Monthly Archives: August 2016

The episode is titled “Los Muertos” which means ‘The Dead”. What is significant about ‘the dead’ in this particular episode? The Mexican people view death a little differently than we do here in the USA. They celebrate the dead every year on November 1st. They call that day ‘Dia de Los Muertos” or ‘The Day of the Dead’. It is a time to pray for and remember friends and family that have died. The Catholics call this day ‘All Saints Day’.

The dead very much remain a part of their lives. There is a respect for the dead and they feel the dead protect them.

NICK

Nick wakes up in the infirmary next to some old woman who’s coughing up blood. Nice alarm clock. He wanders out and finds no one around. Then he sees a little girl looking very scared standing all by herself looking intently at something. The people of ‘Colonia’ have gathered for some sort of ritual. The little girl’s father has become sick and Alejandro and Luciana and the rest of the community are saying goodbye. There is a bus that acts as a tunnel from Colonia to the outside. They are sending him through where he will be sacrificed to the dead that gather at ‘The Wall”. The people chant something as this happens, “De la muerte venimos … y hasta la muerte entregamos nosotros mismos.”

Luciana takes him along on a supply run and tells him that the dead at The Wall protect them. She also says that the people have faith in Alejandro because he had been bitten but didn’t die. Nick calls BS. You get bit you die!

They get to what looks like the Tijuana Costco which is being guarded by an armed gang. They trade drugs for supplies. The gang leader only allows one cart this time even though they had allowed two before. Price gouging in the zombie apocalypse cannot be argued with. Ofelia and Nick go shopping and Nick notices the gang leader looking after a woman who seems to be ailing. As they are leaving with their one cart the guards run after Nick and jump him. He broke the rules. He had something in his back pocket! They are prepared to kill him over this infraction but Nick is a quick thinker and bargains with them. He can tell that the woman is going through withdrawals and, with Luciana translating, determines that the woman is the gang leader’s sister. He negotiates another cart of water in return for a continuing supply of oxycontin. It works. Luciana is both impressed and pissed that he took such a risk and endangering the communities supplies. Once back at the compound we see that Nick had taken some sweets for the little girl that lost her father earlier in the day.

Alejandro meets with Nick and yells at him for his carelessness but sees that he can be a valuable asset and offers to let him stay with the colony. He takes his shirt off and Nick sees he has a major chunk of his shoulder missing. It looks like a walker attacked him. But how could he be alive? This goes against all logic to date about walker bites being a death sentence. What is in the salsa in this place?

Alejandro holds a prayer meeting. He’s like the Mexican Jim Jones or something. He believes that this is a test. He believes that they are the chosen people, that they have been chosen to ‘outlast death’. Well, if you survive a walker bit you would feel that you were special and everyone else would think the same thing. It makes sense. He then says in English the words that everyone was chanting earlier in Spanish; “From death we come and to death we deliver ourselves!” Then the entire room starts the chant and repeating it. “De la muerte venimos … y hasta la muerte entregamos nosotros mismos.” Nick even starts mouthing it. This is a cult and Nick seems to becoming indoctrinated.

MADISON, STRAND, ALICIA AND OFELIA

Apparently this group have been looking everywhere for Nick, Travis and Chris without any luck. Strand and Alicia convince Madison to go back to the Abigail where they have supplies and water. But when they get there the boat is gone! Strand figures the military probably took it. So now they need shelter and happen upon a huge hotel. They push in the door which had been barricaded and determine that the building is clear. I, myself, would not assume that, but, that’s just me. Alicia wants to splinter off with Ofelia and go room to room looking for supplies. Madison is dead set against it but Alicia goes anyway. “It’s me and you now whether you like it or not” Alicia tells her mother. Madison is broken-hearted about Nick. Strand decides to cheer her up. They find the bar and he starts making martinis. They sit at the bar and get drunk eventually opening a bottle of tequila.

Alicia and Ofelia go into one room and find someone who hung himself in the shower and is now a zombie. They find plenty of supplies especially in the filled refrigerators. Ofelia is sad about losing her father and feels alone. “We’re you’re family now” Alicia tells her. “Family is family” Ofelia responds. Hey, Ofelia! She’s just trying to be nice!

There is till hot water in the building so they decide to take showers but when Alicia comes out Ofelia is gone. Great! Who are these people that they think they are better off just going off on their own? Alicia leaves the room looking for her and opens the stairwell door only to find like a hundred walkers! Bloody hell! She returns to the room and sees a body fall from a higher floor. She goes to the balcony and sees zombies falling over the rails and landing below only to get up and start moving inside where Strand and Madison are. How did these zombies know it was happy hour?

Meanwhile Madison and Strand are loaded! Madison thinks she’ll never see Nick again and reveals to Strand that her husband ha d a darkness that seems to have been passed on to her son. He did die in a car accident as she had told Nick in rehab but it was because he veered into oncoming traffic. Suicide. Madison starts doing shots of tequila then throwing the glass against the wall. Strand moves to the piano and for a moment I think it will be revealed that he can actually play the piano but then he starts banging on it and you realize, no, he can’t. They are just making noise which is drawing all the zombies! Haven’t they learned anything! So here come the zombies looking for some happy hour appetizers and Strand and Madison get trapped behind the bar. Why don’t they have weapons?

SIDE BITES

Nick asks Luciana why she’s taking him on the supply run and she tells him ‘because no one will miss him.” Nick asks her ‘Who will miss you?”
“The only one who would miss me is already missing?”
Does that mean he’s alive but she doesn’t know where he is? Hmm, I see a possible love triangle in the future.

“You leave them alone they head straight towards death”, Madison to Strand referring to her husband and son.

“Every so often the ocean washes red. The coast fills with foam and trash. The sand becomes like poison, and burns the water and the land. Washing it clean.” Luciana explaining to Nick why the sick are sacrificed to The Wall. Whaaaaat?

I’m a little disappointed in Strand and Madison. They should have known better than to pick a forty story hotel resort to relax and feel safe in. I mean it’s a cool place with a full bar but the service looks terrible!

Next week we get to see Sad Travis and Crazy Chris. I’m sure we’re all looking forward to that!

The series finale of The Night Of supplied many surprises and not all of them were good.
I wasn’t sure how they would wrap it all up even with the extended time (95 minutes) but they managed to without feeling forced. After seven episodes I was beginning to have doubts of Naz’ innocence or, that even if he was, that he would go free but freedom is a nebulous term and never comes without a price.

DETECTIVE BOX

The episode opened on the now retired Detective Box sitting in a bar, the same bar where they threw his retirement party. Two of his colleagues were at the other end talking about a new cop show on TV and how unrealistic it was. “…how about a show about a cop who doesn’t give a shit?”, one of them says then turns to Box for affirmation but Box is gone.

