Charlie Brooker interview The Black Mirror stories are not warnings. Technological progress is inev
Are you? responded Brooker in a patronising tone.
Hes being very f asterisk asterisk asterisk ing contrarian, Jones said, sounding – for lack of a better word – exhausted. Every f asterisk asterisk asterisk ing thing.
Watch: Black Mirror season five trailer The Evening Standard
Were sitting in a Soho hotel making opening pleasantries because the fifth season of Black Mirror is coming to Netflix. Heavily inspired by Sixties science fiction anthology series The Twilight Zone, Black Mirror first aired in 2011 on Channel 4. It has been Brooker and Joness most successful joint venture yet. Each episode tells a different story about the relationship between humans and technology. More often than not, the results are deeply disturbing.
Yet, despite Black Mirrors notoriously bleak outlook, the duo behind these grim tales are buoyant company. There are few moments during our conversation when theyre not interrupting one another with undercutting jokes and comments. For instance, I ask what they initially bonded over.
Im hoping that will happen one day, Brooker adds.
What, then, has kept them working together for well over a decade?
Its our mutual and healthy disrespect, Jones answers.
Were full of hatred, Brooker continues. And its probably because were unemployable in any other way. We are our own punishment.
Oh my God, its like Black Mirror Christmas, she responds, referring to the Jon Hamm starring episode White Christmas in which two antagonistic characters – played by Jon Hamm and Rafe Spall – are trapped in a cabin for five years with only each other to talk to.
They do, eventually, get to discussing how they met. Around 18 years ago, Brooker – at the time a writer for Channel 4s spoof news programme The 10 OClock Show – was playing the first person shooter video game Counter Strike with a group of writers at the headquarters of Endemol now Endemol Shine , the media company that produces the reality game shows Big Brother, Deal or No Deal and Wipeout.
Someone had met you before, he says to Jones, recalling the moment. And you came in and mercilessly took the piss out of us for quite some time. And I thought, Who the f asterisk asterisk asterisk is she? Shes got some gall coming in here and mocking us just because were grown up children in her estimation.
You were in your pants, playing your video games, Jones says.
See what I mean? he says.
Brooker was impressed by Joness spirit and the pair ended up working together. Their first collaboration was the 2008 miniseries Dead Set, a Black Mirror forebearer that imagines what would happen to a group of Big Brother contestants if a zombie outbreak occurred outside the houses walls, which famously saw Davina McCall join the ranks of the flesh eating walking dead. Since then, the pair have worked together continuously, with Jones becoming an executive producer on Brookers ScreenWipe – the current affairs review programmes that solidified Brookers reputation as the UKs top miserablist.
Unfortunately, despite public demand, the show wont be coming back for its yearly review in 2019. Im too busy, Brooker says. Which is a pity because its the end of the decade. But theres so much going on and you cant do half measures. I always like the idea of doing a Final Wipe. When the world really is about to f asterisk asterisk asterisk ing end.
Is that what youll be doing with your final hours? Jones asks.
It would be a distraction, he replies.
She impersonates him: Oh no the f asterisk asterisk asterisk ing world is ending. I know, Ill do a show.
Youll need a f asterisk asterisk asterisk ing distraction, he says, faux offended. If you see the f asterisk asterisk asterisk ing mushroom clouds going up youll be wiping something. Or just wait and itll all get burnt off. Sorry, Im going off track…
Brooker and Joness world conquering collaboration, Black Mirror, would take form a few years later. The series started off humbly enough in 2011, with the first episode dividing viewers. Titled The National Anthem, the episode – the producers call each one a film – saw Rory Kinnears prime minister forced by a terrorist kidnapper to have sex with a pig. This, of course, came a few years before allegations that actual PM David Cameron put a private part of his anatomy in a dead pigs mouth during his university years were widely published Brooker claims to have no prior knowledge of the claim .
Gallery: Netflixs new releases coming in June 2019 The Hollywood Reporter
Season three was released by Netflix in October 2016 and Black Mirror mania took off, with the streaming service beaming the dystopian series directly into homes around the world. A year later and Brooker picked up an Emmy for outstanding writing for the surprisingly optimistic episode San Junipero – about two OAPs who meet in a virtual reality world and fall in love. By the time season four came around Black Mirror was an all out awards behemoth, racking up three Bafta nominations, eight Emmy nominations and a Producers Guild of America Awards win for Brooker and Jones.
For their next project, the duo knew they had to do something special; something pushing the boundaries of what television can do. The result was Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, an interactive film that allows viewers to choose what happens next to the lead character, Stefan, played by Fionn Whitehead. However, unlike the previous seasons of Black Mirror, the reaction was divided. So much so that one of the actors, Will Poulter, ended up leaving social media.
