![]() It’s an uncertain swirl of anger, regret, and doubt that even extends across a transatlantic satellite phone when Topher Grace’s Jack Dorsey-esque tech CEO enters the mix. Both Scott and Damson Idris (as Jaden, the hostage in this international negotiation) anchor the tension here, especially when the two are confined to a car in the middle of an empty field. So if there’s a problem with “Smithereens,” it’s that the tech-based motivation of a distressed rideshare driver Chris (Andrew Scott) seems shoehorned into an otherwise-gripping kidnapping tale. The best episodes of “Black Mirror” feel like they couldn’t exist as part of any other series. “Black Mirror: Smithereens” Stuart Hendry / Netflix (Also, this episode does have Hayek shouting “Paragraph A can suck my dick!” so that’s not for nothing, either.) Time will tell how potent this chapter ends up being outside the context of the ongoing WGA and SAG strikes, which should make for some illustrative future context. Like those, your enjoyment of this is almost entirely dependent on how well you respond to the one track it sets itself and stays on for almost its whole runtime, Salma Hayek-as-herself-subplot and some other trickery notwithstanding. This show has a growing tradition of episodes based around watching one person melt down as their entire perception of reality is shattered (see also: “Nosedive,” “Entire History of You”). In maybe the strongest “call coming from inside the house” episode of the show so far, Brooker and director Ally Pankiw turn their attention to Joan (Annie Murphy), whose life is inverted when she finds out a streaming series is recreating her life in real time. “Black Mirror: Joan Is Awful” ©Netflix/Courtesy Everett Collection ![]() It’s bleak enough to pacify the most masochistic technophobe, but ends with a parting message that offers the faintest bit of hope that the future isn’t as unconquerable as we might think. But what this episode truly delivers is an overwhelming sense of physical terror, the starkest example of characters wrestling with their own bodies - and even their own souls. With allusions to past installments and extensions of others, it’s the “Black Mirror” equivalent of a bonus track. Rolo Haynes (Douglas Hodge) is as good a narrator as he is an unreliable one, making for a tour guide through the show’s cemetery who delights in the twisted artifacts of his own creation. As a road-tripping visitor (Letitia Wright) stops into a gas station collection of technological curiosities, the accompanying trio of shorter stories make for a bizarre trip through the show’s self-contained history. Then, try out whichever speaks the most to you-you may find a new obsession, just in time for the fourth season's premiere.“Black Mirror: Black Museum” Jonathan Prime / NetflixĪs gutsy a season finale that the show’s put forth so far, “Black Museum” is somehow both a love letter to the series and a massive grenade designed to blast it to smithereens. So, we’re doing something a little different here.įind out which episode is the best at creating the world it lives in, which episode is the happiest (or at least, the least depressing), which episode will cause the most questions, and more. The incredibly diverse episodes make it hard to “rank” the show. This hint of sympathy keeps Black Mirror from going off the rails and keeps viewers on the edge of our seats.Įach Black Mirror episode uses its futuristic setting to depict a familiar problem of contemporary society, even without the superior technology accessible to its characters. ![]() But under the show’s misanthropic and technophobic surface, there is a glint of compassion for our foibles and mistakes. After all, it is a show about how technology warps and changes humanity. Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror could easily veer into something anti-human, vapid, and depressing.
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