Mr. Robot Review: Shayla Becomes a Memory, Season 1 Episode 6

Mr. Robot season 1 episode 6 review: the ultimatum

The sixth episode of Mr. Robot, titled eps1.5_br4ve-trave1er.asf, aired on USA Network on July 29, 2015. Kyle Bradstreet wrote it and Deborah Chow directed it. It revisits Fernando Vera, played by Elliot Villar, Shayla's former drug supplier, who was sent to prison after Elliot turned him in for Shayla's rape in the pilot. An estimated 1.25 million households watched, and the episode drew critical praise, particularly for its ending.

Last week, Vera worked out that Elliot was the anonymous informant who put him behind bars. He is not angry. He admires Elliot because Elliot has power, and he wants it. So he arranges for his men outside to kidnap Shayla, played by Frankie Shaw, and sets an ultimatum: Elliot has until midnight to free Fernando using his hacking skills, or Shayla dies. Anyone who types shayla mr robot into a search bar is usually looking for what happens to her in this hour, and the answer is the one the title gives.

For six episodes the audience has watched Elliot, played by Rami Malek, get into trouble and escape it with ease, coldly reminding everyone that he can fix injustices with a few keystrokes. Vera should be a walk in the park. He is not. Elliot is stripped of every bit of control he thought he had. The safe little bubble he mocked the average citizen for hiding in has burst, and nothing he could have done in the past would have changed the outcome.

If only Elliot could see it.

A word on the title for newcomers: the series names its episodes like computer files, with the pilot numbered eps1.0 and this one eps1.5 because it is the sixth. Season 1 follows Elliot Alderson, a cybersecurity engineer at Allsafe in New York City, who is recruited by the anarchist Mr. Robot into a hacktivist group called fsociety. Its goal is to erase consumer debt by encrypting the data of E Corp, Allsafe's biggest client. Sam Esmail created the series, which premiered on USA Network on June 24, 2015.

Breakfast with a woman who has accepted her fate

The episode opens with Shayla and Elliot at breakfast, and neither can touch the meal. It is not a date. It is a privilege, a visit like the one Elliot later pays Fernando in prison. Vera's men watch Shayla while Elliot apologizes, promises to fix it and says he would do everything differently if he could go back in time.

Shayla has already accepted her fate. She can see the writing on the wall and is at peace with it. Mr. Robot, played by Christian Slater, is less delicate. He calls the situation a zero-sum game, since Shayla was doomed from the day she started working with Fernando, and he pleads with Elliot to let her become a memory. Elliot is blind to the argument, which is unfortunate, and he turns into the blind man leading the blind.

Angela, Isaac and a hand that looks steady

Angela, played by Portia Doubleday, visits with an idea that might change the world and then immediately doubts herself, calling it stupid. Elliot hears her out although time is running out. He smiles and nods, and tells himself in voiceover to say what she wants to hear. He tells her to trust her instincts and believe in herself, which makes the scene a small, bitter echo of his own situation.

It gets worse when Fernando's younger brother, Isaac, tries to kill Elliot in cold blood. Isaac does not want Fernando out of prison because Fernando will murder him. Elliot calmly explains that Isaac's days are numbered anyway: shooting him would only delay Isaac's own death, and springing Fernando at least gives him a chance to fight for his life. Isaac lowers the gun. For a moment the viewer believes Elliot has taken the upper hand in what seemed an unwinnable situation.

The trunk scene

That is why it is crushing when Shayla turns up dead anyway, in one of the most visceral and real moments the series has staged. She has been dead for hours, her throat cut and her body stuffed in the trunk of the car Vera's men used to drive Elliot around. At that point a viewer would expect the show to show mercy. It does not.

The entire scene plays in one take. The trunk opens, Elliot sees what is inside and says nothing. The shock sets in while he searches for an answer and finds none. He was wrong and Mr. Robot was right. Fernando is a stone-cold psychotic with a warped sense of honor, and Shayla's death was foreshadowed the moment Fernando killed his own brother, Isaac, within ten seconds of freedom. Everything builds to a last shot of Shayla's dead eyes, and the whole package is a giant box of intense pain. The viewer feels every second of it.

What the episode does to Elliot

Until now Elliot has been the smartest person in every room, a narrator who treats other people's problems as puzzles. This hour takes that stance away from him. His intelligence cannot save Shayla, because the people holding her do not care what he knows, and the only power he has is the thing that put her in danger in the first place.

The consequence is a more vulnerable lead. Malek plays the final stretch with almost no movement, and the restraint does more than any speech could. From this point the viewer understands that the story is not only about taking down a corporation. It is about what happens to a man who thought he could stay detached from the world he was breaking.

Eps1.5 at a glance

• Air date: July 29, 2015, on USA Network.
• Writer and director: Kyle Bradstreet wrote it, and Deborah Chow directed.
• Key cast: Rami Malek (Elliot), Christian Slater (Mr. Robot), Frankie Shaw (Shayla), Elliot Villar (Fernando Vera), Portia Doubleday (Angela).
• Deadline: midnight, to hack Fernando out of prison.
• Recognition: a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Comedy or Drama Series (One-Hour).
• Why it matters: the shayla mr robot storyline ends here, and Elliot's belief in his own control ends with it.

Verdict: the episode that made Mr. Robot essential

The situation works as a dark parable, a lesson Elliot needed to learn. For all his talk, he is more human than he thinks. He can be hurt, there are people he loves and people who care for him, and he is connected to the system more than he admits, wrapped in its warmth. It is sadly ironic. Shayla in Mr. Robot is the character the audience cannot save.

Craft matters here as much as plot. The one-take trunk scene works because the camera does not look away and neither does the actor. The shot never cuts away to relieve the viewer, so the moment lands with its full weight, and the silence of the actor does the rest. It is the kind of choice that tells an audience a series is willing to pay for its stakes, and it is a large part of why this hour is the one people point to when they recommend the show. Few network dramas dare this kind of patience.

When Mr. Robot began, this reviewer's closing line on the pilot was that the cast and crew had crafted a nice indictment of the wealth gap, with interest in seeing where it went, but doubt it would top the promise of the pilot. That doubt was wrong. The opening episode feels like an experimental student short with a budget, and the show has evolved into one of the most stylish and sophisticated series on television.

If there is one gripe, it is that the main story is so strong that it drowns out Tyrell Wellick's bid for CTO at E Corp. Tyrell, played by Martin Wallström, is told by Scott that his creepy bathroom visit was relayed by the CTO's wife, and Scott uses it to label him a failure. The scene is a brilliantly executed alpha-male standoff, capped by Scott pointing out that his watch could pay off the mortgage on Tyrell's two-bedroom apartment. Tyrell shrinks. Like Elliot, he is forced to accept a hard truth: he will never be CTO, and nothing he does will change it. In an otherwise grim episode, it works as dark comic relief. Searches for shayla mr robot still lead back to this hour for a reason.

This is the best episode of the series so far. It may also be the one that makes viewers ask friends and family whether they are watching the show. They should be. The season went on to hold a 98 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes across 146 reviews, and the show won the Golden Globe for best drama series in 2016, with Rami Malek taking the Emmy for lead actor in a drama the same year.

Sources

• Mr. Robot, Wikipedia — cast, season 1 episode list and air dates