So good! However in my opinion you missed the biggest point of white bear. The whole punishment was carried out in an amusement park setting where spectators could take glee in the suffering. The idea that it’s a delicious moral treat to behave badly but call it righteous indignation situation. They are torturing her but “she deserves it”, and the reveal of the nuances of her crime make it hit even harder. Great episode.
Agree - came down here to write the same thing. The twist of White Bear is that "normal society" turns out to be the sadistic villain. I give it more like a 7/10.
We tsk tsk at our ancestors enjoying the spectacle of a public hanging, but we think it’s great fun to watch a dogpile on social media. I agree, White Bear was one of the better episodes.
Yes, exactly. They don't pay the people who are punishing the murderer -- people pay to come to "White Bear Justice Park" and participate in punishing her. The horror of the episode is that it's _totally believable_ that people would enjoy this -- take a look at photos of a lynching party some time.
He also got the details of blocking in White Christmas wrong -- the person who blocked you isn't a red blob, they're more like black-and-white static. There's a screencap here:
Thanks for the “lynching party” reminder. The white people who attended lynchings brought picnic baskets, often brought their KIDS, and they sent postcards of the event with “we lynched a < redacted > today, here’s a picture! Love, your grandson!”
And I’m also reminded of Particicutions in the Handmaid’s Tale. Or even less organized but still violent incidences of public humiliation and “mob justice.” We shake our heads and disapprove of the crowds who came to see public executions (and sell snacks and pick pockets), in Hogarth’s engravings, but, there are a lot of people who would still gleefully participate if they could.
Of late your columns have been pretty bleak, with all the shit that's happening. I had started to avoid reading you just as I have started to avoid the news.
This essay was a great antidote. Found episodes that I want to rewatch as well as some that I've never seen and need to watch for the first time. Do a top 10 sci-fi movies list, why don't you?
Same here. I just can’t deal. And I’m a paid subscriber, lol! (I pay Substackers because I believe in supporting independent journalism. I just need a break from the endless parade of bad news.) I know that Noah and everyone else is just reporting on what is going on, so no shade, but it’s just been *waves hands*. (Here is where I want to send swarms of angry robo bees after so much of social media, the “influencers” and the enablers.)
“White Christmas” was the single best and most terrifying show I’ve ever seen. The concept of a human essentially having the power to send another person to hell on a whim raises profound questions. If the tech ever develops to upload consciousness, I will refuse, specifically because of the moment that man turned the knob
San Junipero is great! I agree. And not just because of the like, totally, 80’s look that Gugu Mbatha-Raw brings, or the Belinda Carisle theme song. I remember thinking “yup, that’s what I want to have happen, maybe with less nightclubs and more cats.” Incidentally, Yorkie’s “meat life” situation may have been loosely based on the Sharon Kowalski case; Kowalski was a lesbian who was with her domestic partner Karen Thompson, got into a serious accident and was disabled, and her parents stuck her in a nursing home to rot. Thompson challenged the parents in court. The challenge was “were Kowalski’s parents or Thompson her proper POA” since legal rights for LGBT couples had not been invented yet. But, San Junipero was one of Black Mirror’s rare optimistic happy episodes and I was there for every minute.
And, I agree, at this point, I’m ready to send a swarm of robo-bees after every manosphere bro and TikTok baby Karen in existence. Not All Influencers (Kelly Gooch is great for the makeup world, and she actually tells people to spend less and buy less and a lot of what is out there is a scam! I’d spare her from the bees!) but a lot of social media, especially TikTok and X, have proven to be absolute cesspits and bad actors in society.
There was another episode, Arkangel, where a mom implanted a chip in her daughter’s head and used a tablet to track her every move *and control her behavior remotely* - helicopter parenting taken to it’s obvious conclusion. I won’t spoiler the ending but Mom gets a deserved comeuppance.
I have never heard of this == so thank you. I will search for it though my use of paid streaming services is quite limited. People who are interested in such things might be interested in the work of Cordwainer Smith. He mostly wrote short stories of the very distant future -- 20,000 years from now. He writes some really odd stuff but it can be quite fascinating. His only novel (really 2 novellas merged) says something about economics and tarriffs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norstrilia
He imagines a planet that is the only place in the universe capable of producing an immortality drug bur wishes to maintain a conservative rural life style so they have a vast tariffs on their immense wealth that greatly limits imports. People can leave and be vastly wealthy but will not be allowed to return.
Here is a short quote:
"The place? That's Old North Australia. What other place could it be? Where else do farmers pay ten million credits for a handkerchief, five for a bottle of beer? ...Old North Australia has stroon—the santaclara drug—and more than a thousand other planets clamor for it."
You have an error in your summary of Hated In the Nation. The chance to murder-by-tweet _isn't_ fake, and that's part of the point. Initially, the hacker uses the robo-bees to kill whoever the mob nominates most. After the first couple of murders, everyone clearly understands that this process is legit -- that participation in it isn't just some kind of "free speech" thing, they're truly shaping a process that will end with somebody dead. This is part of why he feels justified in turning around and committing an act of mass-murder. (His underlying motivation is that somebody he loved was hounded to suicide by a "cancel mob". He's targeting people who choose to participate in a mass "cancelling" even when they're _explicitly told_ it will end with the cancelled person dead.)
Similar to White Bear, the horror is that it is _completely believable_ that a ton of people would still hit Send on those tweets, as long as they believe nobody will hold _them_ accountable for the death.
This is one of my absolute favorite episodes, particularly for how haunting the soundtrack is, over the denouement.
Noah wrote in the original post that Black Mirror is spiritual and artistic successor to the Twilight Zone. I think he’s right (though whether it’s BETTER, I can’t say!). It made me remember an interview I saw on YouTube with Rod Serling where he said, basically, you can say a lot of things in science fiction shows you can’t in more “mainstream” programming. Serling lived during a different era - the Twilight Zone started in 1959 and the Hays Code was not repealed until 1968, so there were vastly more restrictions on what could be shown on TV. Sci-fi was sniffily relegated to junk TV for teenage boys and weirdo nerds, so, that was one reason Serling and his fellow science fictioneers could be more outspoken; the other, of course, was “this is all pretend. Speculation. Double pinky super secret swear.”
Now we’re more open both with what we can show, in general, and the acceptance of sci-fi and speculative fiction, but, I think the general idea still holds. Call it “science fiction” or “speculative fiction” or even “horror” and voila! You don’t have to hold back, because it’s all “pretend.”
I agree San Junipero was one of the best single hours of television I’ve ever watched. But I would also say the same about a few other Black Mirror episodes. Black Mirror is simply the most creative television series produced in my lifetime.
I agree. White Bear is extraordinary TV. Pulls you apart and reminds you that extreme punishments make victims of criminals - which still doesn't resolve the issue as you could think this is a good thing (makes you feel sympathy for someone deeply unsympathetic) or a bad thing (makes the state a victimiser). And that's the point I think: we are conflicted about punishing crimes in a way that eludes resolution. Don't think I saw Crocodile here which I also loved. Great performance from Andrea Risborough as the title character - just keeps killing until everything in the lake is gone and then after she's murdered her last victim, a child, cries at her own daughter's nativity play. I haven't seen San Junipero but obviously I should!
You really have to watch Bandersnatch. I think it is the best “episode” ( really more like a cross between TV and a video game). The music (including Tangerine Dream & Tomita) is fantastic. The self-referential recursive structure (like a computer program) and twisted plot & path that you select through it make it amazing. Make sure you use a Netflix app or client that is capable of interactivity.
I wish someone would make a Black Mirror series about real technology but set in the historical past, before the technology arrived. E.g. an episode about a future with cars, as imagined before cars were invented. Same for electricity, light bulbs, telephones, airplanes, etc. It would be fun to explore old attitudes towards things like travel, darkness, communication, community, etc. It might also shed light on whether our own fears of future technology are exaggerated or contingent. From that angle, I have a feeling that cultural products like Black Mirror serve less as predictors of the future than a collective effort to steer towards a better (but ultimately unimaginable) future.
1959: the Twilight Zone. 1993: The X-Files. 2011: Black Mirror.
They're all disturbing accounts of alternate realities, similar to our own, but "uncanny."
Before The Twilight Zone, we had HP Lovecraft's debut in 1916.
And before HP Lovecraft, we had Edgar Allen Poe's debut in 1827.
Was there any such thing as horror before Poe?
Maybe. There were medieval accounts of demons that might qualify, or the dance of the dead as depicted during the Black Plague. Or folk stories by the Brothers Grimm, who first published in 1812.
But it seems to me that the divide between the age of Enlightenment and the modern era is that we have horror. Maybe this has to do with the fact that we began to outlaw public executions and torture. We began to hide death from public sight. And as we hid it, and became more distant from it, we became more fascinated with it. Thus, the genre of horror was born!
You skipped the interactive Bandersnatch (to which Plaything is a sequel). I thought Bandersnatch was a decent way to spend an hour or two. I played it enough to get most of the possible "endings", though there's one particularly tricky one that I ended up just reading about / watching on YouTube.
Also, a Thronglets game was released for iOS and Android. I've heard it's amusing, haven't had a chance to try it yet.
So good! However in my opinion you missed the biggest point of white bear. The whole punishment was carried out in an amusement park setting where spectators could take glee in the suffering. The idea that it’s a delicious moral treat to behave badly but call it righteous indignation situation. They are torturing her but “she deserves it”, and the reveal of the nuances of her crime make it hit even harder. Great episode.
Also thanks for the blog this shit rocks
Agree - came down here to write the same thing. The twist of White Bear is that "normal society" turns out to be the sadistic villain. I give it more like a 7/10.
We tsk tsk at our ancestors enjoying the spectacle of a public hanging, but we think it’s great fun to watch a dogpile on social media. I agree, White Bear was one of the better episodes.
Yes, exactly. They don't pay the people who are punishing the murderer -- people pay to come to "White Bear Justice Park" and participate in punishing her. The horror of the episode is that it's _totally believable_ that people would enjoy this -- take a look at photos of a lynching party some time.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/the-cruelty-is-the-point/572104/
He also got the details of blocking in White Christmas wrong -- the person who blocked you isn't a red blob, they're more like black-and-white static. There's a screencap here:
http://www.thebackseatdriverreviews.com/blocked-honesty-and-isolation-in-black-mirrors-white-christmas
Thanks for the “lynching party” reminder. The white people who attended lynchings brought picnic baskets, often brought their KIDS, and they sent postcards of the event with “we lynched a < redacted > today, here’s a picture! Love, your grandson!”
And I’m also reminded of Particicutions in the Handmaid’s Tale. Or even less organized but still violent incidences of public humiliation and “mob justice.” We shake our heads and disapprove of the crowds who came to see public executions (and sell snacks and pick pockets), in Hogarth’s engravings, but, there are a lot of people who would still gleefully participate if they could.
Agree, I think Noah missed on his review of this one. I recall seeing some other negative reviews and wondered if I was the only one who liked it.
Really appreciate Noah for opening up the discussion, though!
"For those who saw it but don’t remember, “San Junipero” starts...."
I can't believe there's *anyone* who saw it but doesn't remember it :-) It's my favorite, too, although Hang the DJ is just a fun watch.
Of late your columns have been pretty bleak, with all the shit that's happening. I had started to avoid reading you just as I have started to avoid the news.
This essay was a great antidote. Found episodes that I want to rewatch as well as some that I've never seen and need to watch for the first time. Do a top 10 sci-fi movies list, why don't you?
Same here. I just can’t deal. And I’m a paid subscriber, lol! (I pay Substackers because I believe in supporting independent journalism. I just need a break from the endless parade of bad news.) I know that Noah and everyone else is just reporting on what is going on, so no shade, but it’s just been *waves hands*. (Here is where I want to send swarms of angry robo bees after so much of social media, the “influencers” and the enablers.)
“White Christmas” was the single best and most terrifying show I’ve ever seen. The concept of a human essentially having the power to send another person to hell on a whim raises profound questions. If the tech ever develops to upload consciousness, I will refuse, specifically because of the moment that man turned the knob
San Junipero is great! I agree. And not just because of the like, totally, 80’s look that Gugu Mbatha-Raw brings, or the Belinda Carisle theme song. I remember thinking “yup, that’s what I want to have happen, maybe with less nightclubs and more cats.” Incidentally, Yorkie’s “meat life” situation may have been loosely based on the Sharon Kowalski case; Kowalski was a lesbian who was with her domestic partner Karen Thompson, got into a serious accident and was disabled, and her parents stuck her in a nursing home to rot. Thompson challenged the parents in court. The challenge was “were Kowalski’s parents or Thompson her proper POA” since legal rights for LGBT couples had not been invented yet. But, San Junipero was one of Black Mirror’s rare optimistic happy episodes and I was there for every minute.
And, I agree, at this point, I’m ready to send a swarm of robo-bees after every manosphere bro and TikTok baby Karen in existence. Not All Influencers (Kelly Gooch is great for the makeup world, and she actually tells people to spend less and buy less and a lot of what is out there is a scam! I’d spare her from the bees!) but a lot of social media, especially TikTok and X, have proven to be absolute cesspits and bad actors in society.
There was another episode, Arkangel, where a mom implanted a chip in her daughter’s head and used a tablet to track her every move *and control her behavior remotely* - helicopter parenting taken to it’s obvious conclusion. I won’t spoiler the ending but Mom gets a deserved comeuppance.
"Eulogy" honestly broke me. One of the best hours of television ever aired. Right up there with "Long, Long Time" from TLoU s1
I have never heard of this == so thank you. I will search for it though my use of paid streaming services is quite limited. People who are interested in such things might be interested in the work of Cordwainer Smith. He mostly wrote short stories of the very distant future -- 20,000 years from now. He writes some really odd stuff but it can be quite fascinating. His only novel (really 2 novellas merged) says something about economics and tarriffs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norstrilia
He imagines a planet that is the only place in the universe capable of producing an immortality drug bur wishes to maintain a conservative rural life style so they have a vast tariffs on their immense wealth that greatly limits imports. People can leave and be vastly wealthy but will not be allowed to return.
Here is a short quote:
"The place? That's Old North Australia. What other place could it be? Where else do farmers pay ten million credits for a handkerchief, five for a bottle of beer? ...Old North Australia has stroon—the santaclara drug—and more than a thousand other planets clamor for it."
I'm looking forward to when AI can make an infinite number of brilliant Black Mirror episodes.
Great review. I approve skipping Mazey Day 😂. I agree the 7th season is a great return to form.
You have an error in your summary of Hated In the Nation. The chance to murder-by-tweet _isn't_ fake, and that's part of the point. Initially, the hacker uses the robo-bees to kill whoever the mob nominates most. After the first couple of murders, everyone clearly understands that this process is legit -- that participation in it isn't just some kind of "free speech" thing, they're truly shaping a process that will end with somebody dead. This is part of why he feels justified in turning around and committing an act of mass-murder. (His underlying motivation is that somebody he loved was hounded to suicide by a "cancel mob". He's targeting people who choose to participate in a mass "cancelling" even when they're _explicitly told_ it will end with the cancelled person dead.)
Similar to White Bear, the horror is that it is _completely believable_ that a ton of people would still hit Send on those tweets, as long as they believe nobody will hold _them_ accountable for the death.
This is one of my absolute favorite episodes, particularly for how haunting the soundtrack is, over the denouement.
Noah wrote in the original post that Black Mirror is spiritual and artistic successor to the Twilight Zone. I think he’s right (though whether it’s BETTER, I can’t say!). It made me remember an interview I saw on YouTube with Rod Serling where he said, basically, you can say a lot of things in science fiction shows you can’t in more “mainstream” programming. Serling lived during a different era - the Twilight Zone started in 1959 and the Hays Code was not repealed until 1968, so there were vastly more restrictions on what could be shown on TV. Sci-fi was sniffily relegated to junk TV for teenage boys and weirdo nerds, so, that was one reason Serling and his fellow science fictioneers could be more outspoken; the other, of course, was “this is all pretend. Speculation. Double pinky super secret swear.”
Now we’re more open both with what we can show, in general, and the acceptance of sci-fi and speculative fiction, but, I think the general idea still holds. Call it “science fiction” or “speculative fiction” or even “horror” and voila! You don’t have to hold back, because it’s all “pretend.”
I agree San Junipero was one of the best single hours of television I’ve ever watched. But I would also say the same about a few other Black Mirror episodes. Black Mirror is simply the most creative television series produced in my lifetime.
I agree. White Bear is extraordinary TV. Pulls you apart and reminds you that extreme punishments make victims of criminals - which still doesn't resolve the issue as you could think this is a good thing (makes you feel sympathy for someone deeply unsympathetic) or a bad thing (makes the state a victimiser). And that's the point I think: we are conflicted about punishing crimes in a way that eludes resolution. Don't think I saw Crocodile here which I also loved. Great performance from Andrea Risborough as the title character - just keeps killing until everything in the lake is gone and then after she's murdered her last victim, a child, cries at her own daughter's nativity play. I haven't seen San Junipero but obviously I should!
You really have to watch Bandersnatch. I think it is the best “episode” ( really more like a cross between TV and a video game). The music (including Tangerine Dream & Tomita) is fantastic. The self-referential recursive structure (like a computer program) and twisted plot & path that you select through it make it amazing. Make sure you use a Netflix app or client that is capable of interactivity.
And Netflix is about to delete it!
I wish someone would make a Black Mirror series about real technology but set in the historical past, before the technology arrived. E.g. an episode about a future with cars, as imagined before cars were invented. Same for electricity, light bulbs, telephones, airplanes, etc. It would be fun to explore old attitudes towards things like travel, darkness, communication, community, etc. It might also shed light on whether our own fears of future technology are exaggerated or contingent. From that angle, I have a feeling that cultural products like Black Mirror serve less as predictors of the future than a collective effort to steer towards a better (but ultimately unimaginable) future.
What do these three shows have in common?
1959: the Twilight Zone. 1993: The X-Files. 2011: Black Mirror.
They're all disturbing accounts of alternate realities, similar to our own, but "uncanny."
Before The Twilight Zone, we had HP Lovecraft's debut in 1916.
And before HP Lovecraft, we had Edgar Allen Poe's debut in 1827.
Was there any such thing as horror before Poe?
Maybe. There were medieval accounts of demons that might qualify, or the dance of the dead as depicted during the Black Plague. Or folk stories by the Brothers Grimm, who first published in 1812.
But it seems to me that the divide between the age of Enlightenment and the modern era is that we have horror. Maybe this has to do with the fact that we began to outlaw public executions and torture. We began to hide death from public sight. And as we hid it, and became more distant from it, we became more fascinated with it. Thus, the genre of horror was born!
You skipped the interactive Bandersnatch (to which Plaything is a sequel). I thought Bandersnatch was a decent way to spend an hour or two. I played it enough to get most of the possible "endings", though there's one particularly tricky one that I ended up just reading about / watching on YouTube.
Also, a Thronglets game was released for iOS and Android. I've heard it's amusing, haven't had a chance to try it yet.