With luck, you’ll have plenty of time for fun in the sun during the three-day holiday weekend, but you’re probably not going to spend the entire time outside. That’s why on long weekends like this, it’s wise to have a really good TV show to binge on. And there’s not a better, more binge-able choice right now than the first season of the fantastic Mr. Robot. All 10 episodes are up on Amazon Prime right now, and you’ll want to be all caught up in time for when season two premieres on July 13 on the USA Network.
Mr. Robot caught me and a lot of other people off guard last summer because of how goddamn good it was—despite its goofy ass title, its biggest-name star being Christian Slater, and it airing on the USA Network of all places. But from the very first frame, Mr. Robot introduced itself as something unique and totally involving. (Seriously, odds are greater than not you’ll be hooked from the very first scene.) It’s a techno thriller crossed with psychological drama. It’s a black comedy crossed with a deeply paranoid character sketch. It’s a commentary on the current state of surveillance, corporations, and internet privacy, but it’s also an homage to pop culture from the late 1990s, with echoes of Fight Club, Darren Aronosky’s Pi, and songs like Len’s “Steal My Sunshine” on the soundtrack.
Conspiracies and secrets abound throughout Mr. Robot, and they’re all too much fun for me to spoil here. All you really need to know is that it centers around a computer hacker named Elliot, played by Rami Malek (who’s kind of incredible in this, to put it lightly). Elliot’s damaged and full of demons, but he’s also smart as fuck—it’s tragic and fascinating to watch him only be able to relate to others in terms of their security vulnerabilities. He’s whip-smart at being able to crack the codes of people’s online accounts, studying the sentimental things that go into creating their computer passwords, discovering vast differences between their private lives and their aspirational online personas. As our worlds become more and more digital, so do our lives become more fractured. The show diagrams this by its unusual placement of characters in the frame, just one of many elements that make Mr. Robot stand out from the crowd.
Some bonkers shit happens in Mr. Robot, and the second season—which, again, kicks off on July 13—is being directed exclusively by the show’s creator, Sam Esmail, in a move that is either crazy or genius (Esmail is probably both). It's easily my most anticipated thing this whole summer. Watch (or rewatch; it totally stands up on a second or even third viewing) the first season of Mr. Robot on Amazon Prime this weekend. It's the American thing to do.
