The television drama Mr Robot came out of nowhere to become the most talked-about American TV series of last year.
Such was the critical and audience acclaim, it was no surprise when in January it won the Golden Globe for Best Television Drama Series, while Christian Slater won a supporting-actor award.
At the Critics’ Choice Television Awards, it won Best Drama, with actor Rami Malek taking home Best Actor in a Drama and Christian Slater picking up another supporting-actor award.
These are just a few of the accolades bestowed on the cybercrime series, which finally makes its UAE debut at midnight on Thursday on OSN First HD.
Heathers and True Romance star Slater plays the mysterious Mr Robot, who leads a group of hackers not dissimilar to real-life hacktivism collective Anonymous.
Slater takes the title role but is not the star of the show. That falls to Malek, an American actor whose parents are Egyptian. He plays Elliot Alderson, a depressed, agitated security engineer at a cybersecurity firm. He moonlights as a high-tech vigilante, exposing the guilty secrets of the rich and powerful – so, naturally, the hacktivists are keen to recruit him.
Malek is a revelation, a beguiling, blank-faced anti-hero who starts to become consumed by the double life of a hacker and the anger he feels towards society. To say any more would give too much away – the less you know going in, the better, as the series is filled with twists and turns.
Creator Sam Esmail, who also has Egyptian roots, has been praised for his fast-paced scripts and in-depth knowledge of the hacking community.
Given that the show is set largely in the boardrooms of New York, it is surprising to hear Esmail say that the inspiration to write Mr Robot came after visiting family in Cairo soon after the Tahrir Square demonstrations.
“Anger does not have to be a negative emotion,” he says. “A lot of my cousins channelled their anger for a positive cause. There was a lot of hostility.
“Then to see all my cousins and their parents unite and talk about politics in a meaningful way, I don’t see that happening much in America. And it was that excitement that made me write the Elliot character.”
One of the features of the Tahrir Square demonstrations was the way social media was used to inspire and coordinate the protests.
“Young guys using technology to make some kind of social change, that’s what gave Sam inspiration,” says Malek.
From American whistle-blower Edward Snowden to the Sony hacks, cybercrime has become a huge preoccupation of governments and businesses. Yet, Esmail’s interest in hacking started at a much younger age and on a smaller scale.
“I was a dumb kid [working in a computer lab at New York University], who had a girlfriend, who went to a liberal arts college, and we were on and off,” he says. “So I spoofed an email from the liberal arts college saying that the school is conformist – ‘down with school’ – and they traced it back to me. I got fired from my job and put on academic probation. I’ve always been interested in hackers.”
Slater, however, had a steep learning curve.
“The first scene, we had to do a lot of technical terminology,” he says. “It was a lot of abbreviations and I wanted to really impress everybody and get it all down, and I Google and Wikipedia all of these terms.
“Then about two hours before we shoot the scene, Sam says we are going to have to change them all because they are already outdated. It made it challenging but fun.”
Asked to explain the popularity of Mr Robot, Malek says: "People want to have entertainment that can impact them in real life."
Working on the show certainly had an impact on the actors. Slater became savvier about social networks and began to pay more attention to the online activity of his teenage children.
“It certainly raised my level of awareness and also paranoia,” says the 46-year-old actor. “I have a 16-year-old son and 14-year-old daughter, and just becoming more aware of what they are doing on the internet, and who they are talking to.”
Though fictional, the show references real life, most notably when Elliot highlights the ills of society in an incredibly powerful speech. One of his targets, for example, is Apple’s production methods.
“We always have to get the scripts cleared by legal before we film anything,” says Esmail. “They were OK with what we said because Apple did do that, they did employ child labour in China.”
Mr Robot clearly flicks a switch in our rebellious nature.
“That thing inside you that wants to break the rules, it channels that youthful part of you that is restless and wants to challenge the status quo,” says Esmail.
Malek agrees, adding: “It has reinvigorated the idealism in me, playing this guy – and it’s entertaining. It has something for everybody.”
• Mr Robot begins at midnight on Thursday, March 3, on OSN First HD
artsife@thenational.ae