Something has been bothering Box since the start. You could see the doubt creep into his mind as he was watching the video of Andrea getting into the cab. DA Weiss felt it showed that Naz chose her and strengthened her case but you could tell that Box didn’t feel that way. When Box leaves the bar he goes back to the precinct and starts looking at this video again. He notices something. Andrea looks back. She looks back as if she were scared of something. He starts reviewing more street camera footage. He finally comes across footage of Andrea having an argument with a man right before she gets into the cab.

He starts digging. He finds out that Andrea was called many times by the same person that night and he puts it together with the credit card transactions of the place Andrea and the man came out of and had their argument. Raymond Halle, Andrea’s financial advisor

Box puts those golf clubs to use and hits the links but it’s only because he’s tailing Halle.
He tracks him to a casino where he approaches him at the bar. He shows him the photo of the argument and also insinuates they had a romantic relationship showing him of photo where they seem to be on vacation together. Halle denies any relationship and any wrong doing and leaves. Box takes what he has to DA Weiss. Box shows a financial statement that shows that Halle took $300K from Andrea’s account. “She could have given it to him” Weiss counters. “Or he could have taken it. He had power of attorney.” Box tells her. He has the timeline down with photos of Halle arriving at home around 3am. Even though Weiss seems intrigued with what Box presents to her she takes a pragmatic position, “We have more on the kid.” She tells him.

THE DEFENSE

Chandra puts up Trevor who testifies that he wasn’t alone when he encountered Nas and Andrea as he first told the police. Then she puts on Dwayne Reed who is now incarcerated for another burglary. She puts in the record that Reed commits burglaries and then uses a knife from the premises to assault the people in the house. She gets the creepy undertaker, Mr. Day on the stand and presents video at the gas station and insinuates that he followed the cab back to Andrea’s house. She’s doing everything she can to present alternative suspects to the jury. Finally she puts Andrea’ step father, Don Taylor on the stand. He is one cool cucumber. He answers all her questions and doesn’t flinch. He’s forthcoming about his domestic abuse charges and that Andrea and he did not get along and argued over her mother’s estate after her death. Chandra confidently presents him with motive and accessibility to the house but Taylor also comes across as confident. “I make $35 thousand a year plus what I make on the side with private lessons. I’m on the verge of bankruptcy and I’ve filed twice before and no, I didn’t kill my step daughter.”

Weiss declines to cross examine any of these witnesses. Chandra is unnerved by this but Stone tells her not to worry. Weiss is trying to signal to the jury that she isn’t worried by not cross examining but in fact she is. He’s confident in their strategy. Chandra, though, wants to put Naz on the stand. Stone is strongly against this but Chandra seems to be over confident in her own abilities and asks Naz to testify. “I’m going to need some help”, Naz tells her and she understands. Naz is now addicted and needs some drugs to steady him on the stand. Chandra goes and scores some drugs on the streets, buys some condoms and then passes the baggie to Naz in the holding cell just as the drug passing techniques Naz is used to in prison. This is so stupid! Why in the world would she risk this?

Chandra puts Naz on the stand and he’s comes across fine but during cross Weiss meticulously takes him apart. When she finally asks him if he killed her Naz takes an enormous pause before saying “I don’t know.” Chandra is reduced to tears because she knew she blew it.

“When this started I thought we had a 10% chance. Now we have zero. You just convicted him.”, Stone tells her afterwards.

STONE

As soon as the debacle of putting Naz on the stand is over, Stone takes the cat back to the SPCA. “I don’t want to discuss it!” he tells the guy at the counter. He thoroughly cleans his apartment and sweeps up all the cat toys and tosses everything in the dumpster.

Stone comes back to his apartment and sees a package left at his door. It’s a disc with footage from the holding cell showing Chandra kissing Naz. Stone goes to see Naz to get his permission to show the tape to the judge and possibly get a mistrial. Naz is hesitant at first, asking what will happen to Chandra but Stone convinces him and shows the tape to the judge. Her career is over. But he doesn’t declare a mistrial. He makes Stone first chair which means he’ll have to give the closing argument.

Stone runs into Box at a dumpling shop and asks why he left him the disc? Box plays dumb. “What did you find? You must be sure or you wouldn’t have done it”, Stone asks but Box just laughs and walks out. “Who did it?” Stone yells at him as he exits.

Stone gets so stressed out as he tries to compose his closing that he goes into full meltdown and starts breaking out all over his body and having a bad asthma attack. He ends up in the emergency room and when he shows up in court he’s wearing his white gloves and his face and neck have eczema break out. But even as he looks his worst he is at his best with his closing remarks. He strongly advocates for his client and gives a moving speech. This will probably go down as his proudest moment win or lose. When he returns to his chair, Naz turns to him and gives a quiet but heartfelt ‘thank you’.

NAZ

Naz has become completely indoctrinated to prison life. Even as the trial went on he got a large neck tattoo (a crown). “I wish you hadn’t done that,” Stone tells him, “It’s on the jury side.” He also has become good at targeting new prospects for Freddy’s drug ventures. When a newbie comes in, Naz immediately goes over to him and greets him, asks if he’s married and offers protection. When he goes back to Freddy he tells him, “He’s married. He can take the drugs from his wife himself.”

As the trial ends Freddy tries to reassure him that staying in prison won’t be that bad. “You got people that care about you. I care about you.” Freddy tells him. “Why?” Naz asks.
“You smell like innocence. You’re the real deal, Naz. You’re unique, like I got a unicorn. So why would I not take care of you? What kind of cold hardened man do you think I am?”

THE VERDICT

Well, I didn’t see this coming. Much to the judges dismay the jury is dead locked 6-6.
When the judge asks Weiss if she wants to set a new trial, Weiss looks over at Naz and tells the judge, “No, your Honor. My office declines to prosecute further.”
“You’re free. You get to go home.” Stone tells Naz.

Wow. And just like that he’s packing up his things in his cell and being led out of Rikers. He goes to say goodbye to Freddy but he’s not in his cell. As he’s leaving he hears the heavy bag being worked and turns to see Freddy working the bag. Before he exits the prison a guard hands him a book from Freddy. Call Of The Wild by Jack London.
When the last gate swings open his father is there to greet him. Mom stayed home.

MOVING FORWARD

Chandra cleans out her desk and leaves probably never to be a lawyer again.

Weiss meets with Box, who is now working as a security guard at NYU. “Let’s go get him” she tells him as she places the photo of Andrea and Halle arguing.

Box is seen tailing Halle. He’s still doing detective work but can he build a better case on Halle than he did on Naz?

