Absolutely love this mindfuck weaponized split personality disorder hacking anarchist premise. The end of season plot twists that re-contextualize everything are so good.
was just thinking about it the other day - it is very much a lib's interpretation of radicalism/anarchism/revolution, in that it's portrayed as being ultimately ineffective and driven by great men rather than a mass movement; and is focused on optics rather than actual praxis, e.g. hacking the banks and 'deleting' public debt rather than redistributing wealth, forcing the corporate exec to burn a big pile of money rather than put it to use etc.
The big issue with the show's politics IMO is that they try to pass off clueless adventurists as principled revolutionaries, it's basically Zero Theory: The TV Show
Not to mention elliot barely has like a organized group, he mostly carries out these massive feats almost by himself cause he is a haxxorman genius.
Because Elliot's Hacker persona is supposed to be a libs interpretation of an anarchist hacker. The final episodes literally reveal this.
Nah I watched it at the time. I watched it fully. There's parts that I like. And overall there are parts that are souring. I by the end felt sour.
This show and person of interest jumpstarted the whole russiagate china peril shit. Fuck this show.
Also only show to cheaply do a horrible sopranos homage. Not to forget the most passive aggressive cheeto in the white house insert.
I quit during season 2 (3?) when his friend went to the house and it was all dreamy n shit. I caught heavy "woo-woo woooeee don't really know where we're going" vibes i hadn't felt since 'lost' and decided to see how the show ended before i committed further. It had its cool moments but I'm glad i quit when i did
Later seasons it still has that ambiguity. It had good moments later on but still it wasn't anything great.
How did person of interest jump start russiagate? That show was great
Well big part of person of interest is that the foreign countries like china are gonna do domestic terrorism and take control by abusing data cause they stole the machine. They are the indirect antagonist. They imply that the main antagonist intelligence firm is in cahoots with china a lot. The central gambit of the show is that if only america had massive robust surveillance then 9/11 could have been stopped.
Mr robot does the same, where american debt or other problems caused by american institutes are indirectly owned by evil china villain to colonize african countries for nuclear projects.
Still I like person of interest more than mr robot its more procedural and slick in some parts. But the themes are very annoying. Enjoyable show though.
I'm pretty sure the bad guys in person of interest were mostly in our own government and domestic megacorps. Maybe its time for a rewatch but I'm currently on Fringe which was one of the best shows ever.
Mr robot sucks though. The first season showed a lot of potential but the later seasons ruined it.
Well that covert bad guys are literally an organization which is in china. The laptop which is the main plot device ends up in china and its implied that they got some important data. Not to mention the main protagonist's whole arc begins with a failed cia mission in a "SCARY GHOST CITY" in china to retrieve this laptop.
I hated it. Well, I didn’t at first, but I did the more I watched it. I didn’t even bother watching the last few episodes. It’s basically Evangelion except I’m more sympathetic to Elliot than Shinji. I think I just hate “save the world” stories. With that being said, I still think Tyrell was the best character.
Tyrell had the Patrick Bateman vibe which hooked me to his character.
Same. But what kept me hooked on him was how he was one of the few characters who was laser focused on the goals and the end game. I also enjoyed the parts where he acted as a double agent and used his position to advanced the team’s agenda (or what he thought was supposed to be their agenda until they kept stalling)
spoiler
Only season 1 is good
Season 1 was great but season 4 is the best imo. The episodes just hit different in s4.
Yeah. Watching season one at that time was tight. It had decent mystique. It could have been a good show but nope they squandered it.
I already commented but here's a sidenote. I also do not like the annoying fans and the showrunner. I remember in like probably 2020 lockdown protests and all that. He tweeted out something like "You are living in season 5" 😎 (all it needed it was any fucking questions at the end).
Then the coup Myanmar happened. There was video of facebook live of someone yoga while the tanks were rolling to take over. Fans of the show could not stfu about how this is exactly like a mr robot intro. They made fancams of it. All the while there's a massive ongoing genocide of rohingya people. VrO ItS jUsT liKe mY Tv ShOw
Also sam went on to make that obama produced movie that came this year.
obama produced movie that came this year.
i only rarely viscerally hate a piece of media but this was the first one to do it for me in a long while lol
I've heard similar things from other people. Sam esmail could've done something else rather than whatever that was. Well its his choice.
There was video of facebook live of someone yoga while the tanks were rolling to take over.
I think this is that video if anyone was curious https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEHiTjViicE
Do yourself a favour and never watch beyond season 1
I was mostly enjoying it until it did a
spoiler
fridging
I really liked it, it was one of my favorite shows for a very long time. Nowadays I think it's very lib, but it still has a special place in my heart and regardless of its politics, it's absolutely a joy to look at, probably one of the most unique looking shows ever.
