It’s Friday on Halloween Weekend, and between now and Monday morning a lot of costumes will get ruined, alcohol will vanish, and delicious things like pizza rolls consumed in mass quantities. Between the parties and getting plastered there’s plenty of time to binge-watch all thirteen episodes of Black Mirror.
What is Black Mirror?
It’s a UK anthology series much like Twilight Zone or Outer Limits only taken to a whole new level of demented. As an anthology, Black Mirror packs more into one (typically) hour-long episode, than most movies do in two hours.
Since Black Mirror is an anthology series, there’s no need to watch episodes in order. So, we created the episode guide below in case you want to jump around.
Be warned!
Black Mirror is not the kind of show that’s trying to make you happy with predictable plots and super-pretty, likable characters. It’s trying to unnerve you in every way possible.
Episode 1: The National Anthem
If you ask me, watching Black Mirror in order allows you see just how insane the show is in so many different ways. The very first episode goes full on crazy with a story about a British politician who is forced to do something truly heinous for his country and the world. Each twist at the end is more disturbing and heartbreaking than the next.
Episode 2: Fifteen Million Merits
Some people become obsessed with fame and others with love. Both fame and love will sometimes drive people to extremes. Fifteen Million Merits exists in a not-so-distant future where generating energy is currency, skipping ads costs money, and being fat makes you a second class citizen. Sucks for me!
Episode 3: The Entire History Of You
Each Black Mirror episode seemingly takes place within a unique reality. In the final episode of the first series, the near-future story unfolds around a technology known as “re-do.” Everyone has an implant that records their memories, allowing us to watch every second of our lives or share every second of our lives. It’s like Facebook only more annoying. And it goes to dark depths as Black Mirror does so well.
Episode 4: Be Right Back
Series two starts with a couple who moves into a remote, countryside house. The next day husband Ash dies. Hayley Atwell (Marvel’s Agent Carter) carries the episode as Martha, the grieving widow. But technology here can virtually recreate the personality of a deceased person. Martha struggles with letting go of a ghost created by technology.
Episode 5: White Bear
One of the best examples of Black Mirror’s precise storytelling is the second episode series two. White Bear follows Victoria Skillane (Lenora Crichlow) through what at first plays out seemingly predictable. But like many of the best Black Mirror episodes, just when you think you have everything figured out it swerves right and left and back again to make its real point clear.
Episode 6: The Waldo Moment
Depending on your political stance, the final episode of series two is probably more terrifying to watch today than it was when originally aired in 2014. Waldo, a CG animated cartoon from a late-night comedy show (think Triumph the Insult Comic Dog), goes around making fun of politicians. Waldo enters an election, and the world crumbles from there.
Episode 7: White Christmas
Yes, leave it to Black Mirror, a twisted and dark show, to have a Christmas special. White Christmas is 90-minutes of pure Black Mirror magic. Jon Hamm (Mad Men) stars in three, thirty-minute episodes that each highlight what this show does best: believable science fiction, spot-on satire, and gut-punching twists.
Episode 8: Nosedive
Series three is the first with Netflix involved but Black Mirror doesn’t miss a beat. Bryce Dallas Howard (Jurassic World) stars in a story about a future world that we’re not too far away from. In this dark reality, your “Like” score sets your societal status. Howard will do anything to raise her score to be in with the in-crowd.
Episode 9: Playtest
Playtest is one of my top three favorite episodes. But at the same time, F this episode. It’s horrifying and heartbreaking and packaged within awesome virtual reality. For Cooper (Wyatt Russel), the need to earn enough money to head back home to his mom leads him to be a guinea pig in an experimental video game technology. As Black Mirror does best, it drags Cooper and the viewer through psychotic imagery and mind-bending shenanigans.
Episode 10: Shut Up And Dance
You’ve seen this kind of story before. A secret group forces someone into a deadly game. As Black Mirror will do, they build the familiar while setting you up for the grand surprise. And few rarely survive the surprise in an episode of this show. The acting by both Alex Lawther and Jerome Flynn (Bronn from Game of Thrones) is as good as it gets.
Episode 11: San Junipero
What if science creates a heaven? One of the most thought-provoking episodes of Black Mirror takes us into the love between two women. The technology here downloads the memories of the deceased to live eternally young in a virtual world. The story is patient, provocative, terrifying, and meaningful. The direction does every minute just right. The use of music in every Black Mirror episode is great, but here it goes to a whole new nostalgic level.
Episode 12: Men Against Fire
Another familiar science fiction story of soldiers brainwashed by alternate realities. This episode does everything the 5th Wave wanted to do but didn’t. Men Against Fire has rare weak moments for a Black Mirror episode but no less ends with a poignant punch about warfare and the warriors made to fight.
Episode 13: Hated In The Nation
The longest single episode of Black Mirror focuses on the consequences (or lack thereof) related to social media. A detective testifies to a case which begins a year earlier. Two new partners adjust to each other while following the clues left behind like robot bees. The entire episode plays out almost like a pilot for its own TV show without losing the power-punch of a twist that makes Black Mirror the brilliant show it is.
All episodes of Black Mirror, including the Christmas Episode, are available on Netflix. Another six-episode series arrives in 2017.