Naz is having dinner at home but as they say, you can never go home again. His father is sweet and happy to have him back but his brother looks at him funny and his mother looks scared of him. He knows she thinks he did it even though she won’t admit it.

He meets with Stone at a deli near his home. Everyone is looking at him. He was set free but in the eyes of many he may still be guilty. “Fuck ‘em all” Stone tells him, “Live your life.”
“Thank you, for everything you did fore me.” Naz tells him.

Then we see Naz score some drugs and go back to the spot where Andrea and he sat by the Hudson River. He gets high and thinks about her. For a moment I thought he was going to OD and fall into the water. Perhaps he’s still wondering if he did kill her or not. It’s a bittersweet moment.

And Stone. He’s back to square one. He’s just as he was when we first met him; walking around in sandals, scratching his feet with chopsticks and looking gloomy. He sits at home watching TV and gets a call. It’s a new client. He’s back to his usual clientele and $250 cases. He gets dress as one of those sad commercials about abandoned pets comes on the screen. Roberta Flack is heard singing ‘The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face’. Is he thinking about his cat that he took back to die? Then just as he goes to leave the apartment we see the cat scamper across the floor!

SUMMATION

The show wasn’t a whodunnit and it wasn’t really a court room drama though the last two episodes showed a trial. It was really a character study of the men and women that work in the criminal justice system and the kind of games that are played with peoples lives. It paints a depressing picture of how someone can get tossed into the system and prison to fend for themselves while decisions are made that have nothing to do about their guilt or innocence.

There really was no happy ending for any of the characters though Naz being freed from prison was a big win, he comes back into the world a changed man, a marked man, an addicted and haunted man. The scene of him by the river getting high and thinking of Andrea was terribly sad.

And John Stone, who is arguably the hero of the story, seems worse off than when the story started. But at least he has the cat.

Richard Price and Steven Zaillian created a good, moody, New York story. I’d like to see more from them so I’m hoping HBO picks up the show for another season. New York is full of good stories.

SIDE BITS

Box sleeping at the precinct as he continues to investigate Andrea’s murder. That’s dedication.

Another detective keeps seeing Box at the precinct and says “You still here? Do we have to throw you another party?”

Box to Halle at the casino bar; “Why are you still here? Waiting for me to throw the bracelets on you? I told you I’m retired. The fuck out of here!”

“What I’m about to tell you is top secret. A conspiracy bigger than all of us. There’s a powerful group of people out there that are secretly running the world. I’m talking about the guys no one knows about. The guys that are invisible. The top 1% of the top 1%…”
Darlene [reading Elliot’s words]

Well if you wanted more action and less mind games you got your wish. Things got real tonight! I also got what I wanted; More Darlene! With Elliot in prison (?), Darlene has been the leader and the face (she dons the mask for an F Society video) of the movement.
But though she has proven a tactful and capable leader she is increasingly getting in over her head and the realization becomes clear in this episode.

I have to say I didn’t miss seeing Joanna Wellick in this episode. I don’t really need to see her again unless Tyrell returns. There was no Elliot in this episode either which may be the first time in 18 episodes that this has happened. That’s fine. He needs a breather. He’s been busy. I’m sure Rami Malek enjoyed some well deserved R & R.

COLD OPEN

Mobley and Trenton meet cute in Ron’s Coffee Shop. They were actually flirting by making fun of each other for the type of phones they had. They even race to see who could get on line first. Mobley wins. “Iphone sucks.” Trenton says. They’re both there to meet someone and lo and behold Darlene shows up! They both thought they were going to meet Elliot but Elliot couldn’t make it so they got the second in command. And so began the first meeting of F Society. No minutes were taken.

ANGELA

Who knew Angela was a karaoke queen? Angela was on a date and being charming as ever when she ran into one of her dad’s friends at the bar. He was friendly at first but then turned hostile by slamming her for working at E Corp, the same corporation responsible for her mother’s death. Angela is mortified and turns to walk away but then stops and walks back to the guy.
“You’re a plumber, right, Steve? You’ve had, what, 60 years at life? And that’s the best you can come up with. Literally cleaning shit for a living. I’m 27, and I’ve got a six figure salary at the biggest conglomerate in history. And I’m just getting started.”
Mic drop.

Then she takes the stage and does a sick version of ‘Everybody Wants To Rule The World’. It was kind of a nightmarish version sung by an ice queen.

Back at the bar she gets hit on by an older, nicely dressed gentleman who looks completely out of place in this bar.
“You really have a desire to rule the world?”
“My desire goes way beyond that”

He tries to go back to her friends but Angela gets him to stay with her. How could he resist? Was he the reason she was there in the first place? Does he work for E Corp? The actor is Mark Moses (Desperate Housewives, Mad Men) so I’m thinking this is the beginning of a bigger story arc. Hey! What happened to her date?

DARLENE

We pick up where we left off last week. The F Society Team learn that the FBI is going to have a conference call to discuss the 5/9 hack Investigation. They tape what is said and use it to make an F Society video (Darlene stepping in for Elliot) using audio from the conference call discussing the warrant less monitoring of millions. They also learn that they have 16 suspects with 1 dead (Romero). Mobley freaks out. He’s all for taking off but Darlene and Cisco won’t have it.

Things take a turn when Susan Jacobs (E Corp General Counsel) comes home unexpectedly and the Team has to subdue her and tie her up. No sooner does this happen then Trenton falls for the old ‘have to go to the bathroom’ trick. Trenton unties Jacobs who tries to jump Trenton and ends up slamming her head against the wall. They decide not to take her to the hospital until they can ‘own’ her which means going through her email and computer looking for some leverage. Once they found something Darlene goes to have a chat with Jacobs.

This is where the worm turns.

Darlene: The first time I saw you, I was four. I still remember. On the news, in the courtroom, when they cleared E Corp of all the bullshit they put my family through. And you were in the back, behind a sea of suits. And you laughed. It was so quick, no one even noticed. No one but me. Four year old little me. So… I’m happy I get to look you in the eye. I’ve taken down your company, I’ve taken over your home, and now, I have you.

Susan: OK. So you got me. Where do we go from here? I’m sure we can figure something out.
Darlene: I already have.

Darlene then zaps here with a stun gun and Jacobs falls into the pool. Dead.

“She had a heart condition. There were plenty of emails. You didn’t read them?” Mobley stammers. Darlene read them which is why she used the stun gun. Darlene intended to kill Jacobs. Later on she tells Cisco, “I didn’t know I could do that.” But she’s crossed a line and there’s no going back. The house is burned. Mobley tells Trenton to leave town as that’s what he’s planning on doing. They’re both paranoid as hell. Trenton tells her father maybe they should move but that’s not going to happen. There’s a noise outside. She looks out and sees a car slowly moving down the street then accelerating out of sight. Mobley actually goes back to his apartment to pack when there’s a knock at the door. FBI.