We always knew it was experimental, Brooker says of Bandersnatch. Youre relinquishing a lot of control and you dont know which ending the viewer is going to get to first. Are there endings I would change? Probably. For instance, theres one part which is quite meta, fourth wall breaking, when you tell Stefan hes a character on Netflix. Originally, that was held back. But we thought it was so different, so we opened it up early on. What that meant was that some people went down the meta path first and that colours their experience.
He continues: One criticism which we thought was a compliment was when people went We just wanted to give him a happy ending! Well, thank f asterisk asterisk asterisk you cared about Stefan. That was our biggest worry. I play computer games and I dont give a f asterisk asterisk asterisk about the people in them. I dont give a f asterisk asterisk asterisk about Mario because hes not really a character and he does whatever the f asterisk asterisk asterisk I tell him to.
No one died, which is the main thing, Brooker concludes. Jones adds, with perfect comic timing: Apart from the dad.
Bandersnatch required a lot of time to complete, which meant Black Mirrors fifth season was delayed half a year and the episode count halved from six to three. Despite the shortened runtime, though, the new episodes feel like classic Black Mirror, particularly Smithereens. In it, Fleabag actor Andrew Scott plays a grieving not Uber driver who hates how people are addicted to their phones. He decides to take someone hostage and demands to speak to their boss.
The story came from two things, Brooker says. The first was regarding the trust you put in someone when you get in the back of an Uber. I had an experience where I got in the back of the car and I was on my phone. Suddenly, I was wondering where I was. The guy got out and was rummaging through stuff in the boot. I was wondering What is going on? It turns out he was just getting a bottle of water out and didnt want to interrupt me.
The phone is meant to keep you there, Jones says. Its very interesting how subtly and incrementally the ingredients have changed. Take your email. A little number appears on your homepage showing you how many emails you have not opened. You now need to check those new emails. Its the gamification of that. Nobody tells you these changes are happening. Were in an ironic situation now where the phones designed to absorb you are telling you, Youre using me too much. Its not common sense telling you – its the phone.
Brooker comes in with a comparison: Its like a cigarette saying, I think you should cut down a bit. Or a barman going, I think youve had enough.
Its f asterisk asterisk asterisk ing nuts, Jones adds.
The second episode, titled Striking Vipers, revolves around two middle aged men; one who is married Anthony Mackie and one who is not Yahya Abdul Mateen II . They begin playing a virtual reality fighting game named Striking Vipers. Mackies character uses a male avatar, while Abdul Mateens uses a female. They engage in an unusual relationship.
In a world where pornography is so immersive, when does it stop becoming a healthy distraction and become an affair? asks Jones, positing the moral quandary at the episodes centre.
Brooker continues: The funny thing is, the germ for the idea came from the fighting game Tekken. If youve ever heard two guys playing Tekken or Street Fighter, it sounds like a sadomasochistic sex scene. They go oof, ahhh, argh, yes, YESSS.
Brooker adds that his Tekken character of choice would be the boxing kangaroo Roger. Mine would be Taekwondo fighter Hwoarang.
Jones joins the discussion: Im not familiar with these works of genius.
Brooker: That was very disparaging.
Im not. Im just not familiar with them.
Theyre lightning speed chess games is what they are.
Lightning speed chess?
Gallery: 10 surprising things you didnt know about Black Mirror Insider
The final episode of the season centres on an Alexa type piece of technology that has the personality of a pop star. The twist comes when that pop star played by Miley Cyrus starts breaking down due to the pressure of the pop industry. Brooker jokes that, if any Black Mirror episode was to come true in the near future, it would be this one, Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too. Perhaps, I wonder, the story is therefore a warning about the future?
Our stories are not warnings, Brooker says. Technological progress is completely inevitable. We think more about the human characters. Theyre not societal warnings. And I think were quite optimistic.
A pause. Brooker knows full well that any avid Black Mirror watcher would likely object to the statement. He picks a modern example to explain his reasoning: how information is shared on the internet and the rise of fake news.
Watch: Miley Cyrus gave raw and emotional Black Mirror performance BANG Showbiz
Jones chips in: We shouldnt forget that people are being mobilised. You have the MeToo movement, and the campaign for climate change. All these people suddenly have a voice. Theyre a commercial body who will bring about change from the capitalists who are doing damage to the environment.
Brooker continues: Were in that period of finding out whats in peoples heads. You get extremes being presented, but I think the world feels more polarised than it actually is.
Who knew that the creators of the often grim Black Mirror – that f asterisk asterisk asterisk ing prick Charlie Brooker and the exhausted Annabel Jones – were such optimists?
Black Mirror season five reaches Netflix on 5 June
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