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'Black Mirror'

A Definitive Guide

By Nicolas BrownPublished 6 years ago 20 min read
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Do you love Black Mirror as much as I do? Okay, let’s get into it. Much has been made of BM’s foreboding, not-so-far away future where our current technology obsessed society has taken multiple swerves over to the dark side, leaving us viewers afraid to look at our phones. But you know it’s also, like, neat. What works best in BM, like any other show, is not just what it is about, but (I can’t stress this enough in my reviews) how it is about it. Sure, it’s cool as shit to see implants that record all of our memories, killer robot bees, or being able to physically block someone from your life, but it’s also damn cool when each of those stories is accompanied by some sort of unexpected twist and involves well drawn, relatable characters. BM does just that, and often just when you think you’ve worked out the commentary and the conceit, it slaps you upside the face with an ironical type shift in story. So yes, not only does the show work as a ‘reflection’ (ha ha) of where we may be heading as a civilization, but each episode, a few misfires aside, are finely written stories with delightful developments and nuanced people to inhabit the universe. So, by season (or series, if you will), here are my favourite episodes reviewed, from least to best in their respective series’ runs.

Series One

"National Anthem"

BM’s inception episode is actually one of its worst, but just clever enough to give it another chance (and thank my iPhone I did). Here, the BM universe’s equivalent of Kate Middleton is kidnapped and held at ransom, the demand being that England’s dorky PM fuck a live pig on national television. Cue the media shitstorm and multiple sequences of a manhunt, all the while eavesdropping on darkly humorous conversations about the logistics and feasibility of what can only be described as the impending ‘act.’ Here BM marries the British terror of being embarrassed with its classical sense of comic absurdity, and yet it doesn’t all quite hit the mark as we fail to find a character to sympathize with or really relate to.

"Fifteen Million Merits"

Not as good as the next review, but a little gem in its own right. FMM centres around a world where, presumably, pollution has forced humanity to live indoors in city-sized buildings where the ‘normal,’ average people work on exercise bikes to power the structure while earning merit points that they can spend on virtual avatars, food, entertainment, or best, a shot at getting out of their one room hellhole existence to fill a slot on one of a few types of reality TV that run on loops - like loud, nightmare commercials that they are forbidden to look away from - on their walls when they return to their rooms. It’s a world where banality and vapidity reign, where any schmuck who can squeeze some kind of talent out of their ass can escape their shitty lives by becoming a part of an even shittier entertainment system. Sound familiar? At the heart of the story is a soft romance, and at the end is the ultimate in satire, as we see just what a normal person like you or me would do to trade their soul to be a part of the awfulness, even when they fly in the face of it.

"The Entire History of You"

Where episode one failed to grab me, but episode two was more than good enough to hit ‘next episode,’ this was the one that firmly planted me in the ‘yes’ to BM fandom. Rod Serling voice now: Picture a world where almost everyone has implants that allow them to go back and view any and all of their memories. We all know how subjective memory can be, and many an argument has transpired over what exactly occurred and how. Well, here, couples can look back on their honeymoons, disagreements, and other milestone moments. They can also obsess over the small details, feed their insecurities, and drive themselves straight up the wall replaying those shitty little recordings as they parse over each glance, giggle, and gesture to determine whether or not their cherished spouse is having an affair. Welcome to what BM is all about; technology feeding the worst in human instinct.

This is the episode where the whole series finds its footing. Episode one was too far gone and outside an immediate social sphere to relate to, episode two was gripping and even touching while maybe a bit too far in the future, but here, as the main dude descends further and further into a petty, jealous madness, we can really see how that could happen to us, and imminently so. It’s firmly placed in a world we can see and feel, and that’s why the hairs on the back of our neck begin to stick up as we recognize how that madness could take a hold of us, given the right implements.

Series Two

"The Waldo Moment"

Ranking at the bottom of BM episodes, TWM probably shows its hand too hard and too early in its commentary, allowing for a digital comedian teddy bear loudmouth to run for public office and become very popular while doing it. I know, I know, Trump blah blah, but the characters are not strong enough, the story not executed well enough, and the message is too obvious here to have any real impact in this world.

"White Bear"

BM’s first ‘run and figure out what is going on later’ episode is probably the best of those, as creepy as one of those being chased nightmares, of which I personally have had many. A woman wakes up in a room with no memory, and finds herself being recorded on the street by people she does not know, who refuse to interact with her. Soon she is being chased by dudes and dudettes with creepy The Strangers sheets with eyeholes masks who are trying to kill her and is on a terrifying run for her life. She finds companions and stays alive just long enough for the monumental twist at the end, which subverts all of our character sympathies and delivers that dystopian, "futuresque" punch that we know and want in a BM episode.