Darlene and Cisco take Jacobs’ body to the pet crematorium where they have to take it out of the body bag they brought it in and hoist it into the fires.

“This is some traumatizing shit, you know that?” Cisco tells her.

AGENT DIPIERRO

Mobley ends up in an interrogation room with DiPierro. She does all the talking. She offers condolences for Romero. She shows him the ‘End Of The World” flier with DJ Mobley advertised on it. She’s looking for help finding Terrell. She can offer immunity.
“Lawyer.” Mobley says.

DiPierro’s supervisor tells her to cut him loose, they don’t have anything on him.
Mobley texts Trenton to meet them at the place they met then wipes the data from his phone and dumps it. Trenton is shown waiting for him and texting him that she’s been waiting for 2 hours. But she’s texting a phone Mobley no longer has.

Oh and Angela’s karaoke date? An undercover FBI agent. “She’s stone cold and to tell you the truth, I kinda got hurt.”, the guy tells DiPierro, “She dumped me for some old dude at the bar.”
“Her contact?”, DiPierro asked.
“No, I just think she’s into old dudes.”
He may be right. She seems to have a think for Price. Ewwwww.

DARLENE

The next morning Darlene wakes up at Cisco’s place. She hears the shower running. She gets up looking uneasy. She sees his computer on the table and sits down to have a looksy. She sees that he has a video feed of her sleeping and that he’s been in contact with The Dark Army telling them that ‘she’s here’. Cisco comes out of the shower looks over and sees his computer destroyed on the floor. He looks over at Darlene and she’s holding a baseball bat. She takes a big wind up and swings for his head! Killing may be coming easier to her.

This was a tight episode. No Joanna, less Angela, more Darlene, more tension. Obviously, Elliot returns next week and will be walking into a mess. Four episodes to go and I hope the concentration remains on F Society vs the Feds vs The Dark Army storyline.

 SIDE BITS

Darlene changes Jacobs’ out of office alert to say she will be out of office from July 4th to July 27th 2015.

The Cold Open takes place on Thanksgiving 2014.

Jacob’s asks Trenton if this has ‘something to do with ISIS’.

The Dark Army have access to the FBI through F Society’s hack.

I’m with Mobley I would just leave Dodge now while they can!!

We’re in the homestretch. The penultimate episode of the show pivoted on the trial. Stone plays detective but not very well as Andrea’s step dad, Don Taylor, turned the tables on him. Naz sinks deeper into prison life under Freddy’s tutelage and Chandra gets too close to her defendant.

THE PROSECUTION

DA Weiss (Jeanne Berlin) presents her case in a very powerful way. It may be all circumstantial evidence but the accumulative effect sure seems damning. The crime scene photos are shown to the jury as well as the courtroom. Twenty two wounds on Andrea’s body. The coroner testifies as Weiss asked and said that the cut on Naz’ hand was from the knife slipping as he stabbed the victim. Naz’ mom couldn’t take it anymore and runs out of the courtroom.
Chandra found her in the restroom after and told her she can’t do that, it reflects badly on her son. But she no longer has faith in her son’s innocence.
“An animal did that. Did I raise an animal?

When Naz tries to call her from his cell phone she does not answer and continues her work mopping the floors.

Weiss puts the teacher from Naz’ old school on the stand to testify to his violent streak. Chandra is taken by surprise on cross examination when the teacher says that Naz assaulted two kids. She was only aware of one.

She questions one of Naz’ classmates that would buy amphetamines from Naz. Naz would charge $10 per pill that costs him 25 cents with his prescription. He was already a pretty good drug dealer himself apparently.

Finally Box takes the stand to testify about the timeline and the evidence. Chandra tries to poke holes in his testimony, pointing out that Naz never confessed but he remained confident.
“I’ll take evidence over a confession any day of the week.”

STONE

Stone keeps shadowing Don Taylor, Andrea’s step dad. Andrea’s financial advisor gets Taylor’s credit history and tells Stone to see Taylor’s ex wife. He even joins the gym Taylor works in and starts asking around about him. While working the bench press, Taylor surprises Stone and tells him that he has been watching him and knows all about his ex wife and son and warns him to stop following him. In court, the coroner admitted that 22 stab wounds would indicate a crime of passion and that might point to Taylor more than Naz. Still, Stone has absolutely no proof that Taylor was involved. Seeing Turturro on the treadmill trying to get info out of his physical trainer was fun.

Stone still has a cat problem. The problem being he really likes the cat but it’s killing him! At one point the cat gets out of the room Stone keeps him isolated in and crawls into bed with Stone. When he wakes up and sees the cat he jumps out of the bed and can barely breathe! I guess the cat is a metaphor for Naz? He likes the cat when it’s locked up in his room but when he gets out he’s toxic.

Stone is still having problems with his son. He finally goers to his son’s school and the son tries to ignore him as Stone calls for him from the fence. He just wants to show him that his feet are better and he’s wearing shoes. He wants to give him the cat but the kid doesn’t want a cat. “I want a pit.” He tells Stone. It’s sad because they seemed close at the start of the series and the son has become increasingly embarrassed by his father.

THE DEFENSE

Chandra puts Dr. Katz (Chip Zien) on the stand and he’s wonderful. He testifies that there is a missing knife; the set should have 4 knives. He says that the back door to Andrea’s apartment didn’t shut and someone could have entered and gone up the stairs without someone in the kitchen noticing. He also states that the cut on Naz’ hand came from breaking the glass in the front door when he came back into the apartment. It’s strong conjecture but Weiss knows him. He’s an expert witness at many trials and well known. This scene was extremely entertaining. Jeanne Berlin and Chip Zien are two old pros working a nicely written scene and they look like they had a ball. It definitely put some questions to the jury but without an alternative suspect to present it doesn’t mean much.

Stone discovers that Naz’ inhaler was at the crime scene but not logged into evidence. Naz tells them that Box have it to him at the station. They put Box back on the stand to question him about this and try to paint him as unethical. They also point out other suspects (the step dad, the drug dealer, the hearse driver) and ask why Box didn’t question them. But Box holds firm. All the evidence pointed to Naz.

The real shocker comes in the scene between Naz and Chandra in the holding cell. Naz tells her that the only person that believes he’s innocent is his father. Chandra tries to assure him that it’s not true. She believes in him. Naz sees that she is fighting hard for him and he asks if it’s more than just her belief in his innocence. Then they kiss. What? Chandra catches herself and knows immediately she screwed up. There are cameras in their catching everything. Is this going to come back to haunt her?

