Season 2 Episode 1, Be Right Back:
I find this episode has a lot of similarities with The Entire History of You. Just like the former, this episode explores technology on a small scale, and just like the former, the featured technology is a bit too far fetched for my taste. The story revolves around a woman who’s boyfriend passes away in a car crash. To deal with her grief she finds a service that uses artificial intelligence to generate a sort of virtual copy of her deceased boyfriend. This virtual persona is based on all of his activity on social media and works as a sort of bot she can chat with in a certain app. All of that makes a lot of sense, and I think something like this would actually be possible with technology that’s available today; at least for someone who posts a lot online so there’s enough data for training an AI. If this was any other TV show I would give it a pretty high rating because it’s an interesting story that’s well told. Unfortunately it takes a technological turn for the worse somewhere around the half way point. When the main character finds that a chat bot isn’t enough anymore, she orders a robot copy of her dead boyfriend. At this point my suspension of disbelief simply crashed. In this world there is a company that is able to build extremely life-like humanoid robots, that a middle class person can afford no less, and that’s somehow not a major, world changing thing. Screw the AI chat bots, I want a story about the implications of the existence of these deep fake robots. That’s not to say I dislike this story, but it deals with the existence of perfect humanoid robots far too casually for my taste.
Season 2 Episode 2, White Bear:
This story starts with the protagonist – who is also the audience point of view character – waking up not knowing where she is. It turns out to be some kind of post-apocalyptic future where she’s constantly being hunted by bad guys that look like they’re from a low-budget version of The Purge. You may ask what this has to do with modern technology – actually I was wonder this the whole time – and the most obvious answer is the people who aren’t hunting our protagonist but silently following her around and filming her with their phones. It seems then, that this episode is a commentary on how some people crave likes/comments on social media to such a degree that they choose to film e.g. an accident rather than help the victims. It’s not until the very end of the episode (huge spoilers) that it’s revealed that the main character is actually guilty of some pretty horrible crimes, and the entire thing has been staged as a kind of punishment. Not only that, but some sort of technology is used to scramble her brain every night so she can be forced to go through the whole thing, including waking up without knowing where she is, again the next day. And the people with the phones? Essentially this woman’s punishment has been turned into a kind of reality show and they are the audience.
To me, this is not actually a commentary on technology at all. Instead it describes a world where the justice system, as well as public opinion, has been so thoroughly corrupted that this kind of torture is allowed to be called a punishment for crime. Any use of technology is just incidental. Had it been better made it might be interesting to watch but the low-budget feel ruins that for me as well. Better then to just watch The Purge.
Season 2 Episode 3, The Waldo Moment:
This episode is focused on Jamie, a comedian who’s job is to control an animated blue bear named Waldo, in real time, like a kind of digital puppet. Waldo, as played Jamie, is the host of a late night talk show where he interviews/makes fun of various public figures. After one such interview with a conservative politician, the producers of the show insist to take things further even though it’s against Jamie’s will. After some drama between him and the producers, Jamie loses his job and the producers end up in control of Waldo. They then enter the cartoon bear as a candidate in the same local election as the conservative politician. Of course the politician still wins but Waldo gets a surprising amount of votes.
The technology featured in this episode could very well become a reality, if it isn’t already. Knowing internet culture, especially Boaty McBoatface, I can easily believe that people would vote for an animated bear. However, Jamie’s story is so forgettable that I had to look it up several times for this review. It would have been much more interesting to have a story about the implications of a cartoon bear actually winning the election. Of course, both Donald Trump and Boris Johnson have given us some hints of what such a world would be like.
Season 2 episode 4, White Christmas:
Here we an anthology within an anthology. There is a framing narrative of two men trapped in some kind of arctic research station telling each other stories to pass the time. Each of these stories is like a mini-episode of Black Mirror, and they are all interlinked by the technologies they feature. First there are the connected eyes that everyone in this future seems to have. Second, there is a kind of brain chip that allows people to upload a copy of their personality to a computer. I find the brain chip to be too far fetched. I know there is research on using brain implants to reduce seizures, but the human brain is so incredibly complex that to go from stimulating nerves to actually being able to copy a personality is a huge leap in technology. I think that could work for a movie or show set in the far future but seems unrealistic for the world portrayed by black mirror. That being said, the chips are mostly relevant for the second of three stories which is not very interesting anyway.
I originally didn’t find the first and third story very interesting either, but I went back and re-watched parts of the episode for this review and both of them are well worth watching. They both rely heavily on the connected eyes. Now, having your actual eyes connected to the internet is just as far fetched as the brain chip. However, if you think of them as Augmented Reality contact lenses instead, they become much more feasible, at least in the ways that matter for the episode. Surprisingly enough, the most horrifying aspect of them isn’t that someone might hack them and see everything you see. Instead it’s the fact that people may block you just like on social media, so that you no longer see or hear them, you just get a pixilated image and some muffled sound. All in all this makes for a watchable, if very bleak, episode with a somewhat unrealistic depiction of technology.