"Be Right Back"

The quality of series two’s episodes work in sequential and descending in quality order, here with the always good Domnhall Gleeson playing the robotic resurrection of an ill-fated boyfriend, a synthetic ‘bot-friend’ if you will, who at first comforts the real life grieving girlfriend, but soon proves unable to live up to the deceased real deal. Packing a real emotional punch, the key to this episode is the believability and poignancy of its leads, and neither fail to deliver as we watch, unsurprisingly, how a facsimile of a person could never properly replace the real one. A sentiment that may not be mind-blowing but still is fascinating to watch when it is played out by two very talented actors.

The next season actually holds three (actually four) of my personal favourites of the whole series, and marks where BM officially hits its stride as one of the all-time classic TV shows. It is, however, the peak, and the remaining installments, while all good, fail to deliver on that utter brilliance that is the holy trilogy of BM episodes.

Series 3

"Shut Up and Dance"

A thematic sister to “White Bear,” yet inferior in every way, "SUAD" may be the most nihilistic of BM episodes, which is saying a lot. No Rod Serling voice needed her, as the whole episode is placed firmly in our world, and involves zero tech that we haven’t seen before. So, there’s a breakneck pace as the teenage protagonist finds himself being blackmailed and is sent on a variety of timed missions where he meets other victims of blackmail, including episode highlight Jerome Flynn (Bronn from GOT, who basically plays that same laconic Bronn). They run around, both guilty of something, and then something happens, and in the end the twist comes as an ugly bit of truth that will no doubt leave a terrible taste in the mouths of any viewer. Pass.

"Playtest"

"Playtest" would have ranked worst this season if not for the preceding review. The concept is good; a loud (too loud), young American traveller is robbed of everything after a tryst in London, and resorts to signing up as a VR video game test model for a shadowy corporation. Said tryst is a journalist, and compels him to spy while he meets the test runner, and even the mysterious owner of said corporation, which specializes in horror games. The game: he is to spend a night in a mansion with an implant in his head while being bombarded with images tailored to terrify him personally. With one too many twists, an over-the-top protagonist (it’s like what a reserved English person would imagine an American is like), and a played out haunted house and VR motive, the episode doesn’t add up to much. Watchable at best.

"Men Against Fire"

This underrated installment, "MAF" deals with a future where a world war, where presumably some sort of bio-weapon has twisted and contorted many humans to become mindless horror zombies who are now hunted by the good guys. Our hero is Stripe, who like all soldiers is equipped with MASS, an implant that aids him in becoming a more effective killer in terms of sight, sound and even smell. As Stripe and his partner clear farmhouses and destroyed neighbourhoods, they encounter locals who may or may not be harbouring the beast people in accordance with their religion. Skip to Stripe having his MASS damaged and some weird encounters with beast people, and yes, not is all as it seems. Spoiler alerts: there is a government conspiracy, the MASS system covers the truth, and Stripe is now in the fight of his…well you’ll see. Shot like a lean action film, "MAF" may seem a tad predictable at first, but rest assured there is a twist on top of the original twist, and Michael Kelly (Stamper from House of Cards) shows up to ramp up the creepy as one of the military government agents. The key here is also Stripe’s compassion and empathy, and the actor holds his own right down to the heartbreaking end.

"Nosedive"

Touted as the series best (but third IMO), "Nosedive" perhaps taps into the doom of our usage of social media best, set in a world where every person rates every other person on their phones on a one to five scale, and every single interaction matters. It’s Yelp! on an individual level, but here if you receive a good rating from higher rated people (the high 4’s as it were, the upper crust) the more your rating counts. Amping up the stakes are the realities that the higher the overall rating you get, the better society rewards you in terms of the services you receive, the cars you drive, and even the neighbourhood you can live in. What does a shitstorm like this cause? Yeah, you guessed it, a civilization populated by phony douchebags. People dressed in awful pastel colours, smiling through gritted teeth while their voices rise to spine-chillingly friendly octaves as they desperately attempt to climb the social media ladder. At the heart of our story is Bryce Dallas Howard, giving a tour de force in fake nicety and desperation as she strives to connect with an old friend (a high 4), in an attempt to raise her status high enough to qualify for a fancy housing community. Her brother (a 2 point something), calls the whole thing for what it is: a bunch of fake plastic trees racing to the bottom of humanity.

Soon, our heroine is invited to said friend’s wedding, an event which according to her ratings coach (eye roll) is sure to boost her over the edge. Thus begins the unravelling, delivered in most hilarious manner as she meets setback after setback, watching as each interaction lowers her score bit by bit, and if the suspense is real, so is the concept that the harder you try to be fake, the more transparent you become. By the end of the hour, in a scene worth the price of my Netflix membership, she has fully melted down and keeps on steaming through, and the point of alienation and obsession has been made.