NAZ

Naz continues smoking crack in his cell. He notices that Petey, the young newcomer that Freddy took under his wing in exchange for his mother sneaking in drugs, is still being used for sex by the older inmate. Naz goes to meet Petey’s mom in the visitation room this time, taking the balloons filled with drugs directly and easily popping them in his mouth and swallowing them. He’s becoming an old pro at this. When Petey’s mom asks about her son Naz reassures her that he’s fine. But one night upon his return from court, Naz stops in the restroom and sees a pool of blood coming from the far stall. When he goes to look he sees that Petey has slit his wrists and is dead.

Freddy is upset of course because this means the drug train will stop. He doesn’t understand why Petey would kill himself, everything seemed fine. Later on Freddy comes into Naz’ cell and sits down. “”You have something to tell me about Petey?” He asks Naz. Naz simply replies“Yes.” Next thing you see Freddy and Naz come down from their cell floor and while Naz distracts the guard in the booth, Freddy slashes the throat of the inmate responsible for Petey’s death with a razor blade.

There is only one episode remaining and it’s becoming more and more apparent that the bigger picture is not whether or not Naz killed Andrea or not but how the criminal system and incarceration can transform a young man into a criminal. Even if Naz is found not guilty he will be haunted by the crimes he committed while in prison and he may end up doing these things once back outside.

Naz’ parents have lost everything even respect in their community. His father sells his share of the taxi for a third of his investment. They also pawn everything of worth in order to help pay the lawyers. Things will never be the same for them.

And what about Dwayne Reed? He has to pop up again, right? But it may be just another red herring. I’m afraid there will be no happy ending to this story. Stone may even have to give up his cat.

Then there’s Detective Box. We see his last day on the job and his retirement party. They give him a set of golf clubs. He stares at those clubs knowing he’ll never use them. The only thing that made his life worth anything was the job. He’s good at it. What will he be good at now? Will he be the subject of a future crime scene? His own?

Fear The Walking Dead is back! The Mid-Season premiere probably was not the episode everyone expected or even wanted but if you were “Nick’ fans you were in heaven! That loveable addict who never combs his hair and is always covered with dead walker goo was the focus of this stand alone episode. As you remember, the last time we saw Nick (Frank Dillane) he was refusing to go with his Mom, sister Alicia, Strand and Ofelia as the Abigail estate went up in flames and zombies invaded. Nick was really sore at Madison for the cold blooded murder of his new friend, Celia. He wandered off, walking with the dead, as he is want to do, headed to who knows where.

In this episode we see where he wandered to but he definitely doesn’t seem to have a specific destination in mind. He’s on a spiritual quest. A walkabout, if you will. He seems to make friends pretty easily and at the start of the episode we see him with a woman and her young son. They go off looking for the rest of their family and tell him to head for a big city where they might be a community of living people. He hugs them goodbye while covered in walker goo! And they hug him back! Do they even thick this is odd? No, it’s just Nick!

Nick wanders down the road. He finds a place for the night and starts a fire. Now this place had no doors, open windows, too many entrances, not a defensible position. Why would he stop there? And start a fire that would draw zombies! Well, it wasn’t zombies that showed up but a woman and her young daughter. Apparently this was their spot and the lady was yelling and screaming and hitting poor ole Nick with a baseball bat! He had to run for his life leaving his bag of provisions and water. I thought he should have been able to take the lady but you know Nick. He doesn’t like hurting anybody, living or dead or clobbering him with a baseball bat apparently.

Now Nick has no water and no food or anything but the walker goo covered clothes on his back. He comes across some cars on the highway. He opens the door of one car that has a walker in it still in her seat belt. He sees a radio on the dash and reaches in to get it. This walker is almost biting him and he’s acting as if it’s just some annoying dog nipping at his arm. He gets the radio but you’d think he’d be a little more careful. Then a jeep with some bad hombres come along. They kill a zombie. Then they come across a guy in his car that hasn’t turned. He’s still alive but dying. The guy asks for water and they kill him. Just then that radio Nick risked his life to retrieve goes on and alert these guys to Nick. He starts running and they start shooting at him. He gets away but he still has no water and no idea where he is.

Mixed in with the Nick’s present predicament we get some flashbacks to Nick’s previous predicament; drug addiction. We see Nick in rehab with his addict girlfriend, Gloria, who looks really nice and sweet for being in rehab. This is the same woman from Episode One that Nick was with in the church. She was also the very first zombie we see on this show. Was she ground zero for the epidemic? We learn Nick had some resentment towards his father pulling away from him and not being there. We see Madison visit Nick and tell him that his dad was killed in car accident. We even see Nick and Gloria in the church presumably the night before everything went sideways. Nick was wearing that Elizabethan white shirt that he wore in the first episode. Obviously, that stay in rehab didn’t take.

Back in the present, Nick tries to get water from a cactus but that doesn’t work. He eats the cactus which makes him sick and throws up. He pisses in his hands and drinks his own pee! He gets attacked by wild dogs and bitten pretty badly. A herd of zombies come along and those crazy dogs attack them. Zombies eat Dogs. Some folks were upset about his but, fair is fair, they did attack first. Shooting in the distance draws the herd away and Nick joins them! Some Dance with Wolves. Nick Walks with Zombies. As they meander down the highway Nick starts hallucinating. He hears them talking. My friend, Charlotte wondered if they had some shared consciousness but then Gloria appears to him as a zombie and offering words of comfort.

Just then, that jeep with the bad hombres shows up again. They get out and start shooting zombies. Nick just keeps walking with them, zombie heads exploding to the left and right of him. I guess he doesn’t care about dying. Then one of the bad guys notices Nick. Nick is looking right at him. He gets freaked out and drops all his bullets. The zombies reach him and feast on his neck. They also get one of the other guys. I’m not sure how he let that happen, these zombies are slow movers. The guys in the jeep take off right quick! For a moment I thought Nick was going to join the zombies in the feast! He’s starving! But he doesn’t.

Up on the ridge we see a woman and two men watching Nick through binoculars. They wonder who this crazy guy is. The two guys want to go help him but the woman says no.
Eventually Nick collapses from dehydration and the herd leave him behind just as the people on the ridge. Fortunately it starts to rain! Water! Nick is saved!

Nick makes it to Tijuana and tries to patch up his dog bitten leg when he runs into the woman and two men who observed him on the highway. The woman’s name is Luciana (Danay Garcia) you just know Nick and her are going to fall in love, right? Once they’ve made sure it wasn’t a zombie bite they take him back to their compound and he meets the doctor and probably leader of this community. As he patches him up and gives him some much needed advice. “Death is not to be feared. It’s also not to be pursued.”

