While this was another great episode in Mr. Robot‘s fourth season, it, like others, didn’t really seem to propel the story forward very much.
We pick up where we left off, with Vera very much dead on the floor of Krista’s apartment. She has to plead to Elliot’s broken psyche to get out before Vera’s goons come back up, and they just manage to do so. Outside the police station, Krista bids Elliot a farewell for now, as he heads to the subway following his younger self.
Earlier in the episode, we see young Elliot playing hide and seek with a young Angela at a museum. In the midst of the game, Elliot hides something in a storage area. Young Elliot takes present-day Elliot there to retrieve what was hidden: a key to his room. His father’s key, more precisely. Elliot concludes that he used to come here to defend himself, rather than running away or hiding.
We also finally get to back to that cliffhanger of a scene with Dom, Darlene, and Janice. Dom and Darlene, tied up, certainly don’t have the upper hand in their stand-off with Janice, and Janice isn’t playing their games. She stabs Dom in the lung and also threatens to have all her family members killed if Darlene doesn’t give up Elliot’s location. She finally relents, but Elliot’s not at Krista’s apartment anymore. Enraged, Janice makes the kill call…but no one is picking up. That’s because Dom worked out a plan with an old criminal acquaintance to have her family “kidnapped” and taken to a safe house. Way to play, Dom! She gets the upper hand during Janice’s bewilderment, and it costs her and her Dark Army goons their lives.
The episode ends back with Elliot at their hacker headquarters, where he sees that Darlene was able to attain everything they need, but Mr. Robot shows up with a heartfelt speech. Elliot knows that he wouldn’t be who he is without Mr. Robot, but he’s also still emotionally defeated. With Mr. Robots hands reassuringly on his shoulders, Elliot rocks in on himself claiming that he can’t finish the hack. And I’m not sure he can either.
Like I said, this was another great episode, but it just didn’t feel like much really happened. But this has been the case for several episodes so far this season. I don’t totally mind it, because they are taking their time not to rush things going into what’s sure to be an epic series finale. I’m glad to see Janice gone and my hopes were totally dashed when I saw Martin Wallstrom’s name in the opening credits to only see pop up in a two second taxi-cab commercial. I’m still holding out hope for his return! As always, I can’t wait for next week!