"Hated in The Nation"

Bees, bees, bees! But also stunning character development, commentary, and just a masterfully directed episode, one that serves almost like a feature film (it’s running length at close to 90 minutes). Rod Serling voice again: Picture a world where the all too real threat of nature’s pollinating bees have become extinct, where humanity’s existence depends upon such pollination, where corporations have created electronic bees to replace them, where the government sees an irresistible opportunity to utilize a scheme to violate our privacy, where social media can ruin lives and now even end them, where one man, two women and…FUCKING BEES!

Scorchingly prescient, hauntingly scored, empathetically acted (the two female leads, particularly Kelly Macdonald, both deliver their own respective senses of weary commitment to duty, commitment to goodness), and yea, suspenseful as fuck. This episode represents BM at its peak, and while it’s not all downhill from here, it is a gradual declining slope with a couple of rises here and there. And I just love Benedict Wong as the surly government agent with a badass haircut equaled only by his scowl. Too bad he is underused here.

FUCKING BEES, MAN!

"San Junipero"

Tears is what this installment may leave you in, whether they are of joy or terror I will leave you to discover. We meet a young, shy, blonde woman who resides in the 80s (here perfectly captured in style and grit) in the eponymous city and crosses paths with an extroverted brunette who pursues her, and a relationship is formed. It’s tough where to go from here, as the sci-fi aspect and twist is revealed early, and it’s too good to disclose here, so I’ll tiptoe carefully. There are time jumps as one of the women pursues the other, mortality is a stake in some manner, and yes "San Junipero" is not all what it seems. Plot aside, I can say that this episode stands aside from all previous in the BM world in tone, as well as its first depiction of a same sex couple (interracial at that!), and it’s first period piece. Moreover, the romance is beautifully realized (more so when the twist comes), and the leads act their hearts out. It is, to employ cliche, one hell of a magical hour of television.

"White Christmas"

My personal fave of the entire run. BM’s Christmas special will have you squealing in delight in the directions it takes you. Always staying one step ahead as Don Draper (Jon Hamm) himself guides you through a date coaching session with a twist, the logistics of an imprisoned cloned consciousness, and a family tragedy, all the while leaving you to wonder where the fuck the two men talking in a snowy cabin on Christmas day really are. Exceedingly clever and peppered with sublime guest appearances (GOT fans be ready), this episode twists and turns and never fails to surprise in its narrative, while maintaining that BM brand of techno-nightmare scenarios, here piled on and on again with glorious results. Magnificently acted, well and well layered again, and scrumptiously shot, "WC" represents all BM is and can be when it's at its best.

Series Four

"Crocodile"

One of the ugliest, creepiest and most depressing hours of television I’ve ever seen (and that’s saying a lot for this show). "Crocodile" (I can’t even remember how the title relates to the plot in this episode) deals with a crime of irresponsibility from the outset that is covered up and comes back to haunt the perpetrators years later, when they are all grown up. This sets off a chain of murders by the female lead, because in true BM fashion, there is a tech that allows insurance adjusters to access the memories of witnesses to accidents and it is enforced by law. That the murderer witnessed a potentially innocuous insurance claim while murdering someone that sets her off on a killing spree and a series of awful decisions is not the problem here…well maybe it is, I actually don’t know. What I do know is that this is miserable, unnecessary, and where BM tends to serve as a cautionary tale where human’s worst instincts are wrought through tech, here all we get is just an awful person that murders and the idea that it is not the tech that compels her, but just because she is a terrible person who wants to protect her now comfortable life. The tech is actually incidental here, as this scenario could have existed in any murder storyline on any show, and indeed has, and so we are really not mining any new territory here. Worst of all when the twist comes, it’s well, just absolutely the worst. Run away from this episode!

"Arkangel"

Obvious and coincidental to a fault, "Arkangel" deals with the pitfalls of continual child monitoring and censoring with the swipes and button pushes on your tablet (eg. You can block out your child’s view of blood or a scary dog barking if you want). Hm, gee, I wonder if this will go south at all? Luckily, the installment (directed by Jodie Foster!) saves us from finding out what a fully-grown adult would be like after 18 years of this (hint: it would be a shitshow), and the mother does clue in early as to how damaging (especially the sensor device) can be, and decides to ditch the tablet altogether while the kid is still small. Skip to the teenage years, and what parent couldn’t resist a little peek every now and then when their kid is out doing who knows what (I know I couldn’t) and, yes, mother tunes in at exactly the worst moments, without any context, and yes it leads to disaster. So, yeah, predictable, not compellingly acted, and well, not compelling overall, BM offers no revelatory twist and mines no new territory that hasn’t already been envisioned and discussed over and over again by parents and all of the internet alike. Shame though, as the subject matter is most definitely worth exploring in this world, but something gets lost in the execution here.