Once he’s patched up he leads him outside where people are moving around normally, kids are playing soccer, people are working stands filled with clothes and food. He’s come across a flea market heaven! Is this what Nick had in mind when he started this journey? Heaven knows! But at least he’s safe for now. But as with everything in the Walking Dead world, there must be something wrong with this place.

The Walking Dead likes to do these stand alone episodes and for the most part they are pretty good. It allows for more character definition and insight. Nick is one of the more interesting characters on the show but he’s also frustrating as hell. He just doesn’t seem too bright. I didn’t understand him just abandoning his mom and sister and going off on hi own. This is the zombie apocalypse, man! Even if you wanted to how would you ever find them again? Of course, they will find each other again because that’s the show.

I kept thinking while watching this episode “This is what you get! Should have stayed with your mommy!” He needs to toughen up and maybe that’s what his character arc is going to be in the back half of the season. And comb your hair!!!!

“It’s not the destination it’s the journey. But what if the destination is you? What if it’s always you?” Elliot
This show is a maze of the mind. Mostly the mind of Elliot Alderson. Throughout the first six episodes we’ve seen the breakdown of Elliot, body and soul. In Episode Seven we begin to see him put his pieces back together again and make peace with himself and with his later ego Mr. Robot. But it left me with many questions and forces me to rethink what came before. I think we all had doubts about where Elliot really was. There was plenty of talk about alternate realities and what if scenarios. I kept wondering why there was no interaction with Elliot’s mom. Last week we got to see what Mr. Robot looked like as an 80s sitcom. This week we get the Twilight Zone version.

JOANNA WELLICK

I have to say I’m not all that interested in Joanna Wellick. She looks great and the occasional S&M sex scenes are interesting but I’m not seeing what her story has to do with anything else. The episode opened with a flashback to an E Corp party where Price introduces the Wellick’s to Scott and Sharon Knowles. OK. Then we see Joanna pushing her baby carriage and a woman throws a bucket of blood on her and screams “Capitalist Pig!” Joanna screams. She was wearing all white you see. Gonna have to toss that outfit.
Later on we see her with her boy toy/bartender having rough sex. He’s turning 30 and wants her to come to his party as his ‘girlfriend’ or their through. When she doesn’t go to his party he confronts her but she says she was busy speaking with her lawyer. She hands him a scroll wrapped in a bow. “This is my birthday gift to you.” Divorce papers. So romantic. Now come to bed and choke me again.

ANGELA /DIPIERRO

We see the rest of the Agent DiPierro – Angela encounter that started last week. Before Angela can complete the code that would give F Society access to the FBI DiPierro approaches her about being on a restricted floor. Angela tells him she was just making a date but DiPierro isn’t buying that. She knows Angela left Allsafe one week before the hack and now lands a job at E Corp. Something fishy going on and she wants to interrogate..er..have a discussion with Angela about it. “Whatever this is, it isn’t you.” DiPierro tells her. Once DiPierro walks away, Darlene feeds Angela the last part of the code and viola!! “We just owned the FBI”, Darlene tells her.

Later on, DiPierro has someone look into the database and it’s obvious they have been hacked. They are onto F Society. So when Mobley, Cisco, Trenton and Darlene look at their screen and smile about something going down the next day you have to wonder if DiPierro hasn’t planted some false info to draw F Society into a trap.

Angela is a real puzzle this year. She’s become so cold and robotic. The scene with her father was disturbing. When did she turn on him? She wants him to agree to let E Corp off the hook on inspections of the water in their hometown because she made a deal with Price and E Corp would settle the lawsuit. Her dad doesn’t buy it and laughs. “You laugh but trust me, they respect me.” He refuses to agree but it didn’t matter because she already got two thirds of the signatures she needed to make it happen. “ Why did you come here because you certainly don’t give a shit about my opinion?” Her dad asks. “This was just a courtesy.” Angela coldly responds.

She tells Price what she did and he agrees that E Corp will settle. She asks to be transferred to Risk management which baffles price because it’s a lateral move. But she gets what she wants and once in her new position she pushes to be involved in the daily briefings. Her new supervisor agrees but when Angela pushes to review the Washington Township records he lets her know that he knows who she is. What is her end game? Her character change from last season has been drastic and quite frankly isn’t making much sense to me.

ELLIOT / MR. ROBOT

Elliot and Mr. R have realized they need each and make an alliance. First things first, what happened to Tyrell? Mr., R tells Elliot that after he completed the hack he (Mr. R) took the gun that Darlene had hidden in the popcorn machine and shot Tyrell.
“No. I shot him.” Elliot says. Hmmm, if that’s true then who has been sending Joanna cell phones and music boxes?

“When you see a good move look for a better one.” Emmanuel Lasker, Chess Master

Ray and his partner bring Elliot back to their office and tell him to finish the work on the website migration and that they’re going to keep him until they’re sure that it’s ‘purring like a kitten.” Elliot does as he’s told but instead of being taken back to his ‘cell’ he asks Ray for a game of chess, for “old time’s sake.” Ray agrees and goes on to tell him that the idea for the site was his late wife’s but that neither of them ever thought it would be so successful and they never looked at what people sold on the site. Ray had never looked until Elliot came along. “You are my answer not the other way around so I thank you.” Ray tells him. “How much time do I have?” Ray asks. See, ray knew that Elliot would fix it so that the authorities would see the site and the cops would be there soon. He was grateful for it. Sure enough Elliot had sent an anonymous tip to the FBI and there were there in minutes.

Once again Elliot is at the basketball courts with his old friend, Leon. Some folks are upset about the site being down and know that Elliot is to blame. A group of white guys approach Elliot and Leon and tell Elliot that since they had $800 unused bit coin on the site that they now can’t access that Elliot would have to pay them back.

Elliot returns to the church group and apologizes to the woman church leader for his previous outburst. She tells him, “I’ve seen you talking to him, not out loud but I’ve seen it on your face.” Elliot is confused but she thinks he’s talking to ‘Jesus’, of course. She leaves him to have some alone time but it’s with Mr. R not Jesus.
“I need to finish what I started with E Corp but I don’t know what to do.”
Mr. R tells Elliot that the hack was Elliot’s choice not his and that he just followed.
“You are a leader. You need to lead.” Mr. R tells Elliot.

