killing off White Rose, and concentrating the bigger finale on Elliott's mental state, which was the  backbone of this show all along... At first, I was afraid that it would be a four year long "Bobby Ewing in the shower" ending, and was composing a "WTF" post in my head, but I should have known better and had more faith in these writers...  appropriate shout-outs, (especially Trenton & Mobly), including acknowledging the fourth wall ... 

... best show on a commercial network since Breaking Bad. 

[SpaceChampion]

Agreed.  Thematically / emotionally ended how I expected.  The steps getting there were great.

[PetyrPunkinhead]

So I finally started binging S4 last night, and I'm kicking myself for not keeping up with this week to week. Every damn episode has had something epic happen.

Currently I'm on S4E8 and I just had to come in here and post--holysplittingdickholes!!! Dom is T2 Sarah Conner level badass. Outstanding. Literally stood up and applauded.  Haven't looked at anything else in here yet, but looking forward to coming back in here and reading people's theories on Tyrell, etc. after watching the finale.

[Paxter]

I have no idea what the deal was with Tyrell in S4. Very odd end to his arc.

I’m also confused by WhiteRose. But Elliott, Darlene and Dom all had great endings.

[karaddin]

40 minutes ago, Paxter said:

I have no idea what the deal was with Tyrell in S4. Very odd end to his arc.

I’m also confused by WhiteRose. But Elliott, Darlene and Dom all had great endings.

I think the big takeaway from the ending of WhiteRose is that she was a true believer in her project. It led her to do evil things, a lot of evil things, but in her delusion it was all going to be undone so it was justified. Its a final juxtaposition with Elliot and the similarities and differences between them - WR never gave up on her dream to make the world better, but Elliot could at least see when things weren't working and changed his approach (undoing the 5/9 hack for Evil Corp for example). It positions her more firmly in the tragic villain category.

Tyrell was a weird ending, can't argue there but it was meant to be very surreal and dreamlike.

[Paxter]

I guess I’m more curious why WR trusted Elliott to finish her plan. After all, the DA spent a good chunk of S4 trying to kill him. And of course he betrayed her straight away by using the video game to shut off the machine.

[PetyrPunkinhead]

How everything wrapped up with the Four Figments and the alternate reality he put the real Elliot in was pretty satisfying.

2 hours ago, Paxter said:

I guess I’m more curious why WR trusted Elliott to finish her plan. After all, the DA spent a good chunk of S4 trying to kill him. And of course he betrayed her straight away by using the video game to shut off the machine.

Yeah, Whiterose's whole decision to let Elliot decide at the end there was way out of character. Other than Tyrell's ending, her project and suicide are my only real complaints about the season. So, in WR's mind, her machine would give "everyone" a better life. Given that the show gave us so little details on the machine, I'm guessing we're meant to take it as delusional--that is, the machine was never really meant to work; the fact that she convinced herself it could work was how she justified doing anything to get the machine operational was WR's delusion.

As for Tyrell, I feel like his arc was ultimately unsatisfying. They were making comparisons to him being a deer (that screaming/screeching sound was the deer dying, yes?) there in his final episode. (Not counting delusion hoodie Tyrell's cameo in the finale.) And I'm not sure what that means--maybe Tyrell represented intelligent but uncreative, hollow, corporate America. Ambition for the sake of ambition, no real purpose for furthering society or humanity--which is why he was so enamored of Elliot. I guess Tyrell dying alone in the cold woods, unloved, his only purpose being a servant of those (Elliot) with purpose is a commentary on those who seek to climb the corporate ladder. 

[Astromech]

Finally got around to watching the season finale. Perfectly bittersweet for me. At times Esmail was really spinning the wheels in earlier seasons, but not much of it this season. Everything seemed to have a purpose.

I really loved Elliot's emotional breakthroughs this final season. Especially his moments with Darlene. Fitting that she was left out of the alternate world the mastermind personality created to protect Elliot. I love that Elliot finally woke at the end and Darlene knew it immediately.

This final season more in Elliot's head than in previous ones(probably designed that way by Esmail), but that seemed much more important to me than wondering about Whiterose, the DA, E-Corp, etc. Very cathartic.

At times I was annoyed by the seeming self-indulgence of the writing, but that is my one criticism of the series. I would have to rank it up there with my favorite series. 

[Heartofice]

Took me some time to get through the final season, but I managed it. 

Mr Robot might well be the most infuriating programme I've ever seen. It is at times completely captivating and enthralling, and then it can quite easily flip into being grindingly hard to watch and full of its own pretentions. 

S4 was a real high point for the show, for the majority of it the pacing was good, there seemed to be a real cohesion in the writing and a sense of direction. They managed to tie off a lot of loose ends and deal with characters and issues that had been building up. I was actually really satisfied with everything up to about Episode 11 and just before the finale.

But the writers have a real habit of writing in a way that makes you imagine a 17 year old college student churning out something he thinks is incredibly deep, but just comes across as derivative and obvious. The show has never done a good job of dealing with Elliots other personalities and I really didn't like the way it was concluded in the finale either. Ever since S1, each personality has just seemed like a dry rip off of better movies and tv shows, most obviously Fight Club. The show improved a lot for me when it stopped being so up front with that side of the narrative.

Which is why I found the Finale a bit of a drag. It felt like the most obvious way to tie up those ends, to do it all as a reality in his head. While I liked the idea of the mastermind being in charge and protecting Elliot, there was something so.. I dunno, so straightforward and unimaginative about the way they presented it (there was even a Malkovic Malkovic moment!). Just all felt so Film Studies with a bigger budget. 

A friend asked me whether he should continue to watch after giving up after S2. I told him that it really improved. I'd tell him to just ignore the Finale and pretend Elliot dies. 

[Paxter]

On 2/10/2020 at 1:12 PM, Heartofice said:

They managed to tie off a lot of loose ends and deal with characters and issues that had been building up. 

I'm not as happy with this aspect of S4. Whiterose and Tyrell were pivotal characters with a lot of build-up and development, but both had weak endings.