Black Mirror has emerged as a smartly critical anthology series about a not-so-distant dystopian
future, and humans' relationship with technology.
Most episodes feel like worst-case scenarios with the ambiance of The Twilight Zone for
the 21st Century.
Will our future interactions with technology be uplifting and empowering, or downright
terrifying?
Scary or not, though, some installments of Black Mirror are just plain better than others,
so here's a ranking of every episode of the show so far, from worst to best.
Do we even need a spoiler warning here?
"The Waldo Moment"
When "The Waldo Moment" first hit screens in 2013, it was met with a pretty resounding
yawn.
Centered on an off-the-wall animated character which uses sarcasm to insert itself into the
political arena, the title anti-hero was seen as far too outrageous to ever be taken seriously
as a public figure.
After the 2016 election cycle in America, however, Charlie Brooker's story reads as
almost clairvoyant, since political theater began to descend into similarly cartoonish
rhetoric and behaviors.
"Mr. Monroe are you addicted?"
"No."
"Sorry, I mean, are you a d---head?"
Despite that unexpected brush with reality, though, the episode is still one of the show's
least enjoyable segments due to its relatively tedious pacing, thin character development,
and uninspired dialogue.
"Crocodile"
If there's any Black Mirror chapter that should give people pause about the future of crime-fighting
technology, it's "Crocodile."
The episode expands on the idea of memories being accessible to machines by having insurance
adjusters rifle through peoples' visual register for details about incidents they've witnessed.
The concept and devices involved are compelling, but the leading character -- an architect
named Mia -- is just a touch too horrible.
What transpires in the episode is a series of escalating wrongs that reaches territory
so terrible you'll wish you had the ability to erase your memory of the entire hour you've
just watched.
"Metalhead"
Not only is "Metalhead" the shortest Black Mirror episode, but it's also the only one
that's entirely black and white, which really ramps up the sense of dread and hopelessness
throughout its 41-minute runtime.
"Metalhead" centers on a bitter chase between a woman named Bella and a robot dog, trained
to slaughter people on sight and brimming with terrifying weaponry.
But despite its grim mood and action sequences, there's not a lot of substance here.
And its connection to the rest of Black Mirror is tenuous, which makes it one of the least
meaningful episodes of the series.
"Arkangel"
In the age of helicopter parenting and GPS trackers for kids, "Arkangel" has a pretty
realistic plot.
A woman signs her kid up for an experimental monitoring procedure after she goes missing
for a brief but scary moment, and the device proves to be helpful in managing her toddler
days.
Things change when her daughter enters her typical teenage rebellion phase, and mommy
starts invading her privacy in ways only the device can allow.
What happens from there is pretty predictable.
For a show that hinges on its surprise factor, the result is a boring, overwrought PSA on
aggressive parenting.
"The National Anthem"
Black Mirror's inaugural episode centers on a royal kidnapping, in which the culprits
demand that the Prime Minister make whoopie with a pig on live television in order for
the nation's beloved princess to be released unharmed.
The now-legendary episode offers some serious cultural commentary on the psychological nature
of viral videos and how the freedom of the internet challenges authority.
Oddly enough, the episode also drew some all-too-real parallels to the supposed PigGate controversy
involving then-Prime Minister David Cameron.
But in the grand landscape of Black Mirror now, it's a pretty mediocre episode compared
to its successors.
"Shut Up And Dance"
Webcam hacking is a legitimate concern for the modern age, so the bare bones basis of
"Shut Up and Dance" is solid.
But the more and more "Shut Up and Dance" unravels, the less compelling it turns out
to be.
The narrative starts out with a kid being blackmailed by people who've recorded him
having private times at his computer.
He's then sent on a series of increasingly dangerous missions, and we're left to wonder
why he'd put himself in so much danger over something so innocent.
It's not until we find out that his act was not so innocent after all that things start
to make sense.
But by then it's a little too late to redeem the episode from being boring — the worst
sin of all.
"Black Museum"
In an episode obviously built for Easter egg hunters, "Black Museum" has a little bit of
everything: a doctor who gets addicted to patient pain zaps; a comatose mom whose soul
gets left to rot in a stuffed animal …
"Monkey needs a hug."
...and a hologram soul who's made to experience his execution for a crime he didn't commit
a thousand times over for the sake of people's' sick pleasure.
The anthology-within-an-anthology style of the episode wasn't new ground.
But there are enough winks to iconic Black Mirror moments and surprise twists to give
the audience a minor thrill or two.
"Men Against Fire"
The most poignant commentary on the morality of war comes by way of "Men Against Fire,"
which centers on a man who belongs to a military of the future.
He's got an implant that turns soldiers into massacre machines, augmenting reality and
keeping them focused on the task at hand: wiping out "roaches," which are said to be
mutated humans who roam the world.
After a few successful slaughter sessions, a glitch in his implant reveals the truth;
these roaches aren't mutants, but ordinary humans.
The device has altered their appearance to make them easier to attack.
It's a devastating truth, and asks a lot of questions real-life soldiers' face on any
given battlefield.
"The Entire History of You"
Perhaps "Crocodile" and "Arkangel" didn't work so well because Black Mirror's depiction
of an Orwellian, tech-enslaved society was done so well the first time around.
Capturing every moment, an implant called a "grain" in "The Entire History of You" allows
people to replay their memories with all the ease of Apple TV.
The vulnerability of the implant is shown through the eyes of a young lawyer whose growing
mistrust of his wife leads him down a paranoid, memory-revisiting tunnel of self-indulgence.
The story mainly explores how the implant has fractured social interactions.
This epitomizes how Black Mirror creates a version of the near-future that isn't all
that unrealistic... and all the more terrifying as a result.