“Control can be an illusion but sometimes you need illusion to gain control” Elliot

Elliot proceeds to burn his notebooks when all of a sudden that group of white guys from before grab him and take him to an alley. They start beating him up (again!) and demanding he repay them. He’s about to get raped when he hears the men getting assaulted behind him. He turns around and they’re all on the ground having been slashed. He looks up and sees that it was Leon who came to his rescue.
“ You’re going to get a letter on Tuesday. Do what it says. When you see Whiterose make sure you say I did you good. I’ll be rooting for you, cuz.” And like a super hero he’s gone. So Leon is an agent of The Dark Army asked to look after Elliot. OK.

Next we see Elliot in Krista’s office. She asks how his relationship with Mr. Robot is going and he tells her, “For the first time we trust each other. I help him and he helps me. You were right. You can’t destroy a part of yourself.” Then Krista asks him “Elliot, I have to ask. Where do you think you are right now? You know you haven’t been staying with your mother, right”
“I know.” He answers. A siren goes off. He’s in prison.
“When you get released I hope you continue seeing me in my office.” She tells him.
He had masked his being in prison with the illusion of being at his mother’s and being back in his old neighborhood. The diner was actually the prison commissary. The woman we thought was his mother was his guard and so on. “Next stop – The Twilight Zone!”

“Please don’t be mad at me”, Elliot tells us, “This will be the last time I keep things from you. I promise. Shake?”

OK. My questions:

1 Why is he in prison? For killing Tyrell? He wouldn’t get out. The hack? No, it doesn’t seem like anyone knows who did that still. Then what? His affiliation with Ray? Was that something that actually happened?

2 Is Tyrell really dead?

3 Did Leon really shiv those four guys?

I like twists and it was clever how he revealed the illusion Elliot created and how they morphed into the prison settings. I need to know the reasons before I can really know if it worked. The season has been disjointed but I’m riding with it because it’s an ambitious show and I love the directing style. I hope it ties the plot together like the rug in The Dude’s apartment.

Side Bits

The morphing of actual CSpan footage of The House Of Representatives with F Society protest of dropping the bronze genitals from the Wall Street bull through the roof! Well done!
Angela calling out Darlene for thinking her and Elliot were smarter than her. Calling back the times they made her watch that horror movie every Halloween. Angela recognized the mask from the movie being used by F Society.

Price telling Angela that it was his birthday and asking if she wanted to help him celebrate that night. Angela answers with a flat “No.” Oh well. Maybe next year.

The banner in the room where the church group met says ‘You Are Not Alone’ reminded me of The X Files.

“Did you like your life out there?” Freddy

As the trial begins, Naz gets more and more comfortable living on the inside. I’m starting to worry that he’s going to sabotage himself. Even if he didn’t kill Andrea is he starting to think that life in prison is better than whatever life he may have if he got out. People will still think he did it. It was an uncomfortable episode watching Naz. But let’s start on what was happening on the outside.

Stone goes to Chinatown seeking help for his feet. He finds a Chinese guy named Mr. Yee who mixes a powder for him that even includes a little aphrodisiac to mix with water that he says will work. Only three hundred dollars. Stone is desperate enough to try anything. Stone still has the cat. He wore a face mask and rubber gloves to clean the kitty litter. He opens the door and slides it back in and then shuts the door really quick. He does the same when he feeds it. The guy is a sucker! He’s allergic to the cat but keeps it and takes care of it anyway. Is he being a sucker about Naz, too? He must be starting to think so when Detective Box tells him what he’s dug up about Naz’ violent past. Box looked through Naz’ Facebook and discovered that he transferred from a school near his home to one 40 minutes away. He goes to the school and finds out that Naz pushed a kid down a stairwell and the kid broke his arm. He continued to get in fights so he was transferred to a different school. Chandra visits Naz and asks him about it. He says that after 9/11 there was a lot of anger directed towards him and his family which led to fights. He said he felt bad for his mom who couldn’t understand how he could push someone down the stairs but that he felt nothing. Chandra says she experienced the same things and that she understood.

“You understand that but maybe I did kill that girl. That’s what you’re thinking.”

Yeah, Naz. That’s what we’re all thinking. Meanwhile, we see Naz’ brother, Hasan, vandalizing school lockers with a red spray paint can. Naz’ mother is fired from her job due to what’s happened with Naz and takes a job mopping floors. Naz’ dad has become a food delivery man as Chandra finds out when she opens the door to find him holding her take out order. She goes back in to get some money but when she returns the food is there but he is gone.

The defense is doing some investigating of their own! Chandra reviews the security tapes of the gas station Naz stopped at the night of the murder. She sees the hearse and the driver go to speak to Andrea. When Naz pulls out the hearse seems to follow. Chandra is able to get the license plate number and track down the driver at the mortuary he works at. This fellow Mr. Day is an interesting guy. His take on Andrea is that she had ‘that vibe’, and described her as a cat and men were like balls of yarn to her. His opinion of women is summed up in the bible verse he gives to Chandra which is where the title of the episode stems from. Delilah betrays Samson by cutting his hair thereby taking his strength and he is made blind by the Palestines. When Chandra asks him where he went after he left the gas station Mr. Day shoots back, “You a cat, too? You think I’m a ball of yarn?” Chandra is thoroughly creeped out. She goes to Stone’s and he takes her to a bar for a drink. She tells him about Mr. Day and that she thinks he may have followed Naz and Andrea back to her place. Stone tells her to let him do the ‘Nancy Drew” work next time. Chandra also tells Stone that she broke up with her boyfriend. There’s a close up of Stone touching Chandra’s hand as he talks to her. Could they be setting up a romance? Only two episodes left. Maybe if they went ten episodes.

As the trial begins Weiss is putting her case together, Chandra nervously prepares for her opening statements, and Stone wakes to find that the eczema on his feet has cleared up! He puts on some shoes and goes down to the courthouse. He is so happy! He tries to show Chandra but she is far too nervous to care. OK. Now we go back inside.

Naz is worrying me. He is getting very accustomed to jail life. He’s getting tattoos, most notably the words, ‘sin’ and ‘bad’ on his fingers. Freddy gives him a cell phone and tells him he can loan it out to other inmates in exchange for payment. “I’m gonna make a proper convict out of you yet” Freddy tells him. When Freddy smokes some crack he offers some to Naz who turns it down but later when he offers some again Naz accepts. This is after the trial begins! Soon he’s in Freddy’s cell with the rest of the gang and they’re all smoking crack. On the morning of the trial Naz finds a new white shirt and black tie on his bed. He takes them back to Freddy to say thank you but his parents are bringing him some clothes to wear. “Yeah but they won’t be right” Freddy tells him. He was right. When they bring Naz into the court room he’s wearing a dark blue shirt. Stone immediately tells him to exchange shirts with him. Perception is everything. One night as Naz is returning to his cell something catches his attention in another cell. He stops and looks through the window to see a man on his knees giving another man a blow job. He knows both of these guys, part of Freddy’s gang. They notice him watching and he hurriedly moves away but the next morning he is attacked in the shower. The man he saw the night before getting the blow job holds a knife to Naz’ throat. “Did you tell Freddy?”
This is his life now.