It also tries some interesting things aesthetically, especially towards the end of the show. I don't know if you've finished it yet, so no spoilers, but there's an episode that goes full Birdman and is just like one continuous shot from beginning to end. Another one is structured like a stage play, another one is like a 90's sitcom, and then all of a sudden you're watching a Lynch-esque surrealistic nightmare episode. It's so unique, and that is a huge virtue when there's so much generic drivel out there.
Edit: also, in a world of shows where nothing ever drastically changes in the setting of the story, I remember how stunned I was when
spoiler
5/9 actually happens lol
I mean the gimmick episodes are nice but its kind of stand in for no plot at times. I mean yeah the event 5/9 is nice but it kind of afterwards goes nowhere.
Pretty much feel the same looking back on that show as I do looking back on my anarchist phase in general. Cringe, with some real problematic blind spots, but nevertheless kinda good at heart with some cool ideas.
Me when I see a post about one of my comfort shows: 
Me reading the comments: 
The comments have a lot of valid criticisms, but idk, I like it. We are on our second watch through since I missed a big chunk of s3.
let your media taste rock! even though i just posted pretty intense crit of it idt that means other people cant have their own different personal relationship with the show, subjective nature of art and all that
Ha, you're good. This watch-through is more me making sure I have all the dots connected. I think a third watch will be more from a dialectical view so it might be subject to change.
I mean I like the show in parts. But as it goes on its more disjointed. I just can't stand its feeble attempts and posturing at revolution but still just say "well you see its the chinese influence that is bad even if the problem is western finance capital". I like shows that I still find faults in. Up in the thread I mentioned person of interest. Like the show but I still get sour over its terrible themes sometimes.
fight club for stallmanoids SUCKED
Where are all the cool hackers in the real world? Are they just working for capitalist?
I mean how about the ones who broke in and exposed cointelpro.
As soon as the twist that his mentor guy, or whoever the fuck it was, was just in his head was GUESSED and posted about widely on the internet weeks before the reveal, I stopped watching.
Ugh, the very first episode was ridiculous. Why would he buy tons of tor exit nodes (a multi billion dollar attack that's unrealistic) to hack the guy whose physical location he already knew?
He would have just compromised the coffee shop's network. You deannonymize onion services by finding some way to the front door, and he was already there.
They shoulda hired a tech consultant or something. Typical Hollywood garbage
Yeah the show has a lot of this. It's technically better than most "hackin" shows but only up to a certain point. Plot is still great though.
They did it that way cause its badass haxxor trick to own the scumbag epic style 😎
I love the show. Yeah I agree, the politics aren't great, queer villain, anti-Chinese bullshit, etc. But artistically, the show is pretty awesome, the 2 part episode, the silent episode, so good. And from a technical standpoint, it was cool to see such attention to detail. Pretty much all of the hacks were feasible and carried out using real tools.
I do like the gimmick eps like the silent episode. The 2 part ep is the ending finale ep right?. I do like the penultimate episode with the confrontation. Also I have to mention, the score by mac quayle rocks and carries the show at times.
Actually I was thinking of the episode when Elliot's therapist gets kidnapped and it all pretty much takes place in the apartment. I think it was actually one episode but was done like a stage play with 2 acts.
I watched season 1, don't regret watching it, I don't remember if I watched S2 or not but I wasn't that interested in continuing.
used to love it, it was one my absolute fave shows. revisited after my politics evolved a shitton and i still love season 1 and 2 but HATE 3 and massively mixed feelings on 4 as they pivot into comic book china bad supervillain horseshit. 4 redeems itself a bit with some good character drama separate from the overarching political plot but i really cant stand the dark army/deus group bullshit and it sours the whole rest of the show for me. also cant buy that someone is so good at computer that they become such a central great man of history. show was ruined for me by the fact that sam esmail couldnt contain his insufferable shitlibness and trump derangement syndrome i guess (plus his gross Lib American exceptionalist xenophobia).
still though the first two seasons do capture the malaise of late capitalism under tech dystopia uniquely well, in a way very few pieces of media have IMO so it'll always have a special place in my heart for those reasons. i also have a soft spot for Elliot and think he would be cool if he just read some theory. i always imagined a rewritten back half of the show where he realizes the pitfalls of adventurism and actually decides to do his part to help lead a mass movement, falling back into being a small-but-important part of said movement that goes well beyond hacktivism. but that wld require the show to not be written by sam esmail so oh well. if u want a more stark view of how the show was always going to be inherently limited by his politics, just watch that Obama produced netflix abomination he directed.
oh also wtf is with the big final hack? spoiler if you care about spoilers for a a long-ended show (tried to do the right thing but sites spoiler tags are janky as shit so last chance turn around now if u no want to see) no dude this secret band of oligarchs doesnt just have Big Money Number that can be subtracted and redistributed a lot of their power and capital is gonna be in real assets and concrete state power and shit like wtf? (am i missing something or was this just genuinely v implausible?)
TL;DR big mixed feelings on mr robot but Elliot is almost cool and just needs a little Marx in his life (also it doesn't hurt that i often dress like him lol we feel like soul bros some days)
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