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| “ | Every hacker has her fixation, you hack people, I hack time. | „ |
| ~ Whiterose to Elliot |
Minister Zhi Zhang, also known as the Whiterose, is the main antagonist of the USA Network drama series Mr. Robot. She is a transgender woman who acts as both the leader of the Chinese hacker group the Dark Army and the Chinese Minister of State Security, under her two personas.
Zhang's true motivations are currently unknown. However, she appears to act in the interest of the Chinese state, coordinating a series of terrorist attacks to destroy American conglomerate E-Corp and to ensure a United Nations proposition that allows for a Chinese-led annexation of the Democratic Republic of the Congo is approved.
She was portrayed by B.D Wong, who also played Hugo Strange in Gotham, Henry Wu in Jurassic World, and the voice of Godspeed on The Flash. In her younger appearance from the flashback of the final season, She is portrayed by Ross Kurt Le.
History[]
Early life[]
As a young woman in 1982, while dressed as her male persona Minister Zhang, she was in a relationship with a Chinese man named Chen. The Whiterose is working as a translator for a Chinese executive making a deal with some Americans and goes down to have a drink with the executives while Chen waits in their hotel room. When she comes back, Chen sees the Whiterose in a dress her mom used to wear, and he calls her beautiful. Earlier that day, the Whiterose and Chen had talked about how the Whiterose most likely will become an ambassador in the US, which would be perfect as it would mean that they could move there and be themselves, the Whiterose being transgender wasn't very accepted in the society they currently lived in and in the USA it would most likely be more accepted. Chen had been forced into marriage by his father but didn't truly love the woman his father had chosen. He was planning on leaving them when the Whiterose was going to become an ambassador in the USA.
During a party that the Whiterose and Chen are at, the Whiterose gets to know that she won't get the job as an ambassador but is granted the job as Minister of State Security of China, which she can't say no to. This makes Chen upset, but the Whiterose tries making him happy by telling him that she can change the acceptance of transgender people from the inside. They kiss, and Chen looks happy again. But then he grabs a knife and screams that the world will never be good enough, before committing suicide by slitting his own throat. The blood spills at some white roses that Chen gave the Whiterose, and that's how the Whiterose came to be.
Seven years later, in 1989, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Whiterose founded a cabal organization known as the Deus Group. The group consists of the most powerful people in the world and uses E-Corp as a front for their activities. Since then, the Whiterose and the Deus Group have been pulling strings in the world and basically rules it. One of the major world events that the Whiterose is behind is Donald Trump being elected for president, as it would help her accomplish her goals.
Season 1[]
The vigilante hacking organization the Dark Army, lead by the Whiterose, is planning on cooperating with the vigilante hacking organization fsociety to perform an attack on the corrupt company E-Corp. The attack is known as 5/9, and would damage the company significantly. But eventually the Dark Army withdrew from the attack. In order to get them back again, fsociety's leader Elliot Alderson arranges a meeting with the Whiterose to convince her that the Dark Army should participate in the operation. After their three minute conversation, the Dark Army do participate in the attack, and they begin the hack. But as it is revealed, the Whiterose is exactly what fsociety are trying to destroy, "the top one of the one percent", the people who basically rule the world and make it corrupt. The Dark Army is used to make sure that no other vigilante hacking group forms and becomes powerful enough to take her down.
At the end of season 1, the Whiterose is shown together with Phillip Price, the CEO of E-Corp at a party in a big mansion. They talk about some business, before the Whiterose brings up a lawsuit concerning the Washington Township Plant scandal, which occurred when toxic waste started leaking out of the plant due to lack of security, which ended up in 26 deaths. Whiterose tells Phillip that she knows who is behind the lawsuit. Phillip responds by saying that he'll get the person behind it to stop the lawsuit as he usually does.
