4) In Rami Malek, It Has TV’s Best New Male Lead
In 2010, Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks’s Band of Brothers follow-up, The Pacific, introduced many to Rami Malek, an almost unnervingly intense, offbeat character standing out even in such an ensemble of great young actors.
Since then, Malek’s been quietly making waves in projects big and small, for screens little and large, but nothing’s really offered him a worthy showcase on the level of The Pacific. Nothing, that is, until Mr Robot came along, and gave him the biggest break of his career.
Slater’s is the biggest name in the cast, but it’s Malek who emerges as the star of Mr Robot: approaching Elliot’s at-times difficult nature with a radiant mix of easy charisma and vulnerability, Malek is awards-worthy in the main role. He’ll likely go onto even bigger stardom on the silver screen after this, but it’s hard to imagine – as with Jon Hamm and Don Draper, Bryan Cranston and Walter White – that he’ll find anything so worthy of his talents.