“Angela’s right. We can’t beat them, but we don’t have to lose to them either. Maybe there’s a way to stop them from winning.”

Last week, Mr. Robot‘s two-part Season Two (S2) finale began with this monologue from series hero Eliot. At the time, it seemed to be referencing the FBI (hot on fsociety’s trails with agent Dom DiPierro following Angela like a hawk) or E-Corp (about to unleash its digital currency on the US to fill the financial sector void created by the 5/9 hack). But based on how the finale turned out, Elliot appears to be on quest to stop himself from winning.

It took 11 episodes, but fsociety’s follow-up to S1’s 5/9 hack has finally come into focus. The mysterious Stage Two proves to be a culmination of prior work. The idea of using temperature to disrupt data storage came out during a Steel Mountain data center attack in S1. Planting a femtocell at the temporary FBI setup stations at E-Corp happened in episode six this season. And blowing crap up was a dark Mr. Robot desire from early in S1 before Elliot fought to include “no killing” as part of the hacking moral code.