Season 2[]
In late June, the Whiterose is applying her makeup in a bedroom while speaking to Phillip over the phone using her male, Zhang voice. They discuss using "her", Angela, to achieve something for the Whiterose's purpose of keeping the power plant open. Phillip is annoyed at the ticking clock (her beeping watch), claiming pressure needs to cook in order to push the President to swing a UN vote. The Whiterose hangs up when Phillip sarcastically asks for more time as her assistant, Grant, enters the room. She speaks in Chinese with her feminine voice, displeased that Price is opting for his E-Coin strategy. They discuss Stage 2, which is six months' minimum from complete. Grant shows her an FBI file about the discovery of fsociety's arcade. The Whiterose wishes to be informed. She asks for an opinion on earrings and kisses him.
An FBI team consisting of SAC Ernesto Santiago, Agent Dominique DiPierro, and others come to China to investigate Five/Nine. Santiago has a photo op with Minister Zhang at a government before they all go behind closed doors to talk. Santiago wants to visit the E-Corp backup sites, which is set for Tuesday, July 1st. He begins to dance around a subject when Dominique bluntly brings up the Dark Army, drawing stares from everyone. Zhang agrees to provide a dossier before inviting them all to a party on Monday night.
At the party, Zhang finds Dominique alone upstairs in his room full of different clocks. Dominique says the rare, German clock is something her parents bought from Kmart. They talk about her being born in New Jersey and raised and that she joined the FBI because of her disgust and fascination for the selfish brutality of the world. Zhang takes her to see a painting in the library and gets her to tell her origin story, of how she quit law school on the day before graduation because the person she was dating proposed. Zhang takes her to a dresser and shows Dominique beautiful Chinese dresses. When she asks to whom do they belong, Zhang says his sister. Zhang then gets tearful, wondering aloud what the world be like without 5/9, if there are alternate realities where they are living different lives. The clocks strike midnight. Zhang walks away and says they must get back to the party. On Tuesday morning, as the FBI are in the hotel lobby for their inspection, gunmen attack, killing many, only to kill themselves when Dominique fires back.
In mid July, Elliot is saved from an attack in prison by Leon. Elliot is told to tell the Whiterose Leon did good and to do as a letter he will receive tells him to do.
In early August, the Whiterose is in the United States at the grave of Lester Moore in, the former CEO of E-Corp until he died in 1995: a plane "crash" rather than an "accident" the Whiterose stresses. She tells her assistant he was going to shut down her project after the Washington Township scandal before he died. She says she is in the mood to repeat herself. As her watch beeps and her assistant urges that they’ll be late, the Whiterose feels it is important to urinate on his tombstone.
After Elliot is released from prison on August 6, believing it to be the work of the Whiterose, teams with Darlene Alderson and Cisco to investigate the Dark Army. They hack the phone of Gao Xun, Cisco's contact, and meet with him to demand to know about Stage 2, hoping to eavesdrop on his later conversations.
Zhang and Phillip Price walk with umbrellas in the rain on a large estate. Zhang laments the state of the United States, which Phillip wonders if it may be intentional. Zhang congratulates Price on Angela succeeding. Phillip addresses the failed bailout, due to the shootout in China, which he blames on Zhang. He explains that on Friday, in two days, the federal government will seize E-Corp facilities, including the Washington Township plant. Zhang reminds the CEO what happened to his predecessor, but Phillip reminds him that his death will not save the plant. Only cash will. He proposes that China lend E-Corp the money at little to no interest. Zhang agrees, but upon making a further threat, Phillip says the next step is World War 3 and he would gladly take Zhang down with him. Phillip leaves.
Later that night, as Darlene is listening in, Gao Xun brings up the encounter with the Whiterose. She finds it odd, since Stage 2 is Elliot's plan. She knows he is a master at this stuff and breaks Xun's phone.
Around the same time, China loans the E-Corp 2 trillion dollars and Phillip pulls strings so the UN will vote on China's annexation of the Congo. Early morning on Aug 7th, Angela is kidnapped by the Inconspicuous Man and Woman who have been following her since Five/Nine.
