In Rabbit Hole episode 3, Crowley is revealed to be the person trying to frame Weir, as a flashback sequence sees Weir, Valence, and Ben conspiring against him. Lance Henriksen plays Crowley.
In 2017, amidst the news of the disappearance of AeroDelhi Flight 285 and the closure of its investigation, Weir’s father, Ben, surprisingly returns from the dead to reunite with his son.
He is back because he believes Weir and Valence can help him rat out Crowley, the person who forced him to fake his own death.
Weir and his friend, Miles Valence, made a career out of the files they found inside Ben’s safe back in 1984. Using Ben’s techniques of manipulating people, they formed a company called Arda Analytics that gathers data to help their clients get an edge over their competition.
Ben says if he hadn’t faked his death, their lives would have been in danger. Ben also warns Weir about an attack on the Panama and Suez Canal. Weir doesn’t buy anything that Ben says, and he throws him out of his apartment.
In 2018, the attack on the Panama and Suez Canal turns out to be true, forcing Weir and Valence to seek Ben out.
Ben talks about Crowley
Ben shares that in their early agency days, they developed techniques to manipulate the population, which Weir and Valence now know about as they have built a career using those techniques.
This research was called the Algorithms of Control. The techniques were used to undermine elections, sway public support, and elect favorable regimes.
One of their colleagues, Crowley, saw this research with darkened eyes. He started selling cutting-edge psyops as a service to foreign governments and businesses on the side.
For years, Ben has been tracking him, hunting him, and watching him cut deals with oligarchs and dictators. Ben almost stopped genocide once in the process of stopping Crowley.
After all these years, Crowley is no longer working for hire; he has enough money now. He is now looking forward to having power and a regime of his own in the United States. It’s also happening a lot faster. By the next election, Crowley may manage to rise to power.
Ben’s plan for Crowley
Time is running out, and Ben thinks he is way too old to be running after Crowley now. He believes Ben and Valence could bring him down, given how they have turned their lives around using his research.
To build his regime in the United States, Crowley will be electing a candidate under the guise of restoring order. Weir and Valence have built a data-based business that Crowley will be attracted to.
The two will have to stage a split. Weir will go undercover and work with Ben, while Valence will make this company public. Valence will make Crowley know that he can collect and process data for the elections, build psych profiles of likely voters, and design strategies to exploit them.
Once the word gets out that they have everything that Crowley needs and that they are ready to work in the gray for a less reputable clientele, Ben knows Crowley will come sniffing around.
Crowley’s death
After losing Valence and his entire team, Weir works with his father, Ben, and some misfits in the form of Hailey and Treasury Department investigator Edward Homm to take Crowley down.
Despite their immense measures, Crowley manages to succeed in his mission by making sure that Nora Evers’ Shared Data Act, which is later renamed the Nora Evers American Protection Act after her death, is passed.
The Nora Evers American Protection Act allows Crowley to access US citizens’ government records and consumer data, making him powerful. From here, he manipulates the population and controls the narrative. Weir and Ben are forced to move forward with their Homm Plan.
The Homm Plan sees Weir allowing respected journalist Debra Wyman-Massey to use the information they have on Crowley’s conspiracy and air it online. To further confirm their claims, Weir is ready to bring Homm to their show.
Homm has been assumed dead for a while now, and Weir created this illusion because Crowley wanted Homm dead. Many people believe Homm is alive, and once it’s confirmed, the people will be controlling the narrative, not Crowley, who is doing it through the data.
To have leverage over Weir, Crowley kidnaps Ben and Weir’s ex-wife, Liv. Crowley’s plan fails as Liv is revealed to be an assassin who helped Weir rescue his real ex-wife years ago. Liv takes Crowley’s crew down, and Ben then observes that Crowley is already sick.
Ben thinks about a minute before killing Crowley, who says he only doubted Ben throughout this plan and not even once thought he was wrong. Ben then wastes no time in killing Crowley.
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