Weiss begins to present her case. She’s well prepared. She follows the timeline as Box has provided her. It’s strong circumstantial evidence. Stone follows another hunch. How could Andrea afford that brownstone? He tacks down her financial advisor who was also Andrea’s mother’s advisor. The place was her mother’s as we already knew. She inherited it and some money after she died. Her step father, a much younger man who preyed on older woman like Andrea’s mother, so Stone is told wanted Andrea to give him half. Andrea refused. “I believe she said ‘over my dead body” the financial advisor tells Stone. Stone tracks down the step father to where he works as a fitness trainer. Stone looks through the window at the step father training an attractive older woman. Another suspect with a motive. But how can Stone prove anything?

Detective Box still seems pretty confident of Naz’ guilt but he never really looked at the step father at all. Can Stone convince him to? How can Stone get any real proof on his own without Box’ help? There is no way Naz gets off without another viable suspect being presented. And what about the guy that Stone chased last week? He must have seen something. In any case, Naz is tapping into his dark nature being in prison and under the tutelage of Freddy. He and his whole family have been destroyed by this and his being set free will not change that.

“All for Alderson and Alderson for one?”

We saw something quite original and daring to start the newest episode of our Mr. Robot! The first twenty minutes were dedicated to showing us what Mr. Robot would look like as a twisted 80s sitcom complete with laugh track, cheesy theme song, “Imagine a world gone insane!” and bad family banter:

“What is that laughing?” Elliot
“Elliot’s hearing voices.” Darlene
“What else is new” Mom. Cue laugh track.

They stop at a gas station and when Elliot enters the ‘E-Mart” he runs into ALF!! What the? Just when you think it couldn’t possibly go on it does go on and on. There’s a noise coming from the trunk and it turns out to be a bound and gagged Tyrell. Elliot is completely horrified and believes that it all means that Mr. Robot has won and has taken over completely. Mr. Robot assures him just the opposite. He’s created this alternate universe as a place to hide while he covers from the horrible beating Ray and his men have given him.
“Sometimes lies can be useful, Elliot.” Mr. Robot tells him, “We had a destination after all.” And he walks him to the front of a hospital.

When Elliot comes out of this hallucination he finds himself in the hospital, severely beaten and scarred. Ray is there to tell him a story about how his dog got sick and he needed the care of a human. His dog is alive only because of him. He needed his master. Elliot is only alive because Ray told his men to stop the beating and bring him to the hospital. Ray is now Elliot’s new master.This was a very brave and daring exercise. More than ever the show is doing deep dives into Elliot’s psyche. This segment could pass for a long skit on the great 80’s variety show SCTV. Loved how the mom kept punching Darlene unconscious. This is the most action Mom has seen all season!

F Society Crash Course

Darlene, Mobley and Trenton try to teach Hacking 101 to Angela to prepare her to walk into E Corp and hack into the FBI system. They only have 24 hours to get her up to speed! It seems like a hopeless cause but Darlene is sure that she can pull it off. Angela even uses her self help methods to inspire herself: “My success is assured. My success is assured.”

Cisco goes to The Dark Army to get the femtocell that Angela will take with her on her mission. But when he asks too many questions they jab him in the finger with a long needle! Whaaaat? Did they implant a tracking device? When Cisco meets with F Society to hand over the femtocell Angela recognizes him as the guy that blackmailed her into downloading that disc into Allsafe last season. She says nothing and heads out.

Darlene sets up shop in a hotel room near E Corp. I loved her disguise. She wore trench coat and platinum blonde wig looking just like Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity. She and Mobley try to walk Angela through the hack. Angela walks up to the floor where the FBI is staked out and walks into the bathroom to work. She has trouble at first but Darlene and Mobley get her through it. When she exits the bathroom she runs into a young good looking agent who starts flirting with her. When Angela doesn’t succumb to his wiles the agent starts asking her what she’s doing on a restricted floor. Angela turns on her charm and agrees to meet him for lunch. That’s all he wanted! He drops all the security crap and struts away like a conqueror. Angela hooks up the femtocell and it all seemed so easy! Until Darlene tells her they lost the wifi and she needs to go to her terminal and reconfigure it. Darlene is talking in her ear and telling her what to type in, people are walking behind her, Angela is freaking out when she hears a voice call her name. It’s Agent DiPierro. “Oh! Are you on a call? I don’t want to interrupt you.” She says.

This sequence was tight and tense. This is more of what the show needed this season. We need to get out of Elliot’s head and into some real life action! DiPierro obviously survived the attack in Beijing (her partner did not). Her boss wants her to take 4 weeks off to recover but DiPierro is not having it. She seems to be the only one that sees that the attack was by The Dark Army (remember she saw those guys at the airport wearing Dark Army masks?). The attackers ended up killing themselves rather than be taken. They erased their own programs. She should have been dead! The attack was only meant to scare them off. She’s a smart cookie. I’m looking forward to the episode that places her and Elliot in the same room. That will be exciting.

“Thank You”

Ray’s henchmen take Elliot from the hospital and dump him on the floor in an empty warehouse. He’s still badly hurt. Ray is training him to obey. Mr. Robot appears to him again. “Before you get bent out of shape, all I was trying to do was take the punches for you.”, he tells Elliot very sweetly. Elliot pulls himself off the ground and lunges into Mr. Robot’s arms. He looks at him and with tears running down his face says, “Thank you.” They embrace.

Does this mean their fighting is over? Are they going to start working together? Elliot needs a friend right now. It might as well be himself.

The episode ends with a flashback. Dad is driving Elliot home from school. Elliot’s been in a fight, his face is bruised. Dad confides in him that he lost his job because he’s sick and been taking time off to go to the doctor for treatment. He’s been keeping it a secret from everyone, even his wife. Elliot looks devastated by this news but Dad reassures him, “I’m never gonna leave you. I promise.” He tells him about the new business he’s starting. He’s opening a computer store and he wants Elliot to name it. He pulls up in front of the building. “The first thing that pops into your head”. Elliot closes his eyes and we cut to black. Gee, I wonder what name he came up with?

I get lost in a lot of the computer jargon so I like when the action is easy to follow.  This episode was really ambitious with that opening sequence and Ray is becoming quite the villain. I’m not sure if season two is matching the narrative brilliance of the first season but it’s not for lack of trying. Maybe trying a little too hard. But I’ll take that over trying to coast on past glories.