She is taken to a NJ suburb and placed in a strange room. For hours, a little girl who looks like her asks her bizarre questions using old technology after showing a bruise on her own body to make Angela comply with the test.
Once the fish is dead in a tank that had been slowly emptying, the Whiterose enters the room and sits across from Angela. She lights a cigarette and says these past hours were to ensure this meeting, given a generous 28 minutes, wasn't a waste of her time. She says it has been nearly 4 hours yet Angela never tried to walk out the door. The Whiterose finds the doors fascinating, as their infinite potential is hindered by a lock to those who are lazy. Angela notes that the fish died, making her captor a terrible person. She assures her the girl's bruises were makeup. The Whiterose says it was part of the test to gets sensitive information out of someone who should have been dead 90 days ago on 5/9. The Whiterose claims to be a woman of time who keeps finding Angela like an annoying penny for whom Phillip is endangering their relationship. She tells Angela that they have an event and person in common, the Washington Township scandal and Elliot Alderson. Angela asks about Elliot, only to be told that their parents died for a reason, to bring humanity to the next level.
The Whiterose won’t kill her, but prove why she should drop the mission. Angela sheds a tear and agrees to give up the files she stole from E-Corp on Washington Township if she can go free. She finds Angela still a threat to her project so she wants her belief. She asks if Angela believes in willing things into existence through her imagination. Angela says she did, but she admits that’s not the real world. The Whiterose is interested in defining "real".
Season 3[]
The Whiterose is now working on a secret project known as "Stage 2". It is unknown how the operation will be done, but it is supposed to obliterate E-Corp. Whiterose manipulates Mr. Robot and Angela, two people who work against E-Corp, into financing the attack and cooperating with her. Due to Mr. Robot's involvement, his right-hand Tyrell Wellick also plays a big part in the attack. However, as Mr. Robot is just a more extremist second personality of Elliot, who is against Stage 2 and believes that it will have horrible effects, Angela starts psychologically abusing Elliot in order to get Mr. Robot as the permanent personality as it would mean that Stage 2 has a higher chance of happening.
When the Whiterose and her associates carry out Stage 2, Mr. Robot realizes that it consists of blowing up an E-Corp office which would result in a bunch of deaths. Therefore, Mr. Robot and Elliot try to negate Stage 2. At first it seems like they succeeded, only to realize that Stage 2 is even worse than that; it targets tens to hundreds of E-Corp offices, resulting in thousands of deaths. When confronted by Phillip about this, the Whiterose tells him that she did it to teach a lesson, as Angela's lawsuit against the Washington Township didn't stop although Phillip promised it to be stopped. Phillip calls her a sadistic fuck, before leaving.
After this, Dark Army hitman Leon kidnaps former fsociety members and hackers Mobley and Trenton and murders their friend who tried to escape. Leon then drives them to a Dark Army base where he leaves it to the Whiterose to decide whether they should die or not. The Whiterose orders the Dark Army soldiers to murder the two, with the point being of framing Iran for Stage 2, with Mobley and Trenton being from Iran.
In the final episode, the Whiterose has her FBI contact Ernesto Santiago kidnap Darlene, Elliot's younger sister. In the process he kidnaps FBI Agent Dominique as she was at the same place as them. Dark Army hitman Otto Irving drives Elliot to the place that Santiago is going as well. They are taken to a barn not far from Otto Irving's house. Elliot and Darlene walk into the barn, while Irving, Santiago and Dominique walk a bit away from there. Irving ends up murdering Santiago and blackmails Dominique into taking Santiago's place as an FBI mole. The Whiterose's right-hand Grant is preparing on murdering both Darlene and Elliot, until León pulls out a gun and shoots the other Dark Army agents around them after Elliot tells the Whiterose that he can help her with one of her projects. The Whiterose calls Grant on his phone and tells him that he isn't worthy of seeing the results of the project she's working on, but that she will tell him when it's done, before telling him that she loves him. Grant reacts to this by stating "take care of Angela" and then committing suicide.