"Metalhead"

The third lean, badass, chase installment, "Metalhead" should be better than it is, and I think the choice to go to black and white rather than colour for the entirety of the episode hinders it more than helps. No Rod Serling voice here, but just picture a world where people live in isolated outposts (I think) and leave said posts to forage for whatever, while tech robots (who have taken over the world in this post apocalypse?) have planted their robo terminator hunter dogs around, waiting to be triggered when the mouth breathers come across their paths. That’s actually generous storytelling on my behalf, as the episode provides absolutely none of that, but cuts literally and directly to the chase, as one woman is on the run of her life through the spare woods and occasional structure while doggy has spat metal tracking shards into her skin (watching her knife them out was particularly gruesome for me). It’s a straight up chase episode where she is the only real human character (she chats with someone on a old fashioned walkie, but we get no real return, though we do learn she cares about someone blah blah). And yeah, this is where the B & W takes away; while it is surely meant to convey the bleakness of this future, the visceral impact of blood and nature and the sheen of the pooch’s robotics could have been better utilized with even a saturated type of cinematography, a la Scorsese of Spike Lee. Maybe I’m getting too pretentious here, but it definitely would have benefited from colour, and even more if Brooker wanted a surreal or artistic world creation. So, while it is technically tense and nicely pared down to an almost dialogue-free action mover and shaker, in the end I think it just screws the pooch a little. Ha.

"Black Museum"

The series' most recent episode fails to hit its mark, with a handful of stories inspired by tragic tech museum artifacts, of which maybe a third of the stories are interesting. It starts well enough, with a young woman traveling in a cool, old car through the desert, only to find her battery needs charging (yay future electric cars!) and she stops in on an abandoned charge station next to the eponymous museum and is forced to kill time with a visit while her car juices up. It’s a good horror movie set up, and yes you are implanted with the idea, whether intentional or not, that it will take on some sort of racial twist (as yes, the woman is black), but it goes to other places and most of them are not pretty or compelling. She meets the curator, a sort of sweaty, nervous talker who takes her through some choice items and tells their tech horror stories through flashbacks (he is present in all of them). The stories range from gross to dull, but yea they are the customary BM cautionary tales, and here when the twist comes it is only somewhat satisfying, as the story has invested so much time in other places that the connection to the characters involved in the twist is incomplete, if not altogether squandered. So, hmph.

"USS Callister"

BM finally takes on internet trolls and lonely, white boy inferioritis here, with a wonderful installment where a man lives out his Star Trek holodeck fantasy (haven’t we all wanted this?) via a computer program in his home. The dark? Yes, he steals DNA samples from his co-workers to create the characters and crew on his fantasy, and yes they are all his subservient slaves. Released in the midst of the Harvey Weinstein stuff and #metoo, our asshole (played with a bang on Kirk accent from Jessie Plemons) doesn’t physically rape anyone but the violation is clear, as are his motivations as one who is not recognized for his accomplishments in the workplace. This episode is right up my alley thematically speaking, as I tend to write about white males who feel deprived of their entitlement (as far as sociability, vocation, and in their romance life – here race is not so much an issue though), and the uncharacteristic for BM comic bits land well. Key is the introduction of a new girl at the office who actually admires Plemons, but any false move in the office means you will be relegated (or a carbon copy of you will be) to servitude and humiliation on the eponymous ship. And while the themes are dark, the episode manages to be fun and even tense, as we cross our fingers that our resident jerk may find his comeuppance.

"Hang the DJ"

Oh yes, finally a sweet, sweet episode where nothing could possibly go wrong…uh, possibly go wrong, uh…OR DOES IT.

Tinder has gone mad in this episode, where people sign up to live in a beautiful giant dome of a community where an electronic disc matches them in relationships with preordained time limits. So, our first couple have 12 hours for dinner and a room, and after hitting it off with sweetness they are ushered off in golf cart and to question the logic of ‘the system’ while the disc (‘coach’) assures them that they will have more matches, and that all if it will amount to them eventually meeting their 99.8 percent guaranteed perfect match for life. So they move on to muddier and shorter (or sometimes much longer) matches until…well, hey, I don’t spoil tinder date outcomes.

By far the nicest of BM episodes, it’s a relief to find good people doing good things, even when (of course) all may not be what it seems. The twist will come, yes, but not without some humour first, and yes, of course, to say it again, some sweetness.

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About the Creator

Nicolas Brown

Teacher of the English language, traveler. Movie, comedy, and TV hound. Wheelchair user and occasionally fun to be around.

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