To offer fans deeper engagement with the series and extend its narrative beyond the linear broadcast, we created a VR experience for Mr. Robot as groundbreaking as the series itself. We set out to do something we felt hadn’t been done before; we wanted to create a truly narrative cinematic VR experience for a TV series that felt authentic to its source material. As a result, we created a 12-minute mini-episode of Mr. Robot in VR that authentically captures the tone and sensibilities of the series in an entirely new medium. The piece takes viewers on a flashback journey with Elliot as he recalls the never-before-seen memory of his first date with love interest, Shayla. We chose to tell this inherently personal memory in VR to leverage the medium’s immersive storytelling capabilities to evoke the inescapable feelings of presence, intimacy and empathy in ways traditional TV could not allow.

The piece stars Rami Malek in his Emmy-award winning role as the anxiety-addled vigilante hacker, Elliot Alderson. Through innovative techniques in the VR medium, using nearly 40 cameras and one of the first projects to use multiple camera systems, the piece reveals Elliot’s vulnerabilities and insecurities in ways that viewers can not only see, but can viscerally feel. As Elliot speaks to the viewer in voice-over, he immerses them intimately into his memory, forcing empathy for his sense of loss and disillusion. Masterful sound design separates external sounds from Elliot’s voice-over, allowing viewers to feel like they are really inside Elliot's head.  Claustrophobic camera placement, uncomfortable framing and jarring jump cuts reveal Elliot’s anxiety and paranoia with moody elegance. Scene transitions, often overlooked in VR, are deliberately crafted to guide the viewer through the experience and ensure they do not disengage from the narrative.

The Mr. Robot Virtual Reality Experience premiere event connected over 20,000 fans, including over 1,200 fans at Petco Park for the largest VR simulcast ever and made the VR experience, which is often considered isolating, something social and communal. Throughout Comic-Con, fans took to social media to share their experiences and the press lit up, generating over 450 million media impressions and praising the piece as a legitimate storytelling experience. Following Comic Con, the experience was made available for all fans to enjoy via Headset VR, Mobile & Cardboard Viewers and Desktop, and to date, it has been viewed nearly 2MM times across these platforms. The popularity of the experience is a testament to its authenticity, innovative storytelling and compelling narrative.   The immersive video lets fans experience Mr. Robot like never before and brings the series to life in an unexpected and deeply satisfying way.