I really expected the paper record battery fire to happen in THIS episode. That should have been the ending of the season.
I didn't expect that, and I disagree that that should have been how this finale ended.
In this season, we have seen the stakes go up in terms of what sorts of lines the protagonists are willing to cross to meet their objectives. We've seen Darlene murder, and we've seen Elliot believe he's committed murder. We've seen fanatical hitmen in action who we believe to be members of the Dark Army and allied with Mr. Robot. We've also seen Leon kill, or at least gravely injure, to protect Elliot, on behalf of White Rose. Gideon was gunned down, and the 5/9 hack has no doubt simply itself resulted in casualties.
The question now is just how far is Elliot willing to go and for what end. It appears that Elliot does not want to blow up a building full of people, innocent or otherwise. He was willing to risk his life to stop that, and although he clearly didn't appreciate just how big a risk it was, because he'd been told by Mr. Robot that he'd killed Tyrell, that lack of appreciation was because he already believed that he had blood on his hands and he was fighting, he believed just with himself, to keep there from being a whole lot more. Elliot has a sense of right and wrong, and we've known that all along, by his hacktivism, beginning in the coffee shop, and his book of CDs.
The dilemma now is what's next in terms of how Elliot will try to do the right thing. Indeed, I hope we get to understand why his psyche is fractured into Elliot and Mr. Robot. From the show so far, in my view, Mr. Robot would seem to be something like an elaborate revenge fantasy that Elliot dreamt up while he was still young that's basically now run amok and actualized itself. Will Elliot finally gain control of himself, and if so how, are central questions, tied into the question of just how far is Elliot willing to go, and to what end. Hanging on the question of whether Elliot will blow up a building full of people, which at that point would basically complete the 9/11 parallel, is in my opinion a great place to stop for now.