Season 4[]
After Stage 2, Angela felt an immense guilt knowing that she participated in an attack that resulted in thousands of deaths, as she wasn't aware of how big the attack would be. Phillip has a meeting with her, eventually revealing that he is her biological father. Now that she knows how much destruction Stage 2 caused, Angela is out to get vengeance on the Dark Army, but Phillip tries to convince her to stop it. After their discussion is over, Phillip walks away. A group of Dark Army hitmen show up from behind and murder Angela, angering Phillip who has now had enough of the Whiterose and the Dark Army. He decides to cooperate with Elliot to take down the Whiterose, so he gives him information about how the Whiterose founded the Deus Group, a group consisting of the world's most powerful individuals used to finance corrupt activities all over the world. The Whiterose's purpose with this was to finance a project of her own, which not even Price knows what it truly is about. The Whiterose talks with her new assistant, Wang Shu, about Elliot cooperating with them. But they come to the conclusion that Elliot is unreliable and that they are better off without his help.
Phillip confronts the Whiterose in a big room, most likely her own house, and tells her that he is resigning as CEO of E-Corp, meaning that they have to find a new CEO. The Whiterose tells him that it isn't possible, but Phillip tells her otherwise. After Phillip leaves the room, the Whiterose pushes a big christmas tree in the room down out of anger. The day after, the Whiterose talks with Wang and tells her to have a Deus Group meeting arranged tomorrow, as Phillip is resigning. She comes up with the idea of Tyrell Wellick becoming the new CEO, which Wang initially disagrees with but has to accept.
In the sixth episode, the Whiterose is shown having a discussion with Wang again. Shu tells the Whiterose that Darlene has been put in custody, which was orchestrated by them, and now it's time to deal with Elliot. The Whiterose disagrees, instead, she believes that they should convince Elliot that her project is going to make the world a better place and that they are in the end on the same side.
In the ninth episode, the Whiterose and Phillip are having a meeting. The Whiterose has discovered that Elliot and Phillip cooperated with each other. He has two choices; if he tells her now what their plans were, he will die peacefully in his sleep, at home - if not, then it'll be quicker and perhaps brutal. Phillip doesn't reveal it. The Whiterose starts talking about how Tyrell is doing well at the Deus meeting as the up and coming CEO of E-Corp. But Phillip responds that it can't be like that as Tyrell isn't even there, which Wang confirms, which angers the Whiterose. Elliot calls Phillip while in his Mr. Robot persona, which the Whiterose answers. The Whiterose tells him that if he stops going against her and the Deus Group, then the Whiterose will reveal something about Angela, who was supposedly murdered by the Dark Army soldiers. The Whiterose tries convincing Mr. Robot that Angela never died and is still very much alive, but as Elliot saw the picture of Angela's dead body, he knows she is lying.
Darlene films a fsociety video where she tells the world about the Deus Group and how it rules the world. She also reveals the location of the current meeting going on as well as private files. The video is broadcasted on the news, which angers the Whiterose when she sees it. The Deus Group members start escaping the meeting to avoid all attention, and hang up when the Whiterose calls them. The Whiterose and Price walk out of the museum they are in. When walking down the stairs, Phillip suddenly stops and starts talking about Angela. How she lives on in those who cared for her. This before revealing that the Deus Group's bank accounts are being overdrawn until there is no money left, thanks to Elliot's hacking. The Whiterose's project is no more, it is destroyed. There is no chance of it becoming reality, as she has no money. The Whiterose initially laughs, not believing what she is seeing. But when she realizes just how real it is, the Whiterose goes insane and grabs a gun from one of her henchmen. She shoots Price multiple times to make sure he is dead, in front of tens of random people walking on the sidewalk. Back in her residence, policemen can be heard hitting at the front door. They want her to open the door and surrender, but she doesn't, so they open the door and start shooting.