"White Bear"
A woman named Victoria Skillane wakes up in an apartment building with no memory of who
or where she is, or why people around her seem more interested in filming her terror
than helping her escape the weapon-wielding people who chase her.
"White Bear!
There's something not right about White Bear!"
The episode ends with a massive payoff that features one morally provoking twist.
Viewers are left to question everything — from crime and punishment, to cameraphone culture.
"Hated in the Nation"
In this episode, robotic bees have been deployed to replace real bees' dwindling populations.
But, of course, the drone devices are hacked by a rogue group, who turn them against whoever
arrives as enemy number one on social media.
And then, they amp up the violence even further.
Not only is it a commentary on surveillance, but it's also a warning signal about the desensitization
to social media, and the creation of a cyber-mob mentality.
"Playtest"
The all-out horror of this episode begins when a traveler named Cooper is offered what
appears to be a dream job — a week's work for a cutting edge video company.
The catch?
A miniature computer implanted into Cooper's neck, which mixes virtual reality with the
user's direct experience without the need for a VR headset.
The company's technology combines augmented reality with the ability to scan the brain
and uncover the user's deepest fear.
"You just stay in here alone and see how long you last until you're too scared to continue."
What ensues is genuinely unsettling, filled with hallucinations, holograms, and more.
"Playtest" is an interesting take on the exploitation of fear as entertainment, how virtual reality
can theoretically, push this too far, and the ethical implications we need to consider.
Will we ever reach a stage when too real is too much?
"Hang the DJ"
The episode begins with a doomed dinner date, set up by a couple's virtual coach, which
tells them they'll only be together for half a day.
"That's one of the bleakest things I've ever heard."
They're separated and thrown into a series of unsatisfying dates.
But as they occasionally run into one another along the way, it's clear they have some legitimate
chemistry that their little techy tool just can't understand.
They're eventually paired up again and agree to ignore the timer instead of finding out
their expiration date.
But when one of them gets anxious and peeks, it inadvertently speeds up their relationships'
downfall, which leads them to rebel against the system altogether.
The final twist?
Maybe algorithms do understand love after all.
"Nosedive"
In this slightly enhanced version of things, every social interaction a person has is given
a numerical score, and a person's score has direct impact on what types of housing, finance,
and job opportunities they have access to.
The central figure of the story tries reconnecting with a popular childhood friend to increase
her ranking, and soon finds that seeking validation is draining and potentially very damaging.
So, it's a fair warning to us all, really.
"USS Callister"
This episode centers on a man who has invented a virtual world in which he has a secret sector
dedicated to his pop culture obsession, Space Fleet.
In real life, he's a social pariah in his own company, but in his world, he's the captain
and commands complete respect from his crew.
Too bad his fake world is populated with digital versions of his real co-workers, and he's
done some cruel things to them to coax them into submission.
After he kidnaps a fellow coder's DNA for his lair, he meets his match.
"Okay.
Stealing my p---- is a red f---ing line."
That's when the tables turn.
This sprawling adventure story features massive set-pieces.
And even though most of the characters are digital replicas, they're just as human and
real as anyone.
"Fifteen Million Merits"
This tragic tale centers on a society of people who earn their merits by cycling on stationary
bikes to generate energy.
Merits serve as a currency, but apart from earning them apples and the right to skip
lewd commercials, they're not very valuable.
But having 15 million of them does offer a person a shot at freedom by way of a ticket
to a televised talent competition called Hot Shot.
Our hero generously decides to gift them to a girl he barely knows from work in the hopes
that she can put her singing talents to use.
But when she's given a gig as an adult film star, he decides to pedal day and night until
he can go to the show himself.
There's no real happy ending here.
By defeating the system, he becomes just another cog in another system, with just a slightly
better bit of window dressing.
The future is grim, people, and this show's just here to remind us of that.
"Be Right Back"
Losing someone is hard, so when "Be Right Back" gives a grieving, pregnant woman a chance
to enjoy more time with her lost love, it's understandable why she chooses to do so.
At first, he merely returns to her in chat format, with a computer program recreating
his communication style perfectly.
Then, it becomes more intense.
Eventually, our heroine realizes her robo-beau is only a skin-deep replacement for the real
thing.
The synthetic version might have gotten his catch phrases and speaking style down, but
it's only a fragment of the real person.
Is that better than nothing?
"White Christmas"
This episode begins with a pair of isolated men, talking with one another on Christmas
Day.
One explains how he witnessed the poisoning of a client he was virtually date-coaching,
and discusses his day job: creating digitally cloned consciousnesses.
The other admits that he'd spent years stalking his ex-girlfriend and his estranged daughter,
which didn't end well.
The final twist reveals a series of shocking truths, but mostly raises questions about
the future of the criminal justice system.
It's another episode that centers on our reliance on technological evidence, the nature of coerced
confessions, and has a hint of casual cruelty in the mix as well.
It's definitely worth watching.
"San Junipero"
As our top episode pick, "San Junipero" shows love as an all-conquering, blistering light
that fractures the dark dystopia of the Black Mirror universe.
It ultimately illustrates how technology could, after all, work out for the best.
The two young ladies in the lead strike up an unexpected romance in 1987, but then their
story suddenly takes them through other decades.
Soon, we discover they're merely projections of their own consciousness, and their real
forms are actually in the twilight of their lives in a hospital.
What results is an episode that serves as a meditation on life, the transcendence of
love, and the power of a great throwback soundtrack.
"San Junipero" is science fiction at its best.
If there's any episode from this entire series that's bound to stick with you and infect
you with real feelings, this is the one.
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