Briefly, let's recount what happened in this week's episode of Mr. Robot (Spoilers):

Elliot slips oxy into the peppermint mocha he gives Olivia, the former addict who works at Cypress National that Elliot slept with a couple of weeks ago. She's been sober for eight years, and Elliot threatens to test her and turn her over to the authorities, who will take her child away if Olivia doesn't agree to help Elliot log into her boss's account at Cypress. Olivia tries to kill herself (and nearly succeeds), but Elliot pulls off the mission, but not before revealing that he may be as much a monster as those in the Deus Group. Even Mr. Robot was appalled at the lengths that Elliot went this week. All the same, Elliot is one step closer to disrupting Whiterose's money supply. Most importantly, the series reintroduced Leon -- the former Dark Army agent -- who gives Elliot the oxy he uses to drug Olivia.

Dom walks in on Darlene and threatens to kill her if she doesn't give up Elliot's location. Darlene refuses, but Dom -- who has a thing for Darlene -- can't bring herself to kill Darlene, even after her Dark Army handler tells Dom that she'll kill Dom's mother if she doesn't execute Darlene. In the end, Dom begs Darlene to kill her, sparing her from having to kill Darlene and presumably nullifying the threat she poses to her own mother. Darlene can't pull the trigger, either, at least not before Dom's handler walks in with two other Dark Army agents. The handler is about to take Darlene's phone away from her and kill her, but Darlene wipes it first, so the Dark Army still needs her to help them track down Elliot.

Meanwhile, Whiterose -- in a brief scene -- says that it's finally time to tell Elliot that they're on the same side, jonhammyeahright.gif.

Finally, after Vera kidnaps Krista, he gives her a long, menacing story about "Lil Bitch," a guy who violently turned the tables on his bully. Vera still wants to be the King of New York -- a fairly ambiguous mission statement -- and Vera believes that controlling and partnering with Elliot is the key. Using his Lil Bitch story and a threat he makes on Krista's fiance, he manipulates her into revealing Elliot's weakness: His split personality, Mr. Robot. Vera kidnaps Elliot at the end of the episode as Elliot is attempting to save Krista.

The Vera subplot is still somewhat confounding to me, although he's a character we see in a lot of crime thrillers: An omnipresent but minor threat who ends up playing a pivotal role in the climax (probably before being killed himself). Maybe Elliot uses him to help take down Whiterose and the Dark Army. Or maybe he exists to give Leon -- who is freelancing now -- someone to kill. Think of Vera -- who vanishes after season one only to reappear in the season 3 finale -- as Chekhov's drug dealer.

In either respect, I wanted to know what Elliot Villar had to say in his post-episode interview over on THR, because I was looking for insights into this storyline. Villar kept his cards close and didn't reveal much, other than he thinks fans will be "quite satisfied" with the resolution.

Given Villar's character on Mr. Robot, however, I'll admit I was slightly taken aback by this line from his interview:

I'm probably the furthest thing from an eccentric, manic, deadly drug dealer, you know? I'm sitting here talking to you and my five-year-old twins are downstairs watching a movie!

I read that line, and all I could think about were Vera's "Lil Bitches" watching 101 Dalmations while Daddy shot a bitch in the face. "Cover year ears, girls! Daddy's gotta work!" I mean, look at the guy. How does this guy have five-year-old twins?

Obviously, the real-life Elliot Villar doesn't look like Fernando Vera. Wardrobe and make-up have done a fine job of transforming him, but just how much of a transformation have they made? This much:

Holy crap! The guy who plays Fernando Vera looks like a nice young man who works as a prosecutor in Syracuse or as an FBI agent in Sneaky Pete.

Lil Bitch even fulfills his civic obligation and votes.

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democracy in action #vote

A post shared by Elliot Villar (@elliotvillar) on Nov 8, 2016 at 12:56pm PST

Tremendous job here in hair and make-up, but genuinely, what a great, underappreciated transformative performance from Elliot Villar. I hope he gets a cool death sequence in the end!