But the Whiterose had prepared a bunch of Dark Army henchmen who shot the policemen in order to let their master escape. When Elliot walks to the Washington Township Plant, he is taken into some sort of chamber by some Dark Army henchmen. The Whiterose appears and tries to get Elliot to understand her project. Her project is elaborated on, as it is to open up the doors to parallel universes, which is according to her a better universe. She states that her motive always has been to create a better world, where people can be what they want to be, as throughout her life she has suffered due to not being allowed to be who she wants to be. Elliot doesn't believe her and sees her primary motive as hate against humanity rather than a will to make a better and fairer world. The Whiterose responds by laughing and saying that Elliot shouldn't be talking about others hating people, as he's "Mr. fsociety". Elliot responds by admitting that he hates people, but that he still acknowledges that there are good people, which is why he won't give up on the world they're living in. The Whiterose's watch starts sounding the alarm, which means that the machine she has been working on is absorbing all the power in the plant, resulting in a meltdown. The machine will place Elliot in the parallel universe, and Elliot will see "what Angela saw".
The real point of the Whiterose's machine was to nuke the world and have people enter the parallel universe. Elliot calls out the Whiterose on the plan, seeing as it is completely insane and most likely wouldn't work. The Whiterose then pulls out a gun from a box and points it at Elliot, stating "all I ever wanted, Elliot, was your belief" and that "he decides". She then points the gun at her head and commits suicide.
Elliot is placed in a game named "exit", which the Whiterose made for him. It is supposed to show Elliot the parallel universe, most likely in order to brainwash him into completing the Whiterose's cause after her suicide. It is unknown if the "exit" really was the parallel universe, or if it was something else.
Personality[]
A defining characteristic of the Whiterose, or Zhi Zhang, is the two different personas she has coveted as she leads both the Deus Group and the Dark Army.
As Zhi Zhang, they masquerade as the Minister of State Security for China, putting on a mild, polite, and calm appearance as she influences the Chinese Government to act in her best interests. However, privately, with Phillip Price, the mask slips, revealing the Whiterose's sinister nature. She despises the man for his unsuccessful attempts to undermine her, and constantly lords her authority over Price, manipulates him, and threatens both him and his daughter, Angela. Her spite for him seems to stem beyond pragmatism, as she orchestrated an attack on several E-Corp buildings, which lead to thousands of deaths, all because she had to "ask him twice' to push forward her U.N vote to annex the Congo.
Her true identity, however, is that of the Whiterose. In her persona of leadership over the Dark Army, she is an individual with a single goal and an unrelenting determination to achieve it, even being willing to sacrifice those close to her, like Grant. Constantly remaining in control of the Dark Army, she is highly intelligent, cold-hearted, calculating, cunning, cruel, ruthless, and completely remorseless. However, her goal does not stem from a desire for self-interest, and she genuinely believes her project will make the world a better place.
Quotes[]
| “ | There’s much work to do, great work, as each second passes I push myself to keep moving. | „ |
| ~ Whiterose |
| “ | Now I've gotten a chance to talk to her, I can see why you like her. She makes a very good companion, and those eyes of hers, I contemplated firing a bullet into each of them, but there.. so hypnotising. Don't mistake my Generosity for Generocity. | „ |
| ~ Zhang confessing to Phillip about involving Angela Moss into stage 2. |
| “ | I have learned to listen when time speaks, our paths were too precisely linked to this moment, for there not to be a reason, this is why you get to decide. | „ |
| ~ Whiterose’s last words before executing herself and giving Elliot the option to continue the exit project. |
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- The way the Whiterose's legal name is given in the show is incorrect. As she is Chinese where they put surnames before personal names when giving full names the name should be referred to as Zhang Zhi, not the other way around that's used in the show.
External Links[]
- The Whiterose on the Mr. Robot Wiki
[]
 Villains
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Dark Army E-Corp Vera's Gang Prison Other | ||