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Black Mirror is Annoying and Here’s Why
Season 2 Episode 1, Be Right Back:
I find this episode has a lot of similarities with The Entire History of You. Just like the former, this episode explores technology on a small scale, and just like the former, the featured technology is a bit too far fetched for my taste. The story revolves around a woman who’s boyfriend passes away in a car crash. To deal with her grief she finds a service that uses artificial intelligence to generate a sort of virtual copy of her deceased boyfriend. This virtual persona is based on all of his activity on social media and works as a sort of bot she can chat with in a certain app. All of that makes a lot of sense, and I think something like this would actually be possible with technology that’s available today; at least for someone who posts a lot online so there’s enough data for training an AI. If this was any other TV show I would give it a pretty high rating because it’s an interesting story that’s well told. Unfortunately it takes a technological turn for the worse somewhere around the half way point. When the main character finds that a chat bot isn’t enough anymore, she orders a robot copy of her dead boyfriend. At this point my suspension of disbelief simply crashed. In this world there is a company that is able to build extremely life-like humanoid robots, that a middle class person can afford no less, and that’s somehow not a major, world changing thing. Screw the AI chat bots, I want a story about the implications of the existence of these deep fake robots. That’s not to say I dislike this story, but it deals with the existence of perfect humanoid robots far too casually for my taste.
Season 2 Episode 2, White Bear:
This story starts with the protagonist – who is also the audience point of view character – waking up not knowing where she is. It turns out to be some kind of post-apocalyptic future where she’s constantly being hunted by bad guys that look like they’re from a low-budget version of The Purge. You may ask what this has to do with modern technology – actually I was wonder this the whole time – and the most obvious answer is the people who aren’t hunting our protagonist but silently following her around and filming her with their phones. It seems then, that this episode is a commentary on how some people crave likes/comments on social media to such a degree that they choose to film e.g. an accident rather than help the victims. It’s not until the very end of the episode (huge spoilers) that it’s revealed that the main character is actually guilty of some pretty horrible crimes, and the entire thing has been staged as a kind of punishment. Not only that, but some sort of technology is used to scramble her brain every night so she can be forced to go through the whole thing, including waking up without knowing where she is, again the next day. And the people with the phones? Essentially this woman’s punishment has been turned into a kind of reality show and they are the audience.
To me, this is not actually a commentary on technology at all. Instead it describes a world where the justice system, as well as public opinion, has been so thoroughly corrupted that this kind of torture is allowed to be called a punishment for crime. Any use of technology is just incidental. Had it been better made it might be interesting to watch but the low-budget feel ruins that for me as well. Better then to just watch The Purge.
Season 2 Episode 3, The Waldo Moment:
This episode is focused on Jamie, a comedian who’s job is to control an animated blue bear named Waldo, in real time, like a kind of digital puppet. Waldo, as played Jamie, is the host of a late night talk show where he interviews/makes fun of various public figures. After one such interview with a conservative politician, the producers of the show insist to take things further even though it’s against Jamie’s will. After some drama between him and the producers, Jamie loses his job and the producers end up in control of Waldo. They then enter the cartoon bear as a candidate in the same local election as the conservative politician. Of course the politician still wins but Waldo gets a surprising amount of votes.
The technology featured in this episode could very well become a reality, if it isn’t already. Knowing internet culture, especially Boaty McBoatface, I can easily believe that people would vote for an animated bear. However, Jamie’s story is so forgettable that I had to look it up several times for this review. It would have been much more interesting to have a story about the implications of a cartoon bear actually winning the election. Of course, both Donald Trump and Boris Johnson have given us some hints of what such a world would be like.
Season 2 episode 4, White Christmas:
Here we an anthology within an anthology. There is a framing narrative of two men trapped in some kind of arctic research station telling each other stories to pass the time. Each of these stories is like a mini-episode of Black Mirror, and they are all interlinked by the technologies they feature. First there are the connected eyes that everyone in this future seems to have. Second, there is a kind of brain chip that allows people to upload a copy of their personality to a computer. I find the brain chip to be too far fetched. I know there is research on using brain implants to reduce seizures, but the human brain is so incredibly complex that to go from stimulating nerves to actually being able to copy a personality is a huge leap in technology. I think that could work for a movie or show set in the far future but seems unrealistic for the world portrayed by black mirror. That being said, the chips are mostly relevant for the second of three stories which is not very interesting anyway.
I originally didn’t find the first and third story very interesting either, but I went back and re-watched parts of the episode for this review and both of them are well worth watching. They both rely heavily on the connected eyes. Now, having your actual eyes connected to the internet is just as far fetched as the brain chip. However, if you think of them as Augmented Reality contact lenses instead, they become much more feasible, at least in the ways that matter for the episode. Surprisingly enough, the most horrifying aspect of them isn’t that someone might hack them and see everything you see. Instead it’s the fact that people may block you just like on social media, so that you no longer see or hear them, you just get a pixilated image and some muffled sound. All in all this makes for a watchable, if very bleak, episode with a somewhat unrealistic depiction of technology.
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RenegadeTourist
February 21, 2023
Media commentary, Movie review
annoying, Black Mirror, review, TV show