Mr. Robot, a critically acclaimed drama thriller television series authored by Sam Esmail, focuses on the lonely and troubled Elliot Alderson. Elliot is introduced to us as an eccentric cybersecurity engineer, and he becomes an enigmatic vigilante hacker as time goes on, one whose motives are unclear even to us. To complement its labyrinthine narrative, Mr. Robot has a distinct visual style which reinforces the isolation and oppression every character faces, and this artistic approach will be the main focus of my discussion. (However, there is no need to fear for spoilers—I will only be analyzing the first episode of the series.)
Within the show, one of the main antagonizing forces is society itself; Esmail demonstrates how consumerist culture can drive people apart from one another, especially in Elliot’s case.
Consider the following exchange from Mr. Robot’s pilot, "eps1.0_hellofriend.mov,” in which Elliot delivers a fervent speech on the evils of our modern world to his therapist:
KRISTA
What is is about society that disappoints you so much?
ELLIOT
Oh, I don’t know. Is it that we collectively thought that Steve Jobs was a great man, even when we knew he made billions off the backs of children? Or maybe it’s that it feels like all of our heroes are counterfeit. The world itself's just one big hoax. Spamming each other with our burning commentary bullshit masquerading as insight, our social media faking as intimacy. Or is it that we voted for this? Not with our rigged elections, but with our things, our property, our money. I’m not saying anything new. We all know why we do this. Not because Hunger Games books makes us happy but because we wanna be sedated. Because it’s painful not to pretend, because we’re cowards. Fuck society.
KRISTA (O.S.)
(echoing)
Elliot.
(beat)
Elliot. You’re not saying anything. What’s wrong?
ELLIOT
(smiling slightly)
Nothing.
(0:12:15 - 0:13:26, formatting and emphases mine.)
In this exchange, Elliot’s estrangement from those he should communicate honestly with is already made clear, and his anger is directed explicitly towards society. Throughout the scene, Krista and Elliot are practically never in the same frame. The only time we see them together is in an establishing shot, one which pits Krista and Elliot on opposite sides of the office, with Elliot’s completely black outfit contrasting heavily with the cream-colored sofa and curtains. However, his outfit is only one aspect which makes Elliot seem out of place. The rest of the time, the two are always in their own close-ups, making both characters seem as visually in their separate headspaces as they are mentally—this being coupled with disorienting cuts to different close-up angles of their faces.
Elliot’s frequent voiceover of his thoughts over this scene only further cement his distance from his therapist, and his monologue on society’s evils is intercut with real-life footage of factory workers, fallen celebrities, and social media feeds. Elliot is not tied down to the visuals of his therapist’s office—that is, not tied down to Krista. It can be said that everything we see and hear about Elliot in the first fifteen minutes of the series has to do with his pained and total aloneness.
Esmail continues to showcase his startling visuals throughout the episode. Later on, when the company Elliot’s cybersecurity firm protects, E-Corp, visits Elliot’s workplace for a briefing on a recent hack, our protagonist meets Tyrell Wellick. Tyrell is a pivotal character later in the season, and the way he is introduced is rife with importance. Our first clear visual of Tyrell places him in a low depth of field close-up, his visage in the far right quarter of the frame as the rest of the shot hovers out of focus. To be clear, when I write “far right quarter,” I mean it:
Elliot’s reaction shot to Tyrell is not unlike this one.
(The actual shots themselves were not included due to copyright reasons.)
Elliot and Tyrell are opposing forces. Both of them occupy spaces in which they are as far as possible from one another, showing their mutual isolation in the world they will eventually unite to combat against. However, even their aforementioned eventual unity is hinted at in these shots. Every background figure and object is out of focus, and Elliot and Tyrell can only clearly see one another. They are destined for a special bond, even if they are both first totally alone when they are introduced to one another. Their future is also foreshadowed in their dialogue; when Elliot’s mental voiceover starts to think an incredulous sentence about Tyrell, Tyrell finishes it for him in open speech. This unites their identities for a single moment. Incidentally, Tyrell finishing Elliot’s sentence also leads to them being in the same frame together for just a second, before extremely distanced close-ups take over once more. (This style of framing is so common in Mr. Robot that Saturday Night Live (SNL) has even remarked on it in a parody of Mr. Robot.)
Esmail’s decisions to frame characters in these ways can be seen in other interactions and scenes of the first episode—as well as for the rest of the series. So far, we have discussed how these visuals portray characters in relation to each other, but Esmail also portrays characters in relation to bodiless presences or omnipresent forces in the world. One of the most telling displays of an abstract force becoming a menacing presence in relation to Elliot comes at the end of the pilot episode.
Elliot is going through a triumphant moment. He strides through Times Square—the setting of Mr. Robot being New York City—as something he has worked for finally comes to fruition. (A spoiler coming for the end of the first episode, now.) A huge first step in his grand plan as an official vigilante hacker is completed when Terry Colby, the CEO of an all-powerful corporation suspected of committing inhumane crimes for profit, is arrested due to Elliot’s hacking.
When we see Times Square with Elliot, nearly every building with a screen is reporting the news, and beneath the gargantuan, towering skyscrapers, Elliot walks into the center of the frame. He changes from being a small figure at the side of the screen into being the dominant visual in its center. The camera even slides into a low-angle position. A huge screen takes up the majority of the background behind Elliot, and the screen displays a news report on Colby’s arrest. It looks like Elliot is in control, and he is, both in the narrative and in the frame.
Elliot slowly pulls down his hood, turns his face up to the light of the screens, and looks around. But there is a subtle shift in the visuals. As he turns, the camera cuts to a different shot of Times Square. Elliot is now level with the camera, and the glaring ads of McDonald’s and Coca-Cola cut off Elliot at both sides of the frame. We can see now that it was only due to our perspective that every building appeared to be broadcasting the news of Colby’s arrest. Even the wide, massive screen that had taken up the majority of the last shot—the screen that reported Elliot’s victory—has become dwarfed by the innumerable amount of advertisements still present in Times Square. Now that the crowd of tourists and city folk is visible, we can see that all of them are indifferent to Elliot’s heroic act.
As the final insult to injury, the camera returns to the first shot of Times Square, where Elliot is seen from a low-angle camera and beneath the enormous screen that reports on Colby’s arrest. That is the shot where he was in control. Elliot throws up his hands and smiles in the genuine joy… and finds out that he has no control at all. Not in the frame, and not in the narrative, because ominous men in black approach the blissful Elliot from behind and threaten him into getting into their car. As this happens, the camera also cuts back to being level with Elliot; this is the Elliot that is bombarded by advertisements. The camera even breaks the 180-degree rule as the men in black accost him, cutting between different men in black circling him, and Elliot has no choice but to comply with his white-collar captors. This disorienting sequence shows how Elliot, even when believing himself to have power, actually has none when combating the force of society.
It is almost as if no act of justice can stop the force of consumerism, the slave-driver that is capitalism; it is almost as if no amount of saving the people from corporate greed will save them from themselves. Elliot tries to be a hero, and he is punished for it. But those are stories for the rest of Mr. Robot to tackle, especially with the neurotic and complicated Elliot as its protagonist. If not for the compelling, twisting, and achingly incisive narrative, one could very easily watch the show simply for its beautiful and dynamic shots, which tell stories and explain relationships without a single spoken word.
Works cited in this text:
“eps1.0_hellofriend.mov.” Mr. Robot. USA Network. June 24, 2015. Amazon Prime